Can you upgrade the FS-100 Hard Drive?
- Thread starter robotx21
- Start date
rogar-Love(DBG): Andrew Smith
New member
Hello kind DVXuser folks, I've just joined the ranks of HVX200 owners and am considering an FS-100 purchase. While I love the 100GB capacity of the device compared to current P2 card capacity, the fellow(me) who's used to having a box of tapes available to shoot a whole day's worth of footage is hankering for more record time. Being in an all day, hurried, run & gun situation is the norm for me when shooting documentary work.Matthew McEwen said:
So would it be possible to have a "Focus authorized service center" upgrade the hard drive without voiding the warranty? It's not that I want to put a cheap hard drive in, I would just find the device more useful if I didn't have to transfer footage to a laptop/external hard drive in the middle, or first third, of a long shoot day on location in an ENG type situation. I've been on some shoots in foreign lands without access to electricity until the end of the shooting day. I know I can link more than one FS-100 together, but it sure would be nice to have increased capacity in the same form factor using only one device.
This also brings up the question of transfer time from a full FS-100 to a laptop with or without an external hard drive. I've read the estimate of 2x realtime, which is somewhat confusing after the firmware upgrade which doubled the record time for some modes. If the 2x estimate is accurate then I'll have to wait ~1.5 hours for 100GB worth of material to transfer? Would having the external hard drive connected via eSATA help speed things up or is the Firewire 800 the bottleneck?
This forum has been an incredible tool for learning about the HVX200 and getting real users' experiences. Thank you for being such an open community willing to share your knowledge and experience.
Where have you read that copying from the FS-100 to a computer takes about two hours for 100 Gbs?
Firewire 400 devices transfer at 400 Mbit/s or 49.152MBytes per second or 20 seconds per gigabyte.
Probably doesn't run quite to that theoretical level, but it certainly isn't as slow as you note.
Firewire 400 devices transfer at 400 Mbit/s or 49.152MBytes per second or 20 seconds per gigabyte.
Probably doesn't run quite to that theoretical level, but it certainly isn't as slow as you note.
Andrew Smith
New member
Hello David,
Perhaps I phrased it wrong, but I'm not claiming anything. I have never used an FS-100, however after researching capacity I understand that it can currently hold roughly 3 hours of DVCPRO HD footage. If the 2x realtime is accurate then I assumed it would mean ~1.5 hour transfer time. If this statement applied to the pre-firmware 3.0 situation then I would assume it would mean ~45min transfer time. I'm asking as an ignorant researcher, I honestly was just hoping for someone who has both an HVX200 and an FS-100 to report how long it takes them to transfer a full FS-100 in the field. I was also curious if having a faster hard drive connection than FireWire 800 would make a difference since I would be purchasing external hard drives if I bought an FS-100. Thanks.
Perhaps I phrased it wrong, but I'm not claiming anything. I have never used an FS-100, however after researching capacity I understand that it can currently hold roughly 3 hours of DVCPRO HD footage. If the 2x realtime is accurate then I assumed it would mean ~1.5 hour transfer time. If this statement applied to the pre-firmware 3.0 situation then I would assume it would mean ~45min transfer time. I'm asking as an ignorant researcher, I honestly was just hoping for someone who has both an HVX200 and an FS-100 to report how long it takes them to transfer a full FS-100 in the field. I was also curious if having a faster hard drive connection than FireWire 800 would make a difference since I would be purchasing external hard drives if I bought an FS-100. Thanks.
siniarch
Veteran
Hi Andrew,
I have an FS100 and happy with it. But now to your questions.
Can you put a larger Hard drive. I'm not sure this will fly. first of all, the hard drive is one of those small laptop factor one. not sure if they make them larger than 100gig. maybe 120. but I'm sure Focus enhancements will void the warranty. They want to sell more drives. so if you want more time without down time, they want you to buy 2 or 3.
I believe the drive inside is a Mitsubishi and i even think its the 5400rpms. so nothing fancy there. The thing to do would be to get the connecting cable to the hard drive and the power cable to come outside the box. so you could just have these empty hard drives. and tape them to the enclosure or something and be able to swap them . (in theory this would work, but I'm not about to void my warranty on a $2000 unit. at least not yet)
As for transfer time, I don't have the time to sit right now and do a test for you. but it definitely is not as long as you think.
If David is Correct, then 20sec / gig x 100gigs=2500 sec divided by 60/min= 33.33min. If you record in 720p camera and set your FS100 to record in PN, I believe you get close to 4hrs of recording in the same 100gig. that would be close to 8x ingestion. if you don't record pn, then it would be around 4x ingestion.
I have an FS100 and happy with it. But now to your questions.
Can you put a larger Hard drive. I'm not sure this will fly. first of all, the hard drive is one of those small laptop factor one. not sure if they make them larger than 100gig. maybe 120. but I'm sure Focus enhancements will void the warranty. They want to sell more drives. so if you want more time without down time, they want you to buy 2 or 3.
I believe the drive inside is a Mitsubishi and i even think its the 5400rpms. so nothing fancy there. The thing to do would be to get the connecting cable to the hard drive and the power cable to come outside the box. so you could just have these empty hard drives. and tape them to the enclosure or something and be able to swap them . (in theory this would work, but I'm not about to void my warranty on a $2000 unit. at least not yet)
As for transfer time, I don't have the time to sit right now and do a test for you. but it definitely is not as long as you think.
If David is Correct, then 20sec / gig x 100gigs=2500 sec divided by 60/min= 33.33min. If you record in 720p camera and set your FS100 to record in PN, I believe you get close to 4hrs of recording in the same 100gig. that would be close to 8x ingestion. if you don't record pn, then it would be around 4x ingestion.