Recording on usb 3 drive

bishop20012

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Greetings,
I know it's recommended to record clips using your local drive. Was thinking of moving recordings to a usb3 drive (more capacity). Usb3 I believe is faster than the internal ssd drive I have. Thoughts ?
Thanks again.
 

wittaj

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In theory the speeds look like they would work, but reality is much different.

These cams send 24/7 non-buffered data and it cannot pause and take a break like most files being moved to a USB.

I tried it once as a test with 1 camera and an external drive connected to USB 3.0 and after 20min it couldn't keep up with the demands. Despite the USB speed showing faster than the internal drive. The sustained speed just cannot keep up. It can do spurts of speed at high rate, but not for long periods.

Some people have been able to do it, or they think they have but haven't experienced the situation to have to playback and find it is missing video.
 

IAmATeaf

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Normal usb 3 on paper is about the same or slightly lower then the max speeds of an internal SATA SSD.

USB 3.1 type-c is twice as fast as usb 3 so in theory will be quicker.

In both cases the burst speed and sustained speed will all be dependant on the chipset of the computer and the internals of the drive itself and how well it has been designed.

Personally for me too much of a lottery so I tend to avoid, favouring an internally connected drive.
 
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TonyR

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Personally for me too much of a lottery so I tend to avoid favouring an internally connected drive.
I'm confused (no surprise there)....do you mean:
"Personally for me too much of a lottery so I tend to avoid <comma> favouring an internally connected drive." ? :idk:
 
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IAmATeaf

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I'm confused (no surprise there)....do you mean:
"Personally for me too much of a lottery so I tend to avoid favouring an internally connected drive." ? :idk:
That’s exactly what I meant, comment now updated.
 

anotherone

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Using disk manager make sure you enable write cacheing on the usb disk. This will allow writes to be satisfied without waiting for the device to acknowledge the write has completed.
 

bishop20012

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Thanks for all the replies. To add more specific info. I have 9 cameras and I only do motion activated recordings and not 24/7. Running out of space on hd so thinking of external hd options.
 

looney2ns

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Thanks for all the replies. To add more specific info. I have 9 cameras and I only do motion activated recordings and not 24/7. Running out of space on hd so thinking of external hd options.
The best option would be to purchase a eSATA adapter card to put in your computer and then buy an external eSATA drive enclosure to add another Western digital purple in.
 

bishop20012

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It's an optiplex and and it's very small. No more room for upgrades but yes that wouldve been a good option.
 

wittaj

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Does it have an optical drive you can remove and put a drive in? Many of us have done that.
 

Flintstone61

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All you can do is run your own experiment and try it.
The more that report their findings, the more we know where the limits are.
Maybe it can be done in a way that doesn't tax the data bus and cause problems.
then again maybe it's a headache.
 
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