HyperShop's "Colorspace UDMA" as a cheap backup drive?
 

Aloha,

While snooping (I mean researching!) on the internet, I bumped into this product from a company called HyperShop. Intended primarily for still photographers, it seems to me like it should be able to be used as a compact flash video backup device in the field. At $249 without a drive, it should be very reasonable to purchase your own SATA hard drives and install yourself. You could build a 750GB device for arounf $330!!! And, it boasts UDMA, which should allow for fast dumping times. Connection to a computer would be USB; that would be a price/performance tradeoff. They offer a 14-day moneyback guarantee, and I'm considering it. I have asked them to send one to Dan Keaton for Convergent to test. I really hope this works. You can have a look for yourself at:

HyperShop - The Official Online Store for HyperMac + HyperDrive

Jeff

Is there an advantage over the Nexto?
 

Took a look, and not clear that there's an advantage over the Nexto - except perhaps being able to install your own drives. I doubt that the viewer function will play the MXF or MOV files (unless I missed something), and it seems to be the still photo viewer functions that you are paying extra for here. At least the Nexto has an esata port.

Much Cheaper than a Nexto !
 

Aloha Jeff & Dave:
In the product description it does list video as one of file types of files the device is capable of saving. I wish you had dropped the company a line and asked them to send me one to test ! ;-) Thanks for the heads up on this Jeff :-)

I have it and I can answer some of those questions. I used it heavily for a week to backup about 350gigs of stills and video from my 7D, HF100.

1) MOV or AVCHD files - They don't play, not supported, but the backup works fine.
2) current 750gig HD's might be too thick physically to fit inside the casing, see KB article on 750g & 1000g drives
3) Downloads are very fast, I average btwn 30MB/s to 40MB/s for CF, about 16-25MB/s for Class 6 SDHC's
4) I've experience incompatibility btwn my Colorspace UDMA and Patriot UDMA 266x cards, but it's okay with 4 or 5 different other types. I've got a support ticket for it, but no resolution yet.
5) It's _really_ easy to switch to another drive, you can easily switch to another drive in about 2min's.. it ships with a niftly little keychain screwdriver
6) You can review JPG and RAW files, but it's _slow_, at least 1-2 seconds per file.
7) The battery is also replaceable, you can carry a spare.

Colorspace and nanoFlash Compat
 

Kin,

OK, since you have one, you are now 'the Man.'

Questions:

1. You are using the Colorspace with a nanoFlash, right?
2. When you say 'downloads,' you mean from cf card to Colorspace? How is download time from Colorspace to computer via USB?

The ability to easily swap drives could be terrific for me: I have an eSATA dock sitting on my desk. I could easily pop the drive out of the Colorspace, drop it into the dock, and blast video into my old G5.

Dave: I must admit, I did not see the cheaper Nexto, which is priced very well. And, it looks very much like some of HyperSpace's other products, which, if you go to B&H, are made by a company called "Sanho." Could it be that the Nexto and the Colorspace are really from the same factory???

Jeff

No, I don't have a nanoFlash, but it will basically download anything from a Fat32 formatted memory card. It also has OTG backup ability like the Nexto. I also used it to backup my GPS and PDA.

Downloads via USB is the same for any USB device, approx 20MB/s. I used a 5400RPM WD Green drive instead of a faster but more energy hungry 7200RPM.

It's so easy to flip the drive out, that you could simply put the drive into a eSATA housing for transfers.

I got my Nexto cheaper than that - you cant get the one with the viewer cheap, but the Nexto extreme was cheaper than the Colorspace plus it has eSata.

Dear Jeff,

The Nexto and the Colorspace Hyperdrive are from two different companies.

The Nexto has the advantage of eSata connection to your computer. This is much faster than using USB 2.0 to transfer your store footage to a computer.

The Nexto does not have the nice display, but the nice display will not work, as far as I know, with our video files. One needs the Nexto 2500, in the Nexto line, to do this.

Also, I noticed that the Hyperdrive was priced ala carte. So do not be mislead by the $259 price (for the "Shell" as they call it).

I like quite a lot of what the Hyperdrive does. Easily removable hard drive, easily replacable, standard 18650 Lithium-Ion battery.

Nexto used to offer user replacable hard drives. This proved to be a support nightmare. Units were being returned, under their warranty, tested, and the problems were due to the user's hard drive.

Users were purchasing and using hard drives that were not suitable, then they were having problems, blaming the Nexto.

Nexto did lots of testing to find a hard drive that worked with the Nexto. The problem is that since the Nexto Extreme 2700 is so small, many users tend to hold it in their hands while copying their files. Then they wave it around (not on purpose), causing problems with the hard drive. Many of the leading, quality brands of hard drives could not cope with the movement.

So, now Nexto only sells units with a suitable hard drive.
And, they will replace the hard drive with another, at a reasonable cost, when one wants to replace their aging hard drive for a new one.

I hope this helps.