Matrox MXO released
by TonyManolikakis
on
Jul 17, 2006 at 6:14:37 pm
Guys
Thought you might like to know that the MXO has been released. Check it out at www.matrox.com/video if you haven't already. It is a great little product if you do not need analog or SDI ingest.
Re: Matrox MXO released by Chris Poisson on Jul 17, 2006 at 8:14:04 pm
With all due respect Tony, after my experience with this company with the RTmac I would't trust them as far as I could throw them. Bah humbug. Damn thing's a doorstop now.
Re: Matrox MXO released by walter biscardi on Jul 17, 2006 at 8:18:09 pm
[TonyManolikakis]"It is a great little product if you do not need analog or SDI ingest."
Both AJA and BlackMagic make similar products and given a choice, I would definitely take either of those over anything from Matrox. No offense, but Matrox is not my first choice for professional video output.
Walter Biscardi, Jr.
http://www.biscardicreative.com
"I reject your reality and substitute my own!" - Adam Savage, Mythbusters
Re: Matrox MXO released by Shane Ross on Jul 17, 2006 at 8:27:48 pm
The point is that people want want a capture card for their laptops...and the DVI out to all those connections is what they are looking for.
However...I hate to sound elitist and snobby but...a true professional would only use a Mac Tower and proper capture card for high level work. And if you have a tower, you'd be better served using an AJA or Blackmagic card.
Re: Matrox MXO released by TonyManolikakis on Jul 17, 2006 at 11:36:04 pm
I am using a Mac tower. Dual G5. The point I was making is that if you are coming in from P2, HDV, XDCAM, Firewire etc not to mention FC or other network setups where you have ingest and editing done on different workstations;You do need output if for no other reason than to preview on a broadcast monitor. That is where the MXO comes in. One thing that I found very useful lately, and I have heard others ask about, is aspect ratio conversion. I was editing a show that was shot SD but anamorphic 16x9. With the MXO I could choose to output, letterbox, center cut or anamorphic with a simple preference. Anyway, just thought you guys would like to know...
Re: Matrox MXO released by walter biscardi on Jul 17, 2006 at 11:41:58 pm
[TonyManolikakis]"You do need output if for no other reason than to preview on a broadcast monitor. That is where the MXO comes in."
Again, BlackMagic and AJA have been making similar boxes for at least the past year so the ability to do this has been around a while. Not really sure what the Matrox offers that the others don't already have.
Walter Biscardi, Jr.
http://www.biscardicreative.com
"I reject your reality and substitute my own!" - Adam Savage, Mythbusters
Re: Matrox MXO released by Jerry Hofmann on Jul 18, 2006 at 12:53:15 am
It's the only way to look at external HD video from a PowerBook/MBP for starters.
Matrox sent me a review copy... it's a nice a box actually. Can down convert to SD, use a 23" CD for an external monitor, send an HD SDI signal out all at the same time...
Sure it doesn't compare with a Kona 3, but doesn't cost as much either.
In the article I've written for the next COW mag, I talk about my experience with it. I was really quite impressed actually.
Since it's pretty much "Apple proof" I think it has it's place.
Re: Matrox MXO released by Andy Mees on Jul 18, 2006 at 4:07:51 am
theres an additional upside to this product, albeit a niche one...
in the world of broadcast news, where speed is of the essence, this product allows field editors, working on laptops, in XDCAM HD, HDV and/or other GOP formats, to output a live feed of their edit using HD/SD SDI, directly from the FCP timeline without having to conform the long gop first
Re: Matrox MXO released by Mitch Ives on Jul 18, 2006 at 3:11:50 pm
[Andy Mees]"in the world of broadcast news, where speed is of the essence, this product allows field editors, working on laptops, in XDCAM HD, HDV and/or other GOP formats, to output a live feed of their edit using HD/SD SDI, directly from the FCP timeline without having to conform the long gop first"
I would like to see that. I'm not sure how it can eliminate the hours of conforming during realtime playback... and more to the point, what compromises werre made in order to achieve it? We don' use HDV, but I'd really be interested in hearing from someone who has used it for that, since it might be helpful to others.
On a side note, it is interesting to hear everyone's reluctance with Matrox. I had predicted that they would have this problem. They are first and foremost a PC company and that will not change. AJA and BlackMagic are proven performers and haven't left anyone hanging... there's a great lesson there for all the manufacturers.
