Question about hard drive space at DVinfo.net
DV Info Net

Go Back   DV Info Net > Windows / PC Post Production Solutions > Non-Linear Editing on the PC

Non-Linear Editing on the PC
Discussing the editing of all formats with Matrox, Pinnacle and more.

Reply
 
Thread Tools Search this Thread
Old October 13th, 2010, 07:46 AM   #1
Major Player
 
Join Date: Feb 2009
Location: Philadelphia, pa
Posts: 705
Question about hard drive space

We all know that the performance of your computer can suffer as the hard drive gets full. My internal drive is about 90% full. If I add an external hard drive and start to capture my video there, will my computer go back to 100% efficiency or will the fact that the internal hard drive is almost full still affect the performance?
Kevin Lewis is offline   Reply With Quote
Old October 13th, 2010, 08:09 PM   #2
Major Player
 
Join Date: Nov 2009
Location: Melrose Park, Illinois, USA
Posts: 936
Quote:
Originally Posted by Kevin Lewis View Post
We all know that the performance of your computer can suffer as the hard drive gets full. My internal drive is about 90% full. If I add an external hard drive and start to capture my video there, will my computer go back to 100% efficiency or will the fact that the internal hard drive is almost full still affect the performance?
The fact that the internal hard drive is almost full will still adversely affect the performance.
Randall Leong is offline   Reply With Quote
Old October 13th, 2010, 09:50 PM   #3
Trustee
 
Join Date: Jan 2008
Location: Mumbai, India
Posts: 1,385
your performance will only be affected if your internal drive is also used to run your OS and software programs. However, if you have a different drive for that, then a 90% drive should not affect the performance of a third drive unless they are called into action in tandem (like reading and writing)
__________________
Get the Free Comprehensive Guide to Rigging ANY Camera - one guide to rig them all - DSLRs to the Arri Alexa.
Sareesh Sudhakaran is offline   Reply With Quote
Old October 14th, 2010, 01:39 PM   #4
Major Player
 
Join Date: Feb 2009
Location: Philadelphia, pa
Posts: 705
Sareesh:

My OS and software reside on my internal haerdrive. There is no third hard drive that comes into play. I'm talking about just adding a second harddrive to store my captured video and project files.
Kevin Lewis is offline   Reply With Quote
Old October 14th, 2010, 05:20 PM   #5
Major Player
 
Join Date: Mar 2010
Location: Red Lodge, Montana
Posts: 889
You really and truly need the external hard drive. Move all your video off the internal hard drive onto the external drive. Get a very big external drive or maybe a pair if you have a lot of video. If you have Firewire or eSata connections, use them rather than USB connections, especially if you are working with HD video.
Jay West is offline   Reply With Quote
Old October 14th, 2010, 05:21 PM   #6
Regular Crew
 
Join Date: Sep 2010
Location: Sarasota, FL
Posts: 55
My editing system had 4 internal drives. C: for the OS, D: for applications, E: for Windows memory cache and F: for projects. I'd archive stuff to the C, D and E drives once projects were done, but never fill them past 80%, which is still probably too much. Overflow kept on external drives or BD/DVD disks.
Richard Lucas is offline   Reply With Quote
Old October 14th, 2010, 10:19 PM   #7
Trustee
 
Join Date: Jan 2008
Location: Mumbai, India
Posts: 1,385
Quote:
Originally Posted by Kevin Lewis View Post
Sareesh:

My OS and software reside on my internal haerdrive. There is no third hard drive that comes into play. I'm talking about just adding a second harddrive to store my captured video and project files.
Your OS+Software Drive should never be more than half full for optimum results. Your system will be slow no matter how many drives you have.
__________________
Get the Free Comprehensive Guide to Rigging ANY Camera - one guide to rig them all - DSLRs to the Arri Alexa.
Sareesh Sudhakaran is offline   Reply With Quote
Old December 8th, 2010, 08:03 AM   #8
Regular Crew
 
Join Date: Nov 2010
Location: Las Vegas, Nevada
Posts: 38
I hate to wake up an old thread but it's better than starting a new one for the same information.
Should my video editing software reside on the same drive as my video archives or should I store nothing but video on my dedicated video hard drive?
And is there any specific reason why so many reference an external Hard Drive? I purchased a second SATA internal hard drive for my editing drive. 10,000 rpm.
Robert Ellis is offline   Reply With Quote
Old December 8th, 2010, 08:56 AM   #9
Major Player
 
