 Capturing To External Hdd - Fast Enough? |
  Sun 19 Feb 2006, 06:32
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 Newbie Group: Members Posts: 3 Joined: 18-Feb 06 Member No.: 77,076  |
Hi Folks
I still haven't quite made it into the Mac World but have nearly settled on the following setup: - Intel iMac 20" - 2GB RAM - Vantec NexStar2 Firewire enclosure + 300GB HDD - PreSonus Firebox audio interface w/ 2x XLR inputs - Edirol MA-15D monitors I intended to use the external firewire HDD as my primary audio capture disk as this would leave the iMac HDD free for OS/application read/writes. Since I've never used an external Firewire HDD before, I'm unsure if it will be fast enough to capture my audio. I'm pretty sure it will be but I thought it best to check. I've only ever used PCs in the past and have always used the HDDs installed in the machine rather than external disks. In fact, now I come to think of it, the iMac HDD is SATA. The NexStar2 HDD enclosure I was looking at uses PATA HDDs. Do you think I'd be better capturing directly to the internal HDD in the iMac or using the external for capture? Your comments on this (and my proposed setup) would be really appreciated. Cheers, Fiddler. This post has been edited by fiddler100: Sun 19 Feb 2006, 06:46 |
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 Sun 19 Feb 2006, 13:43
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 Moderator In Chief (MIC)  Group: Editors Posts: 15,189 Joined: 23-Dec 01 From: Paris - FR Member No.: 2,758 |
Left the internal HD to the system/apps/virtual memory and swap audio to external, even with a fast internal drive you'll encounter conflicts one day when the heads of the drive will have too much to do on their hands. And it can happen fast.
Firewire is more efficient at real time streaming than USB, final. It won't show on a small number of tracks but in the dozens it will. Choose a FW enclosure with an Oxford bridge to IDE/ATA drives, it's fast and reliable. also, only FW external drive will allow you to boot from them, not USB! Should you need it. I don't know the enclosure you write about, so I can't tell. On the drive itself, given the size of audio file, 8 MB of cache will be as efficient as 16 MB (only needed for lots of small files), Seagate are more reliable on the long time (less return %). Edirol monitors are just multimedia monitors, whatever they say, what's your intended budget? -------------------- Our Classifeds • Nos petites annonces • Terms Of Service / Conditions d'Utilisation • Forum Rules / Règles des Forums • MacMusic.Org & SETI@Home
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Posts in this topic
fiddler100 Capturing To External Hdd - Fast Enough? Sun 19 Feb 2006, 06:32
Wilko Hello. I'm a recent newbie to the mac recordin... Sun 19 Feb 2006, 06:49 fiddler100 Thanks guys for your comments so far - much apprec... Sun 19 Feb 2006, 21:41 fiddler100 Anyone else have any advice for me? I'm parti... Thu 23 Feb 2006, 22:56 lepetitmartien For monitors, I need to have a $ figure to gi... Fri 24 Feb 2006, 03:14 TheCatman recording to external FW HD is no prob. You should... Wed 1 Mar 2006, 21:54 Uncle Kvetch QUOTE (lepetitmartien @ Feb 24 2006, 02:14)Fo... Wed 1 Mar 2006, 22:12 UP Multimedia Uncle... If you only have $200.00 get a good... Thu 2 Mar 2006, 13:34 Uncle Kvetch Duly noted, UP Multi. I appreciate the feedback.
... Thu 2 Mar 2006, 15:00 B3 Basher Headphones - Closeback of course. BeyerDynamic HD... Thu 2 Mar 2006, 18:35 mortalengines M-audio has some 100 dollar monitors (I wanted som... Sat 4 Mar 2006, 02:16
UP Multimedia Very Funny EEEEEEEEEEEE. But true... Good advice.... Sat 4 Mar 2006, 07:05 |
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