P2 Store download times and errors

S

slp

New member
Wondering what people are getting for download times from the p2 store to the hard drive on a G4 powerbook computer and or to a firewire drive?

We are experiencing transfer problems and errors on a regular bases. When copying from the p2 to a G4 power book and it is taking anywhere from 3 to 5 hours. It seems to be very combersome.

Any movement with the p2 store and it automatically causes an error. We are also getting errors on a regular basis when trying to transfer directly to an external firewire drive that is hook up to the g4 power book.

Wondering if we are doing something wrong here?
 
I will be running tests this weekend on 8GB card XFR to a G4-PB 17"/1.67GHz. using several methods - both to Firewire 400 & 800 drives. I'll be glad to pass along specific parameters, workflows & results when done.

Best regards,

Charles
 
p2 card not the problem, 60 gig p2 store is the problem

p2 card not the problem, 60 gig p2 store is the problem

We are not having any problems with going from the p2 card to the powerbook. Are problems are coming from the p2 store. It is incredibly slow and is crashing frequently. We have tried 2 seperate computers and we have installed the proper drivers. Any movement of the drive causes it to crash. There have been several occassions where we will copy all of the over to the Mac hd and it crashes somewhere in the process. If we try to go to an external drive it usually crashes with in the first 5 to 10 minutes of the transfer. So we are having to sit at the computer and drag and drop individual file folders. This is very time comsuming. LIKE ANYWHERE FROM 3 TO 5 HOURS TO DUMP THE ENTIRE 60 GIGS. What gives here? Is anyone else experiencing this?
 
slp said:
We are not having any problems with going from the p2 card to the powerbook. Are problems are coming from the p2 store. It is incredibly slow and is crashing frequently. We have tried 2 seperate computers and we have installed the proper drivers. Any movement of the drive causes it to crash. There have been several occassions where we will copy all of the over to the Mac hd and it crashes somewhere in the process. If we try to go to an external drive it usually crashes with in the first 5 to 10 minutes of the transfer. So we are having to sit at the computer and drag and drop individual file folders. This is very time comsuming. LIKE ANYWHERE FROM 3 TO 5 HOURS TO DUMP THE ENTIRE 60 GIGS. What gives here? Is anyone else experiencing this?
Click to expand...


Turn off the verify feature under the battery pack, and turn off the motion sensors in the P2 software on your computer while connected. Leave the P2 store powered via ac adapter, not battery power, that will improve your situation.
 
Not sure about the motion sensor in the software

Not sure about the motion sensor in the software

Thanks for the reply. I am wondering more how to turn off the motion sensor in the p2 software when you can't install the software on a mac? I think I am still missing something here?

SLP
 
One more thing....if you are moving the files to the mac, move the last clip.txt file first, that will double the speed of the transfer.
 
Dear SLP and Green Hornet
The safety features on the P2 Store are there to look after you. Personally I'd not want to disable any features designed to ensure data integrity. Those are, after all, why we're prepared to shell out nearly $2000 for what is essentially $100 worth of 60GB drive.

My workflow is to import through FCP: it takes about 500MB/min - so a 7.25GB volume with about 40 takes on it copied through in about 14 minutes. In comparison, a drag-and-drop can take over 45 minutes. Importing through FCP you get all the clip data you could want and it's into a bin that you can name and manage. I then log the import - much faster than logging from VTR.

Hope this helps.
 
slp said:
Wondering what people are getting for download times from the p2 store to the hard drive on a G4 powerbook computer and or to a firewire drive [...]
Click to expand...
I've timed the transfer time for a single 4 GB Partition transfer from the P2 Store to a PowerMac G5 (with the P2 drives installed) via USB 2.0 connection to be about 5 minutes, plus or minus a few seconds. I've observed similar times with a PowerBook, but I did not time that. Methodology: (1) mount P2 Store (in Mac mode) via USB 2.0 connection onto Mac desktop; (2) Create destination folder (with name of reel number); (3) drag both the CONTENT folder and LASTCLIP.TXT file from the P2 Partition to the destination folder.

If you are experiencing very long times,verify you do indeed have a USB 2.0 connection on your PowerBook, do some older models have USB 1.0? USB 1.0 at 12MB/Sec. or whatever it is is going to be dog slow. I used a P2 store for an whole weekend without problems, the rental house I got it from is very fastidious about making sure the latest version of everything is installed. Good idea to keep the P2 on a stable surface without movement while it's transferring files. Treat it like you'd treat any other hard drive.

Are you still having problems? Let me know...
 
I'm renting the HVX200 + a P2 Stor for a shoot next week, plan to connect it to my G4, but it has USB 1.0 because it's old. I have an external 250 Gb drive with Firewire 400/800 and USB 2.0 ... do I need to run into the Mac from the P2 Store or could I go through the drive? It will be my first time testing all the equipment and I've read in other threads that there are things to look out for installing the drivers, having the machine recognize the P2 Stor, etc... Any step-by-step workflow suggestions would be greatly appreciated, or is it wishful thinking on my part? Just hoping to have a good shoot and not worry about troubleshooting the downloading stuff. thanks!
 
diegballs said:
[...] plan to connect it to my G4, but it has USB 1.0 [...]
Click to expand...
The P2 Store is a USB 2.0 device, not a host, so it needs to connect to a Mac or PC in order to upload files from the P2 Store to the Mac or PC. USB 1.0 will be very sloooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooow. You don't want to transfer 4 or 8 GB cards worth at USB 1.0 speeds.

As with any new technology, allow yourself plenty of time to work through the entire workflow and work out the kinks before going on the shoot. If you can manage it, I think it's better to ingest the cards directly from P2 card to a computer, the P2 Store is an interesting intermediary, but you eventually have got to get the footage onto a hard drive.
 
i wouldnt turn off the shock sensor on the P2 store.. just make sure your not shaking it. you can see when its stopping the device when the e4 button on the top lights up.
 
As promised here are some transfer times from P2 to 17" PowerBook G4.

PB specs: 1.67GHz, 100GB 5400rpm internal HD, 1.5GB RAM, OS-X 10.4.6
Firewire 400 drive: Hatachi 80GB 7200rpm TravelStar in 2.5" EXT case

My FW800 enclosure arrived DOA so no go on those tests. Another shoot preempted my tests so the 8GB P2 card had only 830MB of files but convenient for guestimating by multiplying transfer times X10 for 8GB.

I did 2 types of transfer - copy & disk image - to both PB internal & external FW400. I came across an article quoting an Apple FCP person's recommendation to use Disk Utility to make a disk image of a P2 card & it's contents rather than just copying the folder & files to avoid file corruption. Since a disk image copies sector for sector the entire P2 card "drive" including empty sectors the resulting DMG is the formatted size of the card. In this case approx 7.4GB for an 8GB card.

The transfer test times:
830MB copied to PB internal drive = :55 seconds (approx 9 minutes for a full 8GB card)
830MB copied to external FW400 7200rpm drive = :45 sec. (approx 7,5 minutes for a full 8GB card)

The interesting test for me was the Disk Image method of - opening Disk Utility, selecting the mounted P2 card, selecting Disk Image (read only/no compression) and selecting a destination & name for the DMG.

Disk Image creation times:
8GB image written to PB internal = 4:58 (just shy of 5 minuter)
8GB Image written to 80GB external FW400/7200rpm - 4:45
Both DMG files reported a transfer rate of 20.5MB/sec at finish.

If my math is even close it appears that a disk image is almost twice as fast as a straight copy with significantly less chance of file corruption. Hope this is of interest.

Best Regards,

Charles
 
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