FireWire is a great form of connectivity. It's fast, convenient, painless, and inexpensive. One cable is all it takes to get data from one device to another, with few or no special settings to maintain. But as with all connectivity standards, you can run into problems with it. Here are some troubleshooting tips.
FireWire Connectivity Problems at a Glance |
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Type of Problem | Symptom | Possible Cause | Solution |
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Nonmounting FireWire drive | #1: Disconnected FireWire drive doesn't mount | Drive was improperly disconnected | Remount your improperly disconnected drive, page 832 |
| | #2: FireWire drive doesn't mount despite correct connection | Bad cable or damaged port | Improve your FireWire connections, page 833 |
Dropped frames with daisy-chained FireWire drives | #1: Dropped frames during playback and recording to daisy-chained FireWire drives | FireWire drives and DV deck are sharing the same bus | Separate FireWire drives and video devices to separate buses, page 834 |
Lack of communication with FireWire deck or camera | #1: Insert editing is unavailable with current device | Unsupported device or machine control protocol | Use compatible deck or switch device control protocols, page 836 |
| | #2: Log and Capture reports no communication with connected device | Camera or deck not set to DV or HDV (depending on the type of video format you are working with) | Correct your FireWire device settings, page 837 |
| | #3: Can't communicate with connected AJ-HD1200A deck | Incorrect menu settings for this deck | Make sure your settings are correct, page 837 |
Capture interruptions and failures over FireWire | #1: "Unable to Lock Deck Servo" message during capture attempt | In point for capture is too close to first frame of video on tape or preroll setting is too short | Make sure your device can reach needed playback speed, page 838 |
| | #2: Interrupted captures and spotty performance when using RAID-0 volumes of FireWire 400 or 800 drives | Conflicts and bottlenecks on shared FireWire bus | Optimize your system for HD through FireWire, page 839 |
