regular or fusion drive?

[Howie Young]

Hi John,

I’m researching new iMacs and not sure which internal hard drive would be the best choice. I came across Kent’s original post and found some of your responses insightful and helpful. I realize this thread was started in January and was wondering if you and anyone else who posted would be able to answer some of my questions.

Since this initial post have you experienced any problems with your iMac and fusion drive when editing with FCP X?

I thought Apple originally stated the fusion drives should not be used for editing?

Why did you select the 3 TB over the 1 TB fusion drive?

What kind of projects do you edit?

If RAM is added to the computer later does this affect or void the AppleCare Warranty?

What brand hard drives do you recommend for media – stand alone and RAID?

Thanks!

[John Davidson]

Hey Howie,
I’m still happy with the Fusion drive. It gets around 200-300 MB/s on avg depending on file size. I don’t use it to store media other than iTunes and photo libraries. For everything else we use a Server with 10GbE connections via Thunderlink. If you’re using it as a standalone I’d recommend a Promise Pegasus RAID via Thunderbolt.

I got 32 Gigs of Ram from OWC. It does not void applecare warranties.

Now, with this said, I also picked up a Macbook Air 3 or 4 weeks ago. Let me tell you – that SSD 512 is something else. It’s getting about 700 MB/s. Obviously, it’s too small to edit with, but wow is it fast.

With all of this in mind, I don’t think now would be the best time for you to buy an iMac if you can hold off. It’s very close to refresh time (2-3 months) for iMacs, plus we have Mac Pros coming out in that time frame as well.

We edit short form commercials and on air promotions. We work with full-res media in 30-60 minute ProRes quick times. The drives in our 16 drive array are Hitachi 4TB Enterprise striped in RAID5 with an ATTO R680. I would suggest an Areca 1882x instead of an R680, but if you get a Thunderbolt array, you won’t need this at all. We also have a Promise Pegasus 8 drive and it’s been flawless.

I selected the Fusion over standard 1TB drive because it’s got a larger storage capacity and a built in SSD that lets it get faster speeds on heavily used applications and media. Also, you can’t upgrade the internal drive easily, so a 3TB drive made sense for my future media needs (photos/iTunes).

That help?

John Davidson | President / Creative Director | Magic Feather Inc.

[Howie Young]

Hi Lance,

Which fusion drive did you get with your iMac?

Have you experienced any problems with the drive when editing with FCP X?

Thanks.

[Howie Young]

Hi John,

Thanks for responding so quickly. Yes, your answers do help.

I’m planning on editing web videos, shorts and docs. I’m developing a few web projects. The segments will range in length from 3-7 minutes.

You mentioned holding off on purchasing the iMac because the new MacPros will be released along with a refreshed iMac. What updates could be made to the iMacs?

How difficult is it to install the RAM?

[John Davidson]

Installing the RAM is the easiest thing on earth to do – and a great way to save $200. OWC even makes videos for how to do it. It takes no more than 5 minutes.

No one really knows what is coming, but the new iMacs could have Retina screens for pixel to pixel resolution = or that could be part of a new Mac Pro / Thunderbolt Cinema Display 4k. They could feature Thunderbolt 2.0 for faster speeds. They could be Matte instead of Glossy. I always suggest holding fast when we’re this close to new releases.

John Davidson | President / Creative Director | Magic Feather Inc.