Optimizing hard drive expansion

Hi Everyone,
On my Mac Pro I currently have my hard drives as follows:
Bay 1 - WD3200AAJS (supplied with machine from Apple)
+Running OS, applications and assorted games+
Bay 2 - WD3200KS
+Running Time Machine and almost at full capacity.+
Bay 3 - WD1500ADFD (Raptor)
+Running Windows XP Pro and assorted games.+
Given that my mac is used primarily for gaming how best should I expand my drives for optimum speed!
1. Would it be worth raiding the two 320gb drives?
2. I've read that the new WD640AAKS is worth a go so should I buy 2 and raid them?
or
3. Buy two WD6400AAKS drives and use one for Mac OS and the other for Windows and use the two 320gb drives purely for back up?
I'm really unsure as to which way to go with this so any help would really be appreciated.

A mac primarily used for gaming is like a hooker primarily used for lectures in quantum physics. All that nonsense aside, your gaming performance will be mostly affected by your graphics card. Check xlr8yourmac.com for reports but off the top of my head I think you can combine two 3870 graphics cards and run them together under windows. It won't match the best PC's for gaming but it's worth looking at and finding out if it can in fact be done. I doubt raiding and such will make a huge difference to gaming. Gaming is all about graphics card performance, assuming you have plenty of RAM.

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Optimal Hard Drive Configuration for Premiere Pro CS5 and Pro Tools

I am in the process of upgrading a workstation that is used primarily for multi-track audio recording in Pro Tools to use the following Adobe CS5 products for production of promotional videos in HDV (and AVCHD for the web) as well as printed marketing materials for bands and musicians: Premiere Pro, Encore, Photoshop, Illustrator and Soundbooth.
Since Premiere Pro is probably the most demanding application of the group, I have been studying the suggested hardware configurations on this forum with great interest, particularly HARM's suggestions (including his Generic Guideline for Disk Setup) to determine which hard drives to purchase and the optimal manner in which to configure them.
I am upgrading an HP Z800 with dual quad core 2.44 GhZ processors with hyperthreading (16 virtual cores), 12 GB of memory and an overclocked GeForce GTX 470. Without setting up a RAID configuration (which I cannot afford at the moment), I would like to use the 4 available HDD bays in the Z800 in the optimal manner for Premier Pro, using currently available drives. I am currently considering purchasing a 300GB VelociRaptor to use as my C drive because of the extended load times and demands placed on the drive by ProTools and the associated Waves plug-ins.
I would appreciate suggestions to improve my following plan: C (300GB WD VelociRaptor) for OS and Programs; D (1 TB WD Black Caviar) for Media and Projects; E (1 250 GB WD Black Caviar) for Pagefile (approx. 18 GB) and Media Cache; and E (2 TB WD Black Caviar) for Previews, Exports and Pro Tools audio files.
I have great respect for the knowledge of the members of this forum and eagerly await your suggestions.
/Bill

I very much appreciate the responses to my email because I know that all of your time is valuable and that you have chosen to use some of that valuable time to help an unknown individual. This forum is remarkable because of the wealth of knowledge available and the willingness of so many to assist others.
I now wish to narrow my questions to save you time and so that I can get specific advice. I may not have not been clear that I have already upgraded to the HP Z800 with dual quad core processors and overclocked GTX 470, primarily for the improved performance it will provide in ProTools. My question now is how to optimize its performance for Premiere Pro CS5. Based upon my research, I am considering the following two upgrades, but I am open to other suggestions if they would provide better results at a similar cost
1. I am considering purchasing a 600GB WD VelociRaptor ( WD6000HLXH) for my C drive on which I would place OS (Windows 7, 64 Bit) and programs in an effort to reduce loading times of large programs. I have two questions: (1) Are members of the forum seeing a significant improvment in program loading times with the VelociRaptor because I am still not convinced that the price performance of SSD's justifies their use; and (2) There are so many models of VelociRaptors now that I want to be certain that I am purchasing the best version for my needs. In addition to the usual 10000 RPM speed, this model has 32MB Cache and a 3.5" form factor as well as a SATA 6.0GB/s interface (which I doubt my motherboard can take advantage of but it might extend the useful life of the drive with future configurations).
2. I currently have available for installation in the Z800 the following drives: (1) WD 2TB Black Caviar; (1) WD 1TB Black Caviar; (2) Hitachi 1TB. I believe that the Z800 can accept up to 5 SATA hard drives which I will have if I purchase the Velociraptor. Although I am reasonably knowledeable when it comes to hardware, I have never set up a RAID configuration. Therefore, it would be helpful if someone could recommend one of the various RAID configurations and brieflyexplain why it would seem to be best for my needs. I can then focus my research on understanding that one configuration.
I was planning to follow Scott's suggestion for my current 3 drives: OS and programs on C (WD 600 GBVelociRaptor), media and projects on D (WD 1TB Black Caviar), export files and Pro Tools files (all live musician tracks, no samples) on E (WD 2TB Black Caviar). However, I have been reading about the benefits of a RAID configuration so I am interested in further suggestions now that I have clarified my questions.
Thank you all for your help.
Bill

