Hmmm. Good point about programming macros. I like the fact that I can put Aux Bus selections into my macros. I have the ?Live Mode? set on the Kahuna to lock out all buttons on remote Aux panels. When I?m going to program a macro I enable ?Live Mode? first and then start recording the macro. This ensures that nobody else will affect what I?m doing. The only things that I can think of that would make the panel go dark (other than a power failure :) ) is assigning/removing a macro on the panel or locating a macro. If I mistakenly leave the panel dark it will time-out and return to normal. Of course this is something that is rarely done during a live show since the only limit to the amount of macros you can place on the Kahuna control panel is the number of buttons. I can load up all the macros I need ahead of time. Having a switcher go down is no fun for anyone. Everyone has stories about failures and waiting many minutes just for a simple reboot. There are a whole bunch of Kahuna?s at the month-long World Cup. Let?s see how much down-time they log. Imagine what would happen in the UK if they lost a soccer broadcast. A famous soccer coach (Bill Shankly of Liverpool) once said and is always quoted ?Football ? It is not a matter of life and death ? It is far more important than that!? I wouldn?t be worried about being ?stuck? with old technology for internal things like conversion or DVEs. A manufacturer can always introduce a ?version 2 upgrade? where you just take out the old board in slide in the new one. There are ways to stay in step with future advances. Plus it?s not so much the technology being used but the servicing of the equipment you are currently using. Building more capability into the production switcher is the way things have been going for quite a while now. External tape machine control and server control were things that were done on 3rd party devices that are now built into all modern switchers. Just a few years ago you would have never wanted to use an internal 3D DVE. Now built-in 2D and 3D DVEs are commonplace in switchers. SD/HD conversion is just the next thing and S&W is ahead of the curve. They've been doing conversion for years and finally put it into a production switcher. The others don?t have it YET so their answer will be ?it?s better to use external conversion? until they figure out how to do it internally. When you ask the other manufacturers about internally mixing between HD and SD sources you get varying degrees of answers. Sony says ?Why would you want to do that?? (an actual quote I heard at NAB) ? Thomson says ?use external conversion but now we also have MatchDef (which is limited to 4 sources per M/E and adds delay to those sources)? ? Ross says ?you can use our SmartConversion (but we?ll need to use up some Aux Buses and some of your inputs just for the conversion capability)? ? S&W says ?no problem, just plug in any number of HD and SD sources and go. Plus since it?s done internally, there is only 1 frame of delay for all sources so the audio guy won?t have to worry about using varying amounts of audio delay depending on which source is hot. It is correct that in earlier versions of Kahuna software you gave up a keyer and were essentially left with 3 keyers per M/E. That is no longer the case. Key 4?s Format Fusion circuitry can still be used for switching and transitioning on the A/B Buses like previous versions of software. However, instead of losing the keyer it is now available for ?on-format? keying. Essentially if the M/E is setup for 1080i output then you can key 1080i sources with Key 4 and key any-format source in Keyers 1, 2, and 3. This makes it much more capable and user friendly than many have been led to believe. Conversion is only one part of the equation. There are a lot of other things that make Kahuna a great SD only or HD only switcher that you either can?t find on other switchers out there or are just easier to use. If anyone wants to ask me about specific features or functionality, let?s do that over in the Snell & Wilcox Forum so we don?t hog the TD Forum bandwidth. If you haven?t seen Kahuna at or since NAB, you don?t have the full story. Take a look at Kahuna with an open mind and see what it can do. Don?t automatically dismiss it because it?s not a Thomson or a Sony. There is no such thing as a perfect switcher or a finished switcher. Everyone is still adding new features through software. Since Kahuna is just over a year old, it still has lot of room to grow. Users such as everyone here on Editsuite.com can help the process and grow with it. That?s one of the many things that makes Kahuna such an exciting switcher. Cheers, -= Ken =- Ken Schneider Program Manager - Kahuna Snell & Wilcox

[quote="sahonen"][quote="brad fisher"]I didn't like the way you needed to "steal" a keyer to use "Format Fusion", so the Transform Engine in the keyer was actually being used to provide standards conversion.[/quote] According to [url=http://editsuite.com/new/viewtopic.php?id=152]this thread[/url] the current software allows you to delegate only the TE and not the whole keyer to Format Fusion so you can still use that keyer, minus the ability to transform it.[/quote] Yes but you are still giving up switcher resources to accomplish something that, in my opinion, is better done externally so that signal can be sued throughout the plant. I completely agree with Brad that if the switcher goes down (and they ALL do eventually) you will not have any recourse if all your eggs are in one basket. In my opinion, another downside to doing it internally, is that you are stuck with whatever technology was used at that time. Doing it externally you get to pick and choose which technology you use. For instance, for small cameras you could use a $1500 AJA upconverter but for some important items you could go out and buy a Teranex. RE

[quote="brad fisher"]I didn't like the way you needed to "steal" a keyer to use "Format Fusion", so the Transform Engine in the keyer was actually being used to provide standards conversion.[/quote] According to [url=http://editsuite.com/new/viewtopic.php?id=152]this thread[/url] the current software allows you to delegate only the TE and not the whole keyer to Format Fusion so you can still use that keyer, minus the ability to transform it.

[quote="Mark Schumaker"]... liked the flexibility of the internal up and down conversion done right in the switcher Mark Schumaker[/quote] Having the conversion within the switcher means that in the (unlikely) event that the switcher fails, you have lost all your HD sources (if your backup switcher is a SD cut-bus) or all your SD sources (if your backup switcher is a HD cut-bus). I seem to remember Snell & Willcox claimed that there was no single point of failure in the switcher. I was very impressed with some of the Kahuna's features (when we were investigating a HD switcher), and I realise that software is still under development (as it is with the Kalypso!). But there were two things that troubled me when we saw it, and the software may have changed since then. 1) When programming Macro Attachments, the "next" button pressed gained the attachment, even if it was on a Remote Aux controller in another room. This means you needed to yell out to everyone not to touch a button until you've programmed the attachment. 2) There were modes you could select from the menu that caused the panel to "go dark", and if you then left that menu, the switcher remained dark. I didn't like the way you needed to "steal" a keyer to use "Format Fusion", so the Transform Engine in the keyer was actually being used to provide standards conversion. There were a number of things I liked, too, but as I haven't looked at my notes, I've forgotten most of it. I DID like that you could specify what background would be seen in the Clean Feeds and other Alternate outputs from M/Es - it seemed to go a few steps better than the Kalypso. At the end of our examination of a variety of HD Switchers, I came away feeling that if the Tender was won by Kahuna, we would be able to do the programs we needed to, and we would learn to get used to its idiosyncrasies, and to love its features. If you were using a different brand of switcher in other studios, it's inevitable that you would compare the two and say "why can't it do xxxx like the other one can?", but you'd be saying this about both your switchers. brad

Just an editorial note. . . I've moved this to the TD forum since it deals with non- GVG equipment, too. thanks, JH

[quote="Mark Schumaker"]Can anybody compare the good and bad of these two switchers? I saw the Kahuna at NAB and was very impressed, our Management liked the flexibility of the internal up and down conversion done right in the switcher, any thoughts on why this is a good or bad idea? We will be broadcasting in SD and HD for the next couple of years and using SD and HD sources in our show. We have the Zodiak now and the Kalypso would be a natural step from an operators standpoint, any input is appreciated. Thanks, Mark Schumaker[/quote] I am curious, I can understand maybe for a really small studio or truck how the upconversion is beneficial, but if you have an SD source in an HD facility, don't you need this source available on the router or in other areas in HD as well. So you would still need an external upconverter? Curious Bill