I could use opinions about my RAID set up plan – Thanks!

[Rainer Wirth]

Hi Alex,

why do you want to go for an internal raid? Internal raids create problems after let’s say 3 years of intensive cutting. I worked for a production company which had internal raids on 10 workstations. After nearly exact 3 years one after the other went bad. I think that the cooling within the mac is not good enough for a raid.
I would go for an external 4x8gb FC raid 16/24 bay Raid 6+ spare and Hitachi Ultrastars as HDs. The Atto FC 4x8gb card is a burner. You end up with speeds over 1200MB/s. When you start editing 2K and above plus compositing you need a reliable system like this. It is definitely the most expensive solution but also the most reliable and fastest solution. These systems run for years without a flicker. The rest of your equipment is just fine. Personally I wouldn’t go for FCPX, Premiere or FCP7 are okay. We have switched to Avid MC6 from FCP7 and I have to admit Avid works fine for us.
The cheaper option would be SAS (8 or 16bay enclosure) Raid 5/6+spare and enterprise class drives. The speed is half of the FC raid. I think that you might get slight problems with a workflow above 2K.

cheers

Rainer

factstory
Rainer Wirth
phone_0049-177-2156086
Mac pro 8core
Adobe,FCP,Avid
several raid systems

[Alex Vargas]

Thanks Rainer,

You response helps me consider the cost much better and clarify my “wants”. I am also happy to hear FCP7 is still preferred by some above X. (I will learn X if I have to, but will probably go with Premiere too).

The main reasons for wanting the internal RAID are:

– The ability to use full SATA III capability from each one of my internal drives.
– Space saving (my “studio” and home is UNUSUALLY small until done with this movie).
– Being able to finish this movie without bottlenecks that I have had on my previous Octocore.
– Cost
– Stability

I also want the possibility for this set up to be good for editing RAW next year, but seeing your response, I must accept that I can’t afford it at the moment. I looked into the card you suggest, but it would cost more than my 18 month old mac…the card (external box) alone.
I apologize for my initial post sounding as if I were ready to buy a $15,000 set up. I am not. I will correct it (if I can do that).

This is the first time that I read about internal RAID set ups all failing after around three years of life, so thank you for sharing that. So far all I have read about is what they are good for. Real experiences are valuable. Thanks!

My first conclusion is that I should forget editing 2.5K RAW on this set up and focus instead on my upcoming edit (XDCAM EX HD 1080p 30 fps on a Prores timeline in FCP7).

Will the system I listed be able to handle it?
Do you or anybody else foresee any compatibility issues?
(I am particularly curious about the Accelsior E2 card as a boot drive with FCP7)
Any suggested alternatives for similar speeds and reliability in this planned RAID?

Thanks again!

Alex Vargas
filmmaker/composer
Macpro 5,1 12 core 48GB RAM – Macbookpro 15″ – FCP 7+/Logic 9

[Alex Gerulaitis]

[Alex Vargas] “4 x 2TB SATA III enterprise drives, plus two more of the same in my optical drive’s empty space.”

Am I hearing you right that you plan to have six of those drives in RAID5 plus hot spare, on R608? (Equivalent to five drives in RAID5.)

I think it’ll give you speeds of around 400MBs (when empty) going down to around 200MB/s at 90% full. This is enough to handle BMD 2.5K raw (about 150MB/s at 30fps if I am not mistaken). What I would change is set the drives up in RAID6 instead – which should increase the speeds a little bit. If my hunch is right, and RAID6 is slightly faster, then you also get the benefit of better redundancy.

HTH.

Alex Gerulaitis
Systems Engineer
DV411 – Los Angeles, CA

[Alex Vargas]

Thanks Alex Gerulaitis!

If your calculations are correct, you are saying that I may be able to edit 2.5K RAW with this set up.
That sounds good. It means I am all good for editing XDCAM EX HD 1080p… 🙂

In your opinion, will this set up improve my current SATA II limitations considerably? As obvious as it seems to be, I am concerned that it may not improve much due to any compatibility factors that I may be ignorant about.

My boot drive would be the Accelsior E2 PCIe card (please refer to links on the original post) at much higher speeds than SATA II allows, as would be all other 6 drives through the ATTO R608 for my media (scratch), so all data flow would be above SATA II limitations, but will all this work out to be faster and stable with FCP7? Or are there any known incompatibilities?

Your time is appreciated!

Alex Vargas
filmmaker/composer
Macpro 5,1 12 core 48GB RAM – Macbookpro 15″ – FCP 7+/Logic 9

[Alex Gerulaitis]

[Alex Vargas] “My boot drive would be the Accelsior E2 PCIe card (please refer to links on the original post) at much higher speeds than SATA II allows”

The SATA II limitation only applies to drives connected directly to Mac Pro SATA ports. None of your drives will be. In addition, even if they were, the limitation is only for individual links, not aggregated for multiple SATA connections. Bottom line, nothing to worry about here. 🙂

[Alex Vargas] “will all this work out to be faster and stable with FCP7? Or are there any known incompatibilities? “

I don’t know whether and how does FCP7 handle raw BMD CNG files… Does it do it well? Other than that, and purely on the storage side, I can’t think of any potential problems except heat and serviceability.

