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this is a GREAT article on Thunderbolt shared networks
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[Greg Leuenberger] “You do know that link is for a 4TB box with no HBA?”
My bad! Creeped into a 16TB search, I goofed. That said: a 12-bay SAS JBOD – $800 (no drives, no HBA), 6x 2TB WD SE Enterprise class drives – $930 ($155 ea.). LSI SAS HBA – $350. That’s $2,080 for the same capacity, expandable to 12 drives. 8-bay SAS JBOD towers start at below $400. Need RAID? About $400 more.
Alternately, Areca 4036 is $200 more, with 24Gbs pipeline (vs. 12Gbs on the other one). You probably know what SAS expansion means, and what it brings to the table in terms for storage applications.
Finally, here is to hoping you don’t plan to have 3-5 editors all connecting to a 6-bay Pegasus box as their main shared storage. Once we start looking at 8-, 12- and 16-bay boxes, feel free to prove TB is still cheaper.
We were talking about shared storage, weren’t we? You still think SAS is more expensive?
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For the record, I don’t sell anything. I am not a dealer.
Since April 2013, I use netgear 10 g switches, because they offer incredible performance at rock bottom prices.
I have totally loser clients like amazon, Disney and electronic arts, because they prefer to hire a loser clown like me, than someone really qualified. I am just a lucky 15 year old.As I study new products like Fcp x, and 10g, and mavericks, and tbolt2, I feel I deserve the right to make my smart a$$ observations, based on my experiences. And even when I am wrong, like I was recently about NFS, I correct my errors publically.
Just like my condescending comments about the red camera, and Fcp x, unlike most people, I will continue to research them, and find solutions to make them work for my clients. And with subjects like
thunderbolt networking, and I will ultimately figure out how to get this to work in real world environments, and post them on forums like creative cow, as I have done for years.In the mean time, 10 g Ethernet is the most cost effective was to network a bunch of macs. Not gen 1 thunderbolt..
Bob Zelin
Bob Zelin
Rescue 1, Inc.
maxavid@cfl.rr.com -
Hi Alex – I think we’re arguing about small things here. My initial thought (hope, prayer…whatever) was to have a single bus – Thunderbolt 2 – for storage and sharing. Probably (at least for now) a huge stretch. I do think TB is cheaper than SAS…yes, but it’s not that significant. The cost of the switch and the required NICs (and required expansion chassis if you have iMacs or intend on getting new Mac Pro’s) is the issue I was harping on. Anyway, you seem like you’re trying to be helpful so there’s really nothing to argue about. I’ve looked into SAS fairly extensively because I’m thinking about upgrading my current setup (Apple Raid card in an XServe) and I’d rather just streamline everything with TB (the storage is portable…fewer points of failure…supports more peripherals…ect…I really don’t need to cheerlead it…it’s good tech).
10GB is basically a hack…10GB cards sitting in a Thunderbolt external chassis hooked up to an expensive switch..why? why would anybody want that if you could go thunderbolt only? Unfortunately for everybody this hack of a setup is probably all we can do.
This forum really isn’t the place to ask these questions – it’s basically a shop front being capitalized on by a few small time vendors. Oh well, I’ll go elsewhere – it’s too bad this forum can’t support fellow professionals by sharing knowledge without it becoming a sales pitch and a clown show.
-Greg
Greg Leuenberger
CEO
Sabertooth Productions, Inc.
http://www.sabpro.com -
I’ve done plenty of game openers for EA and been in their edit suites – and yes, they are a loser company : )
All joking aside Bob – your online manner sucks. What’s more, you know it sucks. You wouldn’t speak to me like that in person (because I’d knock your teeth in) but you can hide behind the internet and act like an ass to everybody. You have no business being a ‘forum leader’ around here and surely you know that.
This forum sucks and it sucks because of you….and yes, you have attempted to turn this into your personal store front. It’s BAD FORM to try and sell your services on these forums. Have you been on the internet before? You never see this crap on more respectable forums…you get run out.
You want to compare experience? Do you really? My experience with production almost certainly dwarfs yours. You know, ACTUAL production experience….3D expert…Compositing expert….edit systems like FCP and Premier are things you’re expected to know in passing. Not plugging in network cables. Putting together networked storage is easy. Putting together PCs is easy. If I were to head over to a PC building site and ask what kind of RAM to put in a certain MOBO I’d get a straight up response – not the smart-a$$ crap you write up here.
Why do production companies go out of business? Because they spend money on sh#t they don’t need..like HD decks that never pay off..and obscenely over-priced network storage (the HD deck of the current era). Like a team of people to install things any reasonably intelligent person could do over the weekend with some research.
