Feature Req: 'True' Batch Backup/Restore to DV tape

Shredder wrote on 8/7/2002, 10:38 AM
Hi all,

I will submit this as a true feature request, but I wanted to get your opinion first.

What I'd like is a way to "backup" a bunch of clips to DV tape & then have vidcap "Restore" them with the same names/header info/dates etc.

Now I know that the backup wouldn't be guaranteed to be true bit-by-bit, as there could be transfer errors, but that'd be OK. DV is almost 100% accurate unless you have a transfer problem.

What vidcap could do is create a set of barcode-like header frames before & after each clip, which it could read in on capture & determine the exact boundaries of the clips & save the file with the encoded filename/header info. They could even go so far as to store the path in the header, and optionally restore the clips to the same place -- You could re-edit a .veg file with no problems!

You'd basically get an (99.99%) exact copy of the file you originally backed up!

This would be an extremely powerful feature & help me save big $$$ on traditional backup systems, since DV tape is cheap! I hate to give SoFo any ideas to charge us more, but I'd pay an extra $50-$100 for this option just on the $$$ it'd dave me on backup media.

Let me know what you think,

Jon

Comments

Chienworks wrote on 8/7/2002, 12:15 PM
Hey Jon! Actually i've posted essentially the same idea before (so of course i think your idea is terrific!) both here and at the product suggestion page. Please feel free to submit the idea again. If enough of us ask for it, it will be more likely to get attention. I would like to see this backup method copy all files associated with the project, not just DV and VEG files. Let it do essentially the same thing as the "Save Media with Project" function and include everything. True, someone who watches the video would probably see lots of bizarre static, but if you labeled it "Vegas project backup", then you'd remember that it's actually something important and useful.

By the way, discounting transfer errors, this method would be 100% accurate, not 99.99%. Printing to tape is a bit for bit file copy; there is no re-rendering or recompressing going on.
Shredder wrote on 8/7/2002, 12:30 PM
I guess "great minds think alike"!

I'd be a bit cautious about backing up data files this way, since it would be almost impossible to recover from a failure unless SoFo wrote some pretty heavy reduncancy into the process. The bar codes would store thier data optically across multiple frames, so if you dropped a couple of frames or had some tape defects you could still likely get all the data out. This is highly inefficient from a data storage standpoint, so I wouldn't expect to use it for large data files. (But not that big a deal for storing a few KB of data)

There's a group of people in the open source community trying to use DV to backup data files, and they're having lots of problems with it. Everthing's fine when it works, but if you have a transfer error you lose your file. At least with DV, if you have a transfer error you get a few dropped frames that you can repair with slick editing (but you don't lose the whole file).

I don't want to ask for somehting that's too complex, else we won't get it. SoFo's in the business of media software, not data management/storage.

This method would allow SoFo to not have to get involved with creating file formats etc, as all the video/audio would be standard DV, and the encoded data frames would still just be standard DV frames.

If they were to embark on backing up images, .veg files, non-wav audio etc., they'd have to develop a pretty sophisticated encoding mechanism that was reliable & efficient, still getting close to 13GB/hour. Let's leave that to VV5 & still back up those relatively small files on CD for now.

I'm looking for what we get get quickly, with limited effort on SoFo's part.

- Jon
SonyDennis wrote on 8/7/2002, 6:12 PM
I've thought about how to do such an app, and it would be pretty cool. It would essentially turn your DV camera into a tape backup unit, for data. The special case would be for data that's already in DV format, it would be more efficient. The other data, .veg files, .jpgs, etc, would get encoded as magic DV that could be unwound when read back in.

I think someone has already done it, but I don't have a link, sorry.

///d@
Shredder wrote on 8/7/2002, 11:22 PM
It has been tried, but has mostly resulted in failure due to the fact that they are attempting to using it primarly for non-DV data. Hence the software has to do some serious error checking & they can't get anywhere near the full 13GB/tape.

I feel these projects have been over-zealous. I'm just looking for a way to batch archive large sets of DV .AVIs & restore the, with their correct filenames, paths etc.

The only project that's come resonably close is only for Linux:
http://dvbackup.sourceforge.net/

I really think this feature would be a significant differentiator for VV4 & "well worth the admission price" -- For anyone who has to backup lots of large projects, the software would pay for itself in no time. It would be a no-brainer to buy.
Cheesehole wrote on 8/8/2002, 1:33 AM
>>>I'm just looking for a way to batch archive large sets of DV .AVIs & restore the, with their correct filenames, paths etc.

Scenalyzer Live can do something close to that.
http://www.scenalyzer.com/
imaginACTION wrote on 8/8/2002, 1:55 AM
I used to have an excellent hard drive backup on my Amiga which - pretty miraculously - backed up my entire hard drive onto VHS videotape. It was fast and reliable and should form the basis of a very useful backup facility for both hard drives and Vegas projects.
jopereira wrote on 8/8/2002, 3:32 AM
I have a VHS backup system (BACKER) from an english company DANMERE (no longer exists under this name).
It was able to store 1,5Gb on a 3 hour video tape, and the system was VERY reliable (as one should expect from a data backup method). Of course, there were a lot of bits destinated to error correction (and there was a rotine to determine how many bits we are going to use with our VCR and tape quality combination)
In times when a CD-writer costed $1000, and 1,5Gb was able to backup your intire HD, I think the $50 it costed me was a very small price to pay.
Shredder wrote on 8/8/2002, 12:45 PM
While I do like that product, it's for a different purpose. When I'm done editing a project, I want to back it up so I can tweak it in the future if needed. Scenalyzer would wind up breaking apart avis that were previously edited (imagine a show of 'best of clips' - the edits would be between sequences of scenes), and also could not restore the file names of the source files so re-mapping the .veg project file would be a bear.

I currently backup to a 15GB Echo tape drive, but that's costly & slow $35-$40 for a 15GB tape. I have a friend that recently bought a bunch of 100GB drives on special for $100 each, just to use for DV backups!

BTW, thanks for letting me know about scenalyzer - I had foung a product like that about a year ago but it was $300-$400. For $33 you can't beat it!

I still think SoFo should take a crack at it...
jetdv wrote on 8/8/2002, 1:30 PM
Yes, there IS a program out there already that does this. The name of the program is DVSpoof. You can locate this software at:

http://www.dawnload.net/video_software/video_tools/dvspoof.cfm

I have never used this software and have no clue how well or whether it works.

Edward
Shredder wrote on 8/8/2002, 2:04 PM
This app has 3 major limitations:

1. It must pre-render the avi files & then you use a 3rd pary print to tape tool to record it. That could become quite prohibitive in that you need as much free space as the files you're backing up

2. It has a filesize limit of 2GB - Most of us have large source AVIs bigger than 2GB.

3. Since it backs up your video avis as encoded data avis, if the tape becomes corrupt you lose the entire file.

4. It's shareware - Do you want to entrust your valuable project data to shareware?

I'm also curious about how reliable it could be. They say they can get 20GB on 1 tape in LP mode. At best, DV would give them about 21 GB, so they can't be doing much error-checking/correction

My suggestion had the following advantages:
1. The data would be streamed by the print to tape to & require little or now pre-rendering
2. You could backup files larger that 2GB
3. Your avi data is totally safe & reliable, as it can still be captured by traditional means. The WORST that could happen is that the encoded header frames become corrupt & you have to rename a file by hand. Also, if SoFo were to drop support in the future, the video data doesn't need thier app to be decoded
4. If the tape gets damaged you'll just get dropped frames, not lose the ENTIRE file.

Seems like the best of both worlds.

- Jon