Thanks for the help. I looked this up online and it appears it is NTFS so I may be all set.

How do I know what my "USB host" is?

Also, if I do need to convert it, how would I do this? Right mouse click or just what?

Someone else commented that their files were on external HD and every time they tried to render their movie, the program froze. Any idea if this is a common thing? I'm almost scared to try working with my project from an external drive after reading that.

Thanks again.

By "USB host" I mean the electronics inside the caddy converting from the IDE connector into USB interface. Some have restrictions on format they can handle - but I think this is limited patricularly to network caddies in modern times

To convert:
"Open Command Prompt, and at the command prompt, type convert C: /FS:NTFS, where C represents the drive letter of the disk to convert. Press Enter or Return on the keyboard"

Add for whether or not you're going to get a freeze on render. If you run few USB devices, and your HDD is plugged straight into machine, instead of through a hub, your chances are very good that you will have no problem. I would make a backup, and run a test. That's the only way you will know, and doesn't really hurt to try :)

I confess I'm not knowledgeable enough to understand all of the USH host information.

However, I do appreciate your explaining how to convert a drive. I sent myself this page via email to have for future reference.

Actually, until about a year or so ago, I never used any external hard drive and the only other USB devices were my digital camera, or digital video camera, which are only connected when transferring pictures. I don't leave the external drives connected when not in use. Someone gave me the tip that if they remain connected all the time, they are prone to viruses. I don't know enough to know if this is true but prefer a neat desk so just put them away.

I do not use a USB hub so yes, any of those devices are directly connected to my computer. Someone mentioned that using an external HD would make the video load slower. That's ok - I just needed something with enough space to hold it all. And since I'm doing something for someone graduating now and will have another to do in 4 more years, I figured it'd be best now to load everything and not have to do that twice - this loading off of the DVDs may be the most time consuming aspect of the project. Of course if the hard drive crashes between now and then I will have to reload it all from DVDs.

Hopefully before the week is over I will have time to get the video dumped onto the new external HD and begin working with it and maybe it won't freeze! Wish me luck!!

Some reports of a "freeze" when accessing external drives might be due to them going into power save mode and spinning down. I have a 500 GB external drive, and if I don't access anything from it for five minutes or so (just guessing about the time), it shuts down. Later, if I try to open a file from that drive, or come back to the computer and resume using a Vegas project that was already open on that drive, there is a very noticeable delay (5 seconds? more?) while the drive spins up again and finally responds.

As indicated by others above, NTFS is definitely preferred for video files, since it will let you keep long video clips as a single file. FAT32 has a maximum filesize of 4 GB, so any DV clip over 20 minutes or so will have to be split into multiple files. Vegas is good at handling and reconnecting these split files automatically, but if you don't need to share this drive with any Win 95/98-era computers, go with NTFS. I believe Macs can read, but not write, NTFS drives, but even that might require some extra driver or something.

Tim L

I bought a Lacie 320GB a while ago. Out of the box it was FAT32. I used the standard format prog that comes with XP. At one point the programme asked if I wanted to 'format' or to 'quick format'. I chose 'quick format' and the process took less than a minute. Mind you, there was nothing on the drive at the time. If you format a disk, you loose all the contents.

The Buffalo 500gb drive that I bought several months ago was formatted as FAT32. I tried loading video and kept getting *lots* of dropped frames.

Converted to NTFS and no more dropped frames. Go figure.....

Also, this drive had both USB and firewire. I connect to my system via firewire and have not had any problems.

Bill

Also see my message in this post regarding setting the drive's block size when you format it:
http://www.sonycreativesoftware.com/forums/ShowMessage.asp?Forum=12&MessageID=536155

The new hard drive arrived this week, a Seagate 500GB external and it works very well (and is very quiet, too). It does not have a firewire but the USB/power adapater are fine for what I'm doing.

Some of you have read other posts of mine but I have just under 100 DVDs, all with an hour (give or take) of home movies. I read somewhere about a file becoming corrupt and that file being lost. I'm a firm believer in back ups. Not only do I have the set of DVDs, but I made a back up set for my daughter as she and her freinds love to watch the old movies. I also made a back up set for a family member in another state for safe keeping. If we have a tornado, hurricane or the house burns down, there should be another copy not stored in my home.

By the way, I've also archived all of my digital pictures and scanned items (such as school certificates, awards, newspaper articles, etc.) and have just over 30,000 of that stuff, and counting.

My internal hard drive was too small to hold all the video and I did not want it on two external drives. I checked ads, compared prices, and read reviews and that's how I decided on the Seagate. It looks nice on my desk and now that all the video is stored on that, I have deleted it from the other external drive. If I find a corrupt file I can easily reload it from a DVD.

Thank you all for the help, feedback, and support as I get started on this project. This is a great site.