rjo98

Q: External Thunderbolt HD to use with FCPX

I got a brand new iMac, but the SSD in it is tiny, so I need to invest in an at least a few TB external drive.  Should I go Thunderbolt since I think that's fastest?  I'm looking at Fantom and Lacie but I'm not sure what would work best for using it with FCPX.

 

Any tips or suggestions from those two manufacturers?

 

Thanks in advance for the help.

Posted on Mar 26, 2016 11:01 AM

Close

Q: External Thunderbolt HD to use with FCPX

  • All replies
  • Helpful answers

  • by Russ H,

    Russ H Russ H Mar 26, 2016 11:18 AM in response to rjo98
    Level 7 (21,770 points)
    Quicktime
    Mar 26, 2016 11:18 AM in response to rjo98

    Well, a Tb2 drive (which your iMac supports) will offer great performance. Whether you will need those speeds really depends on how demanding your projects are. A USB3 drive will be plenty fast for the vast majority of HD projects. Expect to spend more for Thunderbolt2 drives.

     

    Here is a good article on configuring systems with external drives.

     

    Good luck.

     

    Russ

  • by rjo98,

    rjo98 rjo98 Mar 28, 2016 9:25 AM in response to Russ H
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Mac OS X
    Mar 28, 2016 9:25 AM in response to Russ H

    Thanks, all the video we do is HD, not SD.  I'm more concerned with getting the right drive, even if it is a little more expensive.  Would Thunderbolt be the best or should I go with USB3?  Do iMacs only support 2TB max external drives?  I see some out there up to 5TB.

  • by Russ H,

    Russ H Russ H Mar 28, 2016 1:31 PM in response to rjo98
    Level 7 (21,770 points)
    Quicktime
    Mar 28, 2016 1:31 PM in response to rjo98

    If you want a Tb drive that's larger than 2 GB, it will work with your iMac. There are some examples of large capacity drives here.

     

    Good luck.

     

    Russ

  • by fox_m,

    fox_m fox_m Mar 28, 2016 3:47 PM in response to rjo98
    Level 5 (5,502 points)
    Video
    Mar 28, 2016 3:47 PM in response to rjo98

    [I keep getting a page error on that Larry Jordan page...]

     

    Before you start spending money on external storage, be aware that spinning platter disks are not going to get you the performance you expect no matter what the interface. A TB single platter HD is not going to perform any better than the same disk via USB3 or eSATA or even perhaps Firewire 800 (depending on the drive). If you want performance with conventional disks, you need to consider RAIDs. You can save considerable money making your own high performance drives with cheaper "internal" SSDs (compared to RAID prices) and inexpensive enclosures (particularly USB3). You can find some decent deals on 500GB SSDs every so often (memory prices bounce all over the place these days.)  I bought 2 500GB SSDs and put them one in an OWC USB3 enclosure and one in a KDLinks "dock" which I can use to easily swap drives (if and when I need to add additional internal drives as backup or storage).  I'm getting better than 300MB/s read/write speeds on each and I manipulate them when rendering so that I'm usually using one to work on and one to render to keep speeds at their highest rates (things slow down if you have to read and write to the same disk.) [As a side note: I also have a Thunderbolt hub interface to eSATA, USB3 and Firewire 800 to support my older "legacy" drives... not cheap but worth it.]

     

    You can also save money by buying a large capacity drive to store finished projects and archival footage as well as source media. Speed is usually not quite the same issue here. 

     

    For Macs running OSX 10.5 or newer, the size limit for "volumes" is 8,000,000TB (8 million terabytes or 8 "exabytes") and Macs also support unlimited "volumes" (so I'm guessing if you have a larger drive, you can partition it into smaller volumes.)  Every "disk" requires about 10-20% of the total for file system information and "maintenance" (but it's more likely every *volume* requires that overhead.)

     

    Consider a multi-disk setup. You can get by with smaller drives than you think. The greatest amount of memory you'll need is for source media and rendered final projects (leave source media in their original locations!) You'll use a lot of memory while editing, but it's mostly trash once you're finished (clean up by deleting render files regularly).  You could get by with a couple of smaller fast SSDs editing drives (no less than 128GB each [but I recommend *at least* 250GB minimum]) and a "roomy" (2-3TB) relatively inexpensive conventional drive for storage.

     

    PS - you can also do yourself a big favor by beefing up your RAM... as much as you can afford.

  • by Russ H,

    Russ H Russ H Mar 28, 2016 3:54 PM in response to fox_m
    Level 7 (21,770 points)
    Quicktime
    Mar 28, 2016 3:54 PM in response to fox_m

    fox_m wrote:

     

    [I keep getting a page error on that Larry Jordan page...]

    Thanks for pointing that out. It worked the day I posted it. Broken  since.

     

    Russ

  • by Russ H,Helpful

    Russ H Russ H Mar 30, 2016 5:39 AM in response to rjo98
    Level 7 (21,770 points)
    Quicktime
    Mar 30, 2016 5:39 AM in response to rjo98

    Just to say that today when I checked the link I posted earlier, the link is working again.

     

    Russ

  • by EcoGreg,Helpful

    EcoGreg EcoGreg Mar 30, 2016 5:39 AM in response to rjo98
    Level 3 (507 points)
    Mar 30, 2016 5:39 AM in response to rjo98

    ThunderBolt is no faster than USB3 for single drives, either ssd or spinning platters. The drives are the bottleneck, not the I/O bus port.

    The Larry Jordan article on "Configuring Your System" is good, but becoming a little dated. Good place to start and I agree estimate your needs and then configure your system.

     

    USB3 comes in 2 flavors, Bulk Only Transfer (BOT) and USB Attached SCSI (UASP). Get a drive that supports UASP, much faster. The chipset also plays a role here.

    I have started to use a couple of ssd drives in external enclosures for editing. I copy the media for a project for the duration of the editing process, and use hdd for longer term storage and backing up.

    Be aware that many large hdd drives put together by manufactures are built with 5400rpm drives and this is around 40% slower transfer speeds than 7200rpm drives. Many other factors such as chipset, cache size, and free space all will effect transfer speeds.

    As Larry says, figure out how much bandwidth you need for the type of editing you do and configure your system to exceed that need.

     

    Hope this helps, Greg

  • by rjo98,

    rjo98 rjo98 Mar 30, 2016 5:39 AM in response to EcoGreg
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Mac OS X
    Mar 30, 2016 5:39 AM in response to EcoGreg

    Right now I'm looking at the three available on this page

    http://www.lacie.com/products/desktop-storage/d2-thunderbolt-2/

    These two Western Digital ones

    http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1009175-REG/wd_wdbutv0040jsl_nesn_4tb_my_b ook_thunderbolt.html

    http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1009176-REG/wd_wdbutv0060jsl_nesn_6tb_my_bo ok_thunderbolt.html

    Then this Buffalo one

    http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1072812-REG/buffalo_hd_pa2_0tu3_2tb_minist ation_thunderbolt_usb_3_0.html

     

    I know I need at least 2TB, but considering doubling or tripling it if possible so I'm set for the future.  But should I avoid any of these due to speed issues?  I only have a 256GB internal drive so will rely on this external storage a lot.