Red Drive size - why not 500/750/1000 GB? [Archive]

View Full Version : Red Drive size - why not 500/750/1000 GB?

Fredrik Harreschou

11-09-2007, 01:45 AM

I believe the size of the Red Drive has always been 320 GB. When will the drive size change? I guess 320 GB was chosen once because it was at the best GB/$. Now 500 GB is more of a standard and 1 TB disks starting to be common.

If the disks are basically quality approved hard disks from a certain supplier, wouldn't larger disks in the same product line work as well?

Cheers,
Fredrik

LEON

11-09-2007, 01:48 AM

Stephen Webb

11-09-2007, 02:02 AM

250GB 2.5" drives are fairly standard now though. It's been a whilst since the 320GB Red Drives were announced - larger capacities at the same cost is not an unreasonable speculation :greedy:

Fredrik Harreschou

11-09-2007, 02:13 AM

It seems they will be using two (size 2,5) 160Gb diks in raid 0 for speed.
The disks you are talking about are size 3,5.

Of course. Silly me. I was thinking the RAID was for data protection and that a single disk could sustain the data rate of REDCODE. I guess the 2,5 drives are a bit slower. Thanks for the clarification.

Fredrik

PaulClements

11-09-2007, 02:15 AM

What is the largest 2.5" drive currently available? Largest I've managed to find is 300GB 2.5" SATA drives. That would be 600GB in the RedDrive.

I think a good feature would be being able to buy the drive unit and have the ability to put in your own 2.5" drives and have it format them for Red use. It'd certainly make obsolesence obsolete!

Another reason for doing this would be to use the 2.5" CF convertors that allows you to replicate the small size harddrive using compact flash. People could if the job called for it replace the drive with a solid state version using off the shelf cards.

A confirmed list of useable drives for both 2.5" SATA drives and CF here at RedUser would be very useful.

I can well imagine I'll end up dismantling a RedDrive after a year or two to see if it can be done.

Paul

Laco Zamba

11-09-2007, 02:17 AM

It would be safer to have 2x 300GB drives in RAID 1

Gunleik Groven

11-09-2007, 02:25 AM

Red-drive enclosure with swap-able drives would be high on my list

Drives die, but are cheap.

If I knew I could store the drives, much like people are talking about CF cards, I'd be a happy puppy.

Open and switch much like on the MacBooks (Not the pro's!!! -;)

Gunleik
Who already stack terrabytes of drives as mirrored backups.

Fredrik Harreschou

11-09-2007, 02:49 AM

It would be safer to have 2x 300GB drives in RAID 1

This is what I was thinking. I guess the reason is as I implied, that the 2,5" disks aren't fast enough in RAID 1?

Cheers,
Fredrik

LEON

11-09-2007, 02:52 AM

This is what I was thinking. I guess the reason is as I implied, that the 2,5" disks aren't fast enough in RAID 1?

Cheers,
Fredrik

Maybe not incase you want to record 4K 60fr/second,
please Graeme answer this one !

roryhinds

11-09-2007, 03:05 AM

anything over 200Gb is moot as you'll always want to offload the date before its gets too risky to loose the footage.

You'll always second guess whether the data is secure and will always feel better once the data is on another disk backed up somewhere.

Keeping a full 3 hours worth of footage on a drive without a back up doesn't make sense unless you're shooting something that can be easily reshot at no extra cost.

Laco Zamba

11-09-2007, 03:20 AM

This is what I was thinking. I guess the reason is as I implied, that the 2,5" disks aren't fast enough in RAID 1?

Cheers,
Fredrik

Do you think that they are writing data parallel to both disks? Then all files are splitted to both disks. If we consider speed, it's good solution but risk of data lost is high.

Gunleik Groven

11-09-2007, 03:21 AM

Rory

Agreed!

But pop'ing in and out mirrored drives (or RAID-0) is what I do all day.

It sort of works.

Gunleik

Fredrik Harreschou

11-09-2007, 03:54 AM

Do you think that they are writing data parallel to both disks? Then all files are splitted to both disks. If we consider speed, it's good solution but risk of data lost is high.

