DCR-TRV620e not recognized by MacBook Pro

[phineas919]

I have a Sony DCR-TRV620e connected to my MacBook Pro using a 4-pin to 6-pin IEEE 1394 (firewire / i.Link) cable, but when I run iMovie '11 in OS/X Lion , it doesn't see the camera at all (i.e. it doesn't appear in the list of cameras).

I have tried two different cables, but neither works. I have tried both VTR and camera mode, both digital and analog tapes, setting A/V->DV OUT to ON, and nothing seems to work. I have successfully connected a different camcorder to my MacBook Pro, so I know its FireWire port works. Is there something I'm missing?

[Mick2011]

Hi phineas919, welcome to the Sony Forums

phineas919 wrote:
when I run iMovie '11 in OS/X Lion , it doesn't see the camera at all (i.e. it doesn't appear in the list of cameras

Which list are you referring to?

Whenever you launch iMovie, connect a DV camera and switch it on, the camera's live feed window should pop up automatically, no need to select it anywhere or click anything. You should check that the camera's switched to VCR of course, but there should be no need to refer to a list.

Whatever happens, iMovie should always give you some kind of camera feed when you click the small camera icon towards the bottom left of the screen. The default will be your MacBook built-in camera feed. This will be automatically superceded by a DV camera feed if you have one connected / switched on. If this doesn't happen, let me know and we'll troubleshoot it from there.

Cheers

Mick

[phineas919]

Thanks Mick...when I click the small camera icon I only get my built-in iSight camera, no matter if the camera is on, in VTR mode (in this camera they call it VTR mode) or camera mode. In my experience also, when I plug a camera in and turn it on, it should show up in iMovie right away, some even in camera mode.

When plugged in and turned on in VTR mode, it also doesn't show up in System Information in the Hardware -> FireWire section. Right now there's only:

FireWire Bus:

Maximum Speed: Up to 800 Mb/sec

It doesn't seem to by recognized by the hardware at all, which is why I bought a second new FireWire cable of a different brand to make sure that wasn't the problem, but it still doesn't work. So now I'm left wondering if there's a broken connector at the physical layer (doesn't appear to be), a problem with the FireWire port on the camera, a wrong setting on the camera, an incompatibility with my FireWire port, or something else I'm missing, but am at a loss for how to troubleshoot further...

[Mick2011]

As a tape-based DV camera it's definitely supported by iMovie. There's no setting I can think of on the camera you could possibly select to make it invisible to the Mac either... so we should discount all 'soft' incompatibility. If you had access to another Mac you could rule out your MacBook but I do think it's unlikely to be the source of the problem.

My guess would be (in order of likelihood):

• bad connection at the camera end
• bad luck with cables; FW cables are easily the most temeramental I ever used
• combination of the above two; bad cables can fry ports and vice-versa

I'd thoroughly inspect that camera port first for damage, dirt etc. If it's anoything other than spotless I'd suggest trying (yet) another new firewire cable. I know you already have two but they're unreliable, as I say. Get a good quality one, cheapies can be pointless wastes of money, to say nothing of frustrating. Make sure you seat both ends very carefully and securely in their respective ports and (finally) power up the camera.

If the port is spotlessly clean you might want to skip the further cable test and just get the camera's FW port checked out; it does sound as if that might be the problem.

Cheers

Mick