Mac OS 9 Lives
Mac OS 9 Discussion => Hardware => Storage => Topic started by: SonikArchitects on October 22, 2014, 06:58:35 PM
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Hey guys!
Anyone successfully formatted a 4TB eSata (internal or external w/card) into 2, 2TB (or 1.8) partitions? If yes 1. How and 2. How did you get the mac to see a 4TB drive? I have 2, 2TB's on an internal bus that work perfect but trying to connect a 4TB I can only format it as 2 1TB "drives".
Any help appreciated!
Thanks :o
_BT
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which sata card are you using?
i personally wouldnt even attempt what you are doing.
thats why i have an AFP fileserver that runs on PC hardware.. and serves up my files in mac Apple Filing Protocol (with native support for resource forks etc)
gigabit ethernet isnt much slower then sata150.. !!!!
by internal bus, you mean the ATA-100 of the mdd?
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if you want it to use with OS9, you should make 8 partitions of 500gb each.
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oh sorry, your question was about how. :)
i´ve never used eSATA, but as for SATA disks i always use OSX´apple disk utility, also for OS9 machines.
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There is some info about this on the internet, but it is usually confusing...
According to this official Apple info:
http://support.apple.com/kb/TA21924
With your (two) 2TB hard disk may be you have reached the *volume* size limit. Even though you can install up to 21 of them! LOL
Using a 4TB Hard Disk in Mac Os 9 is an unexplored territory...
Despite the Apple official info, I'll suggest you (if you haven't tried yet) to format and make the two 2Tb partitions with Mac Os X, to check if Mac Os 9 can see them both.
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On Large Audio Volumes, it might pay to initialize Volumes as "Mac OS Standard" since when using Audio files (that are big in nature), it is beneficial to have a larger "Block size" upon volume initialization. Let me explain...
Since audio files are large... a block size of 64K (like under Mac OS Standard) would be preferred over a block size of 4K (like Mac OS Extended) with all volumes over 4 GB in size that will store audio files. The default bock sizes are directly proportional to the volume size and they differ greatly between Mac OS Standard and Mac OS extended.
Under Mac OS Standard we are limited to 65 Thousand files (assuming most are Audio, this might be OK) per volume. A small block size is STORAGE efficient, but not System efficient. The larger the block size, the smaller the number of blocks the system has to track and load in memory and this is a huge benefit, and thus much more efficient in terms of the NUMBER of blocks needed to store a file. Do you really care if at the end of an audio file that you waste 64K of disk space ? It is miniscule; if you need to store 2 billion text files of 2K in size, then the clear answer is Mac OS extended, Number of files goes up to 4 Billion plus per volume and much more disk efficient.
Maybe a good approach would be to make as many 190GB Volumes, each Mac OS Standard for the volumes that will have Audio recordings and making the one that will store samples and OS Files Mac OS extended. I personally never tried this, but it is worth testing out
- Diehard
*** UPDATED ****
The assumption of this post was that the system was going to be an "OS 9" Only System and that the actual hard drives would be 2 TB or less (NOT 4 TB)... damn, even my Mac Pro raid card peaks at 2 TB drives; Chris explains below some great choices if you want to move the storage out on the Network (although eSATA would obviously be a much faster) or if you want a dual OS X & OS 9 environment on the same system (which Diehard still frowns upon...lol). At any rate... a Pure OS 9 system with many volumes for large drives has been a solid proven environment. The variable we need to test is the max size the OS 9 drive setup or "Hard Disk Speed Tools" initialize will go (most likely 2 TB). I am very interested in any results of a Pure OS 9 environment with drives above 500GB that are partitioned and working ;D ;D ;D
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Hey guys! Thanks for all the info. Thanks for the link MacTron and that is great to know about standard vs extended DieHard. You guys rock. Okay so I am using this: Sonnet - Tempo Serial ATA PCI Card. I'm using it is slot 5 of a MMD. I've "extended" it's reach with a cheap (Amazon 15$) back plate (it's not actually a card) that connects port 2 of my Sonnet to a socket that I can plug an outside drive to. Hope this makes sense. Basically sonnet port 2 to a socket (eSata female) and a cable (eSata male to male) to the 4TB drive. It'd be the same thing as what is happening on port 1 of the sonnet except that terminates in an internally mounted 2TB bare drive. It fucking rules on the internal bus. Faster than anything I've ever seen in OS9 and amazing for working with all my old sessions etc. If you have not tried this I highly recommend it.
