Subject

High Speed Workstation Storage

Server Storage (Sharing, backup, archive)

Real-time Encoding from digital or analog source playback.

Transcoding from one digital format to another.

Relative

844/X, Media 100i, XR etc., Media 100 HD, MAC OSX based systems and other PC Based Editing Systems. Vegas Video.

Demo and Test Sytems

HP XW9300 Workstation. Dual Opteron with 2.- Opteron 252 (2.4 GHz) or 1  Dual Core 280 (2.4 GHz). 2 or 4 GB Ram, GB Enet.

I have 2 of these, but will keep one for testing and use.

Digital Rapids Stream Enterprise / DRC2500.

Dual channel digital and analog video.

and audio, plus 1 DV input.

Includes Deck Control for Frame Accuracy.

844X in HP XW8000, Dual Adaptec ul320. GB Enet.

844/X in HPXW8000 w/ XBlur, Dual Adaptec UL320,  GB Enet.

2- 8 Bay ATA Raid Inc Raid UL160 Storage Bays w/ 8 Hitachi 123 GB Drives.  Raid 5, 1.4 GB total Storage.

On  844/X yields 250 MB/Sec under ATTO speed test. Based on using 1 SCSI ID on each channel and striping Raid 0 across the 2 units.

Can be upgraded using 250, 300, 400, or 500 GB ATA drives.  Raid 5 suggested for 844/X.  Up to 4 TB per box..

3U Dual Intel Based Dual Xeon 2.4 GHz Server w/ 8 Port ATA Raid card, 9 Hot Swap removable drive bays, 1 CD ROM drive., 3.5 Floppy, GB Enet.

Dell 1600SC Dual 2.8 GHz Xeon Server w/ 8 Port ATA Raid Card. 6 Useable Interanl Drive bays and 1 external Drive Bay, CD Rom,  3.5 Floppy, GB Enet.

New

5-8 Bay Serial ATA converted To 1UL320 SCSI Channel 225-250 MB/s

10-16 Bay Serial ATA Convert to 2- UL320 SCSI Channel 450 MB/s

Both configured Raid 5 for added data protection.

Use 250, 300, 400, 500, or 750 GB Serial ATA drives.

844/X and other NLE add on storage

You probably have 10 SCSI drives striped Raid 0 with 5 drives on each channel.  If you are lucky you have UL320 drives on a dual Channel UL320 PCI-X card.

How do you add more storage?  Put 10 more drives on those 2 lines.  Not recommended because it probably won’t work. 

You could consider adding 1 SCSI address with a conversion from 5 or more Serial ATA or ATA drives. If you have UL320, you might be able to get by with 1 unit if it’s UL320, otherwise think about 2 UL160 or UL320 boxes and then stripe across the two with raid 0 as you now do.  What’s the difference?  With Raid 5 on the Serial or ATA drives, if one drive goes bad, you can replace it without losing your data plus it will continue to work why you replace the defective drive.

Other Advantages.

Since this is SCSI, you can use this storage for both workstations and servers.  You can even connect and disconnect them and move them to other PC workstations.  They work on both MAC and PC based systems, but aren’t interchangeable once you format and put data on them.

File Sharing via GB enet

With large video and audio files, you can get between 1.5 GB and 3 GB per minute from your workstation to your server or other workstation in a best case scenario.  This is of course not true with multiple workstations transferring data to and from the same drive mechanisms at the same time, but this is true of every system.

Editing and Graphics via Ethernet

Video editing is not recommended but it does work in certain configurations. Especially in DV editing situations. 

Graphics editing and creation work fine via Ethernet as long as your application allows file storage on the network.

Encoding

Your systems probably work great at outputting to tape.  What works for outputting to other digital formats and also for multiple types.  How do you archive it.  Links for Specs on the hardware and Software.

Hardware          Software

How about a workstation that can do the following:

Hook up an SDI source and set up encoding parameters while encoding from an Component, DV, S-VHS or another  SDI source. 

 That’s right, you can run two instances of the program if you have enough processing power and encode two live or playback sources at the same time.  Say you want to record your client wants an DVD or MPEG 2 file and a 600K windows media file delivered from you 30 minute program.  You can hook up your Media 100 or 844/X STD Def systems via any input and real-time encode the playback. 

Don’t want to stand around to hit the stop, then hook up an old edit deck with a tape with time code and set the record to 30 minutes.  Count down the pre-roll, hit play on the Media 100 system and walk away.

 You can do two at once if you have the processing power.

 You can record to uncompressed and then transcode from there if you will have to be supplying different digital files over time.  Oh yea, uncompressed digital files import pretty nicely into all editing systems.

 You can set up a watch folder and drop files into it and then encode them automatically.

 You can simultaneously stream to the internet or company network from this server.

 You can manage this from your media 100 workstation via Remote desktop. 

 Review the two PDF files supplied with this paper.

 Encoding Formats 

• Windows Media
• Quicktime
• Helix
• Divx
• Sorenson Media
• Mpeg 

Video and Audio I/O 

• SDI (digital models) (2)
• DV (digital models) (1)
• Component (2)
• Y/C (2)
• Composite (4)
• AES/EBU audio (digital models)
• Balanced audio
• Unbalanced audio 

Key Video Processing Features

• Motion adaptive de-interlacing
• 3:2 and 2:2 film process de-interlacing
• 3D (temporal) noise reduction
• 2D (spatial) noise reduction
• Independent horizontal and vertical filtering
• Aspect ratio conversion
• Proc-amp controls 

Key Audio Processing Features 

• 20 bit internal processing
• 8 channels of audio processing
• 7-band parametric EQ (8)
• Dynamic Range compression and expansion (4, 1 for each audio pair)
• Hardware sample rate conversion
• Bass and Treble control
• Master Volume

Cool Stuff

A while back, I made a 14 minute highlight video of stills and video.  After completing it, I converted it to 16x9 HD  at 1920 x 1080.  I then output it to various formats, Mpeg2, Mpeg4, Quicktime, Windows Media in different HD formats in both interlaced and non interlaced formats.  I was amazed at how good some of the DV and old VHs footage scaled up and the photos, since there were already high res, scaled beautifully as well. Played these back at an Apple Store and a Dell kiosk on their systems.  Looked great on there 30 and 40 inch monitors.

One day, goofing around, I had been testing output from SDI from the 844/X into the Digital Rapids encoder.  I then opened Vegas Video which I had installed on the 844/X system. Guess, what, I was able to import them without any conversion and edit multiple streams in Vegas.  Not sure what this means, but for 400-500 bucks it gives you more options in this world.

The ATA and Serial ATA Raid boxes with SCSI interface work seamlessly between workstations and servers.  They also go work equally well on a MAC or PC.