External HD

JohnT

JohnT

Well-known member
Any of you folks using an External Firewire HD. Saw some on New Egg for a good price. 200g for 237.50. Is it as good as an internal?

Specifications:
Capacity: 200GB
Average Seek Time: 9.3 ms
Buffer: 8MB
Rotational Speed: 7200 RPM
Interface: FireWire/IEEE 1394/i.LINK, USB 2.0 and 1.1 compliant
Features: The Maxtor OneTouch drive simply smarter storage with push-button backup. Just press the button and your files are backed up in one simple step
Manufacturer Warranty: 1 year
 
Re: External HD

It has gotten good reviews, but externals generally don't perform as well as internals. And internals cost less.

You can get 200GB internals with the same specs for about $150. Maybe even less, now -- haven't checked for a month or so.
 
Re: External HD

Yeah, Thought that an ext make be kinda nice if a needed to move a progect to another computer. Divit Dan picked up a 250g for 150.00 a few weeks back.
 
Re: External HD

That's where an external does become useful, and I was considering the same for use between my main machine and a laptop.
 
Re: External HD

Do you think that I would notice that much of a change in Editing using an External?
 
Re: External HD

You might -- it might be a little slower on the throughput of the source clips. I haven't had a lot of experience doing that myself, but others have said so.

There are workarounds; you can download the complete project onto your local hard drive and then upload it back the external when you're done working and want to go to the other machine.

But then, you could just keep identical source files in identical folders with identical locations on both machines and only transfer the .veg file between the two, but then you wouldn't even need a hard drive -- you could do that with a flash card or even a floppy disc, actually.

In all, you'll probably be OK, but there will probably be a difference.

You could also look into swappable internal hard drives.
 
Re: External HD

I've got an external WD 80gb in an ADS enclosure, I got it a few years ago. There's no substantial difference between it and any other drive in my system, other than that I can disconnect it and move it to another computer. It's like having an 80-gb floppy disk drive, at hard-disk speeds.

Internal will be a little quicker, and definitely less expensive. But external works fine and is obviously more flexible.
 
Re: External HD

I agree with Barry, for DV25 material, I find no percievable difference when using external HDs compared to an internal HD. Nowadays, I pretty much do all of my work on externals because it's far easier to transport and use to collaborate with others; not to mention it's really the only viable workflow wheneven I'm editing on a laptop.
 
Re: External HD

I use external for minidv footage. No problems whatsoever for that purpose. Bought a 160gb hdd and a 5.25" project box that has both firewire and usb2 for about $55. Easy to put together. Saves more than getting an already built external HD.
Also from Newegg.
 
Re: External HD

I'd say that during editing, usually processor speed is the limiting factor. Even if you have 3-4 DV streams overlaid at the same time even an external drive should be able to cope with it.
I have a few of the 250 GB Maxtor drives and they have a transfer rate (via Firewire) of more than 25 MB/sec both read and write.
 
Re: External HD

I use 2 maxtor 250gb external drives and they work great. Comp USA had them on sale last week for $250, might still.
 
Re: External HD

Diviot Dan bought a 250g external from Microplay here in Atl 2 weeks ago onsale for 150.00. Now thats a deal! :o
 
Re: External HD

$241.00 From NewEgg.
Capacity: 250GB
Average Seek Time: 9.3 ms
Buffer: 8MB
Rotational Speed: 7200 RPM
Interface: FireWire/iLink/1394, USB 2.0 and 1.1
Features: Maxtor OneTouch, Maxtor award-winning hard drive technology
Manufacturer Warranty: 1 year
 
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