What I (think) I need is a formatting application that lets me see the full 4TB drive. I imagine it's actually 2 x 2TB drives and there in may lie the problem. I digress. So if there is a formatting application for OS9 that lets me see the full drive, I can then partition into probably 2 x 1.8 TB drives and rock and roll.
What I have tried :
Formatting using Apples Disk application. It will allow me ONLY to make 1 1TB partition or 2 1TB partitions. I've also tried formatting it on OSX (1 1TB, 2 1TB, 2 2TB) and in none of those incarnations will it see it in OS9. It says "not initialized".
Thanks for the thoughts, any help appreciated!
Best,
_BT
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i am not asking why you dont just put the second HD into the MDD :P
but i would like to discuss if there maybe is problem using an esata connector for sata.
or in other words: why dont you use a normal sata cable to connect the disk?
and finally ... please note that SATA officially only supports 1 meter cable lenght. this remains true when using an esata adaptor ...
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esata is the 100% the same as internal sata. thats why it kicks so much ass;)
but hey, BT!
i think there may be a chance you have forgotten to change the type of partition map its using
GPT
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GUID_Partition_Table
if its partitioned in the GUID partition map, this drive is only bootable with intel pcs / macs / EFIbios machines
MBR
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Master_boot_record
if its partitioned in the MBR partition map, this drive is only bootable with windows machines
APM
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_Partition_Map
is what is needed to be formatted 100% compatible with os9.. this probably slipped by you as all new harddrives these days are
shipped with GUID partition map type..
even tho u have changed the size of the partition map it doesnt change the type unless u specify this in the hidden menus or command switches
in mac os X u have to click a 'customize' or 'more options' button to see this dialog (disk utility)
if the partition map is done in Apple partition map then mac os 9 + mac os x ppc should see the drive exactly the same
as well as be bootable from both.
another thing u could use is GPARTED which is a partition editor built under Ubuntu.. not sure if they would have a powerpc bootable iso of this
this was suggested to me by another use of macintoshgarden so i would think he found a downloadable cd image from somewhere
but its alot easier to just use disk utility if u have X installed.
changing the partition type under mac os 9 is impossible...
mac os 9 doesnt give u the option to change from GUID to MBR to APM unfortunately
**UPDATE
i just found this info :
LARGE 3 or 4 TERABYTE DRIVES IN YOUR G5
Apple Partition Map only allows partitions of 2.2TB. That means if you attach a 3 or 4 TB drive to your G5 it will not work properly although it might appear so. Once you fill that drive above that 2.2 TB level the drive will lose its mind. You can simply partition the large drive into multiple partitions less than the 2.2TB limit. You can use 3 or 4 TB drives in a single partition on a G5 as a DATA only drive by simply partitioning it as GUID. The GUID partition doesn't have the limitations of the Apple Partition Map setup. You will not be able to boot from the drive however.
so it could be apple partition map that is capping u at 2.2TB..
so there u go.. u can make it a 4tb drive by using GUID partition map... but that may be usefull only for X... im not sure if mac os 9 can see GUID type drives? it certainly cant boot from them, this is certain... but it may be able to use them as a data drive?
i was just about to suggest MBR, but that also caps out at 2tb
2 TB
The organization of the partition table in the MBR limits the maximum addressable storage space of a disk to 2 TB (232 × 512 bytes). Therefore, the MBR-based partitioning scheme is in the process of being superseded by the GUID Partition Table (GPT) scheme in new computers.
like the quote from headgap systems says... it will "appear to work" at first but "Once you fill that drive above that 2.2 TB level the drive will lose its mind." this is not what u want to have happen.... my advice.. dont use the 4tb drive with the g4 mac.. take it back to the store if u just bought it and get a 2tb drive.. (and take the difference u save and buy a sandwhich LOL right diehard? ;D ) stay within the 2.2TB range.. have a bootable proper apple partition drive that is 100% compatible with the machines.. i would suspect even if u do 2 or 3 partitions.. something is bound to go realy wrong as you are going past into "unknown territory" as mactron would say.
