[denaliman]

Hi,

I am looking for a good video storage solution for both raw footage (not RAW) and edited video movies. I am using a Sony HDR-HC1 HDV handycam, 1080i video, HDV, DV and I think MPEG-2. Camera transfer to PC via firewire 400. Will be using Sony Vegas Movie Studio Platinum Suite for editing.I have been looking at the G-RAID and the G-drive external units, but not sure what benefit this would be over another internal drive. The G's are highly rated for video, but are also expensive. Do I need RAID or otherwise? How much space...2TB? I have a Coolermaster HAFX with 2 empty hot swap bays and 1 other free bay. Win 7 Ultimate OS, i7 950 cpu, 6870 video card. I run my OS off of a 120GB SSD, my data is stored on a 1TB caviar black drive. I also have a NAS DS209+ running in RAID for business. I would like something independent of these drives. I do have firewire, eSATA and USB 3.0 capable computer. Any suggestions or advice is appreciated.

THX.

 

[sleemo]

You don't need RAID for storage, as in a backup solution, unless cost isn't a factor for you. If you just want a place to backup your work and raw footage, get an external USB or eSATA drive. Or buy an enclosure, like Vantec or Thermaltake, and put in your own hard drive. They cost about $30-$50 plus the cost of whatever size hard drive you want. An expensive fast hard drive isn't needed either, it's just storage and backup. And when you're not using the external drive, shut it down and unplug it.

 

[denaliman]

So you think that an external drive would be better than putting in another 2TB Caviar Black internal drive used just for video editing? Why would the external one be better?

THX

 

[jvincent]

External is good because you can easily take it somewhere else as a backup for disaster recovery.

Since the files in question are quite large you should make sure that the drive is fast enough that it isn't a limiting factor to copying data.

 

[denaliman]

What should I be looking for as far as speed? 7200 rpm is pretty standard. eSATA or USB 3.0 for external? With an external will I be able to download directly from my camera to the drive without plugging into my computer?if so I would need a firewire connection on the drive, or would the data need to be transferred through the computer then transfer to the external hard drive ?

 

[jvincent]

Any standard drive should be OK. Just don't go for one that has a premium for extra speed.

Personally I would go for USB3.0 since it will be more common than eSATA.

Being able to copy directly to the drive is really a function of the camera. If you can get a drive/enclosure with both firewire and USB then it might support direct copy.

 

[Larry]

Enclosures are cheap so changing them in the future is not much of a problem. USB 3.0 is still flakey and not well supported IMHO. I have a Vantec USB 3.0 and it works when connected to my Windows 7 PC (my MOBO has USB 3.0 support), but when the PC goes to sleep, the drive will not wake up. Connected to USB 2.0 it works fine.

I think eSATA is not going away - after all these drives are SATA.. all eSATA is a way to extend the SATA connection out of your PC - it is only a cable.

I have my external drives connected via eSATA and it is just like having them housed inside the PC itself, yet portable.

 

[Transmico]

I do not want to hijack this thread in anyway, but I saw a wireless external hard drive from a company called Clickfree yesterday. Looks pretty cool, a little pricy ($199.00) but from the description it's pretty much stand alone.

Moderators if this is Hijacking then please delete this post.

T.

 

[Zorac]

for backup purposes i use an esata drive. i made a bat file that runs robocopy to do the actual backup when i want it to. you could use something like synctoy as well (but only do an 'echo', the sync function never seems to work quite right for me at least)

i actually juse a esata dock, and as i upgrade my computer, the old drives that were in the computer become backup drives. so if you ajhve some old ones around that are big enough, just use them.

 

[ScaryBob]

So you think that an external drive would be better than putting in another 2TB Caviar Black internal drive used just for video editing? Why would the external one be better?

You need both.

A fast internal drive (or two) for doing video editing is required. Making one fast drive the source and the other the destination speeds up video editing significantly. It also provides some redundancy in case of drive or software failure.

An external drive is needed for backups. The farther removed it is from the source PC the better. There are a number of ways to do this. An internal drive is the least secure from data loss. A local USB drive is better but not by a lot. Two USB drives, one off site and swapped when the other is updated is much better. A NAS is better than a local USB drive, especially if located in a secure room or off site. Off site internet backup services are another option. Backups should be automated on a daily or continuous basis.

 

[denaliman]

Thanks.

 

[denaliman]

So what you are advising is I get two more hard drives? I have a SSD running my win 7 OS. I have a Caviar Black that my video editing software is on and my data. So currently i have 2 HDD. What you are saying is download the video content from my camera directly to a 3rd drive(not my current Caviar) and edit the material and put it on another 4th hard drive?