Heat: those are fast drives and having six of them in a chassis not designed to handle that many drives may cause heat build up.

Serviceability: having them all internally means (1) not being able to see individual activity lights, (2) needing to open the tower to access the drives. What it means is that it may be a bear to determine which drive failed and needs replacement if it happened to fail. With external storage towers, it’s easy. This is why I always try to find the budget (and space) for an external storage box even if the budget (and space) is tight.

Alex Gerulaitis
Systems Engineer
DV411 – Los Angeles, CA

[Rainer Wirth]

Alex’s advice is always of great value. But I doubt that you get enough speed to handle 2k material properly. Especially when you have lots of compositing effects around it. We work mainly with ProRes422 and our SAS raid is sometimes too slow to handle multiple streams together with compositing. So real 200 MB/s is enough to handle one track but I doubt that it will handle multiple tracks with 2K in an appropriate way. I’m also concerned about the heat side inside your computer.

cheers

Rainer

factstory
Rainer Wirth
phone_0049-177-2156086
Mac pro 8core
Adobe,FCP,Avid
several raid systems

[Alex Vargas]

Thanks again Alex Gerulaitis!

Yes, what I meant about the Accelsior is that it will be faster than my current boot drive. So I’m good with that.

And yes, it will run hot and blind. But it will set an alarm of course if there is something going down. I am good with that. If and when it happens, it will happen, be it with lights or alarm. Once there is a hard drive down I will be informed as it begins the re-build on the hot spare. As to figuring out which one is the failing drive, I have to go with ATTO’s monitoring software which seems to be pretty straight forward. I just called them and they went through the application to clarify the basics, even though I have not yet bought the card. That was cool. And opening the cover to replace a drive…not a problem. Hopefully it won’t be often. 🙂 Keeping it cool however will be essential. I’ll figure something out for that.

The software side is OK. The RAW files are processed in Resolve, Prores in FC7 and back to Resolve for final color. I was more worried about compatibility between FC and the RAID…ignorant as I am…

Thank you for your thorough response Alex. My main issue, editing my upcoming feature, seems to be resolved with this set up.
I hope nobody pitches in to mention a known lack of compatibility! (Or actually, I hope they do if they know of it…)

I will consider the possibility of an external array, though I can’t see the space “opening”…I will reconsider all possibilities before I buy.

Much appreciated! 🙂

Alex Vargas
filmmaker/composer
Macpro 5,1 12 core 48GB RAM – Macbookpro 15” – FCP 7+/Logic 9

[Alex Vargas]

Thanks Rainer!

I am certainly listening to all opinions. I have been editing Prores 422 on an MacPro Octocore 3.0GHz 2,1 without a RAID, compositing, multiple tracks when needed…and it has worked fine, but slow. I will be doing the same for the next 10 months on a 12 core 9.93GHz MacPro with the RAID set up I mentioned. I apologize for not clarifying that editing RAW would be for my next project 15 months in the future.

Right now, it is XDCAM EX HD 1080p 30 fps on a Prores timeline. I am also considering an external RAID, but I am 100% clear that I cannot afford the number of drives that you mentioned would be ideal for smooth processing of RAW 2.5K material, so I will focus on getting what I need to make my current project work and wait until next year to see what money I make then before I think 16 – 24 bay external RAID.

And yes, the heat issue…I am on to it. Either a small external enclosure (though I don’t know where to put it…and I mean it) or a very good way to keep it all cool internally.

Thank you for taking the time to share your experience Rainer!

🙂

Alex Vargas
filmmaker/composer
Macpro 5,1 12 core 48GB RAM – Macbookpro 15″ – FCP 7+/Logic 9

[Alex Vargas]

OK, all enclosure considerations made.

iT8 6G SAS Expander is the winner.

If all goes well, I’ll get another (or two) next year. By then, space won’t be an issue. This solution allows for proper cooling, visual monitoring AND expansion for a reasonable price while at the same time using 6Gb/s technology and its SATA III lovers.

Now I only need to figure which ATTO RAID controller is the best option these days to connect with this Enclosure. (One call to ATTO should do).

I am pretty happy with my findings. And yes, after reading a lot of posts, I realize what an excellent tool this site is. I won’t make the same mistakes during set up. I feel the pain… damn.

Thank you both Alex and Rainer…and to the rest of you who read this post and chose to let me make my own mistakes…or bleeding read all other related posts! HA!

Alex Vargas
filmmaker/composer
Macpro 5,1 12 core 48GB RAM – Macbookpro 15″ – FCP 7+/Logic 9

[Alex Gerulaitis]

[Alex Vargas] “iT8 6G SAS Expander is the winner.”

Just curious: why not CR-T08E?

[Alex Vargas] “Now I only need to figure which ATTO RAID controller is the best option these days to connect with this Enclosure.”

R680. Or Areca 1882x.