From: Milton Aupperle <milton@outcastsoft.com>
Date: October 1, 2006 2:38:24 PM MDT
To: Astro_IIDC@yahoogroups.com
Subject: Re: [Astro_IIDC] Using and old G4 Powerbook
Hi Ray;
On 1-Oct-06, at 2:20 PM, Ray Byrne wrote:
-------SNIPPED for Brevity --------
b) Also how fast is the CPU (1 gighz+??)?
500MHz :o[
It's hard to say if a 500 mhz CPU will have enough system bandwidth or not to sustain 30 fps.
If you shooting 640x480 in 8 bit and at up to 30 frames per second, with an 800 mhz + CPU, you can likely record directly to a daisy chained FireWire Hard drive rather than the internal drive. Most FireWire hard drives have 2 FW ports, so you should be able to attach a FireWire camera to a FW port on an external FW hard drive and the other back to your Mac. Failing that you could use a FireWire Hub and cable it up that way.
Excuse my ignorance I'm a "Mac User" :o] Does this mean I can e.g. hook the camera up to an external drive's secondary FW port and image using the Powerbook, saving direct to the external drive (not using the Powerbooks drive at all for writing the data to?).
Yes - however I'm not sure how well it's going to work with 500 mhz CPU at 30 fps. And USB 2 likely will be even worse as it depend more on the CPU for management than FireWire does.
I use a Lacie 160GB FW external for back-up at work that comes home with me every night could I use that?
Yes - just make sure you select the the default folder on the external drive to save file movies to in Astro IIDC.
The main issue you likely will encounter is that if you launch Astro IIDC without the external attached, Astro IIDC will not be able to find your selected folder to save files and movies too. The next time you use it for recording or frame grabbing, it will prompt you for a new default Folder Location.
HTH..
Milton J. Aupperle
President
ASC - Aupperle Services and Contracting
Mac Software (Drivers, Components and Application) Specialist
#1005 - 815 14th Avenue. S.W.
Calgary Alberta Canada T2R0N5
1-(403)-229-9456
www.outcastsoft.com