I WAS under the impression that the RAID was for security (RAID1). I was wrong. I understand your concern about losing data. I hope that somewhere in the future, when single disks are more than fast enough, that we/RED can change this from a RAID0 to a RAID1. Having redundancy would probably make producers more willing to take "the risk" of shooting to hard drives.

On a side note, I have NEVER - knock on wood :wink: - lost data due to a failed hard drive. I still do regular backups though, knowing the day will come sooner or later.

Fredrik

Tonaci Tran

11-09-2007, 05:54 AM

just a guess, I think the limit is due to the requirement that the drives need to be 7200rpm rather than 5400rpm, though there are 7200rpm 200gb 2.5 sata drives.. so 400gb might be possible.

mhandy

11-09-2007, 06:02 AM

While RAID 0 increases the performance of the drives by striping the data (writing to both drives at the same time) it also INCREASES the probability of failure. Since losing either drive would result in the loss of data on both drives, the probability of failure is doubled.

A common solution is RAID 0+1 which stripes two mirrored drives. It requires 4 drives in total (increasing weight, power consumption and cost) but also reduces the risk of drive failure as two (or more) drives would have to fail before you would lose data.

I agree that hard drive failures in stationary devices are reasonably infrequent, but most hard drive issues I've experienced are a result of moving a drive during operation. Wherever practical, solid state would be my choice. Having said that, a RAID 1 CF solution would definitely get my attention.

Matt

Fergus Meiklejohn

11-09-2007, 06:41 AM

I would guess that this is basically the RED drive..
http://www.g-technology.com/Products/G-RAID-mini.cfm
So 400GB would seem to be possibility. Although as Rory said, we'd probably be backing up the data long before we got to fill it

Jeremy Hughes

11-09-2007, 08:02 AM

Can someone explain all of the benefits and drawbacks of having 600GB RED-DRIVEs?

Joe Carney

11-09-2007, 08:14 AM

I'm hoping RED is looking into the new generation of SATA II SSHDs coming out next year. You can go Raid 0 with complete safety. Power requirements go way down, and it's feasable to build a single removable "cartridge" holding both drives.
They currently fit the 2.5" form factor also.
All that would be needed is a standard FW or eSata connection for ingest.

Anyway, that's what I'm hoping they do.

Jeff Kilgroe

11-09-2007, 09:08 AM

Yeah, I think once capacities and prices catch up a bit, we'll see the RED DRIVE go away in favor of the RED RAM / RED FLASH (same unit, just SSD media inside). Might be a while before total replacement. But if in the next year or so, if we could have RED SSD based storage that holds 320GB or more and for not too much of a price premium (no more than double), I see little reason to have a hard drive solution. Currently there are 160GB SSDs available on the market at a price point around $17K. They're definitely reliable and robust -- the ones from Adtron are being used by the US military for critical field storage, flight computers on fighter jets, etc.. I think they're fast enough, given the specs -- especially if used in a RAID-0 configuration. It's the price tag that's the current obstacle.

FLASH media capacities are really starting to grow and will continue to grow at a faster rate. The catch is we're waiting for media that's also fast enough. Most of the upcoming SSDs that are due to hit the market over the next 12 months are still going to be too slow for RED. Most FLASH manufacturers advertise the maximum possible read/write times. And what matters is the minimum write speed that can be sustained over all memory cells in the module and repeatedly in a variety of conditions.

As for the HDD based RED DRIVE, I'm thinking 400GB is probably the largest capacity we would see if it were released today (2x200GB 7200rpm). There are 250GB and 300GB 2.5" drives available, but at 5400 and 4200 rpms respectively and the 300 has fewer heads due to needing an additional platter in there. The 250GB drive probably can sustain the transfer speeds needed, but I would question the latency and seek times. Might still work though, after all these are overall faster drives than their 160GB 7200rpm counterparts.

