Internal drive speed for video capture

[sb]

For DV video you need 3.6MB/sec. All (or virtually all) external firewire
devices transfer data at a minimum of 25MB/sec, most get about 32MB/sec in
the real world. (Firewire 400 is supposed to be 40mb/sec)

When the original iMac DV came out, it had an internal 5400rpm hard drive,
and it worked just fine to capture dv video.

You get a little more "headroom" so to speak, with 7200rpm drives, but some
of the very high capacity drives (250GB) are only available as 5400rpm.

So, you should be ok with a new 7200rpm external drive or replacing the
internal.

If you decide to go with an external, a previous posting from Dwayne gave a
URL for a WiebeTech external box, with or without the drives. That¹s the
best external firewire box for video on the market and the 50% discount
makes it about as cheap as the cheap guys. I paid $60 for a dual box from
CompuGeeks that turned out to not be bootable and not be able to smoothly
play back video due to some problem with the firewire bridge chip. A waste
of $60!

 my .02
 sb

On 12/9/03 7:16 AM, "David Crump" <davecrump at mac.com> wrote:

> I was wondering what is the minimum speed required for an internal hard drive
> for video capture without dropped frames?  I always hear that 7200rpm is best
> for Firewire drives, but does it make a difference if it is an internal drive?
> I am just concerned that if I get a Canon ZR 60 it may not be able to capture
> to an external firewire drive.  If I end up with this problem, then my only
> other option is the internal drive.  With an older iMac with a slower hard
> drive, are my only options replacing the internal drive or getting a non-Canon
> Camera?