Audio Hard Drives - SSD or 720's?
 

Hi all,

I'm about to update my audio drives. I currently have three USB 2.0 500rpm hard drives (Audio Projects, Kontakt Lib's & Samples) and they are currently running off of my 2013 Mac Pro.

When using Pro Tools, I'm working off a Samsung Evo SSD in an enclosure, and then moving the finished session to be stored on the USB's. I'm thinking that I should have my Samples and Kontakt drive on faster drives, but I'm not sure what is better. SSD's or 7,200 hard drives?

At first, I was thinking to go with an external SSD enclosure like the OWC Thunnderbay and putting three 1tb Samsung Evo's in there.

Problem is that it's it pretty pricey and, I'll need to double everything to have a solid back up.

Then I started looking at the G-Drives. So much cheaper and a lot more storage. I know everyone goes on about SSD's but are they really essential for Audio work?

Can the 7,200 rpm drives still cut it?

Thanks!

Re: Audio Hard Drives - SSD or 720's?
 

I assume you mean 7,200 RPM, not 720. Do you have a Thunderbolt port on your MacPro? If so, you could get an external drive bay to house several SATA hard drives. Here is one that can house up to 4 drives:

https://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...-161-_-Product

For sample libraries and session backups, 7,200 RPM HDDs should be adequate. I just picked up a Toshiba 1TB 7,200RPM HDD for $30 this past weekend. (OEM style like they ship out to computer builders, no packaging, just the foil bag).

Re: Audio Hard Drives - SSD or 7,200's?
 

Indeed I did mean 7,200! Thanks.

Yes, I have 6 thunderbolt ports so the enclosure is definitely a sting option.

That’s pretty damm cheap going down the OEM route. Unfortunately, I would need SATA adapters.

Would you still always run your sessions off a SSD?

Re: Audio Hard Drives - SSD or 7,200's?
 

Back in the day before SSDs became available, ProTools had the requirement to use a separate drive (from the drive the operating system and PT was installed) to record to (session drive). With SSDs, I guess you can get away with recording to the OS drive, due to the speed of the SSD.

Personally, I use a 2TB 7,200 RPM hard drive for my session drive, then back it up over my home network to a 2TB drive in a different computer, and also to an external drive connected via USB. I don't have large sample libraries so they are installed on the OS drive.

I think you could easily record to an external 7,200 RPM hard drive in a Thunderbolt drive bay.

Re: Audio Hard Drives - SSD or 7,200's?
 

That's a good backup strategy you have there. If you don't mind me asking, what do you use for your home network? I've been looking at Apple's Airport Extreme for similar solutions and to speed up my wifi.

The other main reason for me re-investing in HD's is that I currently have NO backups of any of my Projects and Samples. You cant put a price on that!

Re: Audio Hard Drives - SSD or 7,200's?
 

I am just using the Gateway (Router/Modem Combo) provided by my internet service provider (AT&T U-verse). My PT computer and my everyday computer are connected via ethernet cables, so copying files across the network is pretty fast. My Wife's computer is in a room with no ethernet jack in the wall, so I use a WIFI range extender in that room that her computer is plugged into via ethernet cable.

I am on Windows and have zero experience with Apple products, so I can't help much there.

Re: Audio Hard Drives - SSD or 7,200's?
 

Another way to back up is using cloning and/or imaging software. Macrium, Paragon and others on PC, Carbon Copy Cloner and SuperDuper on Mac. You would have to image or clone to a separate drive. I image my Audio and OS drive nightly. Easy to restore from an image, easy to search an image and copy off anything I need, easy to change drives if one fails or I want to change from a Hard Drive to an SSD, which I just did recently.

That said, nothing is truly backed up unless it's in three separate places (far) from each other.

Re: Audio Hard Drives - SSD or 7,200's?
 

I clone my OS drives on all of my computers using Acronis True Image. I find it easy just to copy and paste the PT session files, but I realize that if delete an audio file in the current session and then write over the previous backup, that audio file is gone.

Re: Audio Hard Drives - SSD or 720's?
 

I'm recording and running all of my sessions directly to SSDs these days. I only use the 7200RPM spinning drives for back up any more.

The SSDs blow the 7200RPM hard drives out of the water in the same way that the 7200RPM hard drives blew the 3600 and 5400 RPM hard drives out of the water 15 years ago.

I know alot of guys are using the internal system SSD to record and mix sessions on, but I still record to a separate SSD, whether in our MacPro at work or on my personal laptop. :cool:

Re: Audio Hard Drives - SSD or 720's?
 

100% agree - I use an external Lacie drive for working sessions that I upgraded to 500GB SSD and use it with USB3 on my desktop and Thunderbolt if using the MacBook Pro. Then another 500GB SSD for the system drive. I have 4 7200rpm drives for storage, sample libraries, and backup.

Sometimes I'll work on an older session from the storage drive for a quick change and I can really feel how sluggish it seems compared to a session on the SSD!

I've done it and it works fine, but I still prefer having separate drives and separate backups. If I have to re-image or restore the OS, I don't want to deal with restoring (or losing) sessions in the process.