I google'd and searched on here for a definite answer, but can you record directly to a firewire or usb drive? I plan to get a 170 soon and for the times when I actually have external power I was considering just buying a large 1tb or larger drive, throwing it into my firewire/usb 2.0/esata external case and hooking it up to the 170 directly and recording to it so I wouldn't have to buy more then the 16gb P2 card (at least at first).

There are certain special-purpose hard disk recording units that you can use (such as the FireStore FS-100 or the CitiDisk HD) that can do that. Otherwise, no -- you'd need something inbetween the camera and the drive to facilitate live-to-drive recording. Something like Adobe OnLocation or FCP or EDIUS or Avid, some application that can handle live capture of DVCPRO-HD and write it to a drive.

Ok cool thanks for the info! I guess more P2 cards are in my future!

Welcome to the forum, Jarred.

Another albeit more expensive option than just camera-to-bare-drive (not possible) is because the HD-SDI connector *does* have embedded audio and timecode you can now use that connection - in concert with some other third-party devices - to go direct to HDD.

And there is yet another option although it's not "shoot-to-drive" and that is the venerable HOST mode in the camera which you may not be familiar with. This functionality started with the HVX200 and is available in all P2 cameras; you shoot your footage to the card/s, take a 10-minute break (if your shoot allows for it) and then transfer the data DIRECT to a bare drive with a power supply or enclosure. No extra software or hardware required, the camera itself becomes the drive and data I/O controller. Super-cool and an all too often glossed over feature of the P2 system.

Barry has published an extensive overview of the HOST mode transfer process in his HVX200 book - and on this forum and at one time I posted a similar "how-to".

Oh cool, I researched the "HOST" mode this morning and sounds fine. My actors seem to love taking breaks and almost all the time I have a power source so that'll work out.