Unable to import from Sony DCR-PC1000E

All the Apple kbase suggestions,

Surely you are kidding? There must be hundreds in the "Mac OS X" section that MIGHT have an impact.

Anyway, this is a really good one. Take your time and follow the links.
iMovie: Cannot See or Control Camera
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=43000

See the Sony fix here:
http://www.danslagle.com/mac/iMovie/usage/5020.shtml

Do you have any other Firewire devices at all? Do they work with your Mac?

Are you sure you performed the resetting of the FW ports here:
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=88338

In your case, you also need to remove the battery, not just the power cable.

I don't want to tread on Lennart's toes, but have you looked through the camcorder's menus (..when it's set to VCR mode..) and seen, possibly in a menu called 'VCR SET' (..second menu down?..) an item called 'A/V>DV OUT'..?

If so, that should be set to 'OFF', otherwise the camcorder will be trying to send some non-existent analogue A/V input out through the DV cable instead of sending video from your tape. (I'm assuming that there is tape in the camera!)

And you've done that business about 'VIDEO EDIT', 'TAPE' and 'MARK 1 IN' in the 'ETC' menu, if there is one, just to tell the FireWire connection who's boss..?

I see my PC1000 is not on the compatibility list

That list isn't updated and only contains the cameras that are officially tested. There are a whole lot of cameras that are never tested, but works just fine anyway.

I don't want to tread on Lennart's toes

David, you are welcome to "tread" on my toes any time in any thread.

I'm greatful for any help I can get in this very puzzling thread.

I had a very similar one last week that still isn't solved:
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=194835&tstart=30

Hmm, well; I'm in the (un)fortunate position of camcorders always working OK for me ..except once when my D-8 TRV330E couldn't be seen after upgrading to iMHD.

So sometimes I try to make them misbehave, by resetting camcorder menu items when I have some time to spare, and try to see what - if anything - prevents cameras connecting with iMovie.

It's often mentioned in MacFixIt that if these sorts of "unable to connect" problems occur, it might be because a person has upgraded their Operating System (..e.g; from 10.4.2 to 10.4.3..) while a device was connected to a FireWire port ..thus somehow disabling the upgrade from doing whatever it needs to do with those ports. The solution recommended there is to remove everything from FireWire ports, then download the combo updater ..not the small 'delta' incremental OS updater, but the big, full, entire latest OS.. and re-apply the OS update.

That, by their reports, generally fixes FireWire problems.

But in the case of other external devices - such as external FW hard discs - working OK ..but camcorders not.. I can't really offer anything else, from personal experience, other than everything already mentioned.

I seem to remember someone having that "Eureka!" moment last week, when he finally got his cam to connect, but I can't remember what the thread was called ..and can't find it to link to it right now ..I'll have a rummage around and see if I can find it amongst these 'new' Discussions threads..

I have a PV-GS65 with the same problem. I am running 10.4.3, but I didn't upgrade from 10.4.2 to 10.4.3 with anything connected to the firewire port. If I ever get mine working I will post how.

David,

My TRV330 is working with iMovie HD, but you will note it is not an "E".

Ernie

Thanks, Ernie.

I have just had one of those 'eureka' moments with a pc1000e camera which I had starting swearing about as it too was not connecting to iMovie HD
Tucked away on the support pages is a note about checking the sample rate in the audio MIDI setup utility, make sure input and output are setup to 44.1khz !!
This solved my problem
Good luck

Thanks for this reminder.

Sometimes this is called 'The GarageBand Fix', as playing a few notes in GarageBand can seem to do a similar audio reset.

It seems to work for some people, but not for others.

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