External Hard Drive Performance?

[VideoTechMan]

A quick question for those who use external hard drives, mainly those that have externals that connect via Firewire. Does anyone knows how well these drives perform? In continuing my laptop research for purchase soon, id thought on whether to get an external hard drive for my AV captures. Im not much into USB stuff for devices like hard drives so id figure Firewire would be better. Any suggestions or thoughts about them? The laptop im planning to purchase soon has a built in Firewire port (4-pin) so conectivity will be simple.

VTM

[beavereater]

I have an external hard drive, but its USB2...and it works fine!! Can't notice any difference other than the fact that its taking up some space on my desk...other than that...no worries!!

[mujahid7ia]

My USB2.0 40GB drive doesn't even get CLOSE to 480mbps, its less than 80! It takes forever to transfer files...

But it's my cousin's now.

[beavereater]

I never seem to have problems with that...but I dont transfer a lot of LARGE files...so thats maybe where its different

[redwudz]

Running the SiSandra benchmark from my laptop with an external 10GB HD (Probably highly fragmented) I get a score of 12MB/S with the Firewire PCMCIA card and 794KB/S with the USB 2.0 card.

In actual use, I do notice some speed difference, but it's not a major problem. I use the drive only for file storage, not capping.

The Firewire card has been much more dependable and is compatible with an external DVD burner, but the USB wouldn't work with DVD.

[miksu]

Firewire drives generally tend to perform better in benchmarks and real world use. They also consume less cpu cycles, as FW controllers usually have more intelligency build in. And FW is peer-to-peer, not client-to-host as USB(2), where everything has to go thru host, namely PC. In many cases, depending on your USB-tree, USB2 needs to send all kind dummy-packets to obtain compatiblity with old USB-devices. FW doesn't have this restriction.

Much depends of course on actual drive mechanism used (5400rpm or 7200, 2Mb vs 8Mb buffer etc.), which can be same in FW and USB versions. That is, 7200rpm/8Mb USB2 might be able to get equal transfer rates as 5400rpm/2Mb.

Toms hardware has done some benchmarking and I think I read one from Arstechnica, too. X-bit labs and Anandtech may have also tested 'em.[/i]

[Faustus]

Not as fast as local, but very very fast with firewire. Personally I dont think its fast enough to warranty putting an 8mb cache drive in there, but its pretty fast.

Work off the internal, store on the external.

[hech54]

I have a Maxtor OneTouch 120gb USB2.0 to store video on....burn from it....rip to it...no problems.

[Faustus]

I have a Maxtor OneTouch 120gb USB2.0 to store video on....burn from it....rip to it...no problems.

Yeah you should be able to do those things and more from an external Firewire drive, I'm just saying if your gonna anything drive intensive its best to do it on the internal drive, then store the results ont he external.

[hech54]

I was just expressing my amazement at even USB2.0 speed Flaystus...there is no doubt that an internal is still the best way to go...especially with an older computer.

[zak_swan]

i'm going to buy an external hard drive so doing some research found this interesting link http://www.slcentral.com/maxtor-onetouch-300gb-external-hard-drive/page5.php
firewire seems to be the way to go.

[Faustus]

Exactly, while USB 2.0 by spec is 80Mbs faster, in real the difference in CPU cycles, and easy of use (plugging in a FW drive always works at the correct speed for EVERYONE not just you lucky guys) makes a huge difference.

Its kinda like SCSI all over again, except this time USB 2 as the NEW IDE is screaming "We're faster!" while the firewire guys just shake their heads.

In short:
USB 2.0: Works, has its uses.
Firewire: Pro Bus much like SCSI used to be, really good thoough put, easy to work with. (Hubs cost alot though..heh)

[ofbarea]

For firewite devices, the performance also depends on the chipset and firmware of its firewire to ide bridge controller.

Older cases are OK if they have Oxford 911 chipset. Newer cases that support disk over 120 GB should be ok regardless of the chipset.

Cases using the original oxford 911 chipset could use up to 120 GB disks. With one exception been Maxtor 160GB drives. To enable the Maxtor 160 GB support the firmware of the bridge controller should be upgraded at least to version 3.1, but I highly recommend using firmware 3.7 or 3.8.

Cases supporting drives over 120GB usually do not need a firmware upgrade, unless you are using oxford 922 chipset in a Mac environment.

I have two oxford 911 based cases; one has a 40GB Maxtor disk; the other has a HP 200i DVD burner. Both units work great running from the build in firewire port of my thinkpad X-31.

I did many testing with these cases and I found that depending on the firmware used, the performance of the disk varies. The latest Oxford 911 firmware that I have been able to tack down is version V3.8 (dated 22-JUL-2003). Please read about it in here:
https://www.videohelp.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=691487

If you whant internal drive speeds, using an external case, consider getting one of those new firewire 800 cases. You will have to buy a new firewire 800 PC card for your laptop, but you can get one cheap in here: http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=51054&item=3479059005

[Hardcoreruss]

I have 2 Maxtor 5000dv's, excellent drives. Mine are 200gb's each however Maxtor have changed them to 160gb but kept the same model number.

Excellent dirves, I transfer large files regularly and see no difference between them and an internal SATA or IDE (not sure about SCSI)

[VideoTechMan]

Very good information here. I think an internal would be best for capturing since it doesnt have to travel through any external wires or anything....an external drive I feel may be good for backups and possibly archiving, and obviously Firewire would be the better way to go. Any more opinions?

VTM

[Jester700]

Capturing DV is really not that demanding. 3.6MB/s. A 911 chipset or newer firewire case should have no problems at all. Mine don't.

[DVD_Ripper]

Capturing DV is really not that demanding. 3.6MB/s. A 911 chipset or newer firewire case should have no problems at all. Mine don't.

I have heard some people having anamolies when transfering DV via Fwire to a Fwire drive... .some skipping. I've never tested this - just reporting some old thread data.

[The village idiot]

Firewire!

I don't like USB, it hasn't ever worked well (for me) for anything but mouse and keyboard.

[Greg12]

I have a FW DVD-+RW and it does seem a bit slow at times but it's never crashed or ran out of data. I've even daisychained my dv camera to my dvd-rw to my computer (before i bought a 3 port card) and it worked fine.

[zak_swan]

my shiny new Maxtor one touch 250GB external hard drive arrived this morning
i'm tempted to just plug it in and use USB connection but i could go out and buy a firewire card locally.
the question is would it matter what one i bought?
the shop is selling an IEEE 1394 card for £16
would this be ok?
read there is 1394a and 1394b which is double the speed but would it matter as HDD will only go so fast anyway
getting confused again

[ofbarea]

Fire wire 1394a works at 400 Mbit/s (50 MB/sec) firewire 800 (or 1394b) will send data at 800 Mbit/s (100 MB/sec). For this setting to work you will need a card and a case that support this speed. Since the great majority of HD have lower transfer rates that 50 MBps, you should be OK with 1394a.

I have used firewire cards in different systems. My laptop has a Ricoh firewire controller and I also have an older Via PCCard. My main PC has a really cheap Agere (Lucent) firewire card and a second firewire port bundled with the Sound Blaster Audigy. The other PC has a NEC firewire controller and my father PC has a TI based firewire card.

My external 40GB HD has worked properly with all of these cards. I have performed DV capture and firewire networking with most of these cards and no problems so far.