G4 laptop to stand alone DVD Recorder.

[johnxl1s]

I have a 1hour 28min project on the FCE timeline which i need onto dvd,the dvd recorder is a panasonic standalone with dv in, i have the firewire lead connected to the dvd recorder but it does not show up on the external monitor, i have done this before with a sharp dvd recorder,so i know it should work , but it does not show up on this occasion
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[johnxl1s]

mmm, no-one know?

[Frobozz]

I have a Pioneer standalone recorder and iMovie instead of FCE, so I can't tell you exactly how to do it with your system. But maybe this will give you something to try.

When I connect my G4 iBook to the Pioneer DVR via Firewire, I cannot use the Pioneer's special DV menu to receive what iMovie refers to as the exported video. The Pioneer only seems to work with DV camcorders through that path.

However, if I choose DV as my input (the Pioneer cycles between tuner, line 1, line 2 and DV as the input choices) then the recorder will see and record the export from iMovie. But there still is one more glitch. The Pioneer needs to see a signal being received before it lets me press Record so I lose a few frames before the recording begins. Also, if iMovie doesn't see the Pioneer I need to quit iMovie and relaunch the application for it to be seen.

Another user says the JVC standalone recorder can be set to automatically start recording as soon as the stream begins being received. I haven't figured a way to do that with the Pioneer.

Your Panasonic may be more like the Pioneer in this way.

[Frobozz]

I just purchased iLife 5, installed iMovie HD and noticed that I was sending my movie via Firewire to the Pioneer DVR the hard way. There is a preference in both iMovie HD and iMovie 4 to "Play DV Project Video through to DV Camera." With this clicked on I merely need to play the movie in the iMovie timeline and not fuss with the Share settings. The Pioneer sees the movie even when it is not playing. This is much easier and gives me better control.

By the way, there is a problem with iMovie HD in that it isn't working with some capture devices or the pass-through feature of camcorders. There're lots of posts about this at the iMove HD forum in Apple Discussions.

[johnxl1s]

i use final cut express, dont know if it will work the same.