What bird brain at Apple did this?

Question

I'm importing video from analog camcorder and there's video but no sound. I guess apple didn't think it was important to know whether or not the sound is there. One really doesn't know if the audio portion is being downloaded until it's done. Give me a break. Oh sure, you can hear the audio through the recorder but not through the mac, where the (expletive deleted) movie is being downloaded too. Wait an hour and a half to download and find out there's no audio, not good. Someone at Apple must have had a brain ****.
I'm sorry. It just doesn't make sense.

Answer 1

What explanation are you wanting?
I was waiting to hear how you get a single import routine which imports four different major formats (three of which make it impossible to hear the audio as it is being converted) to play the audio for the one remaining format. As stated previously, this would require a completely separate routine. If it is so important to you to hear the audio then you have the immediate option of importing using an application that allows you to monitor the audio (i.e., iMovie HD or Vidi mentioned above) or you can send feedback to Apple requesting they provide a separate "DV w/audio" capture option and wait to see if they do anything. I do not need the constant reassurance of hearing the audio to know that it is working properly and so this is not a "hot topic" as far as I am concerned. I am much more interested in getting the Animation codec to work properly, getting the application to recognize all camcorders without having to jump through additional hoops, and finding and eliminating whatever is causing the additional SD degradation since the last update. You stated it didn't make sense that you could no longer hear the audio and I attempted to explain that this new application is based on the proposition that the growing majority of compression formats make audio monitoring impossible.
As I stated, I'm downloading analog, via Dazzle Hollywood Bridge.
I hope its not earliest model before they added the stabilization circuit.
I have a lot of video with the grandkids on analog tape and thought using iMovie 8 would be better. Well, it's not.
Many, if not most, people agree with you -- me included. I don't use iMovie '08 for anything but the quick sharing of content with my family. Am only interested in it from the standpoint that it is a completely new application/way of editing and may reveal the direction Apple could take with other applications over the next decade. (I.e., it is very interesting but "not ready for prime time" as far as I am concerned.)
Sure, if you already have a digital camcorder then you're okay. I now have one but I still have tapes that are analog and downloading them without hearing the sound pretty much is a joke. I can't understand why apple would omit that feature.
All of my camcorders are tape based -- including the Hi-8 and Digital-8 models not mentioned in my profile. I simply don't see a need to listen to a file as it is being captured or converted and have never used the option (i.e. made it a point to turn down the volume) when importing to iMovie HD. You do. That's fine. However, what I have been trying to convey is the point that if you only have one import routine and it it impossible to have audio for 3 compression formats using that routine, then it is unlikely that you would allow the forth to have audio without some major re-programming. I doubt that such a feature was eliminated by specific design but rather was left out in order to make programming simpler.