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The new IMAC + external HD + capturing video
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The USB on the enclosure is the bottle neck.
USB just simply will not sustain constant data rates. It works in bursts and that is the problem. Why you seem to not understand that does not change it.
There are no “technical solutions” to your “artistic problems”.
Don’t let technology get in the way of your creativity! -
[Phil Wickham] “………the iMac, how do I capture video onto it? I don’t really want to capture to the Mac’s internal drive, as I will quickly fill it up, although I could copy the videos across once captured…
Aside from having to buy another new cable is there a way of getting round this please?
……..”Hi Phil, you answered your own question,
capture to your internal drive and then copy to your firewire storage and edit from there, never edit from the boot drive.Cheers
Alexander -
I’m still waiting to see what are your credentials to be a self proclaimed USB guru. Have you ever been involved in designing a USB link layer? I have.
Burst? USB can even do isochronous transfer if you want to, do you know that? It all depends on the implementation and how good is the chip used, how much buffering it has, the drivers etc.
In the Mac community there is hostility and prejudice toward USB due to the long time history of mac with 1394. 10 years ago no doubts 1394 was a better bus for these applications than USB, but today there is no reason why a USB HD can’t sustain the transfer rate necessary for these applications. I normally do it on my Macbook and I do full HD exclusively.
Again, the thread started because there were no alternative left on the new imac. Daisy chaining 1394 is a solution but then there would be BW sharing and arbitration between multiple devices working concurrently. Not the most desirable solution.In the past USB link layers were sitting on PCI 32bit even when they were integrated in chip sets. It was just easy to do so. THis alone was another major point of conflict and arbitration reducing efficiency. Today this happens very rarely. PCI32 still exists but it is an appendix and not the main I/O bus anymore. Internal connectivity is done with PCI-E, HyperTransport or other high speed low latency concurrent links. I even licensed HyperTransport to Apple for its I/O performance for one of their Macpro Tower (G5 I guess) about 18-10 years ago.
Today, gates are cheap. Adding relative big buffers was prohibitive only 6 years ago when silicon 8 times bigger. Now it is a no brainer. When everything is combined USB is literally transformed and finally deliveries the wire speed particularly if interfaced to a very fast Hard Disk.Regards
Gabriele – California
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You may be able to get by with it, but as a video profesonal which you yourself said you are not. USB is not an acceptble profesional option. It just cannot sustain a constant data rate.
As a video profesional I’m never going to recomend a solution that will not yeld profesional results. You just dabble with video so you might be willing to recomend a lesser solution.
There are no “technical solutions” to your “artistic problems”.
Don’t let technology get in the way of your creativity! -
[Zane Barker] “As a video profesional I’m never going to recomend a solution that will not yeld profesional results. You just dabble with video so you might be willing to recomend a lesser solution.”
OK, when short of tangible arguments the best defense is to move to insult and dismissal. Please tell me what do you mean by “professional results” when editing with an imac that has no ports available. Enlighten us about what professional means in your opinion. In my opinion you either capture and edit HD without frame dropping or you don’t. Are you talking about better artistic output because you use 1394 instead of USB? I would like to know.
As I said I do have 5HD in striping on eSATA because I can. I do have PCI slots, an iMAC doesn’t have enough I/Os so it is question of having the best compromise, USB is one of the options and it works if done the right way. It has nothing to do with ability on doing transitions or anything else.
I have no doubt that you are a better editor than me although you never saw what I do. I’m just honest and admit my limitations.
Technology has nothing to do with that though.Gabriele – California
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Another thought…
I think the Western Digital MyBook has both USB 2.0 and Firewire. Use the USB 2.0 port for capture, but switch to Firewire 800 for better editing performance.
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Just because you haven’t experienced issues does not mean there are not issues using USB drives for video editing.
I’m done arguing with you in the issue.
There are no “technical solutions” to your “artistic problems”.
Don’t let technology get in the way of your creativity! -
[Gabriele Sartori] “Walter
There are very good reasons for you to be right. Things though changed quite a bit and I believe that USB is surrounded by a lot of old prejudice. Let me explain my view :
A 2TB HD has a huge sequential transfer rate.”The hard drive itself is not going to solve the problem. You can put 2TB drives in a FW and SATA enclosure as well. At some point that drive is going to start to slow down as it fills up and gets fragmented.
USB 1 and 2 are not going to be able to give you the sustained throughput required throughout the entire drive to keep you editing without dropping frames.
So no, this is not prejudice speaking here, this is experience and the facts of how the data throughput works. If USB works in your experience, then by all means use it. But don’t expect me to support this view or to recommend this view to anyone who edits professionally and earns money from their systems. This simply is not a solid, professional choice for a video editing system. For hobbyists, maybe, but not for someone earning money and charging clients for their work.
Sorry.
Walter Biscardi, Jr.
Editor, Colorist, Director, Writer, Consultant, Author.
HD Post and Production
Biscardi Creative Media“Foul Water, Fiery Serpent” now in Post.
Creative Cow Forum Host:
Apple Final Cut Pro, Apple Motion, Apple Color, AJA Kona, Business & Marketing, Maxx Digital. -
Try using a G-tech G-Raid and the Firewire 800 port….
You can get a 2 TB drive for $325.00https://www.videoguys.com/Item/G-Tech+G-RAID+2TB+(4th+Generation)/0303032302432574.aspx
I have about 10 of these drives and they never miss a beat…
The USB drives will be too slow for most editing applications. -
[walter biscardi] “This simply is not a solid, professional choice for a video editing system. For hobbyists, maybe, but not for someone earning money and charging clients for their work.”
OK, I can see that this “professional” thing is popping up again. I would like to know what is more professional in 1394 than USB but nobody can articulate that to me. Just prejudice is what I see because I don’t see a single table, data, formula, BW calculation, latency calculation, reliability and the needs for the application(s), nada. just “I say so so it is so, I’m a pro, I know better than you”.
I worked with high speed serial links for about 10 years of my professional life in microelectronics and I never saw so much prima donna attitude without bringing a gram of solid data. It must be that I’m an old engineer and work with data while you guys are more like “artists” and work with feelings.Note, I never said that USB is better than 1394, just that is good enough for the job particularly if the 1394 link is shared with other peripherals. Particularly when used with an iMac that doesn’t seem a “Professional Workstation” to me.
Regards and happy new year, I’m sure the 1394 trade association loves you.
Gabriele – California
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