HDDs 2025 Prices Rip-Off

 We're in a very fucked up moment with hard disks data storage prices right now.

 It's due to many factors, one being that manufacturers are way too concentrated: Seagate, Western Digital and to a lesser degree Toshiba control the entire market.

 Being the only payers in town, S-WD-T can turn the faucet on and off, and set the prices as they wish.

 Then in the US we have tariffs of 25% on imported goods from Asia if I understand that right. Even though Seagate and WD are both US companies... That's jacking up the prices big time. 

 The ssd market which is expected to grow three time faster than the hdd market in the next decade appears more segmented. Although Kingston, (another US company), has the lion share, followed by Samsung, and WD again. We're being ripped off with sdds prices as well in the US, but competition helps.

 Look at this chart of 8TB Seagate IronWolf hdd from camelcamelcamel.com:

 The drive was initially sold for around $230 in April of 2020.

 A year later in April of 2021 the price was down to around $180.

 Then the Covid crisis shot the prices up to $240. But in April of 2022, the price was back down to $170.

 April 2023 it was "rock bottom" down to $130. And in 2024-2025 the price oscillated between $150 and $180.

 Now after a fake Black Friday / Cyber Monday where the $180 Sale price was in fact the same as the high price during the entire year of 2025, it shoots up to $220!

 What? Almost as expensive as when it was introduced almost 6 years ago! R&D and initial investments are all paid for at this point.

 Notice that $180 (all of last year high price) x 1.25 (25% tariffs)  = $225. Which is the new set price, give or take $5, comes December.

 Everything is more expensive leading to Christmas so between now and I assume probably at least January next year, we're being ripped off.

DaVinci Resolve Version 20.3 Update

 DaVinci Resolve Version 20.3 Update!

The Aussies at Blackmagic Design are incredible! DVR 20.2.3 came out on November
4. TWENTY FOUR DAYS LATER comes 20.3!

From the guys at BMD:

DaVinci Resolve 20.3

Welcome to DaVinci Resolve 20.3!

This installer will add DaVinci Resolve software to your system as well as additional software for remote monitoring and utilities for setting up hardware control panels. It also installs Blackmagic RAW Player and Blackmagic Proxy Generator into the applications folder.

The free version of DaVinci Resolve 20 includes all of the same high quality processing as DaVinci Resolve 20 Studio and can handle unlimited resolution media files. However it does limit project mastering and output to Ultra HD resolutions or lower and only supports a single processing GPU on Windows and Linux.

If you need features such as support for multiple GPUs, 4K output, motion blur effects, temporal and spatial noise reduction, multiple AI-based tools, HDR tools, camera tracker, voice isolation, surround sound and immersive audio, multiple Resolve FX, 3D stereoscopic tools and remote rendering, please upgrade to DaVinci Resolve 20 Studio.

We hope you do decide to upgrade as your facility grows and you do more advanced work!

Installing DaVinci Resolve Software on MacOS

Double-click the DaVinci Resolve Installer icon and follow the onscreen instructions. To remove DaVinci Resolve from your system, double-click the Uninstall Resolve icon.

Installing DaVinci Resolve Software on Windows

Double-click the DaVinci Resolve Installer icon and follow the onscreen instructions. To remove DaVinci Resolve from your system, go to the Programs and Features control panel, select DaVinci Resolve, click on Uninstall and follow the onscreen prompts.

Installing DaVinci Resolve Software on Linux

Double-click the DaVinci Resolve installer and follow the onscreen instructions. To remove DaVinci Resolve from your system, select the uninstall option after running the installer.

For DaVinci Resolve 20.3, we have taken efforts to keep the project libraries compatible with DaVinci Resolve 19.1.4. While this allows you to access the project library with 19.1.4, individual projects created or opened in 20.3 will no longer be accessible in 19.1.4. We recommend a full project library backup as well as individual project backups before opening projects in 20.3.

What's new in DaVinci Resolve 20.3

The following features have been added or updated.

