© 2008 Silicon Imaging, Inc Page 34
My “Slave” computer system when running a 3D stereo application is randomly
dropping frames. What is going on?
Faulty sync-signal cables can cause the “slave” SI-2K MINI head to appear to drop frames.
These are actually “missed” frames because they did not receive a frame-trigger event from the
“master” camera head. To ensure the reliability of 3D-sync signals from the master-to-slave
camera in 3D stereo productions, use the 3D-sync box from Silicon Imaging.
Do the SATA drives on the SI-2K support hot-swapping?
The SATA drives on the SI-2K do not support hot-swapping of the drive cartridges. Doing so
risks corruption to the file-system on the hard-drive.
I did a “Set Black” operation, but after and hour or two, I’m seeing dead pixels again
on the screen. What’s happening?
Temperature shifts on the SI-2K MINI camera head can cause dead or defective pixels that were
originally mapped out to re-appear. If this is the case, please re-do the black calibration by
covering the lens and pressing SET BLACK. For more information on the SET BLACK process,
please visit the Silicon Imaging online FAQ.
I’m trying to get the maximum resolution on the external monitors, but for some
reason that seems to “lock up” SiliconDVR. What is happening?
Running the external display on the SI-2K beyond 1280x720, and the viewfinder beyond
800x600, can cause a “slow-interface” condition where SiliconDVR is slow to respond to either
touchscreen or mouse-panel input commands. Response times can take up to 30 seconds.
Why do I see RAM buffer overflows when I set my recording resolution for Quadlet or
Bilinear?
RAM buffer overflows will occur on the SI-2K when recording in 2K CineForm mode if “Hexlet”
display mode is not used for recording (this applied for both 24P and 25P frame-rates). The
recommended configuration is to use Quadlet display mode for preview, and Hexlet display
mode for recording.
What is the setup for recording high-speed CineForm to disk? How much recording
time can I get?
High-speed recording on the SI-2K is only supported in “burst” modes, meaning continuous
recording is not possible without overflowing the RAM buffer, which will then properly close the
file and end recording. This happened because once the RAM buffer overflows, dropped frames
will occur. For continuous high-speed CineForm recording, please attach the SI-2K MINI to a
2.8Ghz or higher Intel Core 2 Duo notebook system.
Is QuickTime or AVI recording performance better under Windows?
AVI encoding performance at the moment is better than QuickTime on the SI-2K. This means
that if you are experiencing RAM buffer overflows with QuickTime on the SI-2K, you should
record directly to AVI files and then re-wrapping them losslessly to RAW CineForm QuickTime
files using CineForm's HDLink utility. Timecode and other metadata is preserved during the re-
wrapping process.
