Inexpensive hi-def woes

doondoon said:
Actually a lot of Sound Guys are now recording to portable HARD DRIVES. One of my good friends has been doing sound on "ER" for years now... he always uses harddrives.
Click to expand...

I would too, except if they keep this harddisk arround their neck ?

And might even have it on Raid setup.
 
toke lahti said:
Common opinion about RED is that it's going to have price with 5 numbers anyway and propably over $100k.
Click to expand...
"Common opinion" from who? Red pricing is completely arbitrary right now as they haven't even developed half of the technology they're going to use for it. Everyone's random hypothesis are nothing more than speculation at this point and certainly aren't numbers credible enough to make comparisons with. Jim Jannard himself has posted several times that the goal is to put it within reach of independent filmmakers or he wouldn't be posting here in the first place. Of course, what that means is anyone's guess.

They are apparently going to release some kind of pricing structure at this year's NAB; until then, the camera itself is just another cool idea.
 
mochouinard said:
It all a question on how someone want to work.
My workflow will be :
P2 camera -> Laptop interface to write to -> 2x External Firewire HD
Once at studio with the external HD, I dump video to Raid 5 storage
Then copy to 2 SATA HD for permanent archive, 1 home and 1 off-site
Empty the external Firewire HD and back we go.

PS. P2 have read speed fast ennuf to write to 2 HD at the same time, so no it not taking twice the time...
Click to expand...


Really!!.. Ok, tell us then what would your setup cost be? I still see large dollar signs. In the independent world cost is a factor. I'm a shooter; I don't produce and I don't direct, at least not yet. And frankly I don't care to have the responsibility of backing up clients work for them. (I would have to charge more) But I do feel resposible to educating clients on solutions for their tapeless work flow.

And no matter what anyone says P2 is still too expesive for the capasities that are currently being offered. Lets bring these prices down and have volume sales ( hey mybe that's an idea... The more you buy the bigger the discount)
 
5ive said:
Really!!.. Ok, tell us then what would your setup cost be? I still see large dollar signs.
Click to expand...
I will lose my time again...

My new politic, I will answer all newbies question. I will answer all question that show profesionnalist and open mind. I might not answer if the answer is in the same post already (please read entire post before asking or repling to someone). I will not answer question that show no content (like this one).

Instead of saying what you said, why not tell me where is the huge $$$ in the setup and I can then post information if you are right or wrong. I mean do some work on your side and not just post comment without content...

Barry... I dont know how you lasted that long !!!
 
mochouinard,
I'm not doing the backups in places that I work, so I'm not an expert in that field, but this unreliability of data tapes really surprises me.
Amateur question: why you don't verify backup tapes right when you record them?
Another thing about hard drives: they are very nice for backups, but for archiving, I've always understood that they don't have really long reliable shelf life.
How many years you can keep them on the shelf and then expect them to work perfectly once again?
Isn't there too many thigns in one package; data surface, reading mechanism and electronics? If one doesn't work, you loose everything?
 
That information is not credible IMHO or at the very least only evidence by an individuals experience, not indicative of actual examples across the spectrum of DLT and HDD. If you are telling me that your DLTs are failing 30% of the time and that HDD is failing 0% then I tell you that you have a problem with you DLT authoring/archiving. Having spent 40 months shooting a doc on the music industry I can tell you I saw MULTIPLE HDD failures that were all restored thru a tape back-up.

One thing the music world does NOT do, is RAID. I wish they would but they just dont need the speed and cant seem to justify the cost.


ash =o)
 
toke lahti said:
Amateur question: why you don't verify backup tapes right when you record them?
Click to expand...
With video, verify will work and it a must. But my problem with tape doesn't end that failure to backup on tape, but the failure to restore it when needed, 1 week, or 1 month, or 1+ year from now. They say they are good for hundred of year when in fact, they dont last. SDLT like someone said, I remember ordering one 2 year ago, 20k$ per drive, and 150$ per tape. And 6 month latter, the tape got stuck in the drive while doing a restore. It wasn't fun ! and ofcourses we couldnt do a full restore.

toke lahti said:
Another thing about hard drives: they are very nice for backups, but for archiving, I've always understood that they don't have really long reliable shelf life. How many years you can keep them on the shelf and then expect them to work perfectly once again?
Click to expand...
Well I started a 250mb HD I had years ago. I even powered on a old monoscreen laptop with 30meg of HD space and still powered on.

