Red Drive Vs. Red Ram

[Joe Taylor]

For $900 you'll be able to by a 320 GB RED hard drive.

For $4500 you can get 64 GB RED RAM.

Why would you pay thousands more for so much less? Would RAM be any faster to transfer than the hard drive? Is RAM safer out in the field?

[Obin Olson]

Ram is safer

[Mark L. Pederson]

RED RAM has two solid state drives you can stripe to RAID 1 (if you want) and they should take more vibration than the RED DRIVE.

I'm pretty damn sure that that price will drop, or the size will go up - or both.

[Stuart English]

If you want maximum data security with immunity to shock & vibration or the lowest possible power consumption - choose RED-RAM.

But for most applications RED-DRIVE will be an excellent choice.

[Michael Lindsay]

RED RAM has two solid state drives you can stripe to RAID 1 (if you want) and they should take more vibration than the RED DRIVE.

I missed this info... raid protected would make ram the way to go for me. Are we sure this is true?


thanks

Michael Lindsay

[Antoine Fabi]

Stuart,

1) For filming when walking or running (well...running with caution of course),
will the RED drive be OK ?

2) In a car ?

thanks

Antoine

[Nick Shaw]

I missed this info... raid protected would make ram the way to go for me. Are we sure this is true?

Stuart has said in the past that the RED-DRIVE can be run in either RAID-0 or RAID-1. I assume since the RED-RAM is basically a RED-DRIVE using solid state disks instead of spinning ones, the same applies to that.

Therefore RAID protection is not a factor in choosing between the two.

[Stephen Webb]

I believe Crossing the Line was shot entirely using Red Drives - so it works OK on a helicopter!

[Stuart English]

1) For filming when walking or running (well...running with caution of course),
will the RED drive be OK ?

2) In a car ?


As Stephen just commented, all of the helicopter shots (in fact all the shots) in the PJ short were recorded to a hard drive based magazine. So I wouldn't worry too much.

[Steve Gibby]

I'll be using both: RED Drive for overall general use, and RED RAM for highly mobile environments where camera jarring may be an issue.

[Antoine Fabi]

As Stephen just commented, all of the helicopter shots (in fact all the shots) in the PJ short were recorded to a hard drive based magazine. So I wouldn't worry too much.

Great !

thanks

[Rocco Schult]

RED RAM has two solid state drives you can stripe to RAID 1...


I missed this info... raid protected would make ram the way to go for me. Are we sure this is true?

I think Mark meant Raid 0 which is striped. RED needs striped drives to get the throughput. No mirroring here AFAIK. I think the RED RAM is the same than the RED drive just with the drives exchanged to SSDs. The protection is the SSD itself as its more stable than drives with platters.

[Stuart English]

I think Mark meant Raid 0 which is striped. RED needs striped drives to get the throughput. No mirroring here AFAIK. I think the RED RAM is the same than the RED drive just with the drives exchanged to SSDs. The protection is the SSD itself as its more stable than drives with platters.

Thats true for a RAID 0 - the SSDs are more resiliant v's shock than HDDs. At the moment we are using RAID 0; we have not seen any reason to use RAID 1, which of course would limit throughput - both record and transfer - and magazine capacity.

[Brook Willard]

I'm guessing that a RAID 1 on the drive would be too slow but a 1 on the ram would be fast enough?

[Jannard]

I believe Crossing the Line was shot entirely using Red Drives - so it works OK on a helicopter!

I do have to clarify... the drives were a problem with the helicopter. They did NOT like the vibration and we needed to come up with a creative solution to make it work. We did not have RED RAM in NZ. RAM (flash) is safer. And you should consider it as a better choice if you can afford it. Another safe option is recording to Compact Flash. Everyone who buys a camera should add this option. I repeat, everyone who buys a camera should add this option.

Jim

[Chris Gearhart]

RAM (flash) is safer. And you should consider it as a better choice if you can afford it. Another safe option is recording to Compact Flash. Everyone who buys a camera should add this option. I repeat, everyone who buys a camera should add this option.

Jim

Jim, I assume "this" means any of the RAM/flash options?

[Antoine Fabi]

I do have to clarify... the drives were a problem with the helicopter. They did NOT like the vibration and we needed to come up with a creative solution to make it work. We did not have RED RAM in NZ. RAM (flash) is safer. And you should consider it as a better choice if you can afford it. Another safe option is recording to Compact Flash. Everyone who buys a camera should add this option. I repeat, everyone who buys a camera should add this option.

Jim

Jim,

How many CF cards at the same time ? and which model and size ?

thanks

[Brook Willard]

Jim, I assume "this" means any of the RAM/flash options?

I assume "this" referred to an onboard flash option like the CF module.

[David Wyatt]

Another benefit of SSD's/Red Ram vs Hard drives/Red Drive is the less likelihood of SSD's to fail in general (not just shock/vibration related - see the following link:
http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/2007/02/16/google_hard_drives/

Sandisk claim their SSDs deliver 2 million hours mean time between failures (MTBF), approximately six times more than notebook hard disks and can handle greater temperature extremes than hard drives as well.

IMHO the solid state vs hard drive decision is a trade off between price, reliability and storage capacity (after all the Red Ram's 64GB isn't huge but, as others have speculated, that's likey to go up before release or the price will fall, especially since there are much cheaper SSD's already being manufactured).

[Clint Johnson]

I do have to clarify... the drives were a problem with the helicopter. They did NOT like the vibration and we needed to come up with a creative solution to make it work. We did not have RED RAM in NZ. RAM (flash) is safer. And you should consider it as a better choice if you can afford it. Another safe option is recording to Compact Flash. Everyone who buys a camera should add this option. I repeat, everyone who buys a camera should add this option.

Jim

And if I read your email to the CLM list correctly, Steven Soderbergh will be using the CF option for filming "The Argentine" (http://pro.imdb.com/title/tt0892255/) and "Guerrilla" (http://pro.imdb.com/title/tt0374569/)?

[Airlawn]

How do these flash storage modules work? Are they factory installed like the RAW Port? Why choose Ram over Flash?

[Eirik Tyrihjel]

I love the idea of primarily recording to Flash memory, The Sandisk Extreme IV, seems like it will do the job, at 8GB they would pretty closely equal a standard 400ft roll of 35mm.

I guess the drive will be very handy at events/concerts and anything that goes on for a long time.

[Poi Boy]

I'm going solid state all the way; P2 has been a good experience for me.
Aloha
-A

[Rainer Fritz]

We want to put the RED in a aerial unit with a Wescam System. Is it possible to know how much weight the RED one body has with RED RAM and one RED Brick ??? Will it possible to get longer wires for the SATA Bus and power cables from the brick?

thanks
rainer

[Frank Weeks]

I do have to clarify... the drives were a problem with the helicopter. They did NOT like the vibration and we needed to come up with a creative solution to make it work. We did not have RED RAM in NZ. RAM (flash) is safer. And you should consider it as a better choice if you can afford it. Another safe option is recording to Compact Flash. Everyone who buys a camera should add this option. I repeat, everyone who buys a camera should add this option.

Jim

Just curious Jim,
At what point prior to our personal shipping date can we make adjustments to our order? I would like to add a couple of options if the money is available.

Thanks for your time and effort.

Frank Weeks
#852