Serato Video General Discussion

Forum
 Serato Video General Discussion
Best and worst external hard drives to use with Scratchlive/VideoSL/MixEmergency
Talk about Serato Video and Video-SL.

Best and worst external hard drives to use with Scratchlive/VideoSL/MixEmergency

DJRemixEnt 4:04 PM - 3 December, 2011
We all know spinning videos require a huge amount of space and im pretty sure those of us that primarily spin video at our venus have had to buy an external hd to accommodate the space needed by large video files. I wanted to start this post to help out other djs who r starting to spin videos and need to invest in an external hd with out goin thru a bunch of heart ache and wasting precious dollars on hard drives that wont hold up to the task of using VideoSl or MixEmergency.

If you have a specific model hard drive that works well for you and your set up, please list it here. Also if there r shitty hard drives to stay away from, please list those too along with the reason you dont recommend that specific hd.

Please be specific on whether you use the hard drive with a mac or pc...the size and speed of the hd...cache... And brand and model number of the hd if possible.

Thanx
DJRemixEnt 4:06 PM - 3 December, 2011
Oh yeah and the connection type: usb, firewire, sata, etc...
djpuma_gemini 4:21 PM - 3 December, 2011
I used to use OWC mercury on the go with fw800 (bus powered) but now I just have an extra hard drive in my mac.
I do like lacies (quadra) used to use those for video, but now just for backup.
nickythedj 4:23 PM - 3 December, 2011
1x 3Gbit, eSATA
2x FireWire 800 (9-pin)
1x USB 2.0
(FireWire 400 via 800 to 400 cable)
Disk Drives:
Type – SATA II
RPM – 7200
Cache – Up to 32MB
Cooling System: Integrated heat sink
Bridge: Oxford 934 chipset
System Requirements: Mac OSX 10.3.x or higher; Windows 2000/XP/Vista
nickythedj 4:24 PM - 3 December, 2011
G-Drive
1x 3Gbit, eSATA
2x FireWire 800 (9-pin)
1x USB 2.0
(FireWire 400 via 800 to 400 cable)
Disk Drives:
Type – SATA II
RPM – 7200
Cache – Up to 32MB
Cooling System: Integrated heat sink
Bridge: Oxford 934 chipset
System Requirements: Mac OSX 10.3.x or higher; Windows 2000/XP/Vista
dj jamalot 8:41 PM - 4 December, 2011
I use an Lacie Firewire 800 1 Tb external rugged an it works flawless with my mac book Pro 2.8ghz running 4 gigs of ram nvidia 8600 graphics card
Code:E 9:16 PM - 4 December, 2011
seagate go flex for mac fw800 2tb (make sire you get a more expensive mac version. PC verions that comes with USB2.0 is only a 5400rpm drive, mac v. has a 7200rpm drive, and over firewire you notice the speed difference)
popnwave 10:04 PM - 4 December, 2011
I'm with djpuma.. OWC isn't the cheapest but I've yet to have a problem with their gear at all. FW800 bus power ftw!
DJMark 1:04 AM - 5 December, 2011
Always better to buy a bare drive, then put it into a good enclosure (OWC and Oyen Digital are both good choices).

Any case made out of plastic is asking for trouble.

Removing the internal optical drive and replacing it with a SSD for boot/apps is an excellent performance upgrade. Then dedicate the larger-capacity conventional HD for music/videos. Compared to using an external drive, that scenario gives better performance, better reliability, easier setup at gigs.
djpuma_gemini 1:41 AM - 5 December, 2011
Quote:
I'm with djpuma.. OWC isn't the cheapest but I've yet to have a problem with their gear at all. FW800 bus power ftw!

YEp

Quote:
Always better to buy a bare drive, then put it into a good enclosure (OWC and Oyen Digital are both good choices).

Any case made out of plastic is asking for trouble.

Removing the internal optical drive and replacing it with a SSD for boot/apps is an excellent performance upgrade. Then dedicate the larger-capacity conventional HD for music/videos. Compared to using an external drive, that scenario gives better performance, better reliability, easier setup at gigs.


+1. I've been without a superdrive for over a year now and don't miss it one bit.
Dj Nyce 2:21 AM - 5 December, 2011
Quote:
Always better to buy a bare drive, then put it into a good enclosure (OWC and Oyen Digital are both good choices).

Any case made out of plastic is asking for trouble.

Removing the internal optical drive and replacing it with a SSD for boot/apps is an excellent performance upgrade. Then dedicate the larger-capacity conventional HD for music/videos. Compared to using an external drive, that scenario gives better performance, better reliability, easier setup at gigs.


