External Hard Drive Problem
 

I just upgraded my storage capacity by getting a 500GB external hard drive. I got it all set up and ready to capture. I changed the scratch disk setting to save the videos to the drive. It says there's 400GB+ of room for capture, yet after about 9 minutes of capturing it stops and says there isn't enough disk space for caputre. I use FCP to edit and I have the feeling I'm missing a vital setting change. Does anyone know what might be the problem? I'd really appreciate the help.

thanks,
Sean

Aren't scratch disk and capture disk two different settings?

i honestly don't know the difference. i use the scratch disk to capture my footage. capturing has always been straight forward for me when editing. i haven't had to adjust the settings in a long time. not since i was in college.

I don't use FCP but the scratch disk generally means capture disk. In PP you can set different disks for video, audio, preview renders etc.

i think the problem is the actual hard drive. there may be a format issue or i didn't install it correctly. i followed the install directions and i was prompted to restart my computer. every indication was that it installed ok. i tried to move a 10GB file to the hard drive and it gave me an error message about 6GB into the transfer. i have a few small video files already stored on the drive. i don't understand what the problem is.

Perhaps the hd is set to fat32 files which won't load larger than 6gb files. Try NTSF and you should have no problems.

you're right! thanks for the help Jason.

has to be formated for mac
 

No, don't use NTSF with a mac, use disk utility and format it using Mac OS Extended(Journaled) and your problem will be fixed.

i didn't, he guided me in the right direction though.

funnily enough i would have answered this straight away if i had seen it earlier..

my last two 500gb externals (diff.makes) BOTH said the same message and BOTH needed formatting before accepting large video files (even though they arrived pre-formatted!)