Optimal Hard Drive Setup for 3D and CS6 Motion Graphics?

Hello, I'm trying to figure out the best way to separate the following into different hard drives for best performance...
- OS (probably Windows 7 or 8 64bit)
- OS page swap disk
- Programs (Cinema4D and Adobe CS6)
- Adobe Media/Disk Cache
- Project files
- Source/Import Data Files
- Render/Output Data Files
So far, I'm thinking of...
- One Internal SATA3 SSD for OS, OS swap, Programs, Adobe Media Cache
- One Internal SATA2 HDD for Project and Source/Import Data Files
- One External USB3 HDD for Render/Output Files
I'm wondering if separating the files in a different way would be more optimal, and/or if adding more SDD hard drives for the Page Swap file and Media Disk Cache would we worth the money. Particularly, should the OS, OS swap file, Programs, and Media Cache be separated into different drives?

1. Why separate Project and Media(I'm assuming you mean footage/photoshop/ect.) files? Aren't project files very small?
Premiere Pro and After Effects project files aren't that large, but on this drive I also include any audio and stills used in the project, as well as the Encore project. Essentially anything you would need to rebuild the project down the line would go here, except the media. That goes on it's own dedicated drive.
Depending on the complexity, a project folder can easily get into multi-gigabyte range.
2. If I have one SATA3 SSD with OS(plus page file) and programs on it, would it be better to put the Cache/Scratch/Previews there as well, vs. on a separate slower SATA2 HDD disk?
I'd go separate. Don't put anything on the System drive but the OS and Windows.

Which is the optimal hard drive configuration for Logic Pro ?

hello people
i would like to ask your advices about possible hard drive configurations for Logic Pro
I have a Mac Pro and thinking to buy 4 x 500GB drives .
there are several combinations in my mind to configure , but first of all i would like to ask which is the best for an optimal system for Logic Pro
model 1 :
1 stripe Raid 0 array drive for ''System'' (500+500 = 1000)
1 stripe Raid 0 array drive for ''recording + sound banks'' (500 + 500 = 1000)
which means to using 4 hard drives as 2 drives
model 2 :
1 stripe Raid 0 array drive for ''System'' (500+500 = 1000)
1 Single drive for Sound banks (500)
1 Single drive for Recording (500)
which means to using 4 hard drives as 3 drives
Or , it is more healthy to use the drives as single , without raid , stripe sets but with its own capacity instead of combining .
and also if someone has an idea regarding to compare of Seagate and Westerndigital drives (which is the best for audio recording) , would be really helpfull
I am kinda rookie for these subjects :/
thanks in advance

heelo blayzay
thanks for the reply and assistance.
1) how can i create a back up set for the 4th HD to be make back up of the 2nd and 3rd HD
2) what about to make 1st HD for system and 2nd3rd4th (1.5TB) for audio recording, and an external drive for backups ?
For the back ups , is there a special process for the backing up HD (internal or external) ? Or should i just need a Clone software to make the back up
thank you again.

