Which Hard Drive Should I Render To?

GoldenPlates wrote on 3/7/2007, 9:36 AM

I have an internal hard drive (250 GB) that has the Windows XP operating system and the Vegas Studio software stored on it. I also have a 250 GB external drive that contains the video clips/photos that I'm editing.

When I render the MPEG-2 file (to then be used by Architect Studio), is there is difference in rendering time if I save the file to the internal or external drive?

Likewise, when I am saving the temp file that burns a DVD in Architect, should I save the temp file to internal or external?

Comments

Chienworks wrote on 3/7/2007, 10:39 AM

Well, rendering to the same drive that contains the source video will slow you down because that drive will be both reading and writing. Rendering to the OS drive will slow you down because that drive will be busy with OS operations. *shrug* Compared to how much time is spent by the CPU, the difference in times between the various drive options probably isn't worth worrying about. So, don't worry about it.

Ideally you should have three drives: OS, source video, rendered video. That will give you the most time savings. But, once again, drive speed is a tiny consideration compared to CPU speed.

HaroldC wrote on 3/7/2007, 3:11 PM

Chienworks, knowing you are one of the go to guys around here. Just to clarify, the optimal three drives is three separate drives, not a drive partitioned into multiple drives?

Chienworks wrote on 3/7/2007, 3:27 PM

Absolutely.

Separate partitions on the same drive are of very little benefit from a performance standpoint. In fact, for almost all purposes, making multiple partitions on a drive is pretty much an obsolete and worthless task.

HaroldC wrote on 3/7/2007, 3:56 PM

Worse than obsolete and worthless. I couple of weeks ago I was going to upgrade my computer. My measly 20 gig C drive was full. That left a 100 gig D drive and 250 gig external. I was going to make the 100 gig D drive the new C drive and install a new internal 320 gig D drive. I shopped around and found a pretty good deal on a new internal drive. I took the computer to the local shop and found out that my C and D drives were actually a single drive that had been partitioned. After the tech guy told me of the risks, costs and everything involved in getting the computer the way I wanted, I decided to just add the new internal drive as just an additional drive. So at this point I have plenty of storage.

At this point I will probably wait until I have a new machine built from the ground up to get the machine I want. Going with a standard motherboard, standard power supply and everything else fairly standard. To make hardware upgrades and expansions as easy as possible. As far as possible I want the next computer to be modular. My current computer has a proprietary motherboard.

Is there a reliable market on proprietary hardware out there. Particularly Sony power supplies?

4eyes wrote on 3/11/2007, 7:21 AM

If you are installing a new drive and windows XP without the SP1 you will have to partition the drive on installation because the original release of XP couldn't handle drives over 137 gig's (I think that was the limit). The service packs corrected this.