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one last thing is the enclosure type itself..
many esata/fw/usb ENCLOSURES have a max drive size that they can handle, be it 1tb or 2tb or 3tb or 4tb
http://www.tigerdirect.ca/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=7664387&CatId=2780
for example this enclosure says "supports up to 2tb" alot of them will have this limitation
http://eshop.macsales.com/item/Icy%20Dock/MB662U32S/
this one says it supports up to 6TB for each drive
u get the idea
u can easily connect the drive directly to the card to avoid this tho..
and put one of the 2tb as the external (swap them)
if it turns out your enclosure doesnt support 4tb drives
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honestly tho..
the best advice is
to just keep the 4tb drive in a intel base mac or pc...
swap the 4tb with another computer's 2tb drive..and only buy/use 1-2tb drives with the g4 macs..
its always better to stay within the 100% compatible area.. to avoid problems
because its not worth the hassle of having something go wrong later.
if u need more then 2tb in one place..
use an AFP file server powered by Freenas or Nas4Free on pc hardware ,
or an intel mac os x machine (10.4-10.7) with AFP filesharing
or a ppc intel mac os xmachine with AFP filesharing..
AFP is the bomb!
you cant beat it for mac os 9.. mounts via "Chooser" same as a local drive, on your desktop, integrated with finder...
once u try this.. u will see esata drive as "Redundant" unless you need to take large amounts of data on the go with you
(Which may very well be the case for you..?)
i think alot of us here on this site forget that mac os x was originally *MADE TO BE A SERVER FOR OS 9 CLIENTS!!*
so you can use "X only" hardware, enable AFP file sharing over a gigabit ethernet network.. and there you go.. now that hardware
is working for you in mac os 9.. just set up your AFP Filesharing + there you go..
but using it with PC hardware. with the freenas + nas4free packages.. allows u to use the largest hard drives possible + have data
redundancy + fast disk access.. :D its seriously win, any motherboard with 4gb-8gb ram can be used as a file server this way..
(untill knez teaches us how to create a SAN in mac os 9) ;D
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apparently windows xp users have the same problem
http://superuser.com/questions/355640/easiest-way-to-use-a-2tb-internal-hard-disk-in-windows-xp-32-bit
therefore i think the following statement is true:
no operating systems prior to 2006-2007 will support GPT Guid partition tables without additional 3rd party software
the takeaway:
things get messy above 2.2TB stay below that size + you have no problems + can focus on your music instead of being forced into being your own technical support
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Under a pure OS 9 environment, one main issue that has been discussed in other threads is hard drive maintenance; Any volumes above the 200GB limit may be a real hassle if they become corrupted or need of a defragmentation (audio recording volume).
Norton Speed disk and other defragmenting (OS 9 programs) will produce "Out of RAM errors" and NOT work. A work around suggested by some members was to create an OS X bootable DVD with a defrag utility and use that method. Many OS 9 disk maintenance (repair file/volume issues) will also bomb on volumes greater than 190 to 200GB; so that was the original reason that I suggested all volumes be 190GB or less was because I was under the assumption that the data put on these volumes was important audio project data (or hot pics of sexy babes).
IMO huge volumes that are not repairable are not the way to go. Most of organize our data into folders, so the additional hierarchy of Volumes seems nice and logical... a Samples Volume (190 GB should be enough for most users), Mac OS (OS & apps), Audio Projects 1, 2, 3... it does not seem unfeasible. Remember, when you put all the eggs in one basket (or on 1 volume), don't bitch if you crack a few. :D
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my advise would be to just install OSX on any such computer with modern gear (big disks as well as other upgrades).
because if you have 2 3 TB HDs and partition then into 200mb volumes (lol) only the first 21 of the resulting 30 volumes will automatically appear on the desktop after startup.
well ok, if xou have something to hide from your wife and kids this might be exactly want you want, but if it is your audio disk that is not funny.
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I was thinking more like (2) 500GB or (2) 1 TB Drives... definitely NOT 3 TB drives... 10 volumes is about what I have and all works peachy... I have an SDD and (3) 500GBs in each MDD
For those with stock MDDs... try this and let us know
1TB (1000 GB) IDE 40-PIN PATA UDMA-133 Western Digital WD Caviar Greenhard disk drive
http://www.ebay.com/itm/1TB-IDE-40-PIN-PATA-UDMA-133-Western-Digital-WD-Caviar-Green-HDD-1000GB-NEW-/300913184224?pt=UK_Computing_HardDrives_RL&hash=item460fd2cde0
Damn I hate "green drives" they die early in life >:(
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what i find strange is that his drive works in OSX after formatting there, but not in OS9. there is no logical reason for this, 9.2.2 shoudl support drives up to 6 TB, (10.2 up to 8, and system after 10.6 something have literally no limit.)
what is even more strange is that apple everywhere claims MacOS9 would only support volumes of 200 gb, which is definetly nonsense. this is not even true for ATA-66 controllers - with the usual software tweaks for hi cap support you can run 250+ IDE drives just fine even in a G3.
hm?