But to tell you the true, I would still have to go throught all my HD within 10 year and put them back onto another medium. But I wont have to do this, because all my data will be on my active system, so I will just create new backup of these drivers and destroy the 250gig HD I used as backup before.

I recently even started doing offline disk parity. It a process that allow for example take 20 250GB HD, and create 1 250GB parity. So I can lose any one of my 20 HD and I didnt lose my data. The same principle as of Raid 5 but done with software + expension. You can even create 2 or 3 or 4 parity disk, so you can lose up to 4 disk and still restore the data from the parity.

toke lahti said:
Isn't there too many thigns in one package; data surface, reading mechanism and electronics? If one doesn't work, you loose everything?
Click to expand...
The important part about HD is they are pretty much sealed from outside elements, also encased in shield metal casing, and the operation of the read/write heads have no contact to the disk. Now the big problem with HD is shock,vibration or movement while operating. It not just that, but it what affected it the most. If motor can't turn the disk fast ennuf you will also have problems. Also, I have all the same model of HD, in case the controler board failed, I can just swap it with another board, and it does work.

So Hard disk is not the ultimate solution, but it the best solution I have found so far
 
AshG said:
That information is not credible IMHO or at the very least only evidence by an individuals experience, not indicative of actual examples across the spectrum of DLT and HDD. If you are telling me that your DLTs are failing 30% of the time and that HDD is failing 0% then I tell you that you have a problem with you DLT authoring/archiving. Having spent 40 months shooting a doc on the music industry I can tell you I saw MULTIPLE HDD failures that were all restored thru a tape back-up.
One thing the music world does NOT do, is RAID. I wish they would but they just dont need the speed and cant seem to justify the cost.
Click to expand...

I see HD failure all the time, especially in Maxtor drive, they are the worst.

I used to work in IT at a firm with over 2500 workstation, that run 24/7 for 3 year. We had over 250 servers split whtinin multiple offices.

Now every year we had 12 failed hard disk in the workstation. And server had over 45 SCSI HD failures.

So 0.48% HD failured every year in workstation, and 3% failured in Servers (I have put here a average of 6 HD per server, since I dont have the exact total figure, but it sound right).

And the 30% restore failure include Backup Software problems, but doesn't end there. We used Arcserve and Backup-Ex and NetBackup.

And we did lost complete Server and had to restore from tape, and we have been lucky. But if a buisness device to work like that, fine, but I do not.
 
Tis true. DAT is no longer going to be supported by a number of manufactures and several making no more DAT recorders. Solid state Compact Flash and harddrives like the Diva and the Traveller are the rage. I just recently recorded 8 tracks for a short film.. all locked to SMPTE, 24 bit 48k all the way up to 192.


The devices are smaller and more stable than DAT. They have pre-record buffers and they are so easy to work with. The FR2 that I used was awesome. DAT is dead.
 
mochouinard said:
I will lose my time again...

My new politic, I will answer all newbies question. I will answer all question that show profesionnalist and open mind. I might not answer if the answer is in the same post already (please read entire post before asking or repling to someone). I will not answer question that show no content (like this one).

Instead of saying what you said, why not tell me where is the huge $$$ in the setup and I can then post information if you are right or wrong. I mean do some work on your side and not just post comment without content...

Barry... I dont know how you lasted that long !!!
Click to expand...

Ok Mochouinard, chill, Some how i missed Bobdiaz post. And I wasn't making a comment You took it out of contex... It was a question.

Regards

Newbe
 
jmfox said:
Would you provide links to the Diva and Traveller? How are you using them in your work-flow?

jmf
Click to expand...


Assuming he means Deva :grin: ....

http://www.zaxcom.com/audio/deva5.shtml

The MOTO is not a location audio device. I think they used one on "The Producers" but can't remember.

If you have more questions about NL audio, post up in the audio section here.

Cheers
 
mochouinard said:
And the 30% restore failure include Backup Software problems, but doesn't end there. We used Arcserve and Backup-Ex and NetBackup.

And we did lost complete Server and had to restore from tape, and we have been lucky. But if a buisness device to work like that, fine, but I do not.
Click to expand...


That makes a lot more sense... there is a lot of TERRIBLE back-up software out there and in general it is not the easiest to use. Retrospect = JUNK!



ash =o)
 
AshG said:
That makes a lot more sense... there is a lot of TERRIBLE back-up software out there and in general it is not the easiest to use.
Click to expand...
The software we use arnt the cheap solution. Also I know someone who use Backup-exec to do ondisk backup ratter than on tape with no problems now. But using backup software to archive video is not a good idea... You want your footage available quickly.

