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Topic: External Hard Drive Recommendation for ProTools |
Pat Burns
From:
Branchville, N.J. USA
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Posted 24 May 2006 5:52 pm |
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| I just bought an M-Box 2 with ProTools LE 7.0 and all the bells and whistles, using a Dell laptop with more than adequate speed and space. However, I still need an external hard drive for the audio. I've read a bunch of stuff, but can't seem to nail down anything definative on what is a good dependable HD for around $300 or less. I'll be connecting to Firewire bus on the laptop, I believe 400 is what I'll need rather than 800. Don't want USB hookup. From what I've seen on Digidesign's website, it needs better than 4.0 ms search speed, and minimum 7200 RPM's. I see a lot of consumer music type hard drives available, but I don't think they would have the search speed. I've read that the LaCie D2 hard drive is shoddy and may not even operate when new. Does anyone have any personal experience with currently available Firewire 400 HD's used with ProTools LE that they would like to share? Any experience with Seagate? Thanks! [This message was edited by Pat Burns on 24 May 2006 at 08:06 PM.] |
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Pat Burns
From:
Branchville, N.J. USA
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Posted 25 May 2006 6:07 pm
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No opinions? This is the Steel Guitar Forum, right? Where they'll debate whether blue or orange thumb picks sound better?
Maybe I should try reverse psychology....Hey, I really love that LaCie D2 hard drive.... |
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erik
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Posted 25 May 2006 6:09 pm
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| Very few people read this section of the forum. Maybe try the pro audio newsgroup. |
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Bob Hoffnar
From:
Austin, Tx
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Posted 25 May 2006 6:14 pm
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Pat,
I don't know what will work best with your computer but I do know that it can make a big difference. I have been in a couple aborted sessions because the extenal hard drive was not compatable. I don't think its a good idea to go cheap on a hard drive with pro tools. I'm talking about the HD system. The Le might not be as demanding.
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Bob
upcoming gigs
My Website
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Wiz Feinberg
From:
Mid-Michigan, USA
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Posted 25 May 2006 7:49 pm
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Eric said: quote:
Very few people read this section of the forum. Maybe try the pro audio newsgroup.
How are we to learn anything about these pertinent matters if our members go elsewhere to discuss relevant technical issues? A lot of SGF members record audio and can benefit from the observations of those who have already experimented with new technologies.
IMHO
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Bob "Wiz" Feinberg
Moderator of the SGF Computers Forum
Visit my Wiztunes Steel Guitar website at: http://www.wiztunes.com/
or my computer troubleshooting website: Wizcrafts Computer Services,
or my Webmaster Services webpage.
Learn about current computer virus and security threats here.
Read Wiz's Blog for security news and update notices
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Jack Stoner
From:
Kansas City, MO
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Posted 26 May 2006 2:07 am
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Why not go on the Dell Users Forum and the applicable laptop section and post there to see what other Dell owners are using and/or find out what is working or not working.
You'll have to register to post on the forum. There are separate sections for the various product lines. e.g. if you have an Inspiron laptop then use the Inspiron, Lattitude then use the Lattitude section of the forum, etc.
http://delltalk.us.dell.com/supportforums
There is also a separate Audio Editing Production section of the forum. http://delltalk.us.dell.com/supportforums/board?board.id=si_audedit |
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Pat Burns
From:
Branchville, N.J. USA
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Posted 26 May 2006 9:32 am
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Thanks for the responses, they are all helpful. Hi, Bob...ProTools LE is demanding enough, it uses up a lot of space depending on how many tracks and the number of edits, but of course the ability of the drive to seek quickly is paramount.
The most important parameter that ProTools mentions is that the drive must have an Oxford 911 chipset in order to be compatible with the ProTools software. You pretty much have to call the manufacturer to find out if they do bccause they don't mention the chipset in the technical specs, and then hope that the person you're talking to knows what they're talking about. I saw a drive yesterday from Micronet that seemed to fit the bill, but then called and found out they don't use the Oxford 911 chipset. That was good advice, but then the guy suggested I call Musician's Friend....I think that was not good advice.