WD Scorpio Blue or Samsung Spinpoint M8 and oyen digital FW800 enclosure FTW!!!
DJRemixEnt 3:03 AM - 5 December, 2011
Quote:
I used to use OWC mercury on the go with fw800 (bus powered) but now I just have an extra hard drive in my mac.
I do like lacies (quadra) used to use those for video, but now just for backup.


How'd you go about puttin an extra hd in your mac? i got a 2011 macbookpro 17", model 8,3. id def be interested in this option.
Marine 3:23 AM - 5 December, 2011
whatever you do buy a good toolkit. Don't use the 00 philips that comes with the kits owc sells it stripped one of my screws on my 17 inch 2011 macbook pro and now I can't get the optical bay out to put the data doubler in. I purchased another mac and bought a good toolkit the ones apple uses so hopefully the install will go good. If anyone knows of a good place to get a stripped screw removed let me know I took it to the apple store and the tech said he couldn't get it out and they wouldn't be willing to take it out unless something goes wrong with my computer under applecare.
djpuma_gemini 3:32 AM - 5 December, 2011
Quote:
Quote:
I used to use OWC mercury on the go with fw800 (bus powered) but now I just have an extra hard drive in my mac.
I do like lacies (quadra) used to use those for video, but now just for backup.


How'd you go about puttin an extra hd in your mac? i got a 2011 macbookpro 17", model 8,3. id def be interested in this option.


This
www.newmodeus.com

Will let you have this
www.djpuma.com
lvmez 4:03 AM - 5 December, 2011
glyph is one of the best for mass storage. too big for gigs.
Dj Wunder 8:13 AM - 5 December, 2011
Quote:

www.djpuma.com


Love the Serato disk icon, care to share?
djpuma_gemini 8:56 AM - 5 December, 2011
I got it on here years ago. maybe I can save it and post it up.
DJRemixEnt 1:33 PM - 5 December, 2011
Quote:
Quote:
www.djpuma.com


Love the Serato disk icon, care to share?


Yeah, that is pretty dope!



Quote:
Removing the internal optical drive and replacing it with a SSD for boot/apps is an excellent performance upgrade. Then dedicate the larger-capacity conventional HD for music/videos. Compared to using an external drive, that scenario gives better performance, better reliability, easier setup at gigs.


Once i convince the wife to let me spend the money on it... ill def be putting an extra hd in my mac. (im still suprised she let me spend $2500 on a 17" when i already had a 13" and a 27"iMac!)
djdaddydog 5:10 PM - 5 December, 2011
damn that looks sexy as hell.

Quote:
Quote:
Quote:
I used to use OWC mercury on the go with fw800 (bus powered) but now I just have an extra hard drive in my mac.
I do like lacies (quadra) used to use those for video, but now just for backup.


How'd you go about puttin an extra hd in your mac? i got a 2011 macbookpro 17", model 8,3. id def be interested in this option.


This
www.newmodeus.com

Will let you have this
www.djpuma.com
djpuma_gemini 5:26 PM - 5 December, 2011
I'm sure you have spare laptop hard drives lying around.

That part is a $42 investment, but it saves you way more in the longrun.

As long as you don't have a 2tb video collection like some people do (way too much imho) than you can toss them all on an internal and just take the laptop.

Now only downside is if say you're spinning with another dj and want to plug you external into his machine, you can't do that with all your stuff on an internal.

I use itunes for crates so it doesn't affect me anyway.
DJCrank 7:18 PM - 5 December, 2011
Quote:
I use an Lacie Firewire 800 1 Tb external rugged an it works flawless with my mac book Pro

I have a WD backup with USB 3.0 I never used it playing live but all my videos are backed up on there.
Dj Wunder 10:33 PM - 5 December, 2011
Quote:
I got it on here years ago. maybe I can save it and post it up.


That would be dope. Easiest way is to create a new folder, hit Get Info on that folder and the folder that has that Serato icon, then click the icon and copy, click the icon of the new folder and paste. Archive that folder and send it my way!

Thanks
djpuma_gemini 11:10 PM - 5 December, 2011
Ok I'll do that
DJ Art Pumpin Payne 11:25 PM - 5 December, 2011
Quote:
Will let you have this
www.djpuma.com


ONLY 645GB of video Puma????

Ya slippin....

Using some of the older Bus powered Firewire OWC On the Go enclosures - been "rolling my own" Drives inside:

eshop.macsales.com

I want to try and move to this enclosure eshop.macsales.com maybe next year - once the Drive prices go down again and recover from that flood....
djpuma_gemini 11:31 PM - 5 December, 2011
645gb of playable videos. The guys that have 2tb worth have way too much.

