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new iMac
- Thread starter Vultch
- Start date
Indywannabe
Well-known member
I was hoping that the new Thunderbolt drive would provide super fast results, so I sprang $600 for the LaCie 2TB Thunderbolt drive and cable to pair up with a new iMac 27", 3.4 i7, 12gb ram.
The iMac running FCP X really screams and pegs the 8 CPU lines (4 physical x 2) in Activity Monitor...and well worth the money.
The Thunderbolt also screams for file xfers but does not seem to deliver any additional performance over FW800 drives for simple FCP work.
1. Xfering files from the iMac boot drive to the Thunderbolt drive is 3 x faster than with a FW800 drive; however, xfers to/from any other connected source are limited by the speed of that other connection.
2. In general within FCP, the Thunderbolt drive is really fast for moving files around and for video playback.
3. For FCP editing and rendering and ingest, however, the Thunderbolt does not seem to provide any advantage and is the same throughput as my LaCie and WD 500GB FW800 drives.
Using the iMac, I tested the Thunderbolt LaCie vs a FW800 LaCie by exporting a FCP X 1080/30p video to a QT h.264 mov.
Activity Monitor recorded the same Read Writes for both (23-31 mbs read / 0-2 mbs write).
The CPU ran at 72% user; 1.4% system (all 8 CPU lines)
The Ram registered 8.14 GB used, 3.85 free
They both completed the task in about 7 minutes.
I ran a similar test with FCP 6.6. (similar, because the FCP export choices were not the same)
The CPU ran at 43% user, 1.4% system (4 physical CPU lines only) (FCP 6 is contained to 2.5 GB app - 4 GB total)
The disk drives ran at approximately the same as with FCP X (23-31 mbs read / 0-2 mbs write)
They both completed in about 22 minutes. (I chalk up the 64bit vs 32bit software as the most likely reason for the time diff)
Bottom line: the FW800 seems to be just as suitable for simple FCP work as the Thunderbolt...and 4x less expensive. Playback may find a way to need more throughput, but for editing and rendering, that is not my experience.
The real test will be Compressor 4. If Compressor uses the Read/Write speed, then the LaCie Thunderbolt will be well worth the cash. Otherwise, as long as the Read/Write needs less than 60mbs/60mbs, then FW800 drives are just fine.
The manufacturer published numbers match what I got from Blackmagic and Aja test software. The manufacturer numbers are impressive for simple Read/Write...but they apparently did not use FCP in their testing. Here are the test results from Blackmagic and Aja test software for writes and reads of a 5 mb file (both registered about the same)
LaCie LBD 2 TB Thunderbolt:
W 180 mbs avg (up to 197)
R 180 mbs avg (up to 205)
LaCie D2 Quadra 500 GB FW800
W 63 mbs avg
R 67 mbs avg
The iMac running FCP X really screams and pegs the 8 CPU lines (4 physical x 2) in Activity Monitor...and well worth the money.
The Thunderbolt also screams for file xfers but does not seem to deliver any additional performance over FW800 drives for simple FCP work.
1. Xfering files from the iMac boot drive to the Thunderbolt drive is 3 x faster than with a FW800 drive; however, xfers to/from any other connected source are limited by the speed of that other connection.
2. In general within FCP, the Thunderbolt drive is really fast for moving files around and for video playback.
3. For FCP editing and rendering and ingest, however, the Thunderbolt does not seem to provide any advantage and is the same throughput as my LaCie and WD 500GB FW800 drives.
Using the iMac, I tested the Thunderbolt LaCie vs a FW800 LaCie by exporting a FCP X 1080/30p video to a QT h.264 mov.
Activity Monitor recorded the same Read Writes for both (23-31 mbs read / 0-2 mbs write).
The CPU ran at 72% user; 1.4% system (all 8 CPU lines)
The Ram registered 8.14 GB used, 3.85 free
They both completed the task in about 7 minutes.
I ran a similar test with FCP 6.6. (similar, because the FCP export choices were not the same)
The CPU ran at 43% user, 1.4% system (4 physical CPU lines only) (FCP 6 is contained to 2.5 GB app - 4 GB total)
The disk drives ran at approximately the same as with FCP X (23-31 mbs read / 0-2 mbs write)
They both completed in about 22 minutes. (I chalk up the 64bit vs 32bit software as the most likely reason for the time diff)
Bottom line: the FW800 seems to be just as suitable for simple FCP work as the Thunderbolt...and 4x less expensive. Playback may find a way to need more throughput, but for editing and rendering, that is not my experience.
The real test will be Compressor 4. If Compressor uses the Read/Write speed, then the LaCie Thunderbolt will be well worth the cash. Otherwise, as long as the Read/Write needs less than 60mbs/60mbs, then FW800 drives are just fine.
The manufacturer published numbers match what I got from Blackmagic and Aja test software. The manufacturer numbers are impressive for simple Read/Write...but they apparently did not use FCP in their testing. Here are the test results from Blackmagic and Aja test software for writes and reads of a 5 mb file (both registered about the same)
LaCie LBD 2 TB Thunderbolt:
W 180 mbs avg (up to 197)
R 180 mbs avg (up to 205)
LaCie D2 Quadra 500 GB FW800
W 63 mbs avg
R 67 mbs avg
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