[Neil Sadwelkar]

Let’s see now…
2x 2722 = $560, Sonnet Echo Express SE II = $500
So total $1060. But both devices (RAID and LTO) have to always be at the same place.

2x Highpoint 6328 TBolt 2 to SAS $1400.
But you can use the 2 6328s together or in different places. So RAID and LTO can be together or separated.

Also, (as far as I remember asking them at NAB), the 6328 permits one to use eSATA devices (even H/W RAIDs) using a miniSAS-eSATA cable.

There may (or may not be) some speed advantage to having both SAS adapters separate rather than sharing PCIe bandwidth.

———————————–
Neil Sadwelkar
neilsadwelkar.blogspot.com
twitter: fcpguru
FCP Editor, Edit systems consultant
Mumbai India

[Neil Sadwelkar]

Actual media files in digital video are generally too large for any kind of cloud backup.

I think you need to have separate approaches for media files and project files. Avid projects, FCP 7 projects, Premiere projects, and audio files are generally small enough to be backed up to the cloud, and even Dropbox or Google Drive is sufficient for this even over ADSL bandwidth.

For media files, keep a mirror offsite which is a clone of your main media drive at the hospital. Depending on its size you can use a small shuttle drive (USB3/TBolt or FW800 depending on your system) to carry new files to the mirror on a daily basis.

For long term backup, there’s currently nothing as robust as LTO tape.

———————————–
Neil Sadwelkar
neilsadwelkar.blogspot.com
twitter: fcpguru
FCP Editor, Edit systems consultant
Mumbai India

[Neil Sadwelkar]

If one uses the RocketStore 6328 TBolt to SAS RAID adapter with the 8-bay chassis shown on the Highpoint web site, then both SAS ports are used by the RAID box and one won’t have a spare port for an LTO drive, right? In that case one will need two RocketStore 6328 boxes, one for the RAID and the other daisy chained for the LTO drive.

———————————–
Neil Sadwelkar
neilsadwelkar.blogspot.com
twitter: fcpguru
FCP Editor, Edit systems consultant
Mumbai India

[Neil Sadwelkar]

To add to the post above.
I now have a tape backed up, and verified, and tape ejected.

I can’t launch Preroll Post any more. If I temporarily remove the three sqlite database files in /Library/Application Support/ImagineProducts/PrerollPost, then it launches instantly, but I can’t see any of my tapes. If I put the drives back in, Preroll post refuses to launch. It bounces in the dock for a couple of times, and then nothing. The Force Quit window shows PreRollPost (not responding).

So I have three drives all backed up but I can’t use PreRoll Post to retrieve anything.
I can use LTFS Manager in BRU-PE to mount the LTO tape and can see all data inside it. Can even use Finder to copy data from the LTO tape to my drive.

But PreRoll Post, not launching. I’m now wondering about the long term use of PreRoll Post for these kind of backups.

———————————–
Neil Sadwelkar
neilsadwelkar.blogspot.com
twitter: fcpguru
FCP Editor, Edit systems consultant
Mumbai India

[Neil Sadwelkar]

I think BRU-PE also has some feature that supports auto-loaders.

———————————–
Neil Sadwelkar
neilsadwelkar.blogspot.com
twitter: fcpguru
FCP Editor, Edit systems consultant
Mumbai India

[Neil Sadwelkar]

Thanks Dan. I’ll try that.

About the number of files, we use LTO-5 and LTO-6 to backup camera originals. So, if its from an Arri Alexa shooting ArriRaw, there are 1,440 files per minute (at 24fps). Each is 7 MB in size. So, for every TB there are 142,000 files. Plus sound files, xml files.
On an LTO-5 you can easily have 180,000 or more files, and on an LTO-6 over 320,000 files.

Sony F55/F65 or Red Raw produces much less files.

If one is backing up a Mac home folder containing address books, certain documents, iPhoto Library then too the backup quickly swells up to hundreds of thousands of files as many Mac document and data formats are packages. So, in PRP, just the ‘Prepare backup’ takes ages.

Which could be healthy, because I did my routine evening walk of 3km in the time Prepare backup got done with my RAID containing old iPhoto Libraries. This needs to be speeded up if possible.

———————————–
Neil Sadwelkar
neilsadwelkar.blogspot.com
twitter: fcpguru
FCP Editor, Edit systems consultant
Mumbai India

[Neil Sadwelkar]

I began an archive in PreRoll Post and after the copying was done, and verify was under way, I hit cancel. Got a warning that the archive would not be complete, but I continued. PreRoll Post went into beach ball mode for about 10 mins. I gave up and force quit it.

Now, the tape shows up on the desktop, and all contents seem to be fine. I checked only folder sizes, of course. But there seems to be no way for getting this LTO tape into the PreRoll Post database. So I can’t verify it, nor use PreRoll Post for retrieve. Maybe I need to dig deeper to find a way. The manual doesn’t seem to have any info on this unusual mode I forced the software into.

———————————–
Neil Sadwelkar
neilsadwelkar.blogspot.com
twitter: fcpguru
FCP Editor, Edit systems consultant
Mumbai India

[Neil Sadwelkar]

Did this get solved?

Could one solution be to take the tape to another system, import the archive and try restore there? And is there a quicker way to import an archive to a new system without the ‘slow scan’ method?

———————————–
Neil Sadwelkar
neilsadwelkar.blogspot.com
twitter: fcpguru
FCP Editor, Edit systems consultant
Mumbai India

[Neil Sadwelkar]

Tim,

Thanks. The data I’m backing up for this project is ArriRaw files. These are one file per frame, So, a Terabyte could hold over 140,000 files. Whereas when one is backing up Red Raw, or F65 Raw files, these are one file per ‘clip’. So in 1 TB one would have about 200-400 files or so.

Does the number of files also affect this 8%-15% ‘padding’ (for lack of a better term)?

Also, speed. I find backing up ArriRaw (file seq) takes longer than Red Raw. Is this a ‘nature of the beast’ thing?

The total backup for this feature I’m doing has now crossed 120 TB (ArriRaw, Red, GoPro, Canon, Phantom, sound etc etc) spread over 93 tapes.
All Bru-PE
Whew!

———————————–
Neil Sadwelkar
neilsadwelkar.blogspot.com
twitter: fcpguru
FCP Editor, Edit systems consultant
Mumbai India

[Neil Sadwelkar]

If you’ve digitised from tapes into files, ensure that the ‘Reel name’ or ‘Tape name’ of the digitised ProRes files are consistent with what’s in the EDLs.

———————————–
Neil Sadwelkar
neilsadwelkar.blogspot.com
twitter: fcpguru
FCP Editor, Edit systems consultant
Mumbai India