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wow ok one more time
apple partition map has a limit of 2.2TB (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_Partition_Map)
Disks using the Apple Partition Map are divided into logical blocks, with 512 bytes usually belonging to each block. The first block, Block 0, contains an Apple-specific data structure called “Driver Descriptor Map” for the Macintosh Toolbox ROM to load driver updates and patches before loading from a MFS or HFS partition.[2] Because APM allows 32 bits worth of logical blocks, the historical size of an APM formatted disk using small blocks[3] is limited to 2 TiB.[4]
u cant format for powerpc larger then 2.2TB
MBR for pc also has a similar limit.
only GPT can format larger then 2.2TB
it is very likely that mac os 9 + lower versions of mac os X
will be unable to read GUID partitions, considering GPT came out years after the fact of
the release date of these operating systems..
collected facts from google searches
-For accessing volumes, both APM and GUID partitions can be used in a standard manner with Mac OS X 10.4 and higher
-10.3.9 will not recognize GUID partitions or ExFAT partitions
-intel mac os x computers REQUIRE GPT disk to be able to boot
-A PowerPC-based Mac can only install Mac OS X on a disk with the "Apple_partition_scheme."
-An Intel-based Mac can only install Mac OS X on a disk with the "GUID_partition_scheme." (http://support.apple.com/kb/TS1600)
-Intel-based models that came with Mac OS X Tiger or Leopard preinstalled are able to boot from both APM and GUID disks
the question to answer;
can os 9 see a GPT partitioned drive?
we know it cant boot from it.. but can it even use it as a data drive?
because if so, there is your answer..
partition the drive with the GUID partition table
and u can format it larger then 2.2TB
but if 10.3.9 cannot see GPT then the answer is most likely NO,
so inside mac os 9.. u cant have a disk larger then 2TB.
this is a limitation of the partitioning technology itself, NOT the disk controller.
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what is even more strange is that apple everywhere claims MacOS9 would only support volumes of 200 gb, which is definetly nonsense. this is not even true for ATA-66 controllers - with the usual software tweaks for hi cap support you can run 250+ IDE drives just fine even in a G3.
hm?
OK... step 1... As stated above...
Norton Speed disk and other defragmenting (OS 9 programs) will produce "Out of RAM errors" and NOT work. A work around suggested by some members was to create an OS X bootable DVD with a defrag utility and use that method. Many OS 9 disk maintenance (repair file/volume issues) will also bomb on volumes greater than 190 to 200GB; so that was the original reason that I suggested all volumes be 190GB or less
Another side note... in theory:
Mac OS X Maximum Drive Capacity
OS X 10.0-10.1.5, 2 TB maximum volume size
OS X 10.2-10.2.8, 8 TB
OS X 10.3-10.3.9, 16 TB
OS X 10.4 and later, around 8 exabytes (8 million terabytes!)
But, remember, that is on the OS side, the actual hardware may be a different issue. From the MacOS9 lives website...
If you intend to use hard drives larger than 128GB under OS 9, then be aware that you will need a Mac with an IDE controller that is 48-bit LBA compliant.
That would be the first hurdle, the next would be any limits imposed on the Internal IDE controllers (that are 48-bit LBA compliant) that we don't know about; or in the case of eSATA, what the PCI eSATA controller limits.
Theoretical limits mean nothing.... the hardware will take precedence...
For instance, the Apple RAID controller (in my mac Pro) limits drive size to 2 TB regardless of the Mac OS version.
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the chart data above posted by diehard
"Mac OS X: Mac OS Extended format (HFS Plus) volume and file limits"
http://support.apple.com/kb/ht2422
thats re: the *FILESYSTEM*
but thats meaningless if the *PARTITION TABLE*
that is the parent container of that *FILESYSTEM* has its own limitation:
APM apple partition map is limited to 2.2TB!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
am i invisible??
https://discussions.apple.com/thread/4259534
u can create disks larger then 2.2tb with the apple raid controller
for example, making a raid from 2 x 2TB drives will give u a 4tb drive
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to BT:
you have 2 options bro
option a) format the disk changing the partition type to APM and bite the bullet + use the 4TB drive as a single 2TB drive
option b) return the disk exchanging it for a 2TB and do the same as option a)
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... 9.2.2 shoudl support drives up to 6 TB...
in what this statement is based ?