I'm actually going to trim that down, every week when I add new stuff, I purge old stuff.
Either delete it fully (if it's utter garbage) or put it on the drobo for safe keeping.
djpuma_gemini 11:32 PM - 5 December, 2011
I got two of those owc enclosures.

I might start piling up the non-essential videos on that for those nights when you spin a new spot and not sure how it's going to go.
djnak 1:38 AM - 6 December, 2011
Quote:
645gb of playable videos. The guys that have 2tb worth have way too much.

I am one of those guys ...and yes I agree its too much and I have tons of videos Ill probably never play, but will I ever delete them probably not(unless I find a better copy lol)

Back to the externals...

I am currently using 2 (1 is a always updated back up) :
Western Digital 4TB My Book Studio Edition II
# USB 2.0
# FireWire-400
# FireWire-800
# eSATA
Its bigger than a brick and is NOT bus powered but it has been rock solid

Before I purchased these I was using 3
(Western Digital 2TB My Book Studio Edition II)
same specs as the 4TB and just as big
Now they are offsight back ups which only get used once a month but when they were used for gigs they were also rock solid

oh and the drive are hot swapable (I think)

www.bhphotovideo.com
djpuma_gemini 1:48 AM - 6 December, 2011
Also another route is to buy your own external enclosure and put your choice of hard drive in there.
I have one like that and I also put a 1.5tb drive in my lacie quadra.
I have it partitioned so I can backup my 1st internal (os and audio) and my 2nd internal (all videos)

Highly recommend dj's backup their stuff. 1 may be ok, but 2 is the safest bet.

you may think one is cool if my laptop dies, but what if someone brakes in and steals your laptop and backup, then you are sol.

I keep one backup at work and one at home. Better to be safe than sorry.

and as stated I prefer Lacie (with power adapter)
OWC (bus powered) external drives.
DJRemixEnt 1:20 PM - 6 December, 2011
Quote:
Quote:
645gb of playable videos. The guys that have 2tb worth have way too much.


I am one of those guys ...and yes I agree its too much and I have tons of videos Ill probably never play, but will I ever delete them probably not(unless I find a better copy lol)



Same here, even with my audio library. I've been tempted to go through both libraries and clean out some of the unplayed stuff, but ive had some ppl request some oddball stuff and sure enough i search for it and its there, so ill prob just keep everything and just delete stuff when im too broke to buy more hd's. lol
djpuma_gemini 7:21 PM - 6 December, 2011
I'm doing that to my audio side now.

went from 330Gb to 280, but I'm trying to get down to 100GB of audio or less.

Never play it so it's a mess right now.
Culprit 10:32 PM - 19 December, 2011
I also agree w/ puma even tho I am one of those 2tb guys. I hate lugging around my external
djpuma_gemini 12:14 AM - 20 December, 2011
Haha.

I just would have to have that much.

I have about 690Gb on my laptop of videos and still end up having too much shit to sort through
DJRemixEnt 12:44 PM - 20 December, 2011
Ive been using the Seagate goflex 4tb drive with usb 2.0, with SL and ME, and i havent had any problems so far.
Dj_Nix 6:18 PM - 20 December, 2011
Quote:
seagate go flex for mac fw800 2tb (make sire you get a more expensive mac version. PC verions that comes with USB2.0 is only a 5400rpm drive, mac v. has a 7200rpm drive, and over firewire you notice the speed difference)


didn't know that... I knew the pc version was 5400... i'll be looking for the mac one... can you document the rpm difference?
Code:E 7:13 PM - 20 December, 2011
Seagate's website had it on there in the specs when i was looking to buy. I am 100% positive in that it is true, plus the fact that it just makes sense. FW800 has a higher transfer rate that a 5400rpm drive.
Code:E 7:18 PM - 20 December, 2011
There website a a new model up its slightly different than the one that i bought, and it doesn't list that spec anymore. Things could have changed but i doubt it.

Anybody know an app I can use, that will tell me when my Seagate is plugged in, the drive RPM?
djpuma_gemini 7:44 PM - 20 December, 2011
mac, about this mac, will tell you.
Djello 5:22 PM - 5 October, 2012
Quote:
seagate go flex for mac fw800 2tb (make sire you get a more expensive mac version. PC verions that comes with USB2.0 is only a 5400rpm drive, mac v. has a 7200rpm drive, and over firewire you notice the speed difference)

So I use the Lacie
Djello 5:25 PM - 5 October, 2012
Quote:
I use an Lacie Firewire 800 1 Tb external rugged an it works flawless with my mac book Pro 2.8ghz running 4 gigs of ram nvidia 8600 graphics card

