[Phil Smith]

Well, then in a round-about way, we are in total agreement. Let’s have a beer.

Cheers.

—
Phil Smith
There are no technical solutions to creative problems. Only creative solutions to technical problems.

[Phil Smith]

A rebuttal:

1) The employees at a company don’t choose to enter such agreements, those at the top do. Management does what it wants/needs/desires. Usually for money. Those below don’ t get a vote. So your statements about “the folks” would be misplaced. It would, however, make sense if you were talking solely about management.

2) My example (taken from personal experience) was not about the “last paycheck”. My example was SEVERANCE pay. It’s EXTREMELY valuable when being given your walking papers in an economy with high unemployment rates. I would suggest maybe not looking at the situation quite so idealistically.

3) You pulled a FOX news when you made the vague statement of: “There were events toward the beginning of fall 2012 that also signaled rumblings so I wouldn’t be so sure that it was so much of a surprise.” – What events? “Awful rumors” have been heard about every other storage company in existence, from Promise to DotHill to Quantum. They come and go with changes of underwear.

4) Consider this statement: “Hey guys, we’re not doing so well. We might be shutting the doors sometime soon. So maybe you wouldn’t want to buy our products… oh, and we’re doing this press release as a heads up so that all of our creditors can get a jump start on suing us for the money they are owed. Thanks.”
– said by No Company, EVER.

If your statement is suggesting that you wouldn’t buy anything from a company that wouldn’t warn you that is was going out of business, don’t buy anything ever again. Wait… except for mattresses… those stores are going out of business every week.

Cheers.

—
Phil Smith
There are no technical solutions to creative problems. Only creative solutions to technical problems.

[Phil Smith]

I’m glad that you brought that up Ian because I have been wanting to say something to everyone that keeps saying things like that:

You all seem to think that the folks at Active had that choice. They wouldn’t have had that option.

I have been through the shutdown of a company that was owned by a board of directors (aka Wall Street). It’s a pretty horrible experience. Not only from the standpoint of everyone losing their jobs, shutting down, etc… but also from a communication perspective.

In my case, in order for me to be able to collect my severance package: I had to sign documents stating that I would not “under any circumstances, divulge any information pertaining to (the company’s) progress to cease operations”.

The reason that this is done is so that the a$$h0les on Wall Street can gut the company’s bank accounts, bonus the hell out of themselves and the C-level execs, sell off any subsidiaries that are worth anything, and quietly get rid of any outstanding liquid assets… so that they can claim bankruptcy easily.

It’s not that the company was TRULY bankrupt, it’s that the execs figured out that the company was worth more to them dead (in the next 12 months) than it is alive. These guys are about quicker money, not long-term growth and longevity. Being able to claim bankruptcy gives them the ability to walk out on the employees, creditors, and ALL of the money that they owed to manufacturers who supported them.

Stop blaming Active Storage and their employees for not telling you what was going on. They didn’t have a choice. I can guarantee you that it was as much of a surprise to them as it was to us, and in order for them to collect their last paychecks, they likely were sworn to silence.

Even the guys that went to Quantum from Active Storage haven’t said jack about what really happened.

It’s because they can’t.

—
Phil Smith
There are no technical solutions to creative problems. Only creative solutions to technical problems.

[Phil Smith]

So, apparently the “unofficial” official date for Active is May 1st. Which makes me think that Mr. “Eric Savage-Ott” (above me in this thread) knows something.

My sources (which are made up of various resellers and fiber hardware folks, etc.), all tell me that the process is done but in the hands of attorneys, and that’s likely why the long silence from the folks who are doing this. Apparently while these large deals are being made, no one can talk about anything.

But, all signs (that I have heard) point to Active coming back in one way or another, along with warranties being honored, upgrades and updates flowing again, etc. etc…

This could end up having a happy ending after all!

—
Phil Smith
There are no technical solutions to creative problems. Only creative solutions to technical problems.

[Phil Smith]

Here in Las Vegas, on the NAB floor, there are some folks talking about Active coming back. Apparently, a few of their customers got together along with some XSAN guys in LA, and are acquiring everything.

