Panasonic launches 64GB P2 card, AJ-PCD35 ExpressCard adapter

Now that you're already penning a purchase requisition for one of those fancy new P2 HD camcorders, you might as well toss a couple of Panny's new 64GB P2 cards (model AJ-P2C064) and its AJ-PCD35 ExpressCard adapter on there, too. Yep, Panasonic has chosen NAB Show 2008 to double up on its current 32GB P2 card and to introduce a five-slot P2 memory drive with an ExpressCard interface. Put simply, the latter can hold all five cards from a fully-loaded VariCam 2700 / 3700 camcorder (or any other P2 rig) and give users the ability to upload content on the go with their ExpressCard-equipped laptop. Regrettably, the company didn't bother doling out dollar figures just yet, but we'd go ahead and file 'em both under "expensive."

[Via I4U News]

[Conor Maher @ Apr 14th 2008 1:46PM]

yay \o/

After Shooting on P2 i can safely say its the greatest thing since sliced bread :)

[kal326 @ Apr 14th 2008 2:01PM]

"The greatest thing since sliced bread. So this is it? A couple thousand years…sliced bread? What about the Pyramids? The Panama Canal? The Great Wall of China? Even a lava lamp, to me, is greater than sliced bread. What's so great about sliced bread? You got a knife, you got a load of bread. Slice the fuckin' thing!! And get on with your life."

Slap a shock mounted 500Gig+ hd in the thing and maybe you have a case for its greatness.

[Mark @ Apr 14th 2008 2:02PM]

super nintendo > sliced bread

[kookykrazee @ Apr 14th 2008 5:45PM]

What a shameless Carlin plug and I love his standup. One of the best of all time!

[takamaru @ Apr 14th 2008 7:32PM]

So much hate for bread...
Wait weren't we talking about something else...

[Sean O @ Apr 14th 2008 1:41PM]

Such a pathetic rip-off. Panasonic is still thrusting the broomstick with these things. Seeing this thing right above the RED products just says it all

[David Hildreth @ Apr 14th 2008 2:45PM]

You have no idea what you are talking about.

[Sean O @ Apr 14th 2008 3:13PM]

Care to back that up with, I dunno, a statement perhaps? Somehow I doubt it. I think you're a clueless anti-RED troll.

P2 cards are a complete ripoff. Always have been. 32GB P2 card is $1650. God knows what they'll charge for this one. Do you even know what non-P2 flash memory costs nowadays? A 32GB compact flash card is like $150. That's less than 1/10th the price.

But forget all that. Let's look at the Varicam. It's obsolete. Period. Name a single advantage it has over the less expensive RED. You can't because it doesn't have any.

[David Hildreth @ Apr 14th 2008 6:00PM]

The cost of P2 is a problem, but when you consider the price of a RAID system to dump your RED footage to it's not even close.

The RED is all hype, I've shot with one and can still say that.

[Sean O @ Apr 14th 2008 7:10PM]

You're talking out of your ass. No, it's not hype. No I highly doubt you've used one.

Panasonic P2 = 32GB for $1650.00
RED DRIVE = 320GB for $900.

DVCProHD = 100mbps
REDCODE = 220-290mbps

Do the frickin math.

Panasonic P2 = $35.87 per minute of footage
RED Storage = $4.33 per minute of footage

WOW! That's quite a drastic difference, wouldn't you say?

And no, you don't need a RAID to dump footage (not that it would matter if you did). Dump it to any storage you want. Cheap 1TB drives from Newegg will work just fine. Hell, dump it to your iPod. Or use those P2 cards if it makes you feel better.

Of course forget all this nerdy math and economics. Are you completely oblivious to how vastly superior in quality the RED ONE is compared to any Panny camera? Even if you work for a 720p station, the RED uses full-raster 1280x720p (it's lowest setting of course). DVCProHD is only 970x720. And the REDCODE uses state-of-the-art wavelet JPEG2000 technology which blows away the old-school DCT compression used by DV/DVCPro.

[Conor Maher @ Apr 15th 2008 11:40AM]

Erm LOL Sean O?!

Red One camera, $17,500 for just the body alone! Add a lens, some batteries and all the mounting hardware and you are talking $25,000 to have a working camera without any media..

Our small production company can actually afford to shoot HD thanks to the Panasonic P2 cameras, you know you can record straight to a terabyte drive in a firewire host right?

A HVX200 and two 16gig P2 cards costs about $7000 a fraction of the cost of a Red camera...

I know they arent even in the same league but you cant bash P2 just becuase its not the OMFG RED CAMERA!!??!?11q1

[Sean O @ Apr 15th 2008 2:11PM]

And my cellphone camera costs $100. What's your point? Try comparing apples to apples. I was talking about the $48k Panasonic Varicam P2. Nobody said anything about the HVX.

So forget high-end. Forget the RED. If you want to talk about prosumer cameras like the HVX then choosing to buy P2 cards for it is even stupider than it is for high-end cameras. Do you have any concept of what a ripoff it is? If you're stuck with the HVX you should get one of those firewire disk recorders for it.

Thanking Panasonic for the ability to afford to shoot in HD. Are you serious? You haven't heard of HDV or XDCam HD? The Cannon HDV outputs uncompressed HD-SDI, so you can record to whatever you want. And the Sony Professional Discs for XDCam are like $60 for 50GB (compared to $1650 for a 32GB P2 card).

You can stroke Panasonic all you want. They're happily returning the favor on the other end whether you realize it or not.

[Jeff @ Apr 14th 2008 2:12PM]

This is just to let you guys know that everything south of Ross Rubin's article is italicized on the main page. Clean up that code!

[John F @ Apr 14th 2008 4:46PM]

Sliced bread was actually invented in the early twentieth century. So that rules out the pyramids. Super nintendo too.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sliced_bread

[murray @ Apr 17th 2008 8:02PM]

What's P2? Damn, I hate it when I miss a memo.