XDCAM-USER.COM

Is the new Pmw400 announced at NAB this year going to kill off 35mbit cams and especially the 320/350s?

The PMW-320 is still cheaper, but then the new PMW-300 is probably a better camera than the 320.

The 400 is a significant improvement over the 350 adding broadcast quality recording yet the price will be roughly the same. Going forwards XAVC will replace XDCAM HD for many productions as it's 10 bit recording will allow for greater flexibility in post. So yes, I think the 350/320 will slowly get killed off by the new cams.

Have you demo'd the 400 yet Alister?

50 mbits certainly broadens the market for the camera.

Not in any depth. It is basically a 350 with new recording modes and flash band correction, so base image quality will be pretty much the same as the 350 )maybe slightly less noise due to new NR) but with integral XDCAM 422 and 10 bit XAVC 422 in the future. It also integrates with the new WiFi and proxy recorder for streaming and remote uploads. It's actually more of a PMW-500 killer than anything else.

And is there any great differnce in picture quality comparing 500 to 400?
PMW 500 is old camera nowadays and PMW400 looks more balanced in price \ features.

I suspect you are right Alistair it looks like the 500 is now being affected by the 400. The 500 is an old camera now as Jerk says. Regional ITV is rumored to hav chosen the 400 over the 500 ( except Granada) for news. I heard grumblings about flashband etc but none of the people grumbling have ever used a cmos cam. I see many films and expensive tv commercials with flash banding so it passes the executives without that much difficulty. The lack of 50 mb on the 350 is a pain but nanoflash it and record back the nano files to a 422 formatted card with Browser and problem solved.
The nano has been a good companion for the 350. The CD software helps get xdcam edits out of Avid and back to SxS card too.
Still enjoy using the 350 over every other cam I ve used but its just developed an Xlr audio input fault out of warranty which is a pain. First issue with it to date. Overall still happy with it.