Using the Sony USB SxS Memory Card Reader vs. NEXTO Video Storage Device

[Will Salley]

Tom. what are relative transfer speeds like with the Nexto? Faster than the Sony reader? Fast as Expresscard slot in Macbook Pro? SDHC?

Thanks,
Will

Mac Pro 2×2.8 Quadcore – 10.6.2 – QT 7.6.3 – 22 GB RAM – nvidia8800GT – SATA internal & external storage – Blackmagic Multibridge Pro – Open GL 1.5.10 – Wacom Intous2 tablet – AJA io
SONY XDCAM EX3 – Letus Elite

[Alister Chapman]

I have a NVS2500 and it’s one of my favourite pieces of kit. The offload is very fast as it uses the full speed of the express card PCi interface and the Esata connection to the drive. The Sony reader is USB so much slower. I find the Nexto to be faster than the express card slot in my Macbook, much faster if I’m saving the files on a USB hard drive.
Nexto run a surface scan on any drives they use on the NVS2500 to ensure they are 100% free of errors, apparently a very high percentage of brand new hard drives will have bad sectors somewhere! Version 1.10 of the Nexto firmware (just released) has some speed improvements, your looking at a 16Gb card in less than 4 mins. The new firmware also allows for single step Sync and Verfication. Verfification is performed by comparing the file on the card and the file on the hard disc and making sure they are the same. The next firmware release should also allow the NVS2500 to write directly to a USB BluRay drive for easy archive. Writing to the PDW-U1 is also being investigated.

Alister Chapman
http://www.xdcam-user.com

[Tom Laughlin]

I mostly shoot with the EX-3, in 24p, in the “SP” mode, which is essentially a higher or more glorified version of HDV, but when I’ve compared the images to the SP and HQ, the image quality, to me, looks identical. It’s a card space issue, I’d rather shoot with 160 min per 32 GB card, than only like 40-60 minutes or whatever, in the HQ mode. With that said, I fill 32GB cards fast and need to dump them fast. When I have transferred using a Mac, or Mac Book, it usually took me about 25 minutes per card.

When using the Sony USB, it took me the same time to copy the files from the card to a drive using the Sony USB, so it eliminates the verification process of copying the BPAV, and having the Sony Clip Browser verify as it is copying from a card to a drive, as the software does this, and the Sony USB drive seems to do this “internally”, one less thing to worry about. With my NEXTO device, I can dump a full 32GB card, to the internal drive of the NEXTO, in under 3 minutes.

When I used the NEXTO, I also found that it also preforms verifications while copying to the internal drive, so when I pull video files from the NEXTO’s internal drive, to another drive, it takes about 3 minutes as well, to copy from the NEXTO to a drive, you can actually mirror the drives to copy to the internal and the external at the exact same time, and still in about 3 minutes, as I’ve seen. But once you need to make another back-up, you can perform another copy to another drive using the NEXTO’s speediness, or if you plug it into a mac, the NEXTO will pop up as an external drive and if you manually drag and drop files from this to another drive, using the mac as your copying director, then it may take longer to transfer, but I’ve never done it that way.

Does this answer your questions? A full 32 GB cards dumps and backs up in 3 minutes or less.

Tom Laughlin
Producer/Editor
Salt Lake City, UT
FCS3/Sony EX-3/Mac Intel

[Alister Chapman]

I’d take 3 mins to backup 32Gb with a pinch of salt. The Nexto is extremely fast, but even Nexto only claim 6 mins for 32Gb. I’m seeing around 3 mins for 16Gb. Prior to V1.10 the Nexto did not automatically verify the backups, this was done by re-inserting the card after a backup and then performing a separate verification. The new firmware gives the option of backup only or backup and verify.

If you doing a Sync copy to both the Nexto’s internal drive and an external USB drive then the speed slows down greatly as you are limited to the slow speed of the USB connection, I get about 6 to 8 mins for 16Gb, depending on the speed of the USB drive.

Alister Chapman
http://www.xdcam-user.com

[Michael Sigmon]

The NVS2500 sounds fantastic… but for $2000!!!! wow… can someone tell me why I wouldn’t be better off putting that $2000 towards a MBP which would have the ExpressCard slot, which I could also use for other purposes such as a 2nd machine to render FCP projects or run Compressor jobs… obviously the space saved by only carrying an NVS2500 is a plus. I just have a hard time swallowing the $2000 price tag compared to the alternatives.

[Alex Vargas]

Mr Chapman,

I signed up alone to let you know that I highly respect your opinions. This site has been an extremely useful source of information and I am happy to join.

I personally like having a Macbookpro in the field, mostly to verify everything shot is in order right away and also because ingesting through the express card reader is fast. I have never even used a Sony usb reader. However, I do not work as much as many of the big boys here, so I have not had a need to ingest faster.

My powerful Macbookpro was unfortunately stolen. Used to the work flow, I bought the first used Macbookpro with express card reader I could find.
It is soon time to get a new one again.

In your opinion, are the speed differences through the Nexto that noticeable compared to a fast new Macbookpro w/express card reader? As a one man band (most of the time), am I not better off investing in a new Macbookpro 17″ and an external hard drive? (I use a 2TB G-Raid).

Thank you for your time,

Alex Vargas
EX1/Elite/Nikon, Zeiss
Macpro 2.1, 3.0 dual quad, 8GB RAM
Macbookpro 15″
FCP 7+
Logic 9+