Re: Matrox MXO released by TonyManolikakis on Jul 18, 2006 at 8:40:59 pm
"Hours of conforming during realtime playback"
I am not sure I understand what that means? Anyway, Greg Mulvey was also on the beta and he used it extensively with HDV, maybe he could post some more details. I used it with P2 and various flavors of SD. It worked very well in every case. There is no compromise required to do what it does.
Re: Matrox MXO released by Jerry Hofmann on Jul 20, 2006 at 5:36:08 am
Tony,
Each sequence has to be conformed back to an MPEG GOP - it's called "conforming" before you lay it back to tape, or create a QT movie for any purpose... and it can take a very long time. I've written an article coming in the next issue of the COW magazine about editing HDV in Appleland, and was amazed by how much time you could spend "conforming"... I used a 5 minute sequence that was identical in HDV, the Intermediate Codec (now there's an odd duck deal), and in DVCPROHD. The article is about how to handle HDV, and my conclusion is worth reading I think.
The HDV sequence took 43 minutes to conform so I could lay it back to tape... same time would have been used to prepare a QT movie for compression... This same sequence in DVCPROHD (converted from the HDV) took 5 minutes to render, and I couldn't see a difference in quality at all. The conversion is fast too... can be done as you capture with the right gear.
If you needed to deliver an SD DVD of a feature length program... we are talking DAYS to get it there from the time your last edit is made on a dual 2 gig machine.
HDV isn't easy in post in FCP at all. Just rendering effects can be painfully slow.
But I digress... the Matrox MXO has it's place, and it's a winning product as far as I can see. There's nothing quite like it out there. Sure, you don't need it if you're running a Kona, but hey, it's a lot less expensive than any other solution from AJA or Decklink and it's portable. NO card slot needed. Not just for HDV either, works with any flavor of HD.
In Matrox's defense (which I'm the first to agree they really dropped the ball with the RTMac from any perspective) Apple didn't make things easy for them. When FCP 3 was introduced, it did as much RT as the RTMac did, which made the product really only an A/D/D/A DV converter. There were a lot less expensive solutions for that. They sort of got bit by Apple's RT Extreme technology. So did Cinewave... It's RT additions became more and more ho hum as the computers and software advances took place. Seeing the product manager screaming at the top of his lungs at the international User's group at NAB a couple of years ago that you just had to have RT was embarrasing... At that point, CineWave really wasn't giving much more than a fast G5 would do... it was pretty sad.
Where Matrox made a big mistake was not only NOT delivering on the drivers for current users past Jaguar (and indicating they were going to), but really didn't make public the fact they had no intention of supporting the product after FCP 3. They shouda said that...
Quite frankly though, all of that is pretty old news, and if they do support the MXO (and I'll bet they do), it's going to be a winner...
Re: Matrox MXO released by Greg Mulvey on Jul 20, 2006 at 5:48:34 am
Hi Jerry,
I have been using the MXO for a few months with HDV footage shot with a Cannon XL H1. I edit in Final Cut pro in HDV 1080i60 and using the MXO I downconvert to SD in REAL TIME in anamorphic widescreen. My signal goes out of the MXO box into another system which captures the footage directly to MPEG2 and is ready to go to DVD. All I have to do is hit play on my timeline in Final Cut. This thing has saved me DAYS of conforming.
Re: Matrox MXO released by Drew13 on Jul 21, 2006 at 6:37:20 pm
Quick question, how did you set this up? (Cycling it back out to encoder, or otherwise. Took a look at the specs, and think I missed a few things, for instance they mention an S-Video out, but did not see it, figured since you have one, you may be able to fill in the blanks)
Sounds perfect, looking to get this (MXO) for my MacBook Pro to keep things moving when Tower tied up or when traveling about
Re: Matrox MXO released by bob flood on Jul 19, 2006 at 2:00:08 am
Mitch
"They are first and foremost a PC company and that will not change"
so its bad that htey have a working multiformat, multistandard editor that actually DOES multiple streams of realtime? and its bad that they have no interest in selling computers, just SOTA video cards?
