This is topic CHRISTIE Digital Readers Living Proof! in forum Film Handlers' Forum at Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE.
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Posted by Demetris Thoupis (Member # 833) on 08-26-2001, 01:24 PM:
Hello all,
Long time no see. Well army duty. I entered the website again after two months. Hope everyone is fine. Nice seeing all of the forums moving well. Anyway. Here in Cyprus the new K-CINEPLEX in Larnaca opened two nights ago and I witnessed the amazing CHRISTIE Digital Readers!!! WOW. What a piece of crap. With CP650, the readers gave a full FALT rate!!! I've asked the technician to do a recheck on the settings of the readers and he said that they tested the readers with the film PERFECT STORM for a whole week and that they gave perfect readings. So I guess everyone's comments about resetting the readers for each film must be right 
. During my three day off I even paid a visit to the reinovation of RIO cinemas in Limassol to help the technician in alligning the KINOTON projectors. Now those are projectors. We alligned the basement readers and they gave perfect readings. We even played couple of trailers and one reel from 5 different films for check. PERFECT!! Of course CP650 does most of the job. So the choices now in the market are CP45 or CP650 right? Anyway. See ya all.
Have a nice time
Demetris Thoupis
Posted by Brad Miller (Member # 2) on 08-26-2001, 02:32 PM:
Try having your techs align the readers with film printed at Deluxe. For some bizarred technical reason of which I do not know why, if you align the reader using something from the Technicolor lab I've found that Deluxe prints will commonly fault. Align the reader from a Deluxe strip of film and all prints generally play fine. At least that's what I have found to be the case consistently.(Perfect Storm was a Technicolor print.)
Posted by Richard Fowler (Member # 893) on 08-26-2001, 04:39 PM:
In the U.S. that may be the case....where does Cyprus get their prints?...the world is not all Technicolor or Delux....sometimes the printing elements will originate from U.S. labs. If the film is dubbed it may have a new sound negative from another source. Dolby has been very good in the Q.C. with the labs but problems still occur. We had a problem with a film that was printed in several countries by different labs last year where the duplicate sound printing element was so far out of register that it would fault immediately on playback.
Richard Fowler
TVP-Theatre & Video Products Inc. www.tvpmiami.com
Posted by Mark Gulbrandsen (Member # 72) on 08-26-2001, 05:09 PM:
As far as I know they also make the CP-65. Since I have gotten most of mine used lately and I have not bought a new Dolby in about a year now. If they have stopped making the 65 than they have lost me as a customer. I will switch to Panastereo at that point as its actually even better than a CP-65.
As far as I am concerned the 650 is a piece of junk.....should reside right along side of every P-35. I wouldn't sell one to anyone. The only thing I find good about the 650 is the setup software. Beyond that you'd think it was made by some nightlighters at SDDS or something.
Mark
Posted by Richard Fowler (Member # 893) on 08-26-2001, 06:41 PM:
The CP-65 is still available even though it can not be officially sold in Europe due to updated CE standards regarding emi/rf emmissions....still have a studio/lab model in stock and I still get requests several times a year for units.
Richard Fowler
TVP-Theatre & Video Products Inc. www.tvpmiami.com
Posted by Steve Guttag (Member # 268) on 08-31-2001, 11:36 PM:
The Dolby CP-45, CP-65 and CP-650 are all still on the available list.I can't say I share Mark's opinion on the CP-650. It has be one of their more reliable processors (no failures on any of the ones I have installed)...a much needed relief from the CP-500's little difficulties.
My only critques of the CP-650 are the lack of flexibility with formats and inputs the poorly implemented Surround-EX outputs (requires that the Ls and Rs outputs be moved to the Option I/O connector and the lack of a separate monitor output.
Soncially, it seems to be on par with just about any unit out there. Also, the CP-650 is 1/3 octave EQ on all channels, right out of the box.
Steve
------------------
"Old projectionists never die, they just changeover!"
Posted by Mark Gulbrandsen (Member # 72) on 09-01-2001, 12:01 AM:
Edwards Theatres just completed weeding out all of the Christie basement readers that they had in the Idaho theatre operations. All Dolby Cat 701's were installed in their place.
Mark @ GTS
Posted by John Walsh (Member # 168) on 09-01-2001, 09:33 AM:
I notice that motion picture equipment from Europe are all CE approved, but very few American manufacturers (and no projector manufacturers) bother.
Posted by Richard Fowler (Member # 893) on 09-01-2001, 10:16 AM:
CE rating is a more informal process of rules and regulations. The manufacturer looks up for applicable regulations within the CE code and notes which rule pertains to their equipment. If taken to court on a liability issue then the manufacturer must prove compliance. In the USA we have UL/ETL ratings which are more formal but as part of the approval process CE ratings can be part of the package. Companies such as Dolby, Smart, QSC and others usually display the CE logo while other manufacturers will stick on a CE label if the item is destined for export.
Richard Fowler
TVP-Theatre & Video Products Inc. www.tvpmiami.com
Posted by Michael Elam (Member # 788) on 09-09-2001, 07:06 PM:
I have nine of these. You can align them all day long but as soon as you change prints, or trailers it can change from readings of 3 to 6,
all the upgrades have been done, twice. If we use rubber bands to hold the two damper arms tighter we can get a steady number, removing the rubber bands we get a higher number and F, like 5 f, 5 f. I have attempted to talk with Bevan and Jim about this but they don't seemed to want to find a solution to make it right, I was even told to use the rubber bands! If you haven't encounter it yet, the bearings in the lateral guide rollers can get so bad you can't get all of it out, so you are forced to buy the entire roller with the bearings at a cost of around $220.00 each., that is if they have any in stock, you need 6 or 8 and they have 2. I guess they are so concerned with the
Digital Projection that we take a back seat.
Posted by Richard Fowler (Member # 893) on 09-09-2001, 08:10 PM:
Christie, according to reliable people I know, asked two well known engineers to make the basement reader more reliable and in the end recommended a penthouse addition. A prototype was shown at CineAsia last year which had some updated neat features compared to the Dolby CAT 701 penthouse. This penthouse is in limbo due to lack of market and the interest of other parties in marketing it.
Richard Fowler
TVP-Theatre & Video Products Inc. www.tvpmiami.com