Alexis Hanawalt

11-09-2007, 09:28 AM

Michael Hastings

11-09-2007, 09:37 AM

250GB 2.5" drives are fairly standard now though. It's been a whilst since the 320GB Red Drives were announced - larger capacities at the same cost is not an unreasonable speculation :greedy:

250s are as cheap as 160s were back in June when RED was scheduled to be released, and cheaper than 160s were when the REDDRIVE was announced.

Stephen Webb

11-09-2007, 10:18 AM

Those drives are sloooow 5400...

The 320GB RedDrives that were announced use two 5400rpm drives in a Raid 0. Stuart even said at one point that to have a Raid 1 you'd need 7200rpm drives, hence the reason it's not an option (or wasn't back then).

So a 500GB RedDrive in theory shouldn't be a problem.

ericyoung

11-09-2007, 10:35 AM

Stephen Webb

11-09-2007, 10:40 AM

Unless you're shooting a 3 hour live event! :)

Or an Indian Wedding :biggrin:

Jaime Vallés

11-09-2007, 10:51 AM

I wouldn't trust field recording to a spinning hard drive unit at all, regardless of size. I'm going CF, until the red flash SSD unit is available.

If I need long record times, I'll record out the HD-SDI to an HDCAM deck at 1080.

Evin Grant

11-09-2007, 10:59 AM

I also believe the Red team wanted to keep the drive single platter, which reduces the probability of a head crash.

Michael Hastings

11-09-2007, 11:25 AM

I also believe the Red team wanted to keep the drive single platter, which reduces the probability of a head crash.

That would actually make sense. So now we should just push for a lower price due to lowered drive costs!:innocent:

Alexis Hanawalt

11-09-2007, 12:05 PM

I wouldn't trust field recording to a spinning hard drive unit at all, regardless of size.

I think we all have that knee-jerk reaction, but statistically a drive crash is about as likely as having a loader accidentally expose a can of film. In 10 years, I've never had a laptop drive crash on me - but I have lost scenes shot on film due to human error.

jimhare

11-09-2007, 01:25 PM

Or an Indian Wedding :biggrin:

I did that for a friend once. Most tape changes I've ever done in a single shoot!
:whistling:
Actually, it was pretty amazing and went for 3 days.

Jaime Vallés

11-09-2007, 01:51 PM

I think we all have that knee-jerk reaction, but statistically a drive crash is about as likely as having a loader accidentally expose a can of film. In 10 years, I've never had a laptop drive crash on me - but I have lost scenes shot on film due to human error.

I thought the same, until my wife's laptop hard drive died at the same time as my desktop's second internal drive, both of which stopped working last week. :angry03:

Fredrik Callinggard

11-09-2007, 02:51 PM

Mark B.

11-09-2007, 03:06 PM

Ive had 4 laptop crashes. It all depends on how much you use them and much you fill the disks. In the RED Raid case I have a feeling we will be filling them quite heavily. So I think we should be prepared on that they can crash.

fred

I really jostled my old laptop (programmer on-the-go), for several years, and never had any problems with the hard drive (everything else, yes, but never the drive). Eventually though, I upgraded to a new hard drive simply because I wanted larger file space. I think something similar would happen if we had a replaceable hard drive system for Red, even if swapping the drives required a screw-driver, some down-time and a bit of cable tinkering. Most people would swap out the internal drives every year or so, to improve capacity, with the side-effect that the newer hard drives would be less likely to have any of the issues that plague older drives.

Steve Murray

11-09-2007, 03:16 PM

Yeah, I think once capacities and prices catch up a bit, we'll see the RED DRIVE go away in favor of the RED RAM / RED FLASH (same unit, just SSD media inside). Might be a while before total replacement. But if in the next year or so, if we could have RED SSD based storage that holds 320GB or more and for not too much of a price premium (no more than double), I see little reason to have a hard drive solution. Currently there are 160GB SSDs available on the market at a price point around $17K. They're definitely reliable and robust -- the ones from Adtron are being used by the US military for critical field storage, flight computers on fighter jets, etc.. I think they're fast enough, given the specs -- especially if used in a RAID-0 configuration. It's the price tag that's the current obstacle.