I did find a drive yesterday on ebay, "buy it now" new, from SAS Electronics in Minneapolis. They seem to be a reputable dealer, and the unit was Maxon 300GB. Maxon does not have a great reputation from what I've read from a lot of people, but an equal number of people have said it works just fine, including audio use. For $157 including shipping, I'll take the chance, I just didn't want to spend $400-$500 to find out that it doesn't work, and then you can't return it because it's used computer equipment. On a side note, Maxon was just purchased by Seagate this week. Seagate is a reputable company with very good product, from what I've read. SAS is the most helpful site I've found yet, they point out that the drive does have the Oxford 911 chipset, the only one blessed by Digidesign for ProTools. It also meets all the other parameters, including (almost) the seek speed at 8ms. I think I'd have to spend a boatload of money to get a seek speed under 4ms.
Jack, thanks for the advice, I will check out those forums....I'm sure I'll find out something useful about Dell as well as ProTools. Erik, thanks for the tip, I'll check that out too...every source of info is worth looking into. And Wiz, thanks for the words of support for info here in the Forum. I did a search before I posted this topic, and didn't come up with anything pertinent, so I thought I'd ask. In general, I value the opinions of the guys and gals here on SGF more than I do in the general public, because members here have already been filtered out of the ocean of nuts out there....even though it may be with a large sieve  [This message was edited by Pat Burns on 26 May 2006 at 10:44 AM.] |
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Pat Burns
From:
Branchville, N.J. USA
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Posted 27 May 2006 5:50 am
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I stumbled onto this website for Pacific Pro Audio while researching, looks like I should have gone here first. Sure wish I had more time to do the research. You have to shuck a lot of oysters to find a pearl.
http://www.pacificproaudio.com/drives.asp |
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Chris Tarrow
From:
Maplewood, NJ
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Posted 30 May 2006 1:11 pm
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Pat,
The important factors are a 7200rpm drive and an Oxford 911 chipset. Firewire 400 is adequate.
Pacific Pro Audio does make an excellent drive, so does OWC:
http://eshop.macsales.com/shop/firewire/fw400-USB2-combo-drives/
More affordable though is AIC Micro, they don't look like much but they work great:
http://www.aicmicro.com/productdetail.asp?id=22408
I've been using IBM drives with an 8mb cache in AIC micro cases for six years without a problem. I have not encountered any issues with the seek time, this drive will play back 32 tracks of 44.1 audio with no problem.
I would recommend buying a second hard drive and a copy of retrospect express or similar backup software and backup every time you work.
Sorry I didn't see your post sooner!
Best of luck,
Chris |
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Pat Burns
From:
Branchville, N.J. USA
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Posted 30 May 2006 6:44 pm
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Thanks for the tip, Chris. I will buy a 2nd drive, and I won't spend a ton on it. And welcome to the Forum, I see that you just signed up a couple months ago.
...next, what's a good passive reference monitor without breaking the bank (I have an excellent clean power amp). |
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Chris Tarrow
From:
Maplewood, NJ
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Posted 31 May 2006 7:35 am
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Depends on your space a bit, and what you mean by not breaking the bank. Check out the "low end theory" forum over at http://www.gearslutz.com, that's usually a good resource for bang-for-the-buck info. people seem to like the Yorkville's, NHT if you can find them, think Yamaha has got a new NS10 style speaker.
