Which storage outfit for TV subtitling?

[Alex Gerulaitis]

SD, HD, frame rate, bit depth? In other words, what is the bitrate of the uncompressed video you are planning to capture, and how much of it do you need to store?

Also, do you need uncompressed? Why?

A couple of 7200rpm disks in RAID0 should handle most scenarios, that’s the way I’d go.

— Alex Gerulaitis | Systems Engineer | DV411 – Los Angeles, CA

[Francisco Rubiales]

Hello Alex, thanks for your reply.

Most of the work we do now is SD, although sometime in the near future we’ll be getting HD material.

I believe for TV broadcast there are some video quality standards you have to stick to, that’s why I think I’ll need uncompressed 10 bit video, in order to maintain quality. But I really don’t know if there are other approaches.

Thanks again for your advice.

[Alex Gerulaitis]

Hi Francisco.

You are in good shape with a single drive for SD, 2-3 drives in RAID0 for uncompressed 4:2:2 1080p30 10-bit.

10-bit uncompressed 1080p30 is roughly 155MB/s. Your average 7200rpm drive performs in the 80-160MB/s range. Three of those in RAID0 would have over 200MB/s transfer rates even at their worst.

You could get away with two if you keep them filled at less than 80% capacity.

Working with uncompressed 8-bit 480p30, you only need about 20MB/s, which even a single 5400rpm drive shouldn’t hiccup much on.

Hope this helps. 🙂

[Francisco Rubiales]

Makes all the sense in the world, Alex. Your explanation gives me a nice starting point.

Thanks a lot, I really appreciate it.

See you around.