This is a half-baked product that is not worthy of purchase. Avoid it.

There are several issues that make this a show-stopper.

Primarily, the unit overheats like crazy and, in some cases, will start introducing frames of black causing a rapid but random, flickering effect in the output video stream. This effect gets worse as the unit continues to heat up. The case has virtually no air circulation so whether this problem is related to ventilation or to poor circuit board design, is hard to say.

Second, there are no power or status lights so you can't tell if the unit is functioning.

Third, the software is a joke starting with the installation process. The Mac .dmg install pushes a bunch of non-relevant software to your drive that you will have no use for. Furthermore, the system pref app is of marginal use as it has no preview pane for video and no real explanation if any of the settings are what you need to use. I've been using digital video software since Premier 1.0 in the early 90s and THAT era had better software than this.

Fourth, the unit's tolerance for stable video is very low. If it is not rock solid, it will not function. Even an otherwise great HDMI signal off of a non-HDCP camera source will cause users some issues.

Bottom line, look to another product such as from Elgato or AverMedia. The Intensity Shuttle is a toy, not a serious product.

The Intensity Shuttle for Thunderbolt records from every type of input that it claims to. *However,* if your HDMI output device (Xbox, Android phone) uses copy protection (HDCP, High-bandwidth Digital Content Protection) then it will *not* record HDMI input. This is not a shortcoming of the Shuttle, it's a licensing arrangement that Blackmagic Design must agree with if they are to support HDMI at all.

Thunderbolt speed is absolutely fantastic, allowing gameplay in realtime on the computer screen eliminating the need to hook up to a TV. We're very satisfied with the product.

To earn one more star, Blackmagic Design could include some instructions in a quick start guide to test analog throughput first, and HDMI later as HDMI streams may be subject to HDCP restrictions.

I am a first-time purchaser of Blackmagic Design products. I purchasedthe Intensity Shuttle for Thunderbolt after spending hours on the Blackmagic Design website. During that time I read anything and everything I could on the products so that I could make an informed buying decision.

What I wanted to do was to capture video generated by a Windows PC that I have. It has a video card that can do simultaneous output to a DVI port and to an HDMI port. I can hook monitors up to both of those ports, mirror them at 1080p60, and they work fine. So I figured I could purchase an external capture device, such as the Intensity Shuttle, and capture the video signal on my iMac.

Seems my expectation that Blackmagic Design could fill my need was premature. I purchased the Intensity Shuttle and hooked it up. It wouldn't work. Came to find out, after calling tech support, that my video card could output at 1080p50, 1080p59, or 1080p60. Except the Intensity shuttle couldn't capture at those rates. It could only do 1080p23.98 through 1080p30.

Crap. So in talking with Gilbert in tech support, he suggested I look to see what interlaced specs the video card would do. I did, and it will do 1080i25, 1080i29, and 1080i30. But, of course, the Intensity Shuttle won't. It's printed specs (available on the Blackmagic Design website) say that it will only do 1080i50, 1080i59.94, and 1080i60. No match, right?

Wrong. Gilbert said that 1080i25 will match up with 1080i50 (likewise for the others, just multiply by 2). Dang! How in the world was a person to know that without a call to tech support (and the attendant 30+ minute wait)? Why wasn't that information on the Blackmagic Design website anywhere? Gilbert couldn't say. (Seems like the company should be interested in anything that would answer users questions and cut down on tech support time. Apparently not.)

So I tried to get it to handshake at those interlaced rates. Wouldn't do it. Convinced that it must be a faulty Intensity Shuttle, I asked for an RMA and shipped the unit back to Blackmagic Design. They tested it, recording video for several hours with no problem.

*sigh*

I called and talked to someone else in tech support (not Gilbert) who told me that the testing had shown no problems. He asked me to repeat for him the problems I was having. He suggested that, perhaps, the HDMI handshake wasn't happening because of HDCP protection. You see, even though I only wanted to capture mouse and cursor movements from the screen for an instructional video, the video card might not talk to a capture device such as the Intensity Shuttle because I could really be capturing a DVD or a Netflix stream.

Could be; I don't know. There is no way to tell without buying more equipment to check how the handshake is working. That's overkill. All I know is that, as a consumer, I plug the HDMI output into a monitor or TV, and it works. I plug it into the Intensity Shuttle and it won't. Works with one device, doesn't with another. Very frustrating.

So, I decided that I would, instead, use the Intensity Shuttle to transfer some old VHS tapes to digital files. It would make a great family gift if I could grab the 1990 video interview of my now-deceased grandfather and share it with my siblings. So, I grab a VHS player, plug it into a TV, and verify that it does, in fact, play the VHS tape. (It was good to see grandpa again.)

Then, I plug the VHS into the Intensity Shuttle and connect the pass-through output from the Intensity Shuttle to the same TV. Doesn't show up on my iMac or on the TV. Only thing different is that I've inserted the Intensity Shuttle into the mix.

*Argh!* (Can't Blackmagic Design figure out that their products should be as drop-dead easy to use as a TV? Just "plug it in" and it works? Apparently not.)

So I make another call to tech support and talk with Richard. He walks me through some steps that show that my iMac is now, all of a sudden, not seeing my Intensity Shuttle. We switch around some cables, and all of a sudden it works. (According to Richard, sometimes a Thunderbolt cable will work with one device, but not another. Sometimes you even have to turn the cable around so that its ends are opposite of what they were. Go figure! Sure does build confidence in the supposed solution you are trying to use.)

Anyway, now the video shows up in Blackmagic Media Express. Except it was unusable. It was flashing on and off, showing tons of dropouts. Richard said that "we often see this with analog signals from VHS players." Seems that the signal from the VHS player doesn't meet the specs required by Blackmagic Design. But I could try to get a timecode corrector to see if that would help. He couldn't suggest one that would work, and he couldn't even tell me if it would work.

*Arrrrgggghhhhh!* I'm trying to grab a simple little composite signal from a VHS player, and a multi-hundred-dollar Blackmagic Design product won't do it. A cheap hundred-dollar TV or monitor will do it, but the Intensity Shuttle won't. Hard FAIL!

So now I have a multi-hundred-dollar doorstop. It won't do "hard" things (like capture HDMI video) and it won't do "simple" things (like capture composite video). It looks pretty sitting on my desk, but it is apparently worthless.

The standard company line (that I've heard from three different Blackmagic Design tech support people of the course of the past five weeks) is that "the specs have to match up exactly, or our device won't work." That seems, to me, to be dodging the issue and borders on "blaming the other guy." Nowhere in the pre-sales information that I read on Blackmagic Design's website did it mention that their specs were so narrow, so finely tuned, so exclusive that their products won't do what a lowly hundred-dollar TV will do. Perhaps that's because if they did say it, it would affect sales. It certainly would have affected the sale of this particular product to me.

Come on, Blackmagic Design—get your collective heads out of your you-know-whats and understand that to a non-engineer consumer, if a device will work with a TV or monitor and it is plug-and-play simple, it should also be plug-and-play simple with your devices. While your tech support people were professional and as helpful as they could be, the bottom line is that I have a very, very bad taste in my mouth based upon my experience with your products. I understand the old adage of "let the buyer beware," and I will certainly be helping other potential customers understand it as well, when it comes to your products.