Join Date: Nov 2009
Location: Melrose Park, Illinois, USA
Posts: 936
Quote:
Originally Posted by Robert Ellis View Post
I hate to wake up an old thread but it's better than starting a new one for the same information.
Should my video editing software reside on the same drive as my video archives or should I store nothing but video on my dedicated video hard drive?
And is there any specific reason why so many reference an external Hard Drive? I purchased a second SATA internal hard drive for my editing drive. 10,000 rpm.
The video editing software and the video archives (or video source drive) should be on separate drives. If the software and the video source (or archive) are on the same drive, the system performance will be effectively degraded to that of the single-drive-for-everything setup. The reason: SATA is still only a half-duplex interface, which means that data can only go through the SATA interface in one direction at a time (in this case, read or write - SATA cannot do both simultaneously for a single device).
Randall Leong is offline   Reply With Quote
Old December 9th, 2010, 09:05 PM   #10
Regular Crew
 
Join Date: Nov 2010
Location: Las Vegas, Nevada
Posts: 38
I thought so. Thanks for the conformation. Another kind fellow answered this for me but I was unsure if I understood him correctly. This is a great help. I'm going to load my editing software on the same drive as my OS and I'm going to put nothing but video on a 10,000 rpm drive I just purchased. It's only a 300 GB drive but I'll archive to BluRay before it is half full.
Thanks again. Much help.
Robert Ellis is offline   Reply With Quote
Old December 18th, 2010, 08:56 AM   #11
Regular Crew
 
Join Date: Jun 2007
Location: West Rosemary Beach, Florida
Posts: 199
Quote:
Originally Posted by Randall Leong View Post
The video editing software and the video archives (or video source drive) should be on separate drives. If the software and the video source (or archive) are on the same drive, the system performance will be effectively degraded to that of the single-drive-for-everything setup. The reason: SATA is still only a half-duplex interface, which means that data can only go through the SATA interface in one direction at a time (in this case, read or write - SATA cannot do both simultaneously for a single device).
Thanks, That answers my question too...........
Tom Blizzard is offline   Reply With Quote
Old December 19th, 2010, 06:35 AM   #12
Regular Crew
 
Join Date: Nov 2008
Location: NSW / Australia
Posts: 76
I have an older Desktop Mac (twin 2 Ghz/2GB RAM/160GB HDD - only!), which I use for HDV editing.
The 160 GB HDD holds only Final Cut Studio and the OS, that brings it down to 98.5 GB.
All Video and project files are on a 2TB external LaCie HDD, the volume: about 730 GB.
Recently, when I tried to open 3 projects, which hold the 730 GB, the last one took about 5 minutes to open,
and when trying to commence editing, I was unable to even open the clips, another time they came in a monochrome green with a boxed info: Memory low.
Previously I was working with a 1 TB external HDD (also LaCie) with 500 GB worth of clips, and exactly the
same HD space (98.5 GB), which worked fine.
I edit on a wildlife documentary and need access to all material (730GB) in the browsers simultaneously.
After transferring the lot from 1 TB to 2 TB recently and adding some more clips along the way, I expected to have no problems with my setup to about 1.3 TB on my external HDD, but to no avail.

For someone who has an answer to that, I would thankfully lift my hat.

Cheers, Gerd
Gerd Kogler is offline   Reply With Quote
Old December 19th, 2010, 11:57 AM   #13
Inner Circle
 
Join Date: May 2007
Location: Los Angeles, USA
Posts: 2,114
Quote:
Originally Posted by Richard Lucas View Post
My editing system had 4 internal drives. C: for the OS, D: for applications, E: for Windows memory cache and F: for projects. I'd archive stuff to the C, D and E drives once projects were done, but never fill them past 80%, which is still probably too much. Overflow kept on external drives or BD/DVD disks.
Are those 4 physical drives? or just 4 partitions?
__________________
LA Color Pros Blog
RODE Authorized Reseller . Comer LED Camera Lights . TakyBox HTML5 Menu Generator
Taky Cheung is offline   Reply
Reply

DV Info Net refers all where-to-buy and where-to-rent questions exclusively to these trusted full line dealers and rental houses...

B&H Photo Video
(866) 521-7381
New York, NY USA

Scan Computers Int. Ltd.
+44 0871-472-4747
Bolton, Lancashire UK


DV Info Net also encourages you to support local businesses and buy from an authorized dealer in your neighborhood.
  You are here: DV Info Net > Windows / PC Post Production Solutions > Non-Linear Editing on the PC

Thread Tools Search this Thread
Search this Thread:

Advanced Search

 



All times are GMT -6. The time now is 06:33 AM.


DV Info Net -- Real Names, Real People, Real Info!
1998-2024 The Digital Video Information Network