MXO Awards and Reviews
Matrox MXO Awards 2006 Vanguard Award for Matrox MXO  Digital Content Producer Pick Hit 06 for Matrox MXO ( Digital Content Producer Magazine, US, June 2006) Pick Hits are awarded to products that show significant technological innovation, while promising to have a positive, practical impact on the day-to-day professional lives of digital content producers. "If this doesn't cause you to leap to your feet and shout, 'Hallelujah,' then you haven't spent two days rendering for output a 90-minute HDV edit in Final Cut," says judge D.W. Leitner. "It's a godsend to editors."  The Vidy Award 2006 for Matrox MXO (Videography magazine, US, April 2006) In recognition of achievement in the advancement of the art and science of production and postproduction technology. "The winners of these awards have shown a deep understanding of their users' needs and have created products that will make video professionals' jobs easier and projects better." Doug Krainman, publisher of CMP Entertainment Media's Video Group. Matrox MXO Editorial CoverageMatrox MXO: Broadcast Monitoring on a Desktop Monitor (creativecow.net – Shane Ross, December 2007) “…the combination of the Matrox MXO, the Apple Cinema Display, and the adjustment controls with the BLUE ONLY option, you can really balance your display to give you color accurate, broadcast quality HD monitoring. And you can adjust the monitor settings with a probe like the Spyder 2 or EyeOne2 to get it to the D65 color setting. For under $2000. The feature set doesn’t stop there. You can also downconvert HD to SD…And send out a letterboxed signal, or anamorphic or pillarboxed...VERY handy, because not everyone has a monitor with at 16:9 button to unsqueeze anamporphic footage.” “So, with the new options released in the 2.0 drivers, I can say that the Matrox MXO and the Apple Cinema Display is a perfect low cost, broadcast HD, color correction combination.” Read entire article Matrox MXO (2.0) Display Output Device Review (Videomaker Magazine – John Burkhart, September 2007) “For high-definition editing on a Mac, take a serious look at the Matrox MXO. Coupled with a relatively inexpensive LCD monitor, it's like getting the functionality of a full broadcast monitor at a fraction of the price, with useful output options not found on any display.” Read entire article Matrox MXO Review (DVuser – Nigel Cooper, August 5, 2007) Rating:  “The MXO is perfect in every way. Brilliant colour grading at a pittance compared to a Grade 1 monitor, beautifully reproduced motion; especially interlaced footage which needs it the most on computer displays, which are progressive by nature. Easy to set up and use and keep updated via future firmware updates.” Read entire article Hands On Matrox MXO (Videomaker Magazine – John Burkhart, July 2007) "You get a very professional high-end, high-definition monitoring solution and you can save yourself thousands and thousands of dollars off of buying a dedicated hardware monitor."  Watch video clip Matrox MXO 2.0 A Mac-only monitoring and downscaling device, and also a great way to calibrate your monitors! (broadcastnewsroom.com – Heath McKnight, June 2007) "This little hardware box packs quite a punch, and if you’re editing with HDV, whether on a desktop or a laptop, you’ll have no need for expensive capture cards; A/D, D/A; or small HD CRT monitors to see and hear your footage in high definition. All you need is an extra monitor (native 1920 x 1200 preferred), speakers and the MXO, and you’re ready to rock and roll!” "Another thing I love about the MXO is that it’s portable. If a client needs you to edit something at his or her office, you grab your Apple laptop and a FireWire drive, and perhaps a deck if you need to capture. Well, throw in your monitor, mini speakers and MXO, and you’re set to professionally monitor what’s happening.” "When I plugged MXO into a new Mac Pro with FCP 6, and output to a 23-inch Apple LCD (native 1920 x 1200 pixel resolution), things got really cool. Now I was able to see and monitor 1080i50 video, and later, 1080p23.98 with no problems…Not only does the MXO allow you to calibrate your monitor, but it also keeps things playing smoothly, with no flicker, at broadcast quality, without any issues.” "Whether you’re cutting in HDV or DV, having the MXO provides many benefits for monitoring and downscaling options. It’s an excellent and affordable monitoring solution with no stutter on playback…I highly recommend the Matrox MXO.” Matrox MXO - Overall rating: HOT Kick Your Workflow into High Gear (Studio Monthly Magazine – By Bruce Nazarian, January 1, 2007) "Every now and then, a really cool tool shows up that performs an assortment of useful functions and really kicks your workflow into high gear. The Matrox MXO is that tool. This tiny standalone box intercepts the DVI output feed from your secondary monitor and converts it into many different formats of broadcast-quality HD or SD video, suitable for output to videotape, or even direct encoding into MPEG-2 (if you have a real-time hardware encoder). MXO can solve annoying formatting issues that have long bugged desktop video editors; for example, MXO can reformat widescreen (HD) content into SD formats (letterboxed, anamorphic or center crop) in real time, as playout occurs from the editorial timeline. There are some other interesting solutions, as well. For instance, MXO "presentation" mode displays the secondary computer desktop on an external video monitor, making it a perfect solution for DVD and broadcast graphics designers who are looking for a way to "proof" their work in real time on a video monitor. In addition, the installation of MXO is a snap! The hardware plugs into your Mac setup in a few minutes; the software installs quickly from the supplied CD. Once I was all set up, I gave MXO the run-through using three of my favorite apps— Final Cut Studio, DVD Studio Pro and Adobe Photoshop.” Matrox MXO - 4/5 Matrox MXO Review "The real beauty of this box, is the ability to output your Final Cut Pro sequence to SD or HD on the fly without having to transcode your video. If you are working with HDV the box is performing a down-res or up-res of your HDV footage. Full HD uses a picture size of 1920 x 1080 with a color sampling of 4:2:2. HDV records at 1280x720 or 1440x1080 using a color sampling of 4:1:1. The Matrox MXO will either up-res HDV, DVCPRO HD or Dynamic RT segments to
full output resolution or down-res your HD sequence to SD Matrox Ships MXO for Mac Video Editing (gizmodo.com, By Charlie White, July 2006) "Matrox just shipped MXO, a handy little box for Mac users who edit professional-level video... MXO is capable of some counterintuitive feats as well, such as extracting 8 channels of SDI embedded audio with stereo audio monitoring from the secondary DVI port on a Mac. The best part of MXO is, until now, Mac users couldn't get an accurate view of what would actually be seen on a television screen when watching their productions in full-screen view on a computer display. Now they can get that full 1080i effect, using this $995 box. I've seen this baby, and it's fo' real." Read entire article Matrox MXO Now Shipping ( www.2-popforums.com, by Ned Soltz, July 2006) "[Matrox MXO] really provides one of the best options out there for monitoring HD and HDV in realtime from your Mac. I'll be writing a more extensive review, but just wanted to spread the word that it is shipping and at $995 represents a good value. I highly recommend it." Read entire article Matrox Intros RT.X2 and MXO at NAB 2006 Bringing HD production down to earth on Mac and PC (Digital Video Editing - By Charlie White, May 2006) "MXO looks like it can be a handy little box, eliminating the need to buy a high-rez HD monitor, and at the same time allowing real-time recording of HD output on a tape deck in addition to real-time down-rezzing to SD." Read entire article |