FLASH media capacities are really starting to grow and will continue to grow at a faster rate. The catch is we're waiting for media that's also fast enough. Most of the upcoming SSDs that are due to hit the market over the next 12 months are still going to be too slow for RED. Most FLASH manufacturers advertise the maximum possible read/write times. And what matters is the minimum write speed that can be sustained over all memory cells in the module and repeatedly in a variety of conditions.

MTRON - MSD 6000 - SATA FLASH
PERFORMANCE (single drive): 150MB/s burst 100MB/s read 80MB/s write <.1ms access time
PERFORMANCE (RAID 0 multi-drive): 2X MTRONs: 171MB/s read
http://www.dvnation.com/nand-flash-ssd.html

Jeff this is what you are talking about, yes? If these new SATA flash drives work then why even bother with regular hard drives? These are shipping as 32gb now with 64gb & 128gb on the way.

I hoping that the delay for the RED drive is to announce a solution with these soild state puppies. And that they will be hot-swappable like P2 cards.....

Jeff Kilgroe

11-09-2007, 09:42 PM

Jeff this is what you are talking about, yes? If these new SATA flash drives work then why even bother with regular hard drives? These are shipping as 32gb now with 64gb & 128gb on the way.

I hoping that the delay for the RED drive is to announce a solution with these soild state puppies. And that they will be hot-swappable like P2 cards.....

Yes, that's the SSDs. I didn't realize that they actually had them in stock now. Just a couple weeks ago, they were nowhere to be found. Cool.

It's very likely that these 32GB models or another brand just like them, is what's inside of the RED RAM (aka RED FLASH) drive. Price-wise they seem to almost fit with the RED RAM pricing, but I'm betting that RED is using something more like the next model up like the Pro series.

We shall see... We're just guessing for now (semi-educated guessing). But I agree, once the 128GB SSDs hit the market at this price or less, I won't consider a magnetic hard drive for my record solution. Some situations where long record times and price are a factor will still sell a lot of HDD based RED Drives until these SSD solutions catch up a bit more. I think another year will make a huge difference. Once the 128GB models ship and they get the price under $1K, you'll start seeing them in notebook computers instead of hard drives.

Dalibor Fencl

11-10-2007, 04:10 AM

Ive had 4 laptop crashes. It all depends on how much you use them and much you fill the disks. In the RED Raid case I have a feeling we will be filling them quite heavily. So I think we should be prepared on that they can crash.

fred

It's for sure, RED drives will be filled up to the end, on the other hand, there won't be those random heads movements here and there, like at system disk of windows.

J. Bernard Vallon

11-10-2007, 06:51 AM

Larger hard drives have higher read/write speeds due to increased platter density. however, the speeds plummet when you get towards the center of the platter. Id be happy waiting until a good sized 2.5" drive comes out, spinning at 5400rpm, maybe 500gb or so, that can have >40MB/s write speed for MOST of the drive. Mirror them together in a RAID 1, call it a Red Drive, but only write to the sector of the drive on the outside, where the write speed is 40MB/s. You'd only really have maybe 2/3 of the drive space, but it would be basically identical to the current red-drive plans but it would have raid 1 protection.

Brent J. Craig

11-11-2007, 05:25 PM

I think acquisition on spinning media will go away sooner than we think. Flash memory specs are increasing like crazy.

I know it's a four-letter-word around here, but SONY is selling cameras that use Expresscard flash just like the Red EX34 drive, so there is a pretty big market pushing the development of those cards.

Does anyone know if the Red Expresscard flash drive is still in the works?

Alexander Nikishin

11-11-2007, 07:48 PM

I really hope they go RAID 1.

Even if we are paying for 320gb and only recording 160gb's worth, (some 1 hour 15 minutes) that would make me feel alot safer about shooting onto a RED Drive.

Steve Murray

11-13-2007, 05:33 PM

Red 1.8" SATA Flash 32GB $600.00 (coming soon) is now on the RED site. RED FLASH (SATA) Module has returned. This seems like the best way to go to me as I think these will become available in larger capacity faster than compact flash and the speed should be better also.