Aight so I have the Lacie Rugged 500TB, firewire 800, no issues at all.. love the drive.. my question is it runs at 7200RPMS so i'm assuming that helps in the data tranfer rate.. ANyways, my question n issue is I want to update to the Lacie Rugged 1TB because I have no space at all but it only runs at 5400RPM's is that an issue for mixing video... if not i've been using this lacie 500 and have had no issues and wanna stick lacie.... my WD's crashed, my Seagates have had issues, never an issue with Lacie... let me know what you think...
bboysupafly 5:38 PM - 5 October, 2012
I have a macbook retina with a Seagate Turbo 1.5TB 3.0 usb external hooked up to a usb 3.0 5 port hub self powered. Transfer rates are insane! I get triple transfer speeds compared to usb 2.0. I also have 3 external midi controllers hooked up to it. All runs smooth.
Djello 5:40 PM - 5 October, 2012
Quote:
I have a macbook retina with a Seagate Turbo 1.5TB 3.0 usb external hooked up to a usb 3.0 5 port hub self powered. Transfer rates are insane! I get triple transfer speeds compared to usb 2.0. I also have 3 external midi controllers hooked up to it. All runs smooth.

Yea, that doesn't help me lol, unfortunately, decided to update my current macbook pro 13in and wait to update my iMac when the new one comes out... anyways does the seagate turbo run at 5400RPM or 7200RPM... that will help the question.... cuz if he works then the firewire 800 should work for me
bboysupafly 6:09 PM - 5 October, 2012
The one I have is a 7200. I like the Seagate desk hardrives for the many adapters they have available, I first started with a usb 2.0 adapter and loading a video in scratch live would take forever, so I upgraded to the firewire adapter and it worked perfectly. So the new macbook came out and I decided to stay future proof with the usb 3.0 functionality so I got it and speeds are freaking amazing!
ankit 10:27 PM - 5 October, 2012
Hi Guys. Would it be a right decision to go for this one..

www.lacie.com ??
dj jamalot 11:30 PM - 5 October, 2012
I upgraded to the aluminum wd 2 Tb firewire 800 and now hav tons of room for my video collection it spins at 7200 so it works great kinda bulky not made to be portable but its working...
WarpNote 11:51 PM - 5 October, 2012
Quote:
Hi Guys. Would it be a right decision to go for this one..

www.lacie.com ??

I like these, have 2 of them, They are 5400rpm. Never used them for VDJing though, but done some HD editing in FCP with them. I would get a dropout in FCP every now and then, but nothing major. Also have the 500GB 7200rpm version, and didn't really experience any major difference in performance. This on an older non unibody mac, might see bigger differences on a new machine.

Will probably get a new mbp within the next weeks, gonna test these drives with ME then and let you know how they perform.
dj jamalot 4:06 AM - 6 October, 2012
I like the rugged's i had the 1 Tb but it got damaged accidently btw they arent meant to be dropped... Handled roughly is ok 4 ft drop = no workie!
Djello 5:36 AM - 6 October, 2012
I just need a 1Tb rugged style hard drive that will work well with video djing if anyone has any experience or suggestions.. N no I'm not trying to carry a desktop drive to gigs with me, I want a small portable hard drive preferable FireWire 800
WarpNote 9:50 AM - 6 October, 2012
For a high performance portable drive, I have my eyes set on the G-Raid mini
> www.g-technology.com
Have good experience with both the regular 2,5" mini and the 3,5" G-Drives.
They cost more than the lacie rugged ones, and are not meant to be dropped from any height...
ankit 4:46 PM - 6 October, 2012
Thanks for your valuable feedback guys. I would be using it for video dj'ing n i have a Macbook Pro late 2011 edition, 2.4 GH, Intel Core i7, Memory 4 GB. More feedback required. Thanks in advance!!
WarpNote 2:01 AM - 7 October, 2012
Max out The ram
Niro 10:58 PM - 7 October, 2012
I'm not a video or computer expert like you guys, but I find OWC stuff to be top notch. Also their customer service is really good. Even thou my really expensive SSD failed from them, everything else has been really good. Also they replaced it immediately.

I spin 100% video, but I keep my video files under 300 gigs. My advice, instead of taking away from your current files, start from zero and build from there. It's a little more work, but you really start to know your library.
DJRemixEnt 12:47 AM - 8 October, 2012
Quote:
instead of taking away from your current files, start from zero and build from there


didnt even think to start from there... that's a good idea
dj jamalot 12:48 AM - 8 October, 2012
My 2 Terabyte wd aluminum isnt that much larger than a rugged lacie however it isnt bus powered so u gotta plug it in but it is very fast loads and tranfers.
DaveS 5:41 PM - 9 October, 2012
Just got to add in my recent experience:

Be really careful with USB 3.0 devices for now, especially the NexStar HX4. Nothing but problems and issues on mac.