Video Storage

1. leonlacourt
   Member

   
   Hi guys, which brand and model of external hard drive that support triple interface (firewire 800-400 and usb 2.0) and also can be configurated as RAID 0-1 do you recommend? I was looking at LaCie and G-Raid. i have only 500 hundred dollars for it. I just want about 500 GB of space for footage and keep it safe. Thanks

   Posted 5 years ago #

2. elderban
   Member

   
   Best bet is to back up your raw footage to DVD. That's what I plan on doing.
   
   Hard drives get full, and what do you do at that point.
   
   Of course you can always consider hot-swap drives, but you're less likely to lose the data if it's on a DVD.

   Posted 5 years ago #

3. Video-maniac
   Member

   

   elderban Wrote:

   Best bet is to back up your raw footage to DVD. That's what I plan on doing.
   
   Hard drives get full, and what do you do at that point.
   
   Of course you can always consider hot-swap drives, but you're less likely to lose the data if it's on a DVD.

   
   
   Huh?? 8-O
   
   I guess it all depends on how big your projects are.
   
   If I were to backup all my DV AVI raw footage to DVD, I would need a million and one disks and a lot of time on my hands. I believe you can only store about 16 minutes (give or take) of uncompressed DV AVI footage on one normal size DVD disk. Of course I would first have to cut up all of my projects into 16 minute segments so that I can put these files on a disk and then I would have to label all of the disks so I could keep track of them. Now if I wanted to bring back all of these files, I'll have to sit down and spend a couple of hours loading DVD after DVD back into my PC again and then I would have to re-assemble all of the 16 minutes files back together again in an editing app. Storing raw footage on DVDs is not very practical IMO.
   
   lonlacourt,
   
   You're on the right track. An associate of mine uses LaCie and loves them. I think they come with a couple of different interface options too. I suggested that he uses the faster IEEE1394 connections thinking that this will easily keep up with the speed needed for video but he actually went with the USB 2.0 connections instead. I was very surprised to find that the USB connection was able to keep up with the speed needed for video work. He said that he has never had a problem yet.
   
   Another option that even I have done on occasion is to copy the footage back to MiniDV tapes via firewire and a camera. It's real time so it takes longer but it's saved in the originally quality and it involves a lot less switching around. If a tape is getting full, you just stop your editing software from feeding the footage, switch tapes and then you just hit record on your camera and play on your editor and you're back to storing. Like I said, it takes a little longer but at least you don't have to baby sit it as much and you don't have to fool around with a lot of DVDs.
   
   RAM

   Posted 5 years ago #

4. kkmac
   Member

   
   I agree with video-maniac. DVDs and not practical for storage due to the sheer number of discs needed. I recently bought a USB adapter for converting virtually any hard drive into a USB drive. It works with IDE, SATA, notebook, and even optical drives. Only cost $30. Hard drives are cheap enough so I buy a good size one, (recently a 320Gig SATA), plug it in with the USB adapter, move the files I want to save, unplug the drive, (its hot swappable), and box the drive until I need it again. Theres no need to mount the drive inside the tower. This frees up the hard drive space actually inside the computer.
   
   By the way, USB 2.0 is faster than firewire. The data transfer rates through this adapter are as fast as if it were installed inside your computer.
   
   I recommend this device for anyone who edits video and wants to save all their work.
   (Vantec SATA/IDE to USB2.0 Adapter @ Newegg.com)

   Posted 5 years ago #

5. stonewall
   Member

   
   this is true. usb 2.0 is 480 Mbps where as IEEE1394(firewire) is 400 Mbps. that being said, usb 2.0 is not a sustained data rate wheere as firewire is a sustained stream of 4oo Mbps. I find that the transfer rate for usb 2.0 fluctuates too much for my tastes. I prefer to have my data comming in at a constant rate.

   Posted 5 years ago #

6. Video-maniac
   Member

   
   I stand corrected! :-//
   
   I think I was looking at USB 1.0 data. Needless to say, I have just been updated.
   
   As far as IEEE1394 configurations go, there is a IEEE1394 S800 out there that is capable of handling 786 Mbits/s but you have to have the right kind of architecture to handle that. This is pretty much overkill for video already anyway.
   
   RAM

   Posted 5 years ago #

7. leonlacourt
   Member

   
   Ok guys i understand all of your concers about the connection, i plan to connect vias firewire400 thats not a problem. I just want to know wich brand do you recommend me between LaCie or Graid. i read that LaCie uses one big hard drive of 500 Gb on the Big Disk Extreme RAID 0 and that the disk is a PATA disk anyone knows about this. Graid instead uses SATA II drives, 2 to be correct. Which of this do you recomend. Is for editing video DV.

   Posted 5 years ago #

8. compusolver
   Member

   
   Probably can't go wrong with either. I use a Coolmax enclosure and a single Sata (JBOD) drive with firewire connection and it works just fine. Either of the configurations you mention should be faster than mine.

   Posted 5 years ago #

9. elderban
   Member

   
   You can store 1 to 2 hours of "DVD quality" video on a DVD.
   
   But then again, my projects aren't very large, so I don't need a lot of storage.

   Posted 5 years ago #

10. compusolver
    Member

    
    My 3 to 4 camera shoot weddings range from 70 to 100gigs average, in raw tape. Which probably edits down to 30 - 40 gig of "keeper" clips.
    
    Something that hasn't been mentioned here is the fact that you can take your clips, store then in different bins (in PP), then use "Automate to sequence" to quickly put them all into a sequence. You can organize them all into different sequences from different bins, then "Export to tape".
    
    If you have weeded out your bad takes, trimmed your AVI's and only use the trimmed ones, you can have a tape of just the "keeper" trimmed clips. No, tapes don't last forever, but they should last until HD-DVD or Blu-Ray burners are installed in your system.
    
    It's also a good idea to use "Export to tape" for your finished (DVD version) video. You can later cut out any particular scene and replace it with an updated one without having to re-do everything.

    Posted 5 years ago #

11. Video-maniac
    Member

    

    elderban Wrote:

    You can store 1 to 2 hours of "DVD quality" video on a DVD.
    
    But then again, my projects aren't very large, so I don't need a lot of storage.

    
    
    Sure but DV AVI quality is better then DVD quality so why would you store raw footage in a lesser quality for later use?
    
    At any rate, either you’re confused or I’m confused. (I’ve been known to be that. :D ) The original poster asked what brand of exterior HD would we all recommend. He said that he needs a place to back up or store footage. Now the question is whether it’s raw or finish footage.
    
    Granted you can store close to 2 hours of video on a DVD but if you wanted to use that footage again, it will be compressed so your end results will not be as good as it could be when you wanted to use that again. DVD quality is compressed were as DV AVI is not.
    
    Now in my interpretation, I look at the term footage as being RAW because this is what you draw from to make a finished project of which you would then burn to DVD. I DO archive my finished projects to DVD but I sure don’t save footage that I want to use again later on a DVD. I’ll either hard drive it or throw it back on a tape.
    
    If he is storing this footage to be used at a later time, then you won’t get 2 hours of high quality AVI video on a DVD. It looks like 20 minutes is about the max.
    
    RAM

    Posted 5 years ago #

12. leonlacourt
    Member

    
    Oki may be is my fualt all the confussion. im talking for storage of RAW mateial for non-linear edting on final cut pro. I plan to go wiht G-Raid because i have read consumer opinions on LaCie and those are bad ones. But if anyone out there could recomend a safer and chepest way to store my raw material for editing and that can offer me som kind of protection, the kind of a RAID 1 configuration, it would be perfect.

    Posted 5 years ago #

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