07-11-2005, 10:47 PM

Hi,
A 12" Powerbook is currently on its way to me, however it only has a 60 gig drive and I am interested in digital video. When I import from my digital camera, I would like to send the footage directly to an external hard drive. However the firewire port will be used by my camera, so will a USB 2.0 port be fast enough to connect an external drive without frame loss?

Thanks!

07-12-2005, 07:25 AM

most external drives have 2 FW ports. connect one to powerbook and the other to camera. problem solved. I'm not sure about usb. it cannot provide constant bitrate and is not as good for video capture as firewire.

07-12-2005, 09:39 AM

Like MAC-simus said, all of the firewire drive I have seen have two firewire ports. You should have no problems.

07-12-2005, 10:29 AM

Am I wrong in thinking that one cannot usually export footage from a digital camera directly to a HDD without some kind of an encoder....at least with the XL-1's I use we have to send it through a "Firestore" unit first or import it through an editing program.

I thought his issue was that since the camera has to go into the computer via the firewire port then he can't hook up the drive to the computer except through the USB not that he was planning on bypassing the computer all together. I know some cameras will let you save right to a HDD but not most consumer or pro-sumer units.

I'm not sure what the best soloution would be for you....if I was going to do a lot of video like that I think I would have gone for the next size up in PowerBook so I would have had two firewire ports...

as it is, I'm in the same position you are when it comes to using my PB for video....a little limited. If I start doing more editing on my own equipment then I'll most likely get a "Firestore" or similar encoder so I can transfer directly to the HDD and bypass the computer until I'm ready to edit.

07-12-2005, 10:43 AM

For most cameras, you will need an application of some type to get the video off of the camera on to the hard drive.

07-12-2005, 03:00 PM

Just get yourself a firewire hub. That will solve your problem. I don't believe they are too expensive either. You can get them at any APPLE store I think Belkin makes them. They even stack so if you need more in the future you can stack them on top of each other. They have USB hubs as well. Hope this helps.

07-12-2005, 04:32 PM

Originally Posted by jeXus

Just get yourself a firewire hub. That will solve your problem. I don't believe they are too expensive either. You can get them at any APPLE store I think Belkin makes them. They even stack so if you need more in the future you can stack them on top of each other. They have USB hubs as well. Hope this helps.

You'd have two devices sharing a firewire 400 port during video download and encoding. Would that be much better than plugging your external drive into a USB 2.0 jack?

07-12-2005, 04:43 PM

You are not going to get the throughtput you want if you use the usb port. The firewire port maintains a more consist speed than the usb port.

07-12-2005, 06:41 PM

Originally Posted by MAC-simus

most external drives have 2 FW ports. connect one to powerbook and the other to camera. problem solved. I'm not sure about usb. it cannot provide constant bitrate and is not as good for video capture as firewire.

Thanks, if this will work. If I connect the camera to the firewire on the external drive though, will i be able to import with iMovie or FCP?

07-12-2005, 09:31 PM

Yes, if either FCP or iMovie can see the camera.

07-12-2005, 10:07 PM

Originally Posted by rman

Yes, if either FCP or iMovie can see the camera.

So you are saying that you can hook up the camera directly to the external HDD and the HDD to the computer and import into the computer and save to the external drive?....that doesn't seem like it would work.

I'll be interested to see if this works..keep us informed.

07-12-2005, 11:17 PM

Originally Posted by rman

Yes, if either FCP or iMovie can see the camera.

Yes the part i'd like to find out about is the if in there. I really would rather not spend a few hundred US on a drive just to find out if iMovie will recognize the camera and whatnot. Any body have any more factual information about this issue?

Thanks all, great forums here

07-12-2005, 11:31 PM

The if is for the camera. There are some camera that iMovie and FCP will not see. I have a Canon Optima 20, which works fine in the setup just mentioned.

07-12-2005, 11:38 PM

Oh sweet! Thanks alot dude. I have a Canon 85 or 90z..I forget. Anyways any idea whether this would work. Thanks alot. Your a good mod

EDIT:
BTW the smiley faces on these forums suck. I mean just look at them. they're ugly.

07-12-2005, 11:38 PM

Here is a list of supported cameras.