I know this is not an easy problem to crack, so I will break it down:

I suppose the easiest way to ask, is Audio content Playback on one mac, Video content Playback on another.

External hardware needed?
Is MIDI Time clock an option in this scenario?

More depth:

My DAW software can slave to SMPTE, or MIDI Clock, on MAC"A"
My video playback ideally is a Quicktime Video, on MAC "B"
In my perfect dream world, the Quicktime video follows the audio content, so if I jump to a marker in the audio sequence, the video knows exactly where it should playback, regardless to what tempo the audio is set to.

Gear: MOTU 828 Firewire Audio card

I guess this begs the question. Why are you separating the video and audio onto two Macs?

Walter Biscardi, Jr.
Biscardi Creative Media
biscardicreative.com

Is there a purpose to this? Just take the audio from one mac and move it to the other via Firewire Mode -- then sync on the same mac -- is this for some museum multiple display? if so then your best bet is one mac many monitors and a video card that supports them to split up the pictures.

Yeah, we need to know the purpose you're trying to achieve. When I first read your request, my first response was just a multi-channel mixer to go out to whoever needs to hear the audio at a different location from the editing station.


www.derekmok.com

The purpose is simple: For my live MUSIC/VIDEO performance, I push the CPU on my laptop to unbelievable extremes while running Apple's Mainstage, live inputs, and a bazillion MIDI devices. My idea is to use a secondary Mac for the purposes of video playback, simply because attempting to do this all on one machine is impossible. I need both Macs to be communicating to each other, because if I jump ahead in an audio sequence on the laptop, spontaneously switch songs, or stop the show all together, I need the video computer to know exactly where I am in the timeline and respond accordingly.
This is why I think I may need to be using SMPTE, or maybe some kind of MIDI machine control.
I have an older MOTU 828, and thinking maybe I need to upgrade to one of their new video/audio cards.

Thanks for your help in advance, I know I am always guilty of attempting to achieve the impossible!


Cheers
Treatment