Hard Drive Expansion/Upgrade

Choices, choices! I am rapidly filling up my stock Maxtor 250 GB hard drive, and I need to upgrade. I've read most of the posts in this forum, and see many potential ways to go. Hopefully, some of you experienced power users can give me some guidance.
My needs/wants:
- Extra capacity. I have a large collection of transparencies I’m scanning. I think my needs (for the next couple of years) will be met with around 350 GB of storage.
- Backup. My (pathetic) backup routine has been to copy important data files to my Powerbook. I need a much more complete, robust, and systematic process for backup.
- Performance. Not a priority, but would be a nice benefit.
- Cost. Not a big deal, but I’d obviously like to save money if I can.
- Heat dissipation. My office is not air conditioned, and gets hot in the summer (90°+). The heat doesn’t bother me, but am afraid of what it might do to an insufficiently cooled drive.
- Space/clutter/convience. I prefer to keep all of my drives inside my G5, but will readily go with external drives if there are good reasons to do so.
Here’s what I’m currently thinking of doing:
Slot 1: Maxtor 72GB Raptor OS, applications (boot)
Slot 2: Hitachi 7K500 backup
Sonnet Tech G5 Jive
Aux 1: Maxtor 7Y250M0 (stock 250 GB) data (RAID 0 drive 1)
Aux 2: Maxtor DiamondMax 10/ 250 GB / 16MB data (RAID 0 drive 2)
Thoughts? Here are some of the things I’m wondering about:
- Will there be any issues pairing my stock Maxtor with a newer 16 MB Maxtor 250GB in a RAID 0 configuration?
- Will I have power or cooling issues with the G5 Jive and the RAID pair?
- Where is the best place to buy this stuff?
Thanks in advance!

MacGurus was always strong on SCSI, out of which the Burly came. Same with Seagate Cheetahs. Seagate may not be the fastest, but it usually is reliable and trouble-free regardless of chipset, controller, or OS. And some buy based on "quiet" or warranty. So you're right, they have.
Sonnet Tempo firmware has had trouble with Maxtor DM10/MLIII. Maxtor had a couple poor years, too, and the very first of the DM10 250GB models wouldn't even work on Macs. You could use a Maxtor utility on a PC, or RMA the drives. They also introduced staggered spin-up feature that doesn't work on all controllers, Sonnet had an issue with their 8-channel card and drives not showing up and RAID would keep failing. MacGurus carried Maxtor last winter, got burned, may come back.
Hitachi had a couple 7K250 models, noted on Barefeats, that had SSC and didn't work on SeriTek but would on Sonnet. The new 7K250 and T7K250 are fine. The 7K400 was not native SATA drive and also had SSC (OWC carries a non-SSC version of this drive, though the 7K500 is just plain superior now).
What has happened with SATA is a lot of changes being introduced and not everyone is on the 'same page' and 'qualifying' their equipment - the end user gets that job I guess.
No one ever lost a job in IT, the saying goes, for recommending IBM mainframes and DASD. Sometimes their mid-range and below wasn't the best, but once IBM was in a shop, they had great support and engineers to help you with your planning and upgrades - long-term commitment and relationship with a vendor, I could be sure of prices, support, and know the equipment.
A lot of people might be turned off by Granite Digital's SCSI costs. I swear by them (tried low costs solutions and threw them away) so I have a large investment in SCSI cables and such. Running four 15K drives, drive coolers, hefty PSU and fans, dedicated UPS.
IBM name took a big hit in storage, what with the 75GXP "deathstars" and poorer performance of their SCSI drives compared to Maxtor, Seagate (and Fujitsu but Fuji drives don't always work in FibreChannel and Mac systems I think). IBM still uses an extra platter as 'spare' so they can still map out bad blocks and get good yields, but their SCSI drives are hotter and louder than others) but any server farm is going to be in a noisy room where that shouldn't be a matter, and is climate controlled).
I keep my drives in a small, cool room - noise and heat are not a problem. Just like cooling an MDD, you look for how much air the fans in a case push, whether it has room for bay coolers, or has front and back fans, as well.
People want their external drive tower to be 'fashionable' and 'color coordinated' to their Gx Mac. I use to buy cases from www.hypermicro.com - CiDesign mainly because they are well made, metal, good cooling characteristics - but they have scaled back, harder to compete in today's market with cheaper products that can drive out even the good ones.