If they do, my answer to that question (would I buy them again?) would be “Hell yes!”

Active products are good. Arguably the best box in the market. Plus, I have invested heavily in the tech already. Why would I want to go through the pain of migrating my stuff?

Sure, there is the argument that they could go under again, but so could ANY company these days. This is a ridiculously volatile market, and Wall Street calls the shots, not the folks who are actually in the know at the company level.

If Active were brought back as a PRIVATE company, that would actually encourage me to buy. But, we will have to wait and see of course. I’m optimistic. 🙂

—
Phil Smith
There are no technical solutions to creative problems. Only creative solutions to technical problems.

[Phil Smith]

Yes, I have it installed and I have used it for two end to end projects. It was fine.

BUT – since starting using Premiere CS6, I have basically switched. It’s really good.

—
Phil Smith
There are no technical solutions to creative problems. Only creative solutions to technical problems.

[Phil Smith]

Not so far, every drive that I have tried is still powered over Thunderbolt to FW and runs like a champ.

I have, however – heard stories about people complaining that some drives don’t work.

I use G-Tech, LaCie, and Verbatim HDs here, we’ve had no issues.

—
Phil Smith
There are no technical solutions to creative problems. Only creative solutions to technical problems.

[Phil Smith]

The bottom line is, if you work with mixed formats inside your sequence, you will have to render in order to see your final product – no way to stop that.

I am a little bit confused about your setup though. You are saying that your ProRes Proxy files are what is filling up your storage? If that is the case, I would highly consider just picking up another FW800 drive to store some files on.

Recently, I had 100 hours of ProRes Proxy 1080p30 footage show up from a studio in Latin America. Total size = 2.7TB. We literally just plugged in the RAID and let it play from there directly. Worked like a champ, since ProRes bitrates are so low.

Good Luck!

—
Phil Smith
There are no technical solutions to creative problems. Only creative solutions to technical problems.

[Phil Smith]

I have used both of these solutions. My last laptop was a 15″ Core i7 with 512GB SSD, (fully loaded). My newest machine is a 15″ RMBP fully loaded (768GB flash, etc.)

I can tell you that both of them provided a very robust solution for editing. I did not have either laptop even hiccup, sneeze or freeze, unless I got into more than 4 streams of HD (I should note: All ProRes workflow for me), and even then – when I received my Pegasus R6 Thunderbolt chassis, sky was the limit.

Here’s the rub: If you spend any time at all inside Adobe apps (planning on using Premiere, or if you develop any kind of comps with a few layers in After Effects), the GPU in the RMBP will give you a SIGNIFICANT speed boost because of it’s NVIDIA Kepler architecture. Adobe apps wrap themselves around NVIDIA tighter than a terrified two-year old will wrap themselves around a parent’s leg.

All that said: The RMBP would be my vote, it’s fantastic so far. I am also using the following:
– AJA IO XT
– AJA T-TAP
– Field Use: LaCie Little Big Disk 2TB (Thunderbolt) – *only because G-Tech doesn’t make mini RAIDs yet
– Sonnet Thunderbolt Echo Express Pro (for on location stuff with our Alexa gear)

Enjoy whatever you get, and good luck!

—
Phil Smith
There are no technical solutions to creative problems. Only creative solutions to technical problems.

[Phil Smith]

Yup, that’s pretty accurate. I wish that I was the editor, I would just take the bull by the horns and go… but, political issues aside:

I was looking for a rather general idea of how to protect us against any delivery issues… this is a client that usually starts with delivery to around 20 outlets – and by the time the event promotion is done, we’re up to 60-70 deliveries. Some of these are international outlets, so that further complicates the matter.

We have elected to go the route that Bill suggested, since everyone (esp. editor) is familiar with the process, and it looks like our client is on board now as well. The majority of the outlets have responded with an “OK” from the tech side as well.

Thanks again to all of you for the advice!

—
Phil Smith
There are no technical solutions to creative problems. Only creative solutions to technical problems.