Stefan,
We have one Akitio with a Magewell 4xHDMI (old one), works just fine over TB3 :)

I am hesitant to use BM, go the impression that their drivers are kind of messy...

Nothing new regarding my fear of the issues with Thunderbolt connectors. I hoped that other vMix users with Thunderbolt would fiddle with theirs, but so far no one has reported anything...

Luckily we have had no problems when live (and we are extra catious), only when testing and prepping.

I'm using a similar setup with the Sonnet Echo expansion box and a Magewell 4xSDI card. I'm using the Apple TB3 to TB2 adapter and it works fine. Based on some posts here, I was a little concerned about the robustness of the connection, but I don't believe it will be a concern.

I as well have been using this exact same setup with the black magic duo and akitio since it first came out and it does work perfectly. i'm also using it with a skull NUC with 4 cameras and all is perfectly fine. As for your issue i bet its because you need to assign ports as single sdi ports in BM. out of the box they are set as 1 & 3 and 2 & 4. Just be sure you set them to only be SDI 1, SDI 2 etc and you'll see them all.

tried it again and i first assigned all sdi inputs. can not select like with the 8 input card, but i have to activate the inputs in bm manager.

in the end i managed to get 3 inputs working, one output active and i managed to daisychain one extra input through thunder3 to 2 conversion and using a bm thunderbolt 2 mini capture. so 4 inputs and one output.

next thing on the list is to get 5 inputs active and try to hook on the displayport to hdmi output for monitoring (output) and or external streaming or wifi streaming.

anyway, getting there and very happy because my set is getting bigger in capabilities and smaller in size... 3 inputs and one output is enough for me for most recordings.

have a good holliday season everybody...
stefan

now I can get all 4 inputs active: it's just knowing how to set the inputs active first time around.

I reinstalled the bm software and then activated the sdi inputs of all fpur inputs, by just clicking on the sdi icon of every input.

I guess that when you set the output, it will disable the input. not sure how to turn inputs on again after setting it as an output. will check that later.

most importantly is that this setup is now very compact and a good alternative for an AYa box ( thunderbolt2) and provides 4 inputs /outputs for about 200 euros per input total.

next step is to test the thunder3 with my yuan cards...

Hi NABtour,

the good news and the bad from a yuan card test in the Akitio thunder 3:

the good is: it just works, installed vmix yuan driver, put the yuan card in the Akitio and got an input. no problem. tested it with a two sdi input card. nice thing about these sdi input cards is they have a loop through on the inputs. I use that for direct projection on a screen at live events and bypass vmix.

the yuan card is input only, so unlike the bm card you can not configure an input to be an output...

more importantly however ( the bad ).

the yuan card i used has the first sdi input very low on the card. about 1 cm lower than the first sdi input on the bm duo 2 ( that is actually the reference which I don't use). The yuan input is so low that it is not possible to use it, or you would have to attach some converter or something.... Maybe it also blocks the card from really getting into the slot aswell, but i think it is just on. but the sdi input it thight to the akitio box, so no room left for a cable.

Anyway: this disqualifies the yuan card for me at this moment.

I think the bm duo 2 offers such sharp price pojnt per input and such versatility with a choise of input output configurations, the card is hard to beat.

will do some more tests with the bm card... pe i noticed the card will convert the sdi input which is 1080i50 automatically to 1080psf25. not bad, but maybe i would prefer vmix to handle the deinterlacing... not sure.

greetings,
stefan

I've been using a Skull Canyon NUC also with an Akitio TB3 and 15" Gechic LCD screen. All packed in my backpack with a small cabin luggage for cameras and sound mixer, handy setup.

I didn't even think about daisy chaining some stuff of the Akitio box, awesome idea, thank for the tips Stefan !
I'll try to borrow another Akitio TB3 and try to daisy chain it with a Yuan 2 HDMI input card (if i can find someone selling it, so far the only good price i found was on Amazon US, Yuan won't even reply to my mails asking for a suppliers list in Europe)
It would be neat for me to get 3 SDI input, 2 HDMI Input 1 SDI Input

I'm just a little worried about the Intel Iris graphics and render time though, but i also have a MSI GE63VR Laptop with a 1060 which should do the trick probably.

Regards,
Valentin

Oh, great new Stefan !
For information, i already have an Akitio Thunder3 with Duo 2 inside, my plan was trying to chain a 2nd Akitio Thunder3 with a Yuan dual HDMI input capture card, because in gaming we still use HDMI a lot and i don't have budget for goods converters like Decimators.

As for the compatiblity between Akitio Thunder 3 box and Yuan Quad SDI, i think you can mod it with tools like Dremel. I understand people would be reluctant to drill a 300€ case, but in my case it's already heavily modded with an added fan on the side and some wiring for also plugging a GTX 1060 inside with enough air cooling :)

Stefan, if you are okay, i will send you a direct message to ask you for a quote when i will get some funds for a SC542N4 HDMI. First i'm getting a Z620 workstation to get rid of my custom X99 setup.

Regards,
Valentin

guess it would be too good to be true- daisy chaining endless akitio pcie boxes untill we can reach Martins magical number of 1.000 inputs.

but alass... did not get it to work...

i can see the second box in thunderbolt but not the cards. tried to switch bm first yuan second, but Vmix only sees the inputs that are seen. with bm you have to open the inputs first with the bm software. but when second in line in the daisy it will not see the card.

it works with daisy chaining a bm mini recorder through the thunder 3 to 2 cable and attaching the bm mini thunder2 to it.

so in theory one could manage 4+1 input and use a displayport to hdmi to get an external screen output for streaming or other output uses.

so no luck this far. there might just be one option left and that is a second bm card in the second box and bm seeing it as one... but my guess is no.

will feedback to akitio though and adk to be sure.

they already reported they have design looking into the low input blocked by frame issue.

keep you posted. ideas and reactions welcome.
stefan
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