[SOLVED] Hard drive expansion options

Hello everyone,
I installed Arch on a 40GB hard drive I had laying around just to try it out. I have since decided to use it as my main OS. How would I go about expanding my storage onto a second physical hard drive (250GB)? Considering I already have Arch installed, is it possible for me to still use a LVM? When I run out of space on my 40GB drive, can I just change pacman's root installation directory to my second hard drive?
Any help would be appreciated, thanks.
Last edited by crypt0 (2014-04-17 03:28:22)

Inxsible wrote:
I don't think the OP is using LVM. He is asking if he can use LVM without having to re-install.
I have to look for a post which enlightened me about using LVM after you have installed Arch. I haven't actually done that. Let me go find that post.
Edit: Here it is: https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php … 3#p1396753
Try out and let us know how it went. I have been meaning to look into it, but just haven't had the time.
Sorry for the late reply. Yes that is what I meant. Blocks has however caused an issue with GRUB. The details are located here: https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=180190
Edit: 1. Got Blocks installed.
Last edited by crypt0 (2014-04-17 01:27:47)

Ibook g4 and hard drive expansion

I have an ibook g4 that came with about 40 gb of space on the hard drive. needless to say that space is about all used up. I'm wondering how I can expand my hard drive without getting an external hard drive-- or is that the only method? I'm also fairly computer illiterate so if anyone could give me the basics on this I'd really appreciate it. I apologize if this is the billionth time this question's been asked.

It is funny you bring this up.. i am trying to do the same with one of my powerbooks.. apple told me they do not sell the internal drives nor will they put it in for you. so i asked "if i buy one myself and put it in will it still be under my apple care warranty?" they said if something fails because of the hard drive or install it will void the warranty onthe computer.. if i put it in and something fails that has nothing to do with the har drive or me installing it they would cover it..
Long story short, you will have to buy a internal off of ebay or the internet and put it in yourself or have another retail shop besides apple do it for you.
hope that helps.

Hard Drive Expansion

What is the best solution for increasing the size of my hard disk on my mini? Is there a way to add an external and have it show up as part of the internal storage space?

Joe,
I replaced the hard drive in my 2 year old mini yesterday. I was careful and it took me about 40 mins. I spent the most time making sure the case went on straight at the very end. I followed the instructions from ifixit.com as mentioned above:
http://www.ifixit.com/Guide/Repair/Installing-Mac-mini-Model-A1176-Hard-Drive/11 08/1
These are very good instructions with photos of each step - just make sure you you choose the appropriate model.
I bought a 500GB replacement hard drive (only 5400rpm in my case). To start the process, I connected the new hard drive to the mini using a USB to SATA adapter and used Carbon Copy Cloner to clone the old hard drive on to the new. http://www.bombich.com/ I checked it worked by booting from it before taking the machine apart and making the replacement.
Good luck

Hard Drive Expansion in the 1st generation iMac G5

I have a first generation iMac G5 that uses a Serial ATA hard drive. What is the maximum size hard drive that this computer will support?
Also, is there any way to disable the pulsing ambient sleep light?
Thanks in advance for any help you can provide.

Current hard drive info in this thread
Did you apply the recent sleep light firmware update? Apple article

Blue iBook hard drive expansion

My friend has an old blue iBook with 6gb HD. She would like to load Panther but needs to expand the HD size. Someone has told her this is not possible. Is that true?
Is the HD a 2.5 inch?
If so can't I just replace with a bigger capacity HD ?
thanks
Pete

Hello,
First let me start by sating 6GB is more than enough room to install and run Panther. I had it installed on my blueberry iBook and I only had a 3GB hard drive. There was no room for additional storage but you will have 3GB left that I didn't have. Second, yes you can install a larger drive. There is quite a bit of disassembly involved but I installed a 40GB drive in mine this past weekend. It only took 2 hours from the time I started to the time I had it running and ready to reinstall the operating system. I had always heard how difficult these machines were to upgrade and granted there are lots of computers out there that are much easier to change the drives in but I found it to be rather simple. You can view instructions for the swap at www.ifixit.com , they lay it out step by step and you can even print out screw charts so you can tape the screws to it as you remove them so you will know where each one goes when you reassemble. Best wishes for the upgrades!

