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Home: Video University Forums: Wedding & Event Videography:
raid 2 - mirroring for extra data protection

Don Pham
User

Apr 2, 2008, 3:57 PM

Post #1 of 19 (513 views)
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raid 2 - mirroring for extra data protection	Can't Post

so i am making plans on this hd move with the ex1. i am thinking about storing the video data on external raid 2. http://www.tigerdirect.com/...ody=MAIN#detailspecs

the 2 tb means i really only have 1 tb of storage because of the mirroring thing. i think that will be around 10 weddings worth of raw footage. good move? bad move? your thoughts please.

thanks

Don Pham
Take 1 Productions
The Blog
ReFrame

brucecleveland
Veteran

Apr 2, 2008, 5:13 PM

Post #2 of 19 (503 views)
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Re: [Don Pham] raid 2 - mirroring for extra data protection [In reply to]	Can't Post

In Reply To

Don I don't know how many hours you shoot. Bringing video into my mac from the cf card on my Z7 takes up 75 to 100 gigs per hour. I have a sata case with 5 terabyte drives inside and hope to be able to fit 7 or 8 weddings on the 5 drives. I have also decided not to raid at this point.

Bruce
"Always over my head, but not quite deep enough to drown."

MLiebergot
Veteran

Apr 2, 2008, 6:09 PM

Post #3 of 19 (491 views)
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Re: [Don Pham] raid 2 - mirroring for extra data protection [In reply to]	Can't Post

Don just so you know, I have heard some bad things about the WD MyBook series units.

I have personaly had a lot of luck purchasing units from firewiredirect. They have great customer service and very solid units.

Michael

Cameras: I do use them.
Audio: Yes, it does come with audio if you like.
Software: I am learning...
Support: I need all that i can get.
Computer: MAC BABY!

RT Steele
Veteran

Apr 2, 2008, 6:16 PM

Post #4 of 19 (483 views)
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Re: [MLiebergot] raid 2 - mirroring for extra data protection [In reply to]	Can't Post

I have heard some bad things about the WD MyBook series units

I've got one (750gb) and have edited 5 weddings on it so far. It gets used a lot too.

The only thing I don't like is it will go in standy-by after a few minutes of idle time and it takes 3 seconds or so to "wake up". Pretty damned annoying.

- RT

Don Pham
User

Apr 2, 2008, 7:22 PM

Post #5 of 19 (474 views)
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Re: [brucecleveland] raid 2 - mirroring for extra data protection [In reply to]	Can't Post

In Reply To

so a 16 gig card which can take 1 hour of video turns to 100 gig when i transfer it to the computer? wow...i didn't know that. how does that happen? i am not a computer guy so it maybe a dumb question..sorry.

Don Pham
Take 1 Productions
The Blog
ReFrame

brucecleveland
Veteran

Apr 2, 2008, 7:30 PM

Post #6 of 19 (471 views)
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Re: [Don Pham] raid 2 - mirroring for extra data protection [In reply to]	Can't Post

Hi Don

That is how it has been working on my mac yes. I was shocked. I still am not sure if I am doing everything correctly yet, as the sizes have varied from 75 gigs to 100 gigs per hour of video. Never a dumb question though.

Bruce
"Always over my head, but not quite deep enough to drown."

fr0gm@n
Veteran

Apr 2, 2008, 7:34 PM

Post #7 of 19 (468 views)
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Re: [Don Pham] raid 2 - mirroring for extra data protection [In reply to]	Can't Post

The original video is probably an HDV for m2t type of stream file that is basically MPEG2 video. By nature it is already compressed with a long GOP. This footage is much more intensive on your system to edit cause it has to basically uncompress the video on the fly and apply changes. When you export and re-encode the final product it will frequently take a long time to encode because of the complexity of working with mpeg2 files.

What Bruce is probably doing is uprezzing to an intermediate codec that is frame based similar to DV. It edits very easily and doesn't tax your system as bad. The down side is that uprezzed file will be about 3x the size of your original file.

I use Edius for editing and uprez all my HD content to Canopus HQ. It uses up about 30gb per hour of video. WHile it takes more drive space it edits easily and an off the shelf dual core computer. Throw an off the shelf quad core at it and it edits almost like you are used to with DV files. When it is time to encode to the final product the encoding is quicker as well because it is frame based. The uprezzed file in Canopus HQ is nearly impossible to distinguish from the original.

