Twickenham Studios, Sunday 21st September saw an audience of over 50 for a presentation by Glen Sanders of Zaxcom, of his company's portable 4-channel digital audio hard disk recorder. Because this was considered an important event, an invitation was extended to the IBS and BKSTS membership to attend, and it was good to see some IBS members who contributed important points to the discussions.
The meeting kicked off with Roger Clemo of UK representatives Harris introducing the team who will be supporting the Deva. He also added a few words about their company - that it is part of the Studio Products Division of the Harris Corporation whose group turnover last year was $3.8 billion. They are based in Cambridge.
Glen Sanders of Zaxcom then took over and made a thorough and illuminating demonstration of the Deva's features, capabilities - now, and in the near and far futures.
He kicked off by plugging his microphone into the Deva's mic amp and announcing that he was going to do the entire presentation through this unit so that if it made any unpleasant noise over the next two hours, we'd all hear it. He turned the mic gain up till feedback so that we could all 'hear' the low noise.
Zaxcom was formed in 1986 and has specialised in digital audio and video products. Products such as the DMX1000 mixer are in use worldwide including the UK. The company is just 14 people and it was suggested that because of this efficiency they were able to keep a very competitive price structure on their products.
Many of the audience were familiar with the concept of the machine from article in the newsletter, so it was the additional points made that were most interesting. Firstly the removable hard disk is airtight, shock and dust resistant. He estimated a current cost of the disk to be around $500 although this would probably come down to $400. Their experience had shown that a big movie would require around 10 disks but following user feedback had decided to offer alternative possibilities. In a static situation it will be possible to record onto the internal HD and an external Jaz drive at the same time. In mobile situations, the recording world be made on the HD and copied to the Jaz. This should increase the convenience of the system - writing to the Jaz in their own MARF format (specifically tailored Mobile Audio Recording Format), WAV format and the new Sony dubbing format, specifically for use with the new 20-bit Sony digital dubber.
Many were impressed by the demo of the Deva's 10 second prerecord - it's always storing audio in a buffer when turned on. Glen pressed Record, and then Stop, and immediately played back the ten seconds of his talk prior to having pressed Record!
He went on to demonstrate the resistance to shock and vibration. The HD is rated at 125g in play and 200g when stationary and so is not likely to be damaged itself but the writing or replay may be affected by vibration - it uses a 20 seconds buffer memory to store audio in until the vibration stops, and then writes it to disk. To show this he violently shook the machine in replay, and there were no detectable errors audible. He also played back some material he had recorded in Trafalgar Square the previous day with the unit just slung over his shoulder.
Not demonstrated but the unit has the ability to print out a take list if attached to a printer. The ease with which you can access takes was impressive. It is also impossible to record over material without executing a specific key sequence. So if you are in the middle of playing back a take and there is the need to record immediately, just hitting the Record button enters that mode, clear of any existing material. It is possible to set up up to 100 cue points for playback.
Not all facilities are currently implemented - insert record and compression/limiting was due within the next few weeks.
Battery life was touched on and it was mentioned that Nickel Hydride batteries had been found to extend life by half an hour, up to nearly 3 hours. The unit still keeps timecode values with the power off.
Provision for a 24-bit future was discussed. The unit runs at 20-bit now (disk 24-bit ready) but the converters, mic amps are designed to to be upgradable at a later date should 24-bit or even 96kHz sampling become a reality. Also larger HD drives are possible in the future upping record time to 4 hours.
The PCMCIA socket adds further possibilities beyond the Jaz drive connection, such as working directly with workstations and modems. Fairlight have already incorporated the MARF format in the MFX system and Zaxcom are in talks with others.
Questions came thick and fast:
Questions and closer examination continued until the meeting closed at 1.15, with the demo machines shown departing with some of the audience who had managed to borrow them for closer examination.
Thanks to Zaxcom and Twickenham Studios for a most interesting meeting.