re: protools, the DUC can be a good resource:
http://duc.digidesign.com
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Pat Burns
From:
Branchville, N.J. USA
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Posted 3 Jun 2006 6:24 pm
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| Thanks again, Chris. I looked over the sites and the forums...I'm a hobbyist, so spending a couple grand on monitors would be breaking the bank for me. I think for my purposes I can get by with a couple Tannoy passive monitors, I already have a Stewart ProReference 1000 power amp. It is interesting to see what it costs to put together a pro level studio...less than it used to, still more than I'm willing to spend on a hobby. |
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Jerry Gleason
From:
Eugene, Oregon, USA
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Posted 3 Jun 2006 10:04 pm
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| This probably should be a topic for new thread in "electronics", but I love the Tannoy Reveal passive monitors. I spent several days listening to my mixes on various monitor speakers, and I chose them over several other monitors that were more expensive. As soon as I heard the Tannoys, I knew that's what I was going to buy, although I listened to several others after that. I actually liked the passives better than the active ones. Great value for the money. [This message was edited by Jerry Gleason on 05 June 2006 at 12:54 AM.] |
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Pat Burns
From:
Branchville, N.J. USA
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Posted 4 Jun 2006 2:53 pm
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Thanks, Jerry. That's also pretty much what all the reviews said about Tannoy. I'll be going with the Tannoy Reveal passive monitors.
Now I just have to overcome a ProTools Playback Engine error that won't let me track at all, and hope, that it's a driver problem and not a chipset problem on a brand new laptop. It doesn't have one of the known incompatible chipsets, but it doesn't have one of the known compatible ones, either. The error says the audio processing is causing problems with system processor....sounds like it could be a chipset problem, there's more than enough RAM and dual processor drive space.
It's a 9073 error...and it looks like I'm not alone. The bad news is, it looks like nobody is getting a good answer as to how to fix it and make it go away. The quick answer is to remove anything from the system drive that isn't absolutely essential to making it run, but even that isnm't fixing it for a lot of people. The good news? It probably isn't my chipset.[This message was edited by Pat Burns on 04 June 2006 at 10:04 PM.] |
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Chris Tarrow
From:
Maplewood, NJ
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Pat Burns
From:
Branchville, N.J. USA
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Posted 5 Jun 2006 7:33 pm
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I'm using XP Home, which has been given approval by Digidesign as a compatible system. I did already see the second link you provided (thanks), and I'll take their advice and turn off everything running in the background to see if that makes a difference.
Actually, the error I was getting was a 9093 error, which says "The operating system held off interupts too long. If this occurs often, try increasing the H/W buffer size in the playback engine dialog".
When I increase the buffer size in the playback engine dialog, the latency suffers badly, and I get an error message which says "Audio processing is conflicting with other CPU tasks. If this occurs often, reducing the H/W buffer size in the playback engine dialog may help prevent the problem". I tried that, and got the original 9093 error message again....talk about "how to keep a dimwit busy 
Didn't have time to work on the problem today, but trying the simplist thing first, I think I should just try shutting down everything that runs in the background...wireless card, Mcafee security, etc. |
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Chris Tarrow
From:
Maplewood, NJ
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Posted 6 Jun 2006 7:56 am
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| From what I've read, I'm afraid this is typical M-Box behavior, it can't seem to pass audio over USB without an unusable buffer size. |
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Pat Burns
From:
Branchville, N.J. USA
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Posted 6 Jun 2006 7:40 pm
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| Surely there must be some workaround? (No, and don't call me Shirley) It's essentially unusable as is. Digidesign sells a ton of MBoxs, and I see this complaint a lot on the site, but still, if there wasn't some workaround, you'd think the word would be out and they couldn't sell a useless product. Anybody else out there own an M-Box? |
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Rich Weiss
From:
Woodland Hills, CA, USA
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Pat Burns
From:
Branchville, N.J. USA
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Posted 7 Jun 2006 3:28 pm
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| Thanks, Rich..I don't think the external drive is the problem, the one I have is 7200 RPM with the Oxford 911 chipset...I think the problem is in the MBox itself, interfacing through USB to the PC. Tonight I'll try shutting down everything nonessential and see if it makes a difference, and report back. |
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