Bruce is on a Mac so he is probably uprezzing to Prorez HD (or whatever the codec for Macs is called). These files are by nature much bigger but much easier to edit.

I have noticed you are looking to build bleeding edge computers lately. If you use an uprezzed framebased codec you can edit pretty well on a much lessor computer. Of course a bleeding edge computer will really sing but my homebuilt quad core with 2gb of ram and a single eSATA drive (no RAID or anything) is handling a 3 camera edit with close the same ease as my older dual core did with SD footage. It is a very usable solution and only cost a little over $1K to build. I didn't install an NX card for RT output as I just used the NLE monitors for editing. Works great for me.

If you are looking to edit the files from your EX1 natively right from the card then you will need as much horsepower as you can throw at it. For that workflow the more power the better.

Hope this explains it a little.

Why does a gorilla have big nostrils.......cause it has big fingers.

frog blog

Don Pham
User

Apr 2, 2008, 7:42 PM

Post #8 of 19 (461 views)
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Re: [fr0gm@n] raid 2 - mirroring for extra data protection [In reply to]	Can't Post

would it be possible to just store the file in an external drive as is...what i mean is 16 gig of data from a card stored as 16 gig on the external drive. when it is time to edit, uprez just that wedding on edius to edit. that way i can save space on the drive.

Don Pham
Take 1 Productions
The Blog
ReFrame

glimmer
Veteran

Apr 2, 2008, 9:15 PM

Post #9 of 19 (440 views)
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Re: [Don Pham] raid 2 - mirroring for extra data protection [In reply to]	Can't Post

There are a lot of mixed reviews on external storage. I actually have some of the WD MyBooks...a 320, 2 500's, and 2 750's. They've worked fine for me. I've actually been looking for a larger system / array and have been considering Buffalo Tech drives. The reviews seem decent and prices are comparable. I do a redundant array for critical information but for client files, especially since each project of mine averages 300-400G, I try to maximize the space. I've been looking into these.... http://www.buffalotech.com/...storage/terastation/ They're more expensive the WD drives, but who knows....The one you linked to though is a decent price - $500 for 2T of space - awesome. Damn, I need to stop spending money.

bruceo
Veteran

Apr 2, 2008, 10:55 PM

Post #10 of 19 (423 views)
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Re: [glimmer] raid 2 - mirroring for extra data protection [In reply to]	Can't Post

Dell had a special a few days ago for $375 2TB storage....

I have 2 terastations and 2 Infrant/Netgear readyNAS boxes. They I am lukewarm on them. They are nice for always on access to media and files but give you a somewhat false sense of security. I use USB drives for project drives and back up all of the raw files and project EDL files to a 2nd external drive. All finished projects go to the raids and then I use Western digital passport drives for backup of the finished projects and store them offsite in a deposit box. So once the project is finished the project and backup get cleared the final files are in 2 places the raid and the offsite backup. My recent challenge is the fact that a few project piled up and i didn't get them on the offsite backup yet, when one of the RAID 5 boxes went down (terastation) So I am now hoping that the project drives have not been cleared. on a raid 5 if any drive goes out you are supposed to be able to replace the drive and the array will rebuild itself with no data loss. Well I got a e04 error, which means the firmware would not boot up. So I'm thinking well the data should be safe and it is probably a bad cmos, but after 5 hours on the phone with Buffalo it turns out that when updating the firmware it gets loaded onto the chip and then I guess once it fills up the memory limit it then proceeds to load the rest of the firmware on the array, so now if any part of the firmware gets corrupted on any 4 of the drives the firmware will not load which is anti-redundant and seems totally retarded to me. Longer story shorter after hours of emergency booting and other crap a newer firmware load, but now will not mount the array and tech says the data is lost.....

They're sending me a new box, just in case the drive controller is faulty, but they are pretty sure the drives are fubar. Personally I know there can't be anything wrong with the drives so over a few days I just keep rebooting it with no luck and then I leave it alone for 2 days and then I just boot it up almost as a joke and the shit works.... SO on the Buffalo stuff just google buffalo e04 and see how prevalent this issue is....