• Up to 32K resolution support with Apple M5 processors.
• Improved performance for Resolve FX Noise Reduction.
• Timeline backups now allow named snapshots for versioning.
• Support for adding metadata fields as media pool bin columns.
• Media Pool metadata ALE import and export support.
• Option to create custom metadata for unknown fields on import.
• Exported metadata files now include custom metadata fields.
• Media pool views and state are now retained for each project.
• Edit menu action to insert gap at playhead.
• New assignable key shortcut in media pool to start a search.
• Assignable key shortcut for open in timeline with source viewer.
• Speed change and duration change actions now follow sync lock.
• Added 2.39 and 2.40 broadcast safe aspect ratios.
• Alpha support for film look creator, film damage and analog damage.
• Support for IMF workflow for HDR Vivid and Audio Vivid.
• Ability to embed HDR10+ metadata in QuickTime and MP4 encodes.
• Ability to set stereoscopic mode in clip attributes for MXF clips.
• Improved match frame behavior for clips with negative speeds.
• Addressed missing clip actions in subtitle caption context menu.
• Addressed intermittent lag when using stacked timelines.
• Addressed source timeline not restored when switching back to edit.
• Addressed issue tracking with high-quality deinterlace in Fusion.
• Addressed issue with immersive world pose if using Fusion tools.
• Addressed issue loading some deep OpenEXR files.
• Addressed decode issues with compressed ARW clips.
• Addressed AI Music Remixer muting audio on macOS 26.1.
• Addressed possible QuickTime decode hang on Windows.
• Addressed Remote Monitor start up issue on Windows.
• General performance and stability improvements.

Note: Starting from DaVinci Resolve 20.3, OpenCL mode for GPU processing is no longer supported on macOS.

Minimum system requirements for Mac OS

• macOS 14 Sonoma or later.
• 8 GB of system memory or 16 GB when using Fusion.
• For monitoring, Blackmagic Design Desktop Video 12.9 or later.
• Apple Silicon based computer or GPU which supports Metal.

Minimum system requirements for Windows

• Windows 10 Creators Update.
• 16 GB of system memory or 32 GB when using Fusion.
• For monitoring, Blackmagic Design Desktop Video 12.9 or later.
• Integrated GPU or discrete GPU with at least 4 GB of VRAM.
• GPU which supports OpenCL 1.2 or CUDA 12.8.
• AMD/Intel official drivers from your GPU manufacturer.
• NVIDIA Studio driver 570.65 or newer.

Minimum system requirements for Windows for Arm

• Windows 11 for ARM.
• Qualcomm Snapdragon X Elite series processor.
• 16 GB of system memory or 32 GB for 4K or when using Fusion.

Minimum system requirements for Linux

• Rocky Linux 8.6.
• 32 GB of system memory.
• For monitoring, Blackmagic Design Desktop Video 12.9 or later.
• Discrete GPU with at least 4 GB of VRAM.
• GPU which supports OpenCL 1.2 or CUDA 12.8.
• AMD official drivers from your GPU manufacturer.
• NVIDIA Studio driver 570.26 or newer.

Additional Information

You will also need to download and install the latest Blackmagic Design Desktop Video software for monitoring with your Blackmagic Design video hardware. Desktop Video is available from www.blackmagicdesign.com/support.

© 2001-2025 Blackmagic Design Pty. Ltd. All rights reserved. Blackmagic Design, Blackmagic, DeckLink, Multibridge, Intensity, H.264 Pro Recorder and "Leading the creative video revolution" are trademarks of Blackmagic Design Pty. Ltd., registered in the U.S.A and other countries.

Updated November 28, 2025.

Black Friday 2025 Is CANCELED!

 This year 2025, Black Friday is canceled! There are very few deals on good items, only loads of crappy stuff you do not want, who cares about the price of useless items.

 Only 1 page of "deals" on external ssds, almost all being a single Crucial or Lexar product (good products at least.) The price is the same as a few months ago though, so where is the deal?

 Internal SSds? FOUR products and that's it. Again Crucial leads the way. At least these can claim to be actual deals, meaning they cost less during Black Friday week than they did before.

 Asus ProArt monitors? More expensive for most models on "Black Friday Deal" than they were a few months ago! Dell monitors? Barely discounted by a meager 10%. LG monitors? Same price as a few months ago.

 Almost no Apple computers deals, MacBook Air same price as early November. Apple Watch 10% discount at best on an overpriced item.

 Cameras? Lenses? You'll be lucky to find a 10% discount. Again Black Friday Deal is nothing more than the same price as a few months ago. Since then, the price was artificially jacked-up, and look, magic 10% off deal! Wow, really? Nope.

A few good deals on audio items. DJI Mic Mini combo wireless microphone 45% off at $66. Presonus Eris E7 XT Active studio monitor 16% off at $118. No deals on JBLs, no deals on Kali Audio. Universal Audio interfaces on "Black Friday Deal" are more expensive than they were for most of last year. No deals on MOTU, Mackie, Focusrite.

