At IBC (stand #7.703) Convergent Design is showing what it’s calling the first fully CompactFlash-based HD field recorder. Called Flash XDR (Xstream Data Recorder), it features HD-SDI (with embedded audio and timecode), 1394, LTC (timecode), and ASI (MPEG2 over SDI) I/O; 4-Channel AES inputs; and two CompactFlash card slots in a lightweight, battery-powered box. The new unit employs HD MPEG-2 compression to capture video at HDV, XDCAM HD, or 50 Mbps 4:2:2 data rates. And best of all, it’s available for under $5,000.

Utilizing built-in Sony MPEG-2 technology combined with CompactFlash storage, the unit offers twice the performance and 1/3 the cost (16GB for about $300) of proprietary flash-based cards. The memory cards are hot-swappable, highly-reliable, and 100 percent solid-state, housed in a rugged box that’s ideal for use in extreme production conditions, such as helicopters, backpacks, and race cars. A Firewire-800-based reader included with Flash XDR supports 340 Mbps file-based transfers. This means an hour of HDV (1080i @25Mbps) footage can be transferred to a laptop editor in under six minutes.

CompactFlash is an attractive media, due to its low power consumption (8 watts, or 5 percent of disk drives) combined with long-life (10K insertions/removals, 100K read-write cycles) and price-parity with HDV Firewire drives. And capacity continues to increase, with 16 GB cards (69 minutes of 1080i HDV storage) available today and 32 and 64 GB cards expected in the near future.

The compact (127x89x165 mm) and lightweight (4.4.lbs) Flash XDR stores video footage in either QuickTime or .m2t file formats. When one of the two hot-swappable CompactFlash cards is filled, the Flash XDR automatically starts recording to the second card. Editors can then eject the first card, quickly transfer the video (using the Firewire-800 reader), and edit while continuing to shoot.

The Flash XDR is not limited to just HDV data rates. Users can select 35 Mbps (XDCAM HD) or 50 Mbps 4:2:2 (422P@HL), full-raster 1920×1080/1280x720p video with up to four channels of uncompressed 16-bit 48 KHz audio. In addition to the standard 1080i/p and 720p formats, the unit supports 1080p23.98 for digital cinematography.

For more information, visit http://www.convergent-design.com.