Just for fun I looked at some tape backup solutions :
LTO2 drive = 2000$ + scsi card for 200gig uncompress + 50$ per tape
LTO3 drive = 4000$ + scsi card for 400gig uncompress + 115$ per tape
SDLT drive = 3500$ + scsi card for 150gig uncompress + 50$ per tape
Cheapo SCSI 320 card = 500$
Cleaning Cardridge +/- 70$
Backup software 780$

So cheapest setup is 3400$ setup fee + 50$ per tape for LTO2

So if you were to record 10 000 minutes of HD Video (167hours of HD).
It will cost you with tape : 5900$
It will cost you with Hard disk : 4000$

Or let choise a smaller number : 1 200 minutes of HD Video (20 hours of HD)
It will cost you with tape : 3700$
It will cost you with Hard disk: 480$

Now make more 1 backup of 1 video please... Tape OR Hard disk.

Also with tape, you HAVE to have a drive to read and scsi card. With Hard disk, you can just put it into any enclosures (USB/Firewire*) and you are good to go (I have personally used a CDROM IDE enclosure and installed a Removable IDE rack. And but 4$ casing for the Rack for all my hard disk I use as backup.

Now if someone go back at miniDV scenario, well you can't have DVCPRO HD on miniDV. And if the DVCPRO HD deck were on the camera, it would have cost more than the price of the camera.
 
P2 In Independent Film

P2 In Independent Film

First post for me. I enjoy reading all the posts!:thumbsup: I want to discuss my
thoughts on a possible work flow with the HVX200, P2 and Independent film.
To me it is unreal how so many people can be upset over the P2 cards!
Ok here is how I see it working. Beyond the fact of the already covered tapeless direct to edit
scenario....Most shots are going to be short ( one to five mins on average ) Why
can't you simply put the HVX200 in loop record with 2 8gig P2 cards? In film that
equals a ton of time for Just about any shot! Now why do I say loop record? Two
reasons. One....You go through a lot of preparation for that one shot! So take after
take you want to get it right! Now lets take the pressure off everyone on the set.
Go into loop record relax. This will change the way you work with your actors.
At this point there is no cost in tape or film. No brake to change film or tape, no rush
....Simply press stop when you nail that perfect shot, I also think if you take
the pressure off your actors you may get a better performance. Down load P2
card and your off to the next shot faster then ever! Second..Endless shoot time in loop
record with out cost in tape or film! Only thing saved is that perfect shot. No waste!
So now all you do is back up on tape, disk or what ever...Oh and cost of
back up? How much of what you have is no good just takeing up space.
There is no reason with the HVX to save trash...Bottom line 10-15 min of loop record time is priceless!
I give it a year to see if P2 cards come down before I buy a HVX. I'm sure I'm over looking something with this scenario.....Feel free to point it out
 
mochouinard,
I'm still wondering about hdd archiving.
AFAIK no big data archive or national libraries etc. uses them.
Do you know why?
Have you read any studies/research about hdd shelf life?
Any links?
We can't just buy more online raid5/6 storage with every new project, so the question is what we put on the shelf.
And I can't just trust somebody's personal experience. We need a bit stronger proof.

How about PD-data, $60 for 23GB = expensive now, maybe a lot cheaper in the future, reliability against data tapes and hdd?
Or iomega rev, $40 for 35GB = iomega's reputation?
 
toke lahti said:
mochouinard,
I'm still wondering about hdd archiving.
AFAIK no big data archive or national libraries etc. uses them.
Do you know why?
Have you read any studies/research about hdd shelf life?
Any links?
We can't just buy more online raid5/6 storage with every new project, so the question is what we put on the shelf.
And I can't just trust somebody's personal experience. We need a bit stronger proof.

How about PD-data, $60 for 23GB = expensive now, maybe a lot cheaper in the future, reliability against data tapes and hdd?
Or iomega rev, $40 for 35GB = iomega's reputation?
Click to expand...


Well, remember, P2 is the key to an IT approach... so I'd look to IT for answers, as there are decades of experience. I'm sure there are hundreds of studies, because it is the meat and potatoes of an IT / computer support person's activities; and many scholarly and technical journals devoted to the subject.

I've never heard of any computer center or other large IT concern archiving on hard drives. One thing I've heard often is that hard drives need to be exercised... sitting on a shelf for long periods of time leads to mechanism problems.

The very fact that a HD incorporates mechanism and media makes it prone to far more problems than a strictly media archiving format.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top