On the software front, at least Waves is having its usual Black Friday discount sale. A good time to grab the Gold Bundle for $99, or useful plug-ins, like Clarity Vx, or Vocal Rider, for $29.

PluginBoutique has some good deals by FabFilter, SSL, Celemony among others. Cyber week sale ongoing at Plugin alliance. As always with plugins, watch for EOL, or frozen in time not so useful items.

 Anyway, we are broke! Our groceries are 25% more expensive than last summer. Which was already 25% more expansive than after Covid. 

 So this feels like an encouragement to not spend any money. Although we've been on economic blackout for a while, so it's not like we're gonna perform just for Black Friday week, Cyber whatever.

DaVinci Resolve Version 20.2 Update

DaVinci Resolve 20.2 is here!

With all the training you need to get up to speed and more.

What's new in DVR 20.2 in 8min.

Nablet's X-OCN Media Extension Ads X-OCN Media Importing And Raw Processor Settings To Final Cut Pro Compared to DVR and PP

 In addition to permitting Final Cut Pro to recognize and import X-OCN clips, the Nablet Media Extension offers media clips based Raw Processing Settings in FCP.

Accessible under the inspector window when the clip is selected, you will now see the active Media Expensions: nablet X-OCN Decoder, and nablet X-OCN Processor.

The below button "Edit RAW Properties", opens the RAW Processor Settings:

It is set by default to the Original Camera Values i.e. the recorded camera metadata.

You can at any time revert to: Initial Values, Original Camera Values, or Neutral Values.

You can adjust Output Color space between: Scene/Linear 2020, S-Log3/S-Gamut3, or S-Log3/S-Gamut3Cine

In Raw Image processing: Color Temperature is adjustable between 2000 and 15000 degrees Kelvin. Tint is adjustable between -100 and +100. ISO is adjustable between 50 and 32000. Exposure Offset is adjustable between -1 and +1. Sharpness is adjustable between -300 and +500.

In Camera VFX is greyed out for Burano footage as it is exclusive to certain Venice footage.

Skimming and playback of 8K X-OCN LT footage is smooth on modestly specced media storage. It plays fine off my TG Vulcan Sata SSDs. For 8K X-OCN ST and XT you need beefier media storage speed. Sata SSDs cannot keep up. Skimming and playback is fine with a USB-C Samsung T7 as media storage.

In DaVinci Resolve, Camera Raw settings under Decode Using Clip has all the adjustments for Color Temperature, Tint, Exposure, Sharpness, and also Shadows, Highlights, Color Boost, Saturation, Midtown Detail, Lift, Gain, and Contrast. Plus Decode Quality and White Balance adjustment.

Other decode modes are: Sony Default, Camera Metadata, and Project.

In Premiere Pro, Color Space is assignable within the Source Settings. Rec 709, S-Gamut/S-Log2, S-Gamut3/S-Log3, and S-Gamut3Cine/S-Log3 are available. On import it correctly identifies S-Gamut3Cine/S-Log3.

Then there is the case of Modify/Interpret Footage/Color window. Use Media Color Space is selected and stamped as Rec 709, which is puzzling.

The Source Clips Settings is also available under the Lumetri Color Settings tab:

The footage appears desaturated in this case:

Changing the settings to Override Media Color Space and to S-Gamut3Cine/S-Log3 as it should be, then the footage looks nice.

Nablet's X-OCN Media Extension Allows Native Sony's X-OCN Media Workflow In Final Cut Pro (And System Wide)

 We saw in my previous post that both Resolve and Premiere could deal with X-OCN clips without plug-ins or add-ons.

Final Cut Pro on the other end, as of version 11.2 and ProVideo Codecs v3.0, needs Nablet's X-OCN Media Extension to load X-OCN clips. So we downloaded and installed it.

Nablet's X-OCN Media Extension, ready to install.

According to the user manual, minimum supported configuration is macOS 15.6, Pro Video Formats 3.0, and FCP 11.1 or 11.2

After installation, we need to manually turn the Nablet extension(s) on. To do that, go to System Settings, General, Logging Items and Extensions, scroll down to Extensions, Media Extensions and click on the ⓘ

You are then presented with Three Media Extensions: Nablet X-OCN Decoder, Apple ProRes Raw Processor, Nablet X-OCN Processor. Turn them all on.

