Is it possible to edit HD with external USB 2.0 hard drive?

[Adi Head]

I've just finished shooting a documentary project in HD format. The project was shot with a Sony PMW-EX1. There is about 600 GB of material currently stored on an external LaCie 1TB USB 2.0 hard drive which will be delivered to me in a couple of days. I will be working with this material using Vegas 9 - to view, log and possibly make a couple of rough assemblies - before going to edit the material with an editor.


The question is if I will be able to work on the project using this hard drive. I know that it is recommended to use hard drives with SATA, e-SATA or firewire connections rather than USB 2.0. But before I make my case and demand that the material should all be transferred to a new hard drive with different interface (which will have to be bought) - I really need to know exactly what the consequences would be if I were to try and edit the material on Vegas using the LaCie drive.

Here is a page with the information on the LaCie drive:
LaCie - Desktop Hard Disk - Hi-Speed USB 2.0

Looking forward to your replies...

Thanks!

[James McBoyle]

I edit my footage using a western digital mybook external usb2 harddrive so I would say it should not be a problem, if you were the only one accessing the drive.

[Mike Kujbida]

Ditto on that. I use a lot of external USB hard drives at work with no problems at all.

[Jeff Harper]

Has anyone edited a three/four camera shoot using Ultimate S muliticam of HD footage on a USB drive? Does that work as well?

[Adi Head]

thanks for the replies.
so i'll wait for the LaCie USB drive to arrive and try it out.

thanks!

[Jonathan Gentry]

If you had the option of using eSATA that would of course be the best way to go.

Grab one of these: Newegg.com - Thermaltake BlacX ST0005U External Hard Drive SATA Enclosure Docking Station 2.5” & 3.5” USB 2.0 & eSATA - External Enclosures

Put a standard SATA drive in and plug it in with the included eSATA connector. Then store the drives in a plastic case like this:
WiebeTech Micro Storage Solutions - Protective Hard Drive Cases

You can actually use this method to edit and store your footage.

-Jonathan

[Adi Head]

Originally Posted by Jonathan Gentry

If you had the option of using eSATA that would of course be the best way to go.

Grab one of these: Newegg.com - Thermaltake BlacX ST0005U External Hard Drive SATA Enclosure Docking Station 2.5” & 3.5” USB 2.0 & eSATA - External Enclosures

Put a standard SATA drive in and plug it in with the included eSATA connector. Then store the drives in a plastic case like this:
WiebeTech Micro Storage Solutions - Protective Hard Drive Cases

You can actually use this method to edit and store your footage.

-Jonathan

Hey Jonathan, thanks for the info. Yah, actually I already have an external hard drive similar to the setup you described. But there's another project sitting on that drive currently.
Anyway, the usb drive was delivered to me, I made a few tests... and so far it seems to be ok.

thanks!

[Mel Enriquez]

Originally Posted by Jeff Harper

Has anyone edited a three/four camera shoot using Ultimate S muliticam of HD footage on a USB drive? Does that work as well?

I have. But I didn't use Ultimate S. I used only the Sony Vegas 8.0c multicam feature. All four hdv files (hv-20, hv-30, A1, hc3). It's no different as editing it from a local internal drive. It's ok. It's just that if the final video is long (e.g. 15 min and up), it does take a while to get the timeline all freshen up during startup or initial load. Other than that I don't see much difference from a local access vs an external usb 2.0 drive.

BTW, I used a Q8200 Oc'd to 3.0ghz 4gb RAM, ati hd 3850, win-xp 32-bit sp-2 setup and the data is on an external Seagate 1.5TB usb 2.0 drive.