I used a pc edit system, with matrox cards, for a long time and had no qualms with any of it. rock solid 24 7
so lets not make it sound like a "pc" company is a bad thing, ok?
especially when fcp still cant mix 8 bit and 10 bit ntsc on the same timeline (better stop here, or it'l just get ugly)
btw sorry if you had a bad experience w matrox in the past. I think you would find them a different company to-day
Re: Matrox MXO released by walter biscardi on Jul 19, 2006 at 2:24:40 am
[bob flood]"btw sorry if you had a bad experience w matrox in the past. I think you would find them a different company to-day"
A LOT of people had bad experiences with Matrox in the past. They have a long history with FCP and not a whole lot of it was good. They abandoned FCP altogether so you can understand why there is so much negative feedback towards the company with this latest product.
Again, AJA and Blackmagic both have very similar products so given their support of FCP through the years and proven track record of both companies with FCP, you can understand why people would want to stay with these two.
Walter Biscardi, Jr.
http://www.biscardicreative.com
"I reject your reality and substitute my own!" - Adam Savage, Mythbusters
Re: Matrox MXO released by JeremyG on Jul 18, 2006 at 12:04:12 am
I'm playing devil's advocate. With the speed of these intel laptops today (which in some cases are faster than my sturdy dual 2.0), I'm not sure if having a tower qualifies you as a true professional. I don't have experience with Matrox and I've heard the horror stories, but the proof is in the pudding which we will see when people pick it up and use it. I have a guy that work with a lot and he's always asking how to monitor his DVCPRO HD footage shot on P2 through his laptop on set. Without buying a $20,000 HD deck, this might be his ticket. He's a professional and been in the business for 20 years. Because he has a laptop on set he's disqualified? This device is intended for output and monitoring only, it captures nothing. Would I use it for final output? Probably not. Shane, I believe I have heard you say that you use cinema desktop all the time and this box expands on that concept and allows you to connect to a proper monitor. When firewire first became a video capture/output spigot, people swore up and down against it calling it non-professional. Now, firewire transfers certain formats of HD, professional HD at that. Pro's use it all the time. With the efficient codecs and relatively low cost of relatively fast storage, this could be an option. Would I prefer some sort of AJA IO HD? Sure. But it's not here and this MXO thing is. I have taken my AJA io and my powerbook on the road many of times. Saves me the hassle of checking my whole edit suite and I travel much lighter saving money and back pain. I sure don't feel like less of a 'pro' because I am connected to a computer that takes a little longer to render. So what? I am using the same software and same techniques that I use on my big box in the suite connected to the same monitors, etc, etc. As of now, I can only work in SD with that setup, but I can do UC 8 bit SD all day long with a friggin laptop! Now, if I could only hook up my fibre array to my laptop I'd really be into something. If this product works, I could edit HD on my laptop and hook it up to a proper monitor and output via firewire when the job is done. Can I do uncompressed HD? No, i can't. Is the MXO for every situation? No. But for some situations it could be the way to get some work done on a small, light and portable set up. If it doesn't work, then this whole post is moot.
Re: Matrox MXO released by Chris Poisson on Jul 20, 2006 at 6:35:04 pm
Hey gang,
There's some very enlightening (Jerry, Greg, Mitch etc.) comments here, and taking a closer look at this is making me curious about a couple of things. First, I notice it has DVI in and out, so does that mean you don't lse one of your monitors if you have two?
Second, would this thing preview Compressor and/or DVDSP to an NTSC monitor? If so, that makes it worth the price of admission to me, I'd be sold.
Re: Matrox MXO released by Greg Mulvey on Jul 20, 2006 at 7:06:55 pm
Hi Chris,
You will be glad to hear the answer is YES to both of your questions.
You won't loose your 2nd monitor AND the MXO will output from Final Cut Pro and other QuickTime-based applications such as DVD Studio Pro, Soundtrack, Combustion, and even Motion!
Re: Matrox MXO released by Chris Poisson on Jul 20, 2006 at 7:19:18 pm
Well well,
This IS looking better all the time, thanks Greg!
Now here's a good one, I bought two RTmacs way back with FCP v. 1.2, and I paid a thousand bucks for each, and I think it was about the time of v. 3 that they CUT THE PRICE IN HALF! Boy was I pissed, but at about the same price today for the MXO, think they will lower the price of this one too?
Re: Matrox MXO released by Andy Mees on Jul 22, 2006 at 3:03:25 am
hey Chris,
do you think this is worth the price of admission now, or can you wait till v3?
just like when you buy your Mac or PC, or if you buy a harddisc, you've got to expect the price to lower over time and/or the specs to improve ... if it's very popular, we could expect competing products too.
cheers
Andy