Hard drive expansion expert needed! - recommendations?

Hello-
I have a Powermac Dual 450 with a 120Gb Seagate drive and the original 40 (30?) Gb drive. I would like to add a second larger drive to create a mirrored backup using CCC or Superduper!. I see a few options, and ask you all what is the best choice:
1. Pull the 40GB drive and add another 120GB - the 40 is rarely used, and data could be transfererd to a 2.5 external drive.
2. Pull the 40GB and add a 200GB drive (which is now CHEAPER than the 120 at Circuit City - $50 vs ~$100), knowing that only 120 will be recognized - does this affect performance? Will the drive revert to 200GB in a newer machine in a few years?
3. Can I add a 3rd drive to this system, keeping the current 120 and 40??? Not sure from what I have read on line.
4. Go with an external enclosure - do I have to max at 120GB with this, or can I go higher? Since the internal is 120, I don't really need much more. Any advantage to the external over internal - speed? Seems a bit more $$. Easier for someone to walk off with the external than the whole computer too!
Enclosure recommendations?
5. Something else I haven't considered?
Right now I am leaning towards #2 as it is a $50 solution, but wonder about #4.
THANK YOU!

Hello,
when you sleep the computer the external should go to sleep , i got a problem though on my powerbook G3 233Mhz and the external sometimes stop the comp starting after a long sleep so i have to restart, but i haven't tried yet with the G4, so far i don't remember having problems with my Imac G3, i think it depends .
But when you shut down the comp then switch the external off but don't forget to start it up first before starting the comp back as the desktop still got the ex on it!!!
When you want to shut or unplug the ex you always heve to eject it first to get it off the desktop and save your data from moss.
if you set the computer to back up your data (eg.index) the comp should wake and start the script!!!
As far as speed with external or internal is a simple fact. Internal goes faster, but with a good processor it doesn't show much the difference to your eyes, it's stay at a good rate for the ex, the ext as the advantage to be able staying away from troubles . I mean you can always plug it in on another comp and use your datas rather than the inter might have more hardware troubles since it is plug straight onto the motherboard and else!!! it's always better to have an external to keep your data safe and back them up so clean ones are more likely to be on the ext than the inter in case of hardware problems or damages.
Get one that 's all I can advise you. Also i use Techtool Pro which help me keeping my data safe.
regards

Internal Hard Drive Expansion Suggestions

I would like to add another internal drive to my Mac Pro 2 Ghz, with 2 GB memory and 250GB drive. I was thinking of 250 to 500GB. I plan to use it for storing iPhoto files mostly. Speed is not a primary factor. Reliability and cost are. I would like to take advantage of the collective knowledge on this forum to help sort through the many alternatives that I've read about so far. What has worked for you? Can I just plug it in and go? Where do I get it? Thanks in advance for you time.

AMUG has posted an article that displays performance of the Maxline III 320GB, Maxline III 300GB (7V300F0) and the Seagate 7200.10 with the latest shipping firmware version 3.AAE on an Apple Mac Pro. It is published at this link:
http://www.amug.org/amug-web/html/amug/reviews/articles/maxtor/
I would go with the Maxline III 300GB 7V300F0 based on these tests and my experiences. It can be found here:
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B000FLPWIY/arizomacinusergr
Have fun!

Two drives : same buffer on all hard drives ?