Last month one of my friends raid-0 mirrors had a drive go down and no matter what he tried he could not resore the raid or recover from the mirror, it was fubar. Right now I fee more safe with memeo auto sync and 2 drives

First Sight Pictures

Mark Foley
Veteran

Apr 3, 2008, 6:32 AM

Post #11 of 19 (391 views)
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Quote

would it be possible to just store the file in an external drive as is

Yes... keep it simple and save the raid crap for the computer geeks. Like bruceo, I use a simple USB external drive and store a copy on another...redundancy make take a little longer but damn near 100% reliable

_________________________
Mark

fr0gm@n
Veteran

Apr 3, 2008, 7:48 AM

Post #12 of 19 (379 views)
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Quote

That would work well for archiving. When it is time to edit you can uprez the files to Canopus HQ all at once. It will take a little while but will work fine. You could set to do the uprezing while you are running errands or out of the house. That solution would work great. I thought you were wanting to edit the files natively which will take some major horsepower.

Why does a gorilla have big nostrils.......cause it has big fingers.

frog blog

2ndMile
Enthusiast

Apr 3, 2008, 8:08 AM

Post #13 of 19 (372 views)
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The bad thing I found about the WD MyBooks that are above 750GB is that they have an internal fan in the case which kicks on after about 30 secs and will vibrate your desk. It sound like a mini vacuum cleaner. I returned it and get a 750GB with FW800 and eSATA. They had it a Best Buy for $169 locally. It does "go to sleep" as RT pointed out but not as quickly as he said.

Brian Morris
2ndMile Blog

Don Pham
User

Apr 3, 2008, 12:46 PM

Post #14 of 19 (349 views)
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Re: [bruceo] raid 2 - mirroring for extra data protection [In reply to]	Can't Post

boy...that's what i don't want to hear. drives craping out like that. thanks for the info...one day a want to get ex1 the next i want z7.. Crazy

agghhhh!!!!! Unsure

Don Pham
Take 1 Productions
The Blog
ReFrame

Don Pham
User

Apr 3, 2008, 12:47 PM

Post #15 of 19 (348 views)
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thanks for the info.

Don Pham
Take 1 Productions
The Blog
ReFrame

fr0gm@n
Veteran

Apr 3, 2008, 1:46 PM

Post #16 of 19 (344 views)
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Re: [Don Pham] raid 2 - mirroring for extra data protection [In reply to]	Can't Post

Feel free to give me a call if you have questions about some of that stuff. I sent you a PM with the numbers. If all you are doing is archiving the data till you are ready to upconvert and edit I would probably get a little more reliable setup with a mirrored RAID. www.cooldrives.com has some "cool" stuff. I would just buy the enclosure from a place like that and then get 2 drives of my choice that you trust the reliability on and set the RAID up yourself.

I have an old WD Raid enclosure that everyone has mentioned. I actually took the big 500gb drives out of there and use them stand alone in other enclosures now. I took to older drives and stuck them in there and made a RAID0 for a small HD project I worked on and wanted to keep around for future inquiries. It was a high profile funeral video and people are always asking for a copy or a piece of footage from it. I just stuck the whole HD project on there. If it crashes that is ok as I have everything archived on tape as well. I just assigned the enclosure a non-critical job. I have had no trouble with it. For your critical data I would get a little higher grade enclosure.

Why does a gorilla have big nostrils.......cause it has big fingers.

frog blog

Edit 1 Media
Veteran

Apr 3, 2008, 9:15 PM

Post #17 of 19 (332 views)
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I had a RAID 0 crap out on me and thought I had lost everything....got a quote of $6K to have it restored. We finally found a program for about $300 that took almost three days to restore it but we got everything back. No more RAID 0's for me ever again!!
__________

Laura Randall
Edit 1 Media Blog

4EVER GROUP AFFILIATE

2ndMile
Enthusiast

Apr 3, 2008, 10:21 PM

Post #18 of 19 (324 views)
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In Reply To

I listen to a podcast where they call RAID0 "SCARY RAID"

Brian Morris
2ndMile Blog

Daniel
Veteran

Apr 3, 2008, 10:40 PM

Post #19 of 19 (321 views)
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Re: [Don Pham] raid 2 - mirroring for extra data protection [In reply to]	Can't Post

Don, instead of starting all of these threads, you need to just call me dude. Cool

I have 6TB set-up (some of it mirrored RAid) right now. A full wedding takes about the same as SD, about 60-75 gigs of space.

"Happiness is beating your good friend by one stroke with a birdie on the 18th hole" Me