[Bob Zelin] “As I study new products like Fcp x, and 10g, and mavericks, and tbolt2, I feel I deserve the right to make my smart a$$ observations, based on my experiences. And even when I am wrong, like I was recently about NFS, I correct my errors publically. “
No, you don’t. Let me repeat that just so I know that it’s sinks into your head. No…researching new products doesn’t allow you to act like an a$$ to people. I’m an expert in 3D animation (you know, the hard stuff) – I provide HELPFUL NON-SMART-A$$ assistance to people all the time on the Foundry forums, on CGtalk and other places. That’s why I demo at Siggraph for The Foundry…for Dassault..for Adobe. Because I have a good name in the community and am respected. Who in the world would want you to represent them? If you want to be respected act respectable…you do act like a 15 year old, it’s embarrassing.
Again, READ YOUR FIRST POST on this thread. Do you think this forum can be called professional with a stupid post like that from it’s “leader”. Seriously? Now read the last sentence of your last post….was that so hard?
Grow up dude.
-Greg
Greg Leuenberger
CEO
Sabertooth Productions, Inc.
http://www.sabpro.com -
Hi Greg –
so let’s talk about Thunderbolt network distribution. From what I can tell, at the moment, there really are no Thunderbolt hubs or switches. So we will have to wait for the new Mac Pro, which will be $3000, or $4000. This will become our “server”, and provide us with 6 Thunderbolt ports. Now, one of these ports has to go to our large shared storage volume (Promise, Areca, Netstor, other yet to be released products). So that leaves us 5 computers that we can share over Thunderbolt. Which makes this potentially a comparable solution to an 8 port Netgear XS708E switch, which you can buy from Newegg for $922. But of course, you need 10G NICS for all those damn computers, and Thunderbolt is free on iMac’s and Mac Mini’s. Of course, I assume that you don’t have any Mac Pro’s at your company, because as you know, you can’t get a 12 Core Mac Pro with an NVidia GTX-680 to work with that Thunderbolt stuff. So I assume that you have all iMac’s and Mac Mini’s currently.So, you have your new $2999 or $3999 new cylinder Mac Pro, with your new TBolt 2 RAID array from Promise, Areca, Netstor, etc. You now need LONG Thunderbolt cables, because I am assuming that your staff is not all sitting next to each other on the same desk. Sumitomo
https://global-sei.com/ewp/E/thunderbolt/
has 20 and 30 meter optical Thunderbolt cables, and so does Corning, but I am having great trouble finding them. I wonder how much they are going to cost. I wonder if they come with a Plenum jacket, when we run them thru your ceiling tiles, so they meet firecode.So now we have a maximum of 5 client Mac computers, all running Cinema 4D and Adobe After Effects at your facility, with our new Mac Pro, and our long optical Thunderbolt cables. I sure hope that Thunderbolt 2 interfaces can allow for at least 1500 MB/sec on the 16 bay Netstor drive array (I certainly have not tested this), because this is what is currently available from countless RAID manufacturers that you see here on Creative Cow, and we all know that you need this kind of bandwidth for a shared environment.
With so many facilities, such as yours, that use existing Mac Pro’s with NVidia cards, it seems that getting five $600 dollar 10G nic cards, and that $924 8 port Netgear switch (it’s so damn noisy !), is a pretty cost effective solution, considering I can use generic Cat6 cable for up to 55 meters for this, as opposed to who knows how expensive for those new optical Thunderbolt cables from Corning and
Sumitomo.And yes, I know, if you have a bunch of Mac Mini’s, we can certainly keep them all on the same desk with the new Mac Pro tower, all connected with 1 meter copper Thunderbolt cables, and use Gefen or Smart AVI DVI/USB extenders to get back to our client desks, where their monitors and keyboards are (of course, we wil need Cat6 cables to accomplish this, for the extenders).
So Greg, when you need a render farm setup for your Cinema 4D, or Adobe After Effects workstations for your facility, and if you need other things, like large storage solutions, LTO archive solutions, Asset Management from companies like CatDV or Axle Video – or even some video tie in stuff for those dreadfully expensive HD Decks, that some of your clients might demand that you rent, and you need them tied in with some hardware from AJA, Blackmagic or Matrox – well, you feel free to call me any time, and I will be more than happy to assist you with all of this, and your growing company.
And as soon as I am lucky enough to get my hands on a new cylinder Mac Pro (hopefully next month), I will be sure to tell you my test results with Thunderbolt networking, and the performance over a new Mac Pro.
Your picture on LinkedIn looks real cute, by the way !
Talk to you soon –
Bob ZelinBob Zelin
Rescue 1, Inc.
maxavid@cfl.rr.com -
[Greg Leuenberger] “Why do production companies go out of business? Because they spend money on sh#t they don’t need..like HD decks that never pay off..and obscenely over-priced network storage (the HD deck of the current era). Like a team of people to install things any reasonably intelligent person could do over the weekend with some research.”