I just ordered a SATA Maxtor drive 300G 7200, Buffer 16Mo (model 6B300S0) to add onto the second bay of my G5 DP 1.8 Ghz.
The original drive (that will be kept in place) is also from Maxtor, 80G 7200, Buffer 8Mo.
I just went by this article from apple support "http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=300355".
It says
"Storage :
Two Serial ATA controllers supporting up to 150-MBps data throughput per hard drive
Two 3.5-inch hard drive expansion bays with drive guides for a second drive
One 80GB or 160GB 7200-rpm Serial ATA drive installed in standard configurations(5)
Support for up to two internal Serial ATA drives; 500GB maximum system capacity(5)
8MB memory buffers on all hard drives"
Is this "8MB memory buffers on all drives" restrictive, meaning there might problematic to have two hard drives running with different buffers ?
Thank you for any suggestion, I still have time to cancel my order and order another drive with 8 MB buffer before tomorrow..
Luc

Thank you for your reply,
As a matter of fact, the Apple report is from october 2004, and my machine from April 2005, not much further away. I have found an happy report in XRL8yourmac from sept 2004 describing no problem with the same drive in a Dual 2.5 GHz Power Mac G5 .
The writer says it ran faster than the original 250GB Maxtor 7Y250M0 (8Mo buffer), but did not say if the two drives are running allong well or if he did replace the 250 by the 300. I understood that we cannot instal more than 500 Gig total in a G5 this generation ??
My specific question is :
Is it any reason to think that running two SATA drives with different size buffers would be problematic ?
Many thanks
Luc

WD hard drive warning?

I just purchased three Western Digital 500 GB SE16 hard drives, model # WD5000KSRTL. The install guide says they are supported only by Windows 2000 and XP. It also states that using any other operating system may result in data loss. My intention was to NOT use them in a RAID configuration and to use them as Mac only drives. Is it safe to use them or do I need to exchange them for something else?

While the WD warning may just be a "I am too lazy to test on a Mac" disclosure, it may also have some truth. If a company does not test on the Macintosh platform (which is most HD manufacturers) there is no guarantee that performance will be optimal on a Mac Pro or a PowerMac.
Seagate is working hard to try to correct the slow write speed of the 7200.10 hard drives when mounted internally in a Mac Pro or a PowerMac G5 as an individual volume. They also have slow Random write and read performance even when in a striped RAID set. You can see the same Mac Pro with a three drive RAID using Maxtor 7V300F0 drives and Seagate 250GB 7200.10 hard drives here.
http://db.xbench.com/merge.xhtml?doc1=192905&doc2=192875
Look at the random HD performance rates.
Barefeats tests also show that the Hitachi drives are one of the slowest on the Mac Pro. The article is here:
FOUR INTERNAL DRIVE RAID 0
Hitachi = 243MB/s READ, 245MB/s WRITE
Maxtor = 271MB/s READ, 262MB/s WRITE
Raptor = 297MB/s READ, 286MB/s WRITE
http://www.barefeats.com/quad07.html
If you look at the WD5000KS random write tests they are very slow and the random read tests are nothing to brag about either. You can see the results at:
http://www.barefeats.com/quad08.html
While the WD hard drive will probably work, don't expect it to be the optimal hard drive for a Mac Pro. The WD150 Raptor seems to be the fastest but it is louder and its price per GB is about 3x that of a Maxtor MaXLine Pro 500GB 7200rpm SATA 3G drive (7H500F0)that compares very well in the Barefeat boot tests found here:
http://www.barefeats.com/quad08.html
Have fun!

How do I reformat my Seagate Expansion external hard drive so I can use it for Mac

I recently purchased a 3TB Seagate® Expansion® external hard drive for PC. My plan is too reformat it so that I can use it, but it has been acting wierd on me. It says on Disk Utility that it is 4 gbs but I have a 3TB one. Im on OSX mavericks by the way. Thanks!

akostainsek,
the diskutil output shows that the disk has no Apple-recognized partitioning. Try the following commands in Terminal to establish the partitioning, and to see if it takes effect:
diskutil eraseDisk JHFS+ Seagate disk1
diskutil list
Again, please include in your reply the full output from these commands.

Optimizing hard drive expansion

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