Advice re: switching from FCE to FCP X

1. No problem at all. I have had FCP X, FCE 4 and FCP 7 all on the same iMac hard drive for the last year.

2. Any. I have 2 FW LaCies but no longer use them as I have 4 cheap (bargain basement Iomega Prestige and Western Digital Elements) USB 2.0 Hard Drives which work perfectly well.

Gary Markovich wrote:

… You really use a USB 2.0? I'd heard, for at least the last 5 years or so, that one needed a FW connected drive for working with FInal Cut programs. A USB drive certainly would be a less expensive choice.

Ian and I represent the 'amateur fraction' on this board - by recommending usb-drives. 😁

• my (very) old fw-cases do 'stutter deliver' too - due to its internal, lame ATA/5400 drives

• in my humble observation, my usb2 WD 1TB delivers faster

• FCPX offers usage of proxy-media while editing - I'm working with 6-tracks-multicam without major issues

yes, I notice here&there stutter, data-shoveling needs perhaps some minutes more and 'hesitated delivery' - but, hey, this no commercial edit-facility, charging 1.500€/h, but my tiny hobbyists set-up. the finally exported project is stutter free and in perfect shape/quality.

a fw800/Raid would be nice and is a must for the 'pros' - but for my vacation-movies and game-reviews I would never spend thousands just for a drive ... I prefer to invest in back-up media for my precious recordings ....

Back in 2005 when I first came on the forums I too heard from everyone of note that USB 2.0 HDs were no good and one should only use FW.

I believed what I was told but a couple of years later I saw a very cheap LaCie USB 2.0 HD and bought it for storage purposes.

Of course my curiosity got the better of me and I decided to see if it would work with DV.

To my astonishment, not only did it work, but it was perfectly OK.

However, I felt a bit guilty at not using the "proper" item so I went back to my FW.

Then about 3 years ago I got fed up with the exorbitant prices of FW drives and bought 3 Iomega Prestige 1TB drives for £69 each, followed last year by a WD Elements 2TB for £70.

I use them daily for DV, HDV and AVCHD editing.

No problems at all.

However, if you are intending to do 4 angles of multicam in hi-def you might be better getting a FW800 but for all "normal" work you will never notice the difference.

Incidentally, this is not just a one-off applying to me.

Most of the amateur editors I know use them perfectly successfully.

P.S. You can't get HDs as cheaply as I did because of the Asian floods last year destroying most of the factories resulting in a jump in prices.

Sorry, I didn't notice that Karsten had already posted more or less the same answer.

I would stress that I don't get any "stuttering" at all because I do not do quite such intensive editing as Karsten . . . 6 tracks is more than I normally require!

Even if you use FW 800 you will get stuttering when you push it too much, but obviously you will be able to stress it a bit more before the HD starts complaining.

However, most amateur editors are unlikely to ever get to those levels.

P.S. As well as Tom's excellent book you will also find IzzyVideo's FREE FCP X video tutorials extremely helpful.

http://www.izzyvideo.com/final-cut-pro-x-tutorial/

Gary Markovich wrote:

… and once I learn the "proxy" media aspect of the software, the USB drives may be my best option.…

that is, as many things in FCPX, a no-brainer:

on Import, you're telling FPX to create proxies - which means, your videos are not only importd in a 'best' quality, but also in a 2nd, quality reduced (= much smallr file size) version - this increases import time, but whatever? you're no news-room.

on edit, you need only the proxies - which reduces the transfer-rates dramatically. When project is done, on final export, the high quality files are used, based upon the edits (and processes, such as color correction) you did.

that's the whole trick.- 🙂

Gary Markovich wrote:

… -that was covered in "Lesson 3" from Wolsky's book...the chapter which I've just finished.

Tom is the sensei ... !

I'm just a lil' kohai .... 😉