[JeffO]

Hi,

I went to use iMovie for the first time in a couple of years and I ran in to a problem. I have a Sony TRV310 Digital 8 camcorder that's a few years old but still works fine. When I first got the camcorder I hooked it to my iMac DVse (running OS9 and iMovie 2) and everything worked great. I could import digital 8 and also import older 8mm analog footage without any problem.

Now I have a iMac 17" FP with OSX and iMovie 3. I plugged in my camcorder and it works fine with the digital 8 format but no longer recognizes the 8MM analog stuff. Any idea why this is happening?

Does iLife '04 solve the problem?

Thanks for any help.

Jeff

[Old Toad]

Originally posted by JeffO:
Hi,

I went to use iMovie for the first time in a couple of years and I ran in to a problem. I have a Sony TRV310 Digital 8 camcorder that's a few years old but still works fine. When I first got the camcorder I hooked it to my iMac DVse (running OS9 and iMovie 2) and everything worked great. I could import digital 8 and also import older 8mm analog footage without any problem.

Now I have a iMac 17" FP with OSX and iMovie 3. I plugged in my camcorder and it works fine with the digital 8 format but no longer recognizes the 8MM analog stuff. Any idea why this is happening?

Does iLife '04 solve the problem?

Your problem is that with analog you will need an analog to digital converter. Your earlier iMac probably had an analog input whereas the newer Macs do not. You have two routes to take here. One is to get an analog to digital converter like the Canopus ADVC-100. You then can import from any analog signal, your camera or VCR, into iMovie. The other is to get a digital camera that has passthrough capability, i.e. internal A/D converter.

Hope this has been of some help. Good luck.

[JeffO]

Thanks for the reply. The camcorder has a firewire connection and I was under the impression that the camcorder was actually converting the analog to digital on the fly, but maybe I got that wrong. What you're saying is that the older iMac actually has a piece of hardware in it that does the conversion?

I just bought a "new" used Quicksilver 733 G4 and haven't hooked it up yet--do you think that this might work? I'l try it as soon as I have a chance.

Thanks, Jeff

[Old Toad]

Originally posted by JeffO:
What you're saying is that the older iMac actually has a piece of hardware in it that does the conversion?

Now you've got me wondering. I know that my old 7600 Mac had analog video in/out built-in. Just don't know about your old setup. Does the Sony manual say anything about pass through?

[Person Man]

Originally posted by JeffO:
Thanks for the reply. The camcorder has a firewire connection and I was under the impression that the camcorder was actually converting the analog to digital on the fly, but maybe I got that wrong. What you're saying is that the older iMac actually has a piece of hardware in it that does the conversion?

I just bought a "new" used Quicksilver 733 G4 and haven't hooked it up yet--do you think that this might work? I'l try it as soon as I have a chance.

Thanks, Jeff

No, there was no analog to digital converter in the old iMac.

[sledsbehave]

Originally posted by JeffO:
Hi,

I went to use iMovie for the first time in a couple of years and I ran in to a problem. I have a Sony TRV310 Digital 8 camcorder that's a few years old but still works fine. When I first got the camcorder I hooked it to my iMac DVse (running OS9 and iMovie 2) and everything worked great. I could import digital 8 and also import older 8mm analog footage without any problem.

Now I have a iMac 17" FP with OSX and iMovie 3. I plugged in my camcorder and it works fine with the digital 8 format but no longer recognizes the 8MM analog stuff. Any idea why this is happening?

Does iLife '04 solve the problem?

Thanks for any help.

Jeff

there is no reason that i can think that this shouldn't work. especially since you got it to work on an older machine with older software.

the camera should be doing the work for you...unless there is some type of setting you have to set on the camera itself to play older tapes?

i know on my canopus advc-100, it has a "analog" or "digital" transfer button. of course i don't really need the digital transfer, but if i don't switch it to analog, imovie won't recognize it.

[JeffO]

Been gone for a few days. Thanks for all the input. Can't find any setting on my camcorder. I know it just worked automatically with my old iMac. There must be a solution here somewhere. I have some older analog footage that I was hoping to convert and I figured that since I'd done it before it wouldn't be a problem.

Thanks,

Jeff

[JeffO]

Update

I just plugged my camcorder into a G4 Quicksilver 733 running OS 10.2 (iMovie 2 I think) and everything works fine. I have iLife '04 and I want to install it, but I'm afraid that I won't be able to access my old analog tapes. I guess I can archive them now and then install, but that's a bit of work. Anyone know if iLife '04 will solve my problem?

Thanks,

Jeff