This file alerts you to software changes and late-breaking information that was too late to include in the manual. Please read this file before you install or begin using MoviePak. We also recommend that you print this document for easy reference and keep it with your documentation.
See your manual for full instructions on installation. In most cases the following procedure is appropriate. You may need to disable virus protection software before proceeding.
1. Click on the ‘Installer’ icon on the ‘RasterOps Video Install 1’ disk.
2. Click ‘Switch Disk’ until you have selected your startup disk.
3. Click ‘Install.’
4. Restart the Macintosh.
NOTE: The installer does not install the RasterOps Video Capture Plug-In for Photoshop. Please consult the READ ME file in the Adobe PhotoShop Plug-In folder for installation instructions.
CAUTION: When installing the MoviePak card set into the machine, check to be sure that no portion of the cards touch any conductive components in the computer. The bottom slot of the Quadra 900 and 950 has a metal tab on the motherboard which may touch the MoviePak card.
Some 24STV and MediaTime display adapters may have only three of the four mounting holes described in the manual. For these boards, the fourth stand-off is unnecessary. Remove the stand-off that does not have a corresponding mounting hole. See page 8-6 of the manual for more information.
If you experience problems with your MoviePak board, check the following:
1. System 7.0 or later is installed.
2. The MoviePak daughtercard has been firmly attached to the display adapter.
3. The RasterOps Drivers, RasterOps VDIG, and RasterOps MoviePak™ extension files are installed in the Extensions folder. IMPORTANT: Make sure ALL previous versions of these files are removed (using the Installer will automatically remove old versions).
4. QuickTime 1.5 is installed in the Extensions folder.
5. The display adapter is set for the proper color depth. If the display adapter is a RasterOps 24STV or RasterOps MediaTime, the display adapter should be set for ‘Millions’ of colors. If the display adapter is a RasterOps 24XLTV or RasterOps 24MxTV, the display adapter can be set for either ‘Thousands’ or ‘Millions’ of colors. This is set inside the ‘Monitors’ Control Panel.
To record and play movies at full speed, follow these general guidelines. You can tell the rate at which a movie was recorded by opening it in MediaGrabber. Open the movie and click the ‘Clock/Counter’ button until the ‘Frames/Second’ display appears. Your system configuration and storage devices will determine your maximum frame rate.
1. Be sure that the speed setting in the compression dialog is either set to 30 fps (NTSC), 25 fps (PAL/SECAM) or to ‘Best’.
2. You will achieve better performance by using the Normal quality level in the compression dialog. Selecting higher quality levels will improve the image but may reduce your frame rate.
3. Try using the ‘MoviePak Video’ compression format instead of ‘MoviePak JPEG’. MoviePak Video allows recording at higher rates.
4. Recording to RAM or a RAM disk is a good alternative when peak performance is crucial. You may need to experiment to find the best balance of system RAM and RAM disk size.
5. A high performance disk drive is critical for achieving maximum frame rates. Keep your hard disks optimized (defragmented) using a third-party disk utility.
6. Faster machines enable higher frame rates. We recommend Quadras for best results. Other Macintosh II models are fully compatible, but may not perform as well.
7. Close all control panels and quit applications that are running in the background.
8. Run with a minimum number of System extensions installed. Even screen-savers can routinely ‘steal’ processing time. Remove all extensions that you are not using. For instance, if you have a CD-ROM drive that is not in use, remove the extension and disconnect the CD-ROM drive. We have found that some SCSI drivers (the Apple CD-ROM extension, for example) can affect MoviePak performance.
9. If you are recording a video-only movie, disable sound before recording. Even if no audio source is connected, recording with sound turned on takes some additional processing time.
10. Network activity may cause intermittent pauses during recording or playing of movies. You may want to disable AppleTalk during these times.
11. Use a moderately sized disk cache (192K works well). This is set inside the ‘Memory’ control panel.
12. For full speed playback in MediaGrabber, select the ‘Export to Video’ feature under the Movie menu. In Adobe Premiere, select the ‘Print to Video...’ feature under the File/Export menu.
13. Although MoviePak is compatible with Virtual Memory, we recommend that you turn Virtual Memory off. This is set inside the ‘Memory’ control panel.
14. Setting ‘Loop’ mode while playing back a movie in some applications (such as MoviePlayer, JimTV, SimplePlayer, and MovieRecorder) can actually reduce the frame rate. Turn looping off. This is not a problem in MediaGrabber or Adobe Premiere.
1. Still images are restricted to 1024x8192 pixels. If you try to compress or decompress larger images, the Apple Photo-JPEG codec will be used instead.
2. Disk performance affects MoviePak recording and playback significantly. If you have a slow drive, consider upgrading to one with average seek times of less than 20 milliseconds. Some older drives may cause problems.
3. When a MoviePak movie is played on screen the image must be aligned on even scanlines. If not, you will see one additional black line at the top and/or bottom.
4. MoviePak always records the odd field of incoming video.
5. MoviePak JPEG has a known problem recording at high quality levels. Use MoviePak Video format for recording at higher quality levels.
QuickTime problems may be fixed in future releases. Contact Apple for more information.
1. There is a known bug that affects movie playback. If a movie stops while playing, but the frame indicator continues to update, then either restart the playback, or jiggle the indicator.
2. The cursor can leave a white box over single frames that are decompressed on screen.
It may be necessary to convert movies to other compression formats for playing on systems without MoviePak hardware. You will most likely want to do this when creating CD-ROMs as well.
You can use Apple’s Movie Converter or RasterOps MediaGrabber to convert movies. In MediaGrabber, open a movie and select ‘Save-As’ from the File menu. The standard file dialog will include a check box allowing you to specify other compression formats. When the file is saved to disk, it will be converted to the desired format. This process can take some time since each frame of the movie is individually decompressed and recompressed. Get some coffee and read your instruction manual!
Adobe Premiere and other QuickTime applications also let you convert movies.
When using Adobe Premiere, increase the size of the clip windows so that the IN and OUT points can be seen, otherwise the video may overwrite these indicators.
PixelFlipper version 1.3.3 appears to have a problem with QuickTime sound channels. It may cause crashing when trying to record movies with sound.
While our old icons were socially acceptable, our new and improved icons are incredibly cool! To reveal them in the Finder, rebuild your desktop after installation. (This isn’t required if you are installing RasterOps software for the first time since you are cool by default.)
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Telephone
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FAX
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