While an optimal hard drive arrangement can boost boot up and program launch times somewhat and make a noticeable difference while simply copying huge files from one place to another, almost all of your time is spent editing and rendering or other tasks that aren't booting up or launching programs. So for a ton of money you can speed up a few little things that you seldom do. However, all most of your usual tasks depend much more on the CPU than drive speed and won't run noticeably faster than if you just used one single scummy old drive for everything. Really, how often do you boot your computer or launch Vegas? And if you do do it often, why? My computer stays on for months at a time with a Vegas session open pretty much constantly. I may sometimes launch a second one to work on a different project simultaneously, but mostly i just use the one session that's been running since i booted the computer. Yes, that means i often have Vegas running for months at a time without shutting down and restarting, which means it's always ready to go at an instant rather than waiting for it to launch at all.

My concerns for hard drives are 1) space, 2) reliability, and a way distant 3) cost. Speed doesn't figure into it at all since the speed of the drives doesn't noticeably affect my workflow or how long it takes to get things done. I suppose part of my opinion is colored by the fact that the cheapest bargain/economy drives these days run over 100 times faster than the top of the line drives i used not that many years ago. As far as i'm concerned, there are no slow drives anymore.

Seems a good idea to avoid USB(2 or 3) and Firewire drives for 'active' audio data or temp files. Keep 'em for backup and file-transfer, IMO.

Myself, I run 2 SATA internal drives HDD1 OS and Apps, HDD2 Projects and Temp files (separate Temp file folders for each app and version). And then I have various USB2/3 drives for 'utility', and backup on NAS (with RAID 1) .

On laptop I do all on a single combo HDD/SSD, but that is usually straightforward audio acquisition. That also has USB and eSATA. If I did anything 'heavy' I would be inclined to use an eSATA drive there...

geoff

Hard drive optimization is not as critical as it once was. With hard drive density increasing and size and speed remaining constant, new hard drives are writing more data faster that ever before.

Having said that... I like to maintain a 5 drive system with 3 internal and 2 external drives:

Drive 1: SSD boot drive for OS and all Applications
Drive 2: HDD Media drive with stock footage, loop libraries, music, etc.
Drive 3: HDD Video project drive for all active projects.

In my last PC, Drive 3 was a 2TB RAID 0 but on my Mac Pro, drive 3 is a 6TB RAID 5 (3 x 2TB disks).

I also have two sets of external drives: One set is Camera Card Archives, and the other set is Project Archives with projects and all of their media.

Camera Card Archives: (multiple 1TB USB 3)
After a shoot, I copy the entire contents of the camera card structure with all it's metadata to the Camera Card Archive drive. I create a folder with a descriptive name and copy the entire camera card into it. Why copy the entire card? Because the card contains metadata that tells your NLE how to stitch files back together that have been split during recording due to FAT32 file size limitations. The metadata is also very small so there is no benefit to throwing it away but a great benefit in keeping the card structure.

This drive then gets replicated to another drive so that I have two copies of the camera archive. I do not erase the original camera card until this drive is copied to another drive because I believe that "if it ain't backed up up twice... it ain't backed up!". Once the second backup completes, I format the camera card.

Editing: (internal)
When I'm ready to work on a project, I create a project folder for it on my Video drive. Then I connect my camera card archive drive and open Vegas Pro Device Explorer and import the media to the project folder on my internal project drive. Because I keep the entire camera card structure, Vegas Pro Device Explorer can take advantage of the metadata within. Sometimes I work on an external project drive but most of the time my current projects are on my internal storage. The point is that I do not work on the same drive that contains the camera card files. This drive is in a safe place just in case my work drive becomes corrupt or files get accidentally erased.

Project Archive: (multiple 1TB USB 3)
When a project is finished, I copy completed projects to the Project Archive drive. Archiving a project is as simple as dragging the project folder from my internal drive onto the external Archive Projects drive. That's why it's important to create a project folder for every project and keep all of your files under it. So current projects are on an internal drive, finished projects are on an external drive and camera card archives are on an external drive. That ensures that I have at least 2 copies of my files, the original camera files and the files I used in the project at all times. As I said, I also make a backup of my camera card archive drives so that is a third backup just in case. Sometimes I'll also have an external Active Projects drive for projects that need to be edited on both my laptop and desktop. Finally I also keep backups of my Project Archive drive because... you guessed it... if it ain't backed up twice... it ain't backed up. ;-)

~jr

Reply by: Chienworks
Really, how often do you boot your computer or launch Vegas?

