New PW Mini/Flex Production Release Candidate Beta for Canon and Nikon Now Available

PW has updated the Mini and Flex firmware to a production Release Candidate Beta. It has many bug fixes and a few new features so check them out.

I just tried my AB800, FlexTT5 w/AC9 and was able to shoot up to 1/2500 with no banding using hypersync on a Canon 60D. 1/4000 only showed slight banding but still usable. I'm much more satisfied with this release as I was only able to shoot up to 1/400 on the last beta using hypersync.

I can't wait to try these out on a senior shoot I have on Saturday!

markhyo wrote in post #12941253
PW has updated the Mini and Flex firmware to a production Release Candidate Beta. It has many bug fixes and a few new features so check them out.

I just tried my AB800, FlexTT5 w/AC9 and was able to shoot up to 1/2500 with no banding using hypersync on a Canon 60D. 1/4000 only showed slight banding but still usable. I'm much more satisfied with this release as I was only able to shoot up to 1/400 on the last beta using hypersync.

I can't wait to try these out on a senior shoot I have on Saturday!

Thanks for the heads up on the new firmware. I'm glad to see that the AC3 now works off-camera with the MiniTT1/FlexTT5 off camera for manually setting the power output of flashes/strobes.

[Edit: Oops! Meant to say AC3, not AC9. (fixed now)]

markhyo wrote in post #12941253
... was able to shoot up to 1/2500 with no banding using hypersync on a Canon 60D. 1/4000 only showed slight banding but still usable. I'm much more satisfied with this release as I was only able to shoot up to 1/400 on the last beta using hypersync.

Hypersync at 1/2500? The mechanical limit of most APS-C shutters is between 1/400 and 1/800. I can't imagine any shutter is fast enough to allow true sync at 1/2500 no matter how perfect the timing. The PW switches to HSS at some point (1/640 on my T2i).

AntonLargiader wrote in post #12944010
Hypersync at 1/2500? The mechanical limit of most APS-C shutters is between 1/400 and 1/800. I can't imagine any shutter is fast enough to allow true sync at 1/2500 no matter how perfect the timing. The PW switches to HSS at some point (1/640 on my T2i).

If you leave your PW's at the factory default the Hypersync switches at some point before 1/640. However if you go into the PW Utility and change to Hypersync only mode you may be able to shoot at faster shutter speeds. It's all dependent on how long your flash duration is. It's harder to get faster shutter speeds with flashes like a B400 because they have a short flash duration. The B800 is better but the B1600 has the shortest duration of them all. I have not tested hypersync with my speedlights yet and I really don't plan to use them in hypersync mode since they function very well with HSS. I mainly wanted to push the shutter for my Alienbee B800 since I like to shoot close to wide open.

In the past firmwares (betas) it took a little bit of experimenting to get hypersync to perform the way pocket wizard claimed but in this latest release I didn't have to do any tweaks at all.