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| Re: Firewire 800? [message #102237 is a reply to message #102235] |
Wed, 21 January 2009 18:11   |
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Hi Jeff,
Yes, I'm talking about an external FW drive. This seems to be a PCI Firewire
800 adapter. The question, I guess, is whether, with a Firewire 800 drive,
my computer would be able to move data faster using this board than it can
using it's internal Firewire 400.
Thanks!
Gantt
Jeff Hoover <jkhoover@excite.com> wrote:
>Gantt Kushner wrote:
>> Would one of these:http://www.granitedigital.com/firewire800pcihostadapte rs.aspx
>> make data streaming faster on my Mac? The last G4's to boot in OS9 have
>> only Firewire 400 ports. Would 800 work better. Mostly I don't have
any
>> complaints but high track counts can slow things down sometimes.
>>
>> Gantt
>Gantt,
>
>Are you talking about streaming to an external drive or somthing else?
>FW800 will pass more data but both the drive and the mac have to be FW800.
>
>Jeff
Gantt Kushner
Gizmo Recording Company
Silver Spring, MD
www.gizmorecording.com
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| Re: Firewire 800? [message #102238 is a reply to message #102237] |
Wed, 21 January 2009 18:06 |
JeffH
Messages: 307
Registered: October 2007
Location: Wamic, OR
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Senior Member |
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Gantt,
Trying to get my head around your question from a practical standpoint
and came up wiht the following ( I may have overanalysed. Somone else
may need to correct the logic).
THe following table shows space needed for sample/bit rates and track counts
Sample Rate 44100 44100 48000 96000
Bits 16 24 24 24
KB/S 88200 132300 144000 288000
MB/M 5.292 7.938 8.64 17.28
# Track MB/S
24 2.12 3.18 3.46 6.91
36 3.18 4.76 5.18 10.37
48 4.23 6.35 6.91 13.82
First disclaimer is this is all theoretical. Given that Firewire 400 is
400mb/s or 50MB/sec, 48 tracks at 96K sampling rate and 24 bits would
only use about a quarter of the bandwidth to your exisitng hard drive.
Reality is that many things affect the data transfer such as the
software, the processor, the pci bus, and the hard drive cache and spin
speed, and also your project (that may be reading from and writing to
the drive at the same time).
Try a test to find out how the chain minus your DAW software is
responding.
-FInd a large file on your internal hard drive (preferably at least 500
MB).
-Copy the file to the firewire drive and time the transfer.
-Delete the file on the external drive and repeat three or four times to
get an average time.
-Repeat the process goin the opposite direction (from the firewire to
the internal drive) to check the read times. THis won't be entirely
accurate bu will get you in the ballpark.
-Find the average seconds for wrrites. Divide the files size
(hopesfully arround 500MB) by the number of seconds to give your
approximate write throughput.
-Do the same for reads.
Compare your MB/s numbers you came up with against the track count
table. If the number you came up with are dramatically over the ones in
the table, going firewire800 may not be the best use of funds. If they
are close (double or less), firewire 800 might help.
Probably way more than you were looking for, but hope this helps (and of
course hope it's accurate :-)
Jeff
Kushner wrote:
> Hi Jeff,
>
> Yes, I'm talking about an external FW drive. This seems to be a PCI Firewire
> 800 adapter. The question, I guess, is whether, with a Firewire 800 drive,
> my computer would be able to move data faster using this board than it can
> using it's internal Firewire 400.
>
> Thanks!
>
> Gantt
>
> Jeff Hoover <jkhoover@excite.com> wrote:
>
>>Gantt Kushner wrote:
>>
>>>Would one of these:http://www.granitedigital.com/firewire800pcihostadapte rs.aspx
>>>make data streaming faster on my Mac? The last G4's to boot in OS9 have
>>>only Firewire 400 ports. Would 800 work better. Mostly I don't have
>
> any
>
>>>complaints but high track counts can slow things down sometimes.
