why don’t i want mirrored (raid 1?) discs?
Mirroring means the same data is copied to two drives simultaneously. This is great when you transfer P2 material in the field as you instantly create a backup. But for editing, you gain no speed advantage which is the point of a RAID array.
if i want a Raid5 set up is it best to get someone to build it for me or can you buy this stuff off the shelf?
The vendors I mentioned in my prior post all make off-the-shelf turnkey systems. You get a tower with the drives and a controller card for your computer. Some system have the RAID controller in the hardware and you simply connect to your computer via Firewire 800. You’d probably purchase this kind of system from a local reseller. They should know of all or most of these companies. If they don’t I’d look for another reseller.
what is better about raid5 and why would i need 4 smaller disks? is it safer? quicker?
RAID 5 gives you redundancy. What that means is if one of the 4 (or more) drives in the system fails, you put a new drive in the system and it automatically rebuilds and recovers the data that was on the failed drive. RAID 5 needs a minimum of 3 drives to work. More drives is always better as it increases the data rate of the array. If you’re going to edit HD, you need more speed.
John
MacPro 8-core 2.8GHz 8 GB RAM OS 10.5.5 QT7.5.5 Kona 3 Dual Cinema 23 ATI Radeon HD 3870
ATTO ExpressSAS R380 RAID Adapter, PDE Enclosure with 8-drive 6TB RAID 5
24″ TV-Logic Monitor
Final Cut Studio 2 (up to date)
Pro Tools HD w SYNC IO, Yamaha DM1000, Millennia Media HV-3C, Neumann U87, Schoeps Mk41 mics, Genelec Monitors, PrimaLT ISDN