I am putting a system together for my neighbor he is into video editing (Pinnacle Version 10) soon to be Vegas

Here are the system specs:

ASUS P5B Deluxe LGA 775 Intel P965 Express ATX Intel Motherboard

CORSAIR XMS2 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Dual Channel Kit X 2 (4 GB total). WIN XP only sees 3GB but that will change as soon as he updates to Vista 64bit later on.

Intel Core 2 Duo E6400 Conroe 2.13GHz LGA 775

Western Digital Caviar SE WD3200AAJS 320GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive X 2 (640 GB total)

XFX PVT73GUGD3 GeForce 7600GT 256MB GDDR3 PCI Express x16 Video Card

COOLER MASTER eXtreme Power RP-650-PCAR ATX from factor 12V V2.01 650W Power Supply

LG DVD- Burner

CD RW

Win XP / Sp2 32bit






Here's my question. How should I setup the Hard Drive Configuration for optimum speed while video editing and post production? Should I partition any of the drives? Should I leave one drive for OS only? Is it worth setting up a Raid Configuration? Should he add a 3rd Hard drive?

Any opinions would be appreciated. I have never built a system for Video editing before only gaming systems.

Thanks

Jdegid

Western Digital Caviar SE WD3200AAJS 320GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive X 2 (640 GB total)Jdegid

I would go for a smaller main (OS) drive and 2 large working drives

Should I partition any of the drives?

No.

Should I leave one drive for OS only?

Yes.
Is it worth setting up a Raid Configuration?

For speed (RAID 0) yes, for security (RAID 1) yes.

Should he add a 3rd Hard drive?

Yes.

Out of curiousity, why not partition the working drives? I mean granted each project being worked on will be contained in its own drive, will that hurt performance?

yes, because the head will physically need to access the system drive(partition) and the media partition.. so it needs to be in 2 places at once.. the wear and tear will trash the HDD in no time.. not to mention the lag

Hi Peter,

My setup is as follows:
- 1 physical OS & Software Drive. 160 gig.
- Multiple scratch/work drives, all physically 250 gigs each. With each drive partitioned into 2 125 gig partitions.

Even after capture, exported footage, dvd/hdv etc, I dont exceed 125 gigs per project so that works fine for me regarding space requirements.

In my case I don't think that I am plauged by the performance and disk wear problems that you mention even tho my work-scratch drive happens to be partitiioned, the key to it beign on a physically different drive then my system/os drive.