[Parker Gowan]

[Steve Modica] “dd if=/Directory/sourcefile of=/NewDirectory/Destfile bs=4m

Not much will beat this. (unless one side or the other, or the network) can’t go very fast. Then you may want to compress or do other things)”

This piqued my interest Steve, can you elaborate? I’ve tried searching for more detail, but think I need to understand where you are starting from.

Parker

[Parker Gowan]

Looks like fun stuff Eric,

I have what most likely will be a stupid question but I have been trying to follow along from Bob’s article through the boards – and I feel as though I am missing something. This is my first exploration into these sorts of SAN, or as I see you calling it VEoE.

question: it looks as though you are using the server – both your mobile and mac pro – without using the managed switch Bob talks about – by simply pluggin straight into the 4/6 port card.

Am I getting that right?

I know we will need to pay up front for several things to make this work but we will save over going to someone like Editshare.

I run a small production group within a larger media company.

We aren’t doing anything complicated – SD capture from three dedicated G5 systems – one laptop and an imac for some work. We are looking to add a couple more stations – possibly laptops – but that probably isn’t in the near future. We encode into flash for the web.

I’m trying to be realistic about what we would need to spend for the all out Bob version so I can make my proposal accurate without any surprises. But if I get a rejection off the bat – I’m looking for the next best thing – or at least a 2nd proposal that could “work for now” by spending less money.

could the 6 port switch be something I could seriously use as a back up plan – taking out the cost of the switch and software? or have I missed something in the details here?

Parker

Thanks just for reading!

[Parker Gowan]

Much help,

Thank you Bob and Sean for taking the time to respond – will lobby the money dudes for the extra mac and software – so prob won’t happen in the next 6 months!

[Parker Gowan]

“what you are REALLY asking is “I have a PC lying around here, and we want to use it as a server – will this work”

I don’t want to do the recycle thing exactly – although whatever we DO have and can use – the bettter. I am honestly interested in what it would take to make this setup work with a PC at the center and not a mac. I have read your posts and realize that you have not tried this directly – was hoping you or someone you know – or someone else here on the forum might have found success in this area – primarily because i do have strong IT support – but strong in the windows world.

“. I doubt that you are interested in buying the latest fastest blade server for this application.”

So what you say about the simple Mac computer you don’t think applies to a windows comp at the center – I’m talking using all the additions you mention – 4 port card – managed switch and applicable software – will that PC heart and Mac muscle make for a fully functioning SAN man?

[Parker Gowan]

So Tyler, did this setup end up working out for you? did you end up getting the speed you were looking for?

I am working on setting up a system with my production group and our IT folks are seriously PC centric – so my assumption is that in order to get the support at the most affordable price we will try the PC as server route.

Thanks in advance for any experience you can share!

Parker

[Parker Gowan]

First off thanks for your response, Questions in my rushing around that I should be able to ask myself but never find the time to do so!

So i am talking with our design group on the specifics of the frame size and data rate, but as far as moving away from On2, I think that our restrictions are that we stay within Flash 8, we do have a corporate audience, and the feeling is that 9 is too advanced. in order to stay in 8, does that make On2 the best quality we can do, barring our audience restrictions and all?

As far as key frame, no it does not need to be that precise, I will reduce, thanks!

[Parker Gowan]

You could try recording the video using snapsPro X. Doesn’t work very well with files longer than a couple minutes, but it works, will record in a quicktime compatible format…

[Parker Gowan]

When you export a ref movie instead of a self contained movie, it takes much less time and allows the movie to use your render files and video files.

My biggest question is why does it still take so long to create that mpeg2 in compressor. With QT it took about a third of the time. Is there a setting that we haven’t changed, or does compressor simply take longer? I’m ready to make compressor work, but the time, with our current workflow, takes FAR too long. I saw that Walter said that you should quite FCP, is that the soel reason that our mpeg2 take so much longer?

[Parker Gowan]

That didn’t answer anything that he asked. Stock answers needs some stock glasses…

ktacos: I actually won’t be any more help than Shane. We tried wrestling with mpg4 in the past, and there didn’t seem to be a good solution at the time. Perhaps there is a conversion you can do outside of FCP, hopefully someone here can shed some light…

[Parker Gowan]

That’s pretty much what I figured, but thanks for the information. Actually it turns out our client is looking for closed captions on the DVDs, I haven’t done the leg work myself to see what that entails, but from briefly scanning the DVDSP manual, I need to do something similar to what you talking about with subtitles and the stl files.

Thanks a lot for the response.

Parker