Btw, This is my home PC so to save energy, it's shut down and powered up 2-5 times a day. I don't leave it on because it draws about 150W idle. (;

But reflecting on what Chinworks mentioned, my work PC at the office is a single drive PC on 24/7 which does take muuuuuch longer to load but only gets rebooted every 2 weeks so in this case the initial load times don't really matter to me.

If you're using an SSD ( good one of course ) it apparently makes no difference, you can have everything on that single drive. That seems to be the consensus among DAW people and recording audio reliably is more dependent on hard drive performance than video editing ( you are actually recording/writing/reading data simultaneously in real time vs. just editing something that has already been written to a drive ).

I am doing just that on my DAW laptop and no problems with absolute minimal latency settings ( 2ms ).

So a single 1TB SSD would be all one needs to get the job done. Then when done just back it up to some other drive to make room for a new project.

"So a single 1TB SSD would be all one needs to get the job done"

This may or may not be true depending on bit rate of media, size of project, or multi-camera editing. Most SSD are using old school spinning media interfaces and can get just at saturated with requests and become a bottle neck. NVME solves this problem, but most do not have the hardware that supports it yet. Clearly the x58 board the poster has will not.

The posters cameras are shooting consumer basic AVC at about 4MBs. Drives should not be the issue when editing this level of media. I would look at replacing the x58 or upgrading the RAM to 8GB modules or 48GB of RAM. The caching windows will do with that much ram will out perform HDD issues.

I set my systems up like this:

* Max RAM for the motherboard
.
* SSD for Boot drive / apps

* Then pairs of inexpensive WD Blue HDD as Media/project drives, configured in a Windows RAID 1.

* If multi-camera editing with higher bitrate codecs (100Mbs+), spread the camera angles out across multiple drives.

* Backing up/archiving projects to external USB drive that get stuck on a shelf when not in use.

Again Drive speed when doing such low bit rate media is not a that big of a deal. Even 4 camera angles of AVC at 4MBs is only 16MBs. A cheapo WD blue drive these days is capable of 100MBs+.

This is good advice, astar. A single drive is INSANE. I have a Samsung 500Gb SSD for my OS and Apps. It loads faster and is quiet but that's it. Editing and rendering don't require the high speed of an SSD. You need memory, OPEN CL and a high MHZ chip for that.

An optical drive is good because of its reliability. SSD's are fraught with reliability and speed issues since the more they are used, the slower they get and will crash without warning. Why would anyone want ANY media on this drive?

My system:
SSD for OS and Apps
1TB Optical drive for all documents
1TB Optical drive for all personal photo and video projects.
1TB Optical drive for all project effects like AfterFX, Lower thirds, motion effects, etc.
1TB Optical drive for all audio: Sound FX, Music, recordings & singularly audio
Dozens of 1TB Optical drives full of video media in SD, HD, UHD and more.

I used to segregate my projects by media type but as they grew into the hundreds I found that changing drives caused Vegas and other editors to look for the new media location as Windows reassign drive letters. I now put everything used to make that project into one "project" folder with the exception of audio and video media like motion graphics. lower thirds and stock video. Its easier. Optical media is cheap.

And yes I have back ups for most everything.

VideoFreq are you sure you mean "optical drive" and not spinning disks?

Yes a spinning drive and not optical in the CD/DVD sense. I think of the optical reader and have made that mistake before. Thanks!

My setup is similar to VF's in that I use an SSD for the OS and apps, a smaller SSD for swapfile and temp files, but 4TB magnetic drives for everything else.

Being old skool, I am a bit skeptical of SSD's. However, if it is true that SSD's have a 500K+ MTBF, that could 'theoretically' mean over 70 years - much, much longer longer than a magnetic drive.

Would have to question the idea that SSDs get slower and crash. If you have one that does, it's defective.

It is true that an SSD needs to do certain housework that a hard drive doesn't, but they do it transparently to the user. It's also true that an SSD will eventually wear out, but that's many years down the road.

Riredale: I didn't think that an SSD would slow down with use either, until mine did. Here's why: HowtoGeek.com
and
PC World Article: PCWorld.com Maximizing SSD Lifepsan.
I mirrored my OS and programs onto a Samsung 840EVO and all went well until I had some issues and did it again a few months later. I noticed that SVP12 took longer and longer to load timed from 4.5 seconds to 12. The Windows Experience Index went from 7.4 down to 6.8. with my SSD being the SLOWEST thing in my machine. I ran it again a month ago and it was 6.4. I discovered Samsung Magician which has some nice tweaks that seem to have worked. I ran it yesterday and now it is at 7.5. Vegas loads in 5 seconds again.

I do not know what is going on. My SSD is fast again. I believe what I have read and also try to prevent a lot of HD read and right - especially with Vegas.