FW800 or SCSI?

[E_Tedeschi]

Hey ASEers,

I am looking at low cost uncompressed SD options for the Mac, and wanted some opinions.

I have been looking at the Kona LS (which has an optional rackmount breakout box - nice), or the Decklink (only breakout cables). Both do all flavours of Analog plus SDI, and they both hover within a couple of hundred bucks of each other, so no price issue, but what is the better piece of kit?

Storage is the sticking point. I'm looking at around the 1TB mark. Will FW800 cut it for SD? Lacie reckon their Bigger Disk Extreme will support "multiple streams of uncompressed SD video". Alternatively, an external SATA RAID, or SCSI? I am viewing the storage upgrade as an intermediary option until I can justify a bigger better option ( unless of course I need that right off the bat).

All ideas and comments more than welcome!!

[JWRL]

I haven't used either the Kona LS or the Decklink so I can only have a go at the second part of your question.

FW800 will definitely cut it for uncompressed SD, but how many real-time video streams do you need? If you want to future-proof your system with an eye on HD I would be more inclined to look at external SATA RAID. SCSI RAID will definitely do it, but it's an expensive solution.

And LaCie drives have had a history of running rather hot. As we all know hot drive = early failure. I don't know how they are now, but if I were you I'd continue to ask around about them.

[E_Tedeschi]

You're right about the Lacies. It's not ideal, but from what I can tell it'll save me a couple of thousand dollars in the interim. It will only be a short-term fix - get some more work through the door, then uprgrade...

I'm not too fazed by realtime streams - any more than two is more than plenty for the time being. And there is always the "offline / online" option if it really becomes a problem I guess?

[Daz]

Check G-raid for storage. Much more reliable than LaCie, based on the experience of quite few people I know. Comes in FW, SATA, Gigabit Ethernet, you name it.

[E_Tedeschi]

Daz, you rock.

I think this is just the thing I'm looking for.

Thankyou!