I'm trying to decide whether to get the MXO2 mini or HD Express, but don't have any experience in this area. I've upgraded to MC 6 and want to be sure that I have a good capture/monitoring box. I read some bad reviews of the MXO2 mini. Haven't found much on the Motu HD Express. My brain hurts! :-)

Any experiences or advice would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks!

Under MC5.5 the MXO2 mini was great. Very good value, made for very snappy editing & colour correction. Works great for After Effects too.

Under MC6 it's a bit sluggish but that will hopefully be fixed shortly.

No idea what it's like to capture with, haven't tried that with MC6 yet (wasn't possible before). Not sure it can do true 1080p capture, just 720p and 1080i (and SD of course). Anyone tried?

Swil:

Under MC5.5 the MXO2 mini was great. Very good value, made for very snappy editing & colour correction. Works great for After Effects too.

That's been my experience too.  I can't comment on the version 6 situation since I won't be going that way until at least the first point release.  By that time Matrox may very well have released new drivers if past experience is is anything to go on.

Anybody with experience using the Moto HD Express monitoring solution? It looks like a good unit.

We have a MXo2 mini and also have tried the Matrox mxo2 le with max, they both work horribly with Media Composer 6, now 5.5 and version 5 thats a different story. They work very well, we have contacted Matrox and they basically said they are waiting on Avid for better support and from the sound of it they won't have any better solutions and we might just have to wait for Media Composer 6.5. We also have a decklink studio 2, it works okay it does have some audio glitches but is useable but rather annoying. We just ordered a Motu HD express, should arrive tomorrow. Will let you know if it works out for us. 

All systems Mac Pro (2010 5.1) 2.8 Quad-core with 16 gigs of memory.

trevorgant:

...We just ordered a Motu HD express, should arrive tomorrow. Will let you know if it works out for us. 

Do report back once you've tried it - we're considering this unit as well.

We are in the same boat, also considering the Black Magic DeckLink solution as well as Motu (both around $500 / @650). Lots of retailers are pushing for the Aja Kona LHi! card, but at $1000+ that is a bit pricey when you consider multiple work stations.

I will keep an eye on this thread.

We have two Matrox Mx02 mini I/O boxes and they are simply dreadfull on MC6 as an I/O for SD digitizing.

 

Richard

So far the Motu is so much better than the Matrox its scary. Works Great in Final Cut Pro as well. We are doing a producers cut with the Motu hd express right now and has been really good. No device for a client monitor is perfect with Avid Media 6, at least I have not seen one and used alot of them. Motu seems to be the best so far, has a little audio lag sometimes in trim mode but really overall has been working well. I will keep you guys posted on it the more we use it as we have only had a day with it.

 

 

I dont know about other manufacturers boxes, but I have not had the bad experience with MXO2 mini that others report.

Yes it was initially sluggish on MC6, but that was on an under-powered machine. Now on MC6.0.3.1 with the appropriate driver for MXO2 (6.1 from memory) all is well and we dont see any sluggishness or lag.

I have recently used to capture in SD from BetaSP - and that all worked as ecpected (although I discovered there is no way to adjust the analogue audio input levels from within the MXO2).

I have not tested, but it is supposed to ba able to capture full 1080p HD via the HDMI or RGB input ports. Of course the MXO2 mini does not support SDI/HDSDI like the other models do.

I mostly use the MXO2 to give me a client monitor, feeding an old Sony SD glass tube. Although we work mainly in HD I still like to check colours on a galss monitor and it also highlights any field order errors that creep in from time to time.