Yikes, I Know it Happens but Still..........

I bought two new bus-powered hard drives to transfer P2 files in the field for a new camera that I bought for documentary and corporate work. Today I did my first green screen and work flow test. One of the drives died almost immediately after transferring the data!   It couldn't be any clearer, always immediately back your data onto two hard drives and verify that it's good before reformatting those cards. The drives were On The Go (OTG) drives from Other World Computing.  I just spoke with customer service and they are emailing me a return shipping label and will replace the drive upon receiving the fried one. It was a one-minute conversation.

I will keep you posted as to whether their customer service follows through on honoring their warranty quickly. I am hopeful, I have had good luck with OWC and am a long-term customer.  OK, as I am typing this the shipping label has already arrived.  Good sign.

Finally, A Pansonic Single Card P2 Reader Is Coming

If you use the Duel Adapter for P2 data transfers with a Mac laptop, do not upgrade to Snow Leopard. There is no driver to support the card, for that matter, my recollection is that Duel seems to have stopped developing Mac drivers for their card some time ago. There have been lots of complaints about reliability and compatibility with Duel Adapters, but they've been the only game in town if you want to import a single P2 card with your laptop (and not tie up the camera). I personally have not had any issues but there are a lot of complaints out there.

The good news is that Panasonic announced that they will be releasing a single card P2 card reader in Spring 2010. They don't say what the interface will be. Let's hope that somebody makes a Snow Leopard driver for the Duel card before then.