The definition of “over-priced” is as they say, “all relative,” and I can assure you, the most over-priced gear anyone can buy is hardware that doesn’t adequately do the job for which it was purchased.
And, buying gear from a manufacturer or reseller, and paying to have it configured, deployed, and supported by experts, can be the very best investment of capital there is. There are many thousands of casualties in this industry who fall by the wayside every year because they fail to recognize this.
David Roth Weiss
ProMax Systems
Burbank
DRW@ProMax.comSales | Integration | Support
David is a Creative COW contributing editor and a forum host of the Apple Final Cut Pro forum.
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FYI, the price for the optical Thunderbolt cables is $330 for the 10m Corning and about $850 for the 30m Sumimoto (I got that by converting from Yen since I could only find them for sale on Amazon’s Japanese storefront).
Best,
Andy -
I see allot of very experienced editors and technology industry people in the Cow forums who give very valuable info including How to’s and problem/workflow resolution information every day. I understand there is allot of excitement about TB2 and the new Mac Pro’s. For many, both seem to answer allot of requirements they have needed for some time while remaining in the Mac Domain. I and others are simply pointing out that this excitement can turn into problems when purchased. These problems can turn into no end of failure to work with applications or workflows required and these over all are not inexpensive investments. I am simply pointing out that Apple has some really strong marketing behind TB and there are pitfalls here with regards to technological limitations and the current editing applications/workflows. Whether that is enough to give some one pause to consider this further or not is their choice and not mine. However I will present the info or even the questions I have about a new technology whether good or bad.
Eric-ADK
Tech Manager
support@adkvideoediting.com -
Quite a thread.
The frustration of this SAN forum is that you’ve got people with very little technical knowledge and those with expert knowledge. And a lot of vendors. It doesn’t feel very ‘hobbyist’ which is the charm of the Cow. In the other forums, someone who has figured out something on a short film can help someone who is working on a Hollywood film.
There isn’t quite the critical mass here to make it work like the others.
SAN forum doesn’t feel very peer-to-peer.Bob at least showed people how to build their own SAN. Which was really useful for me.
Because I couldn’t afford a turnkey system. I get why he’s cranky. SAN stuff is the backbone of your business if you do post. Bad things happen when it goes wrong.But there’s surely room on this forum for those people geeky enough to want to try out unorthodox networking shizzle and report back to other people on how it worked.
Isn’t that the point of this forum?
It’s great that we get warned by people that it won’t work or that we’ll lose all our data.
But sometimes, in between jobs, it’s fun to just give things a go and see what happens.I am not a network engineer but I manged to build a SAN from scratch, which is still working 4 years later.
Just to restate that for those people who are on a budget, Ebay is a very viable option for 10gb equipment. We’ve bought all our 10gb from ebay. All of it has worked.
There are very few moving parts in networking equipment.
It is sold at knock-down prices by people stripping out data centres.
My 20 port switch cost less than the EdgeCore switch that does the 1gb ethernet.You can probably get 4 or 5 machines linked to a 10gb switch for under $4k total if you search hard enough.
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Hi Marcus –
I have had this type of fight with other people like Greg, in the past. I am active on many “professional” forums, and like to express my opinion. When I talk to people in person, many people feel that I am “yelling” at them. I am just passionate about this stuff (like I might be passionate about talking about cars, guitars, women, and alcohol !). And I raise my voice.Greg does not like this type of behavior, and would rather “knock my teeth down my throat”.
At CCW in NY City, I saw the Corning Thunderbolt 2 cables – both 10 meter and 30 meter. I saw the speed tests with Thunderbolt 2, showing between 700 – 800 MB/sec. And I am fully aware that a new Mac Pro (cylinder) with it’s 6 Thunderbolt ports, may make a wonderful server, if you purchase these Corning Optical Thunderbolt 2
cables. These cables cost the following –
10 meter cable – $295
30 meter cable – $599So if our friend Greg is reading this, once again, YOU CANT DO THIS FOR $30 DOLLARS ! (this seemed to piss him off when I said this, and I kind of like that). The idea of using Thunderbolt as a replacement for a small workgroup instead of gigabit, 10G, or Fibre Channel is a wonderful idea, and in may, in fact work wonderfully.
Obviously, there are no Thunderbolt 2 ports or cards for existing Mac Pro’s. But a new young company that wants to put together a small workgroup, with a new Mac Pro, will have wonderful opportunities.So when new products that are a challenge to our industry – like RED, FCP-X, and Thunderbolt networking – I pay very close attention to all of this, research it, and report it, on forums like Creative Cow. I feel passionate about this. If some people don’t like that – well, it’s a good thing those people are not in the same bar with me, while I am expressing my opinions on different types of lager !
Bob Zelin
Bob Zelin
Rescue 1, Inc.
maxavid@cfl.rr.com
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