Sorry for ignorance but what is NEO and how does it compete with HD Link?

ALSO: DGrob what are these 30p settings you like? I have been shooting 30p with cineframe this week and have so far seen no advantage over shooting 60i and converting in post. Please tell me your work flow. Thanks.

Is this the thread with the Cineframe 30 settings you are talking about?:

http://www.sonycreativesoftware.com/forums/ShowMessage.asp?ForumID=4&MessageID=479022

I think this IS the post but it has many unanswered questions (most asked by me). I will add a reply to get it active again then we all here can follow along.

>"Sorry for ignorance but what is NEO and how does it compete with HD Link?"

NEO is the next version of ConnectHD (i.e. ConnectHD v. 4.0). And I suppose that it comes also with new version of HDLink.

Check www.cineform.com.

Vegas 7 includes CineForm's codec - do I need NEO?

Vegas 6 and 7 both ship with basic CineForm Intermediate HDV codec components for an improved HD editing workflow. But NEO includes a number of additional visual quality and workflow enhancements for users of Vegas 6 and Vegas 7. NEO includes HDLink, our I/O and format conversion utility that operates externally to Vegas, plus a DirectShow implementation of our CineForm Intermediate HDV codec. HDLink supports most AVI files, many MOV files, plus MXF P2 files and HDV. With these extra components, NEO offers:

* Capture and conversion directly into CineForm Intermediate from HDV camcorders external to Sony Vegas.
* Supports Panasonic HVX200 DVCPRO HD (P2 MXF)
* Noticeably faster conversions into CineForm Intermediate with HDLink than rendering from the Vegas timeline.
* Faster Vegas timeline editing performance for CineForm Intermediate files converted using HDLink1
* Multiple quality modes selectable during render operations from the Vegas timeline
* Improved threading on 4+ logical/physical CPU cores for applications that use DirectShow decoders (Windows Media Player)
* Conversion of Sony CineFrame-25 material to 24p for film (including audio remodulation)
* Inverse telecine processing on Sony's 24p (in 60i) material such as from the new HVR-V1U
* Inverse telecine processing on CineFrame-24 material to yield a 24p film workflow
* Support for the 24p mode of JVC's HD100U for a true 720 p24 workflow
* Support for Canon's 24F / 30F modes for a true 1080 24p / 30p workflow
* Spatial / temporal resampling
* "Image flip" during capture to support Redrock Micro's innovative "M2" lens adapter for increased depth of field
* Export .m2t files back to HDV camcorders external to Vegas 6 /7

Have you seen the PC specs for NEO? If your computer is up to the NEO spec (dual core with min 2G of Dual 1066MHz min memory speed) you should be able to edit raw HDV! Seems to me that only if you have multiple HDV time-lines will you see any advantage in speed. The Vegas codex has the same image quality and raw uncompressed HDV is, of course even better. Comments?

My question is, what will be needed for my fancy, wishful, XDCAM EX?

Q, your previous post with the list as on the Cineform site I understand . Those are the same things you get with the current Connect HD that many of us have.

A bump, figured David might miss this being at NAB and all.

Yes, I missed this until now. NEO HDV is what would have been Connect HD v4.0. The price is $249, as NEO HDV will also support AJA Xena, Blackmagic Decklink and Blackmagic intensity cards. For $249 you get a high quality DDR. NEO HDV will be faster as it far more fully supports SSE2 instruction sets (now required.) The line up now includes NEO HD and NEO 2K for those want higher resolutions and 4:4:4 (NEO 2K.) Also NEO HDV/HD/2K all include the next generation v3 codec (backwards compatible of course.)

David Newman
CTO, CineForm

I noticed that when you go to the trial page it says connect HD V3 is the Neo trial not avail yet?

Also could you clarify for me my other question in the forst post.
>In addition I have always wondered when we have CFDI's created in Connnect HD on the time line ,and then render to a new track are they still rendered using direct show or do they go to VFW when rendering out from Vegas.
<

Thanks

The NEO line up is out May 1.

Vegas uses VFW for all rendering, even if the AVI was created in HDLink via DirectShow. This is a only speed not a quality issue.

David Newman
CTO, CineForm

David:
I've been a Cineform user since the beginning and with Pentium machines have found it a great help. But I have a concern about NEO, which is this. The recommended computer specs you have given for running NEO are so powerful that it looks to me that such a system could edit native HDV just as easily, and without any conversion, hence making NEO redundant.

Michael

Michael,

We have only moved from MMX to SSE2, so we are still talking old sub-2GHz Pentium 4 system here (true P3 and very old Althons will not support NEO.) NEO requires no additional CPU power for HDV / P2 functions, rather the code change was to normalize all our products for improved stability. We had problem on with Vegas and the Connect HD, part due to the strain of adding new features and support for old underpowered systems (that where always below our recommended systems.) Clearing out alternative code paths helped greatly. Also you may have noticed NEO is not just for HDV on slow systems any more, there many reason to avoid native MPEG editing, HDMI/HDSDI live capture, multigeneration quality, XDCAM, AVCHD, compositing and keying performance and tools, format conversion etc. If you are being left behind, maybe a new Intel Core 2 Duo PC isn't a bad investiment.

David Newman
CTO, CineForm

P.S. The minimum system specs are for those doing live captures form HDMI or HDSDI sources.

Thanks for the explanation Dan. Seems NEO is still what we want. Now what happened with the results of that test you had us do checking picture quality?