>>>
>>>Gantt
>>
>>Gantt,
>>
>>Are you talking about streaming to an external drive or somthing else?
>>FW800 will pass more data but both the drive and the mac have to be FW800.
>>
>>Jeff
>
>
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| Re: Firewire 800? [message #102239 is a reply to message #102238] |
Wed, 21 January 2009 20:00 |
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Hey Jeff! Thanks for all your thought and effort! It sounds to me like I
have enough bandwidth w/ FW 400 to do most anything I need. I almost always
record at 44.1K/24 bit. I suppose if it ain't broke there's no need to fix
it!
Thanks!
Gantt
Jeff Hoover <jkhoover@excite.com> wrote:
>Gantt,
>
>Trying to get my head around your question from a practical standpoint
>and came up wiht the following ( I may have overanalysed. Somone else
>may need to correct the logic).
>
>THe following table shows space needed for sample/bit rates and track counts
>
>Sample Rate 44100 44100 48000 96000
>Bits 16 24 24 24
>KB/S 88200 132300 144000 288000
>MB/M 5.292 7.938 8.64 17.28
>
># Track MB/S
>24 2.12 3.18 3.46 6.91
>36 3.18 4.76 5.18 10.37
>48 4.23 6.35 6.91 13.82
>
>First disclaimer is this is all theoretical. Given that Firewire 400 is
>400mb/s or 50MB/sec, 48 tracks at 96K sampling rate and 24 bits would
>only use about a quarter of the bandwidth to your exisitng hard drive.
>Reality is that many things affect the data transfer such as the
>software, the processor, the pci bus, and the hard drive cache and spin
>speed, and also your project (that may be reading from and writing to
>the drive at the same time).
>
>Try a test to find out how the chain minus your DAW software is
>responding.
>-FInd a large file on your internal hard drive (preferably at least 500
>MB).
>-Copy the file to the firewire drive and time the transfer.
>-Delete the file on the external drive and repeat three or four times to
>get an average time.
>-Repeat the process goin the opposite direction (from the firewire to
>the internal drive) to check the read times. THis won't be entirely
>accurate bu will get you in the ballpark.
>-Find the average seconds for wrrites. Divide the files size
>(hopesfully arround 500MB) by the number of seconds to give your
>approximate write throughput.
>-Do the same for reads.
>
>Compare your MB/s numbers you came up with against the track count
>table. If the number you came up with are dramatically over the ones in
>the table, going firewire800 may not be the best use of funds. If they
>are close (double or less), firewire 800 might help.
>
>Probably way more than you were looking for, but hope this helps (and of
>course hope it's accurate :-)
>
>Jeff
>
>
>
>
>
>Kushner wrote:
>> Hi Jeff,
>>
>> Yes, I'm talking about an external FW drive. This seems to be a PCI Firewire
>> 800 adapter. The question, I guess, is whether, with a Firewire 800 drive,
>> my computer would be able to move data faster using this board than it
can
>> using it's internal Firewire 400.
>>
>> Thanks!
>>
>> Gantt
>>
>> Jeff Hoover <jkhoover@excite.com> wrote:
>>
>>>Gantt Kushner wrote:
>>>
>>>>Would one of these:http://www.granitedigital.com/firewire800pcihostadapte rs.aspx
>>>>make data streaming faster on my Mac? The last G4's to boot in OS9
have
>>>>only Firewire 400 ports. Would 800 work better. Mostly I don't have
>>
>> any
>>
>>>>complaints but high track counts can slow things down sometimes.
>>>>
>>>>Gantt
>>>
>>>Gantt,
>>>
>>>Are you talking about streaming to an external drive or somthing else?
>>>FW800 will pass more data but both the drive and the mac have to be FW800.
>>>
>>>Jeff
>>
>>
Gantt Kushner
Gizmo Recording Company
Silver Spring, MD
www.gizmorecording.com
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