Clicking on the respective ⓘ, brings you to the location of the extensions. In this example in the Applications folder, under tablet Media Extensions.

Click on done, and you are done with installing the Nablet extensions.

And now Final Cut Pro can read and import X-OCN footage.

Also, since the extension is system wide, Quicktime now recognize and plays the clips as well, including in the Finder previews.

Without Nablet X-OCN Extensions, no preview.

With Nablet X-OCN Extensions installed, preview is available.

As well as QuickTime Player playback.

In the next post I will look into the X-OCN settings within Final Cut Pro, and compare them to Resolve and Premiere settings.

Sony's X-OCN Media Works In DaVinci Resolve And Adobe Premiere Pro, But Not In Final Cut Pro. At Least Without The Help Of Nablet's Media Extension.

 DaVinci Resolve and Adobe Premiere Pro can open Sony's X-OCN Media, but Final Cut Pro cannot... At Least Without A Media Extension.

Resolve, OK.

Premiere, OK.

FCP sees and import the XAVC clip just fine, but does not understand and cannot import the X-OCN clips.

X-OCN clips are a no go for FCP (v11.2) as-is.

 X-OCN (eXtended tonal range, Original Camera Negative) is yet another codec developed by Sony in their high-end camera line. Here is Sony's X-OCN page for more details.

It supports up to 16bit video in a variety of compressions, and playback is not computer intensive, so it checks all the boxes, or so it seems.

See this article by Newsshooters.com for a detailed explanation of X-OCN.

Sony's own Catalyst software opens X-OCN, but I don't like Catalyst, and one would use it to convert the X-OCN footage to something FCP understands, say ProRes. But really it's an unnecessary step considering the nature of X-OCN.

X-OCN Clips open as expected in Sony's Catalyst Browse (the free version)

Note that, as deplorable as it is, for Sony Catalyst to read XAVC H-I HQ, it requires activation with a Sony Camera Model + Serial Number. Remember that all three NLEs read and Import the XAVC Clip just fine... As an editor I find this move pretty stupid.

But Catalyst Browse does not want to open the XAVC clip... ???

Camera serial number required. Yeah, sure Sony, I'm an editor.

Anyway, back to what we are trying to achieve, import X-OCN into FCP.

A not so useful chart by Sony of "X-OCN / AVC H Supported Products by Alliance Partners" does not list any solution for dealing with X-OCN media in FCP. It does not specify that a camera serial number is required to open XAVC H clips in Sony Catalyst Browse either.

Resolve and Premiere are perfectly happy with X-OCN clips, and open, import, and work with them just fine. Final Cut Pro on the other end does not understand the codec.

Supposedly there used to be a Calibrated{Q} Sony RAW Decode plug-in that one could buy that allowed FCP to understand X-OCN, but it was back in the F55 days, and it looks like it is not being updated, or it has been discontinued.

Enters Nablet Gmbh and their X-OCN Media Extension for Apple macOS. Currently in version 1.1. It's downloadable here, and is free for the time being. 🙌

Nablet's X-OCN Media Extension downloaded and ready to install.

Read this FCPCafe article detailing how it works.

And here is the Apple documentation about Media Extensions if you are interested.

I will be installing and testing it in incoming posts, and I will try to show the similarities and differences between DVR, PP and FCP+NME. Stay tuned!

Apple's Safari Download Is Execrable

 Safari 18.6 is downright execrable, unreliable, slow.

 I today wanted to download a 7GB file from Wetransfer, Safari first told me it needed 350h to complete. Huh? What?

 I cancel that shit, tried again and it went through an hour of downloading at not so great speed, until it got stuck at 6GB. No progress after that. Super!

 Third time is a charm... You'd think. Nope. 4 hours needed at 400KB/s to download the file at stupidly slow download speed. And the estimated time is not even real as an hour later it's still showing 3h43min needed...

 All right,enough with Safari, Firefox to the rescue. Boom! Downloading at 7.7MB/s. Steady does it. 17min. later the file is on my computer. First try, no fuss.

 Apple, get your shit together with Safari, it's a disgrace.

How To Export An Archive Of Your Gmail Mailbox, And Open It "Offline" With Thunderbird On Mac - PART TWO - Thunderbird Setup

 Allright, in PART ONE of this saga I showed you how to export your Gmail data.

Now in PART TWO, we setup Thunderbird to open and browse the data.

