[Marc Kerr]

We started calculating the storage needs Yaow! We could easily get to 64TB in a single semester. We can make them delete about 90% at the end of the semester but it’s adding up fast. Other factors are also indicating a minimum of 2 SAN units at this location. Again expense may limit how large we make them at this point but we’ll try for expandability if we can’t afford the space now. Quotas will be enforced.

Right now the situation is sub par for students, they do get common resources form a server but there’s no server for them to upload their work files to. They use their own drives that have frozen and thawed in the back of their car a few times or they dump the camera to a local scratch drive and hope their buddy doesn’t delete it because they needed the space. Any reasonably fast online storage that lets them work at any workstation will be an improvement over what they have now.

[Marc Kerr]

All, thanks this is useful info.

Bob, that helps confirm what I was thinking about networking. If our network people give me enough dedicated fiber out to our nearly bomb proof datacenter then I’d love to put the SAN/NAS out there. The expense of that may prevent that though. We do have a secure location in the building near the classrooms for the network gear, and SAN if needed.

I guess I can say we are looking at SNS, we have had one meeting with them but I do need to look at the other solutions like the ones you listed. I like the SNS system mostly because you don’t need an intermediary to muck up things. Or for me to muck up.

[Marc Kerr]

Reset NVRAM (Zap PRAM) https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204063

Then if the Diagnostic still isn’t working the next step I’d do is a full rebuild. Boot to recovery mode, wipe the drive then reinstall the OS. https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201314

I’d also reinstall apps instead of trying to restore them from TimeMachine. Restoring apps will just being back what ever corrupted bits that caused the problem to begin with. Or if it’s under warranty have Apple check it out.

[Marc Kerr]

You can’t really restore the old OS from a Time Machine backup, if you have installed a newer OS version. So it’s solid advice to clone the drive.

[Marc Kerr]

I’ve got the same model of iMac that will shutdown for no apparent reason, I think heat is the actual issue in my case. It may not be the issue in yours but to check run some other apps, not FCP and Premier, and get it up the same temp you noted and see if the issue occurs again.

Maybe you know all this and have checked. I’m new here so forgive me this one time.
Also check About This Mac > System Report > Diagnostics. Then in the same System Report look at Memory. The Diagnostics may tell you about any hardware issues that occurs at startup. Memory may tell you if you have any bad RAM. You might also try Apple Diagnostics. https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT202731

Log files are very often unintelligible but might provide a clue to which app is causing the freeze, if it’s software related. Note the exact time, including seconds if you can, of the freeze. After restarting look in /Applications/Utilities/ and run Console. Check All Messages under System Log Queries. Scroll back to the time the freeze happened. If you forced a restart you should see a “bootlog: BOOT_TIME” entry for the restart or something similar. The info before that point may tell you which app did something stupid. If it looks like a particular app try working the machine without that app for a while. If all goes well then bring in the possible offending app and see how things go.

[Marc Kerr]

Hay Bob, yea you do come across as rather harsh but not necessarily insulting. Despite that the info you provided is useful. Thanks.

Yes we are trying to essentially build a TV/movie studio and provide as close to real life experience as possible. Because this is a university environment instructors also have their favorite software so we can/t standardize, we’ll have FinalCut, Adobe and AVID for sure and being professors someone will fine whacky 3D option they want to try.

We haven’t actually selected a SAN yet. We talked with 1 vendor, who is used in broadcast TV, but we but they still need details of our setup to really make recommendations. This post is part of me trying to figure out those details and make sure I’m asking for the right infrastructure. At this very moment I’m concerned with getting the infrastructure right (conduit, wire, fiber) before they start putting drywall up which is literally in days. Because of politics and shifts in responsibilities our departmental IT was consulted late in the game so we’re in catchup mode. We still have politics to over come from central IT to justify the need for the secondary network outside of their central control.

So it sounds like we are on the right track with the physical infrastructure. The copper will be CAT 6A which is 10Gb capable, with the run lengths we are proposing, and the fiber is 25Gb capable. So that’s a little future proofing. We should also have proper conduit if we ever need to run more lines.

With infrastructure out of the way selecting a SAN is going to be about what bandwidth can we afford. The edit suites will need priority for sure. For the general classrooms we mostly want to keep them from spending half the class moving video files around. When 20 students all download the same 10Gb sample file I don’t want that to take 20 minutes. 2 minutes later another 20 in the next classroom do the same. When they upload the their work for that class it also can’t take 20 minutes. If it takes 10 minute at each end I can live with that. I don’t want to spend another 100K to take 2 minutes off that time but if we get 2x the storage capacity and full bandwidth to all edit suits then maybe we will.

We should have 6 to 9 month before we need to select the SAN and network gear.