1. Google exported a zip file that we've downloaded on our computer. In my case it's called: "takeout-20251103T234620Z-3-001.zip", and is in my Download folder.

2. Move the file to a location of your choice, in my case I put it in my Documents folder, inside a subfolder that I renamed "Gmail Takeout Zips". Open the zip file, and the following is decompressed: "Takeout" folder, "Mail" subfolder", "Work/Moviola.mbox" folder. All the messages/data is contained in the ".mbox" folder. Remember I elected to export only one of my labels/Gmail folder, so my dataset / .mbox folder is small. If you were to export your entire Gmail data, the size of the .mbox will likely be way larger, and possibly will come in multiple parts due to the file size option/constrain imposed by Google. I previously exported a Work-DVDList folder, so the corresponding Takeout and decompressed .mbox is also present.

4. Create a new Folder in Documents, and name it "Thunderbird Read Gmail Archives". Copy the ".mbox" files in it. You can then eliminate the remaining emptied Takeout folders. Your setup should look like this:

5. Launch Thunderbird. When presented with the Welcome screen / "Setup your existing email address", Click on Cancel.

6. "No email account configured" pops up, check "Use Thunderbird without an email account" and click "Exit Setup".

7. Thunderbird opens on the Privacy Notice page / tab.

8. Go to: File / New / Feed Account

9. Give the account a name, I choose "Mail Archives - READ ONLY", and click Continue.

10. Thunderbird pops a Feed Account Wizard confirmation window, click Done.

11. You now have a "Mail Archives - READ ONLY" feed in the list. Right Click on the name to reveal a pop-up menu.

12. Click on Settings.

13. For the Message Storage  / Local Directory, Click on Browse

14. Select the "Thunderbird Read Gmail Archives" containing the .mbox folders, and click Open.

15. Thunderbird needs to restart pop-up, click Restart.

16. Thunderbird restarts and now in the local directory points at the correct folder:

17. Click on the Mail Archives - READ ONLY feed tab, and the mailboxes show up:

18. You can now browse, search, export individual messages:

And that's a wrap!

How To Export An Archive Of Your Gmail Mailbox, And Open It "Offline" With Thunderbird On Mac - PART ONE - Gmail Export

 Warning! This is a loooong thread, thanks Google, so hang in there!

PART ONE, let's export from Gmail:

1. Click on the Gmail account Icon, click on "Manage your Google Account"

2. When in your Google account page, click on the Data & privacy tab on the left.

3. When in the Data & privacy page, scroll down to get to the "Download your data" area.

4. Click on the Download your data. It will open the Google Takeout page. This is where you can choose what data you want to export. There are TONS of data, and some selection is already made by default as you can see. But we do not want that.

5. So click on "Deselect all". That will deselect some of the data, not all unfortunately, so you have to scroll down and deselect each box manually. Continue to scroll down and deselect all the boxes, until you get to the Mail area.

6. Click to select Mail. By default, "All Mail data included" is selected which will export EVERYTHING. You may or may not want to export your entire Mail content. If you do, you can skip the next steps and go directly to step 13.

7. On the other end, if you want to choose which part of Mail to export, click on "All Mail data included". This will open the "Mail content option" page. And by default "Include all messages in Mail" is selected.

8. From there you can choose to select only some mailbox folders to export.

9. If needed then, deselect "Include all messages in Mail", and scroll down and deselect the default folders you do not wish to export / select the folders you only want to export.

10. For example, I do not wish to export "Archived", "Chat", "Drafts", "Inbox" that are all selected by default, so I uncheck them all.

11. I only want to export "Work/Moviola", so I checked that. I previously exported "Work/DVDList". And I click "OK".

12. Now instead of the default "All Mail data included", it shows "1 label selected", which corresponds to my single selection of "Work/Moviola".

13. Now scroll down and click on "Next step"

14. In the "Choose file type, frequency & destination" you are presented with frequency, file type, and file size options. I leave everything at default. Then click "Export".

15. Google asks for identification, so fill-in your info.

16. When Google finishes prepping the export, you will get an email with a link to download. You can also view the available download sets by clicking on "Manage exports".

17. I have two completed Data backups available to download. The one I want is the most recent, so I click on the top arrow.

18. From there I can click on the Download button to get it transferred to my computer.

19. The Zip file is downloaded onto my computer.

And we are done with the Google Mail export. Go to PART TWO for the Thunderbird How-to.