... oficial Apple info, real world tests, your test, or it is just a personal conviction...
can os 9 see a GPT partitioned drive?
No, it can't.
I haven't tested it by my self (by now...), But there is several statements on the internet, saying:
"... Windows XP, Mac OS 9, or any other system incapable of comprehending GPT Partitions"
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OK... step 1... As stated above...
yeah, thats probably the reason for the confusion, apple makes these notes and has the ATA controllers in the OS9 computers in mind. so while 6 tera might be true for SCSI or firewire, it is prolly not for ATA.
what i interesting here is that this 2 tera limit of OS 9.2.2 has survived since OS 7.5, which also could make use of 2 TB drives already.
now i am curious if someone gets bigger disks to work using the SATA-150 solution from sonnet. myself i also only have 1.5 tb disks in my macs, just like you.
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there is an exception:
windows xp x64 edition can use GPT disks
https://www.microsoft.com/resources/documentation/windows/xp/all/proddocs/en-us/guid_partition_table.mspx?mfr=true
GPT disks are supported only by Windows XP 64-Bit Edition. You cannot move GPT disks to computers running the 32-bit versions of Windows XP.
so for whatever reason it seems GPT happens to be compatible with every major 64 bit os + not compatible with any 32bit os..
another good point to note:
You cannot use the GPT partitioning style on removable media, detachable disks that use universal serial bus (USB) or IEEE 1394 (also called FireWire) interfaces, or on cluster disks that are connected to shared SCSI or Fibre Channel buses used by the Cluster service.
any usb/firewire disks cannot be formatted to GPT?? perhaps this is relative only to windows..
IIO: why do u bother to ramble on without checking any of the facts that u say???
seriously.. u do this EVERY post.. u just type a few quick sentences... u dont check if anything u say is true..
"stop talking out of your ass" as we would say in north america.
http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=talking%20out%20of%20your%20ass
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http://classroom.synonym.com/size-limitation-hfs-format-hard-drive-15364.html
HFS Volume Limitations
HFS can allocate logical volumes on storage devices as large as 2TB.
Computer users can work around the maximum volume sizes by creating several HFS volumes on the same storage device.
It is confusing again ...
A logical volume is an allocation of physical space as a unit on a storage device. HFS volume size limits are also limited by the computer's operating system. Mac OS 6 and 7 computers can only address HFS volumes as large as 2GB and OS 7.5 bumped the capacity to 4GB. As of the OS 7.5.2 revision, all Mac computers can address HFS volumes of up to 2TB in size.
Apple's HFS+ is designed to replace HFS on modern hard drives extending into the terabyte and beyond storage range. HFS+ can store up to 2.1 billion individual files and folders on a single volume. Additionally, HFS+ supports massive maximum volume and file sizes extending up to 8 extabytes. However, the maximum volume and file sizes are limited by operating system version: OS 10 has a cap of 2TB, OS 10.2 increased the cap to 8TB, OS 10.3 can address up to 16TB and OS 10.4 can use the full 8EB.
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yes hfs+ on A GTP partitioned drive can be up to 8 exobytes or whatever..
hfs+ on an APM partitioned drive is a different story apparently.
the article i quoted above said u can do this on a disk larger then 2.2tb + it will 'appear to work..'
but then once the actual data goes over 2.2tb 'all hell will break loose'
so this 'workaround' by doing 'multiple volumes' is not something u want to try unless your data is not important because the main problem is at the partition table level.. so even tho it can support huge filesystems.. the powerpc "APM" partition map cannot.
its easiest to say STAY at 2TB OR UNDER physical disk sizes + all is ok.. and keep focused on music;)
instead of being your own techsupport personnell
we should be happy mac os 9 works with 2TB even..
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but thats meaningless if the *PARTITION TABLE*
that is the parent container of that *FILESYSTEM* has its own limitation:
APM apple partition map is limited to 2.2TB!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
am i invisible??
https://discussions.apple.com/thread/4259534
u can create disks larger then 2.2tb with the apple raid controller
for example, making a raid from 2 x 2TB drives will give u a 4tb drive
Yes Chris, you are totally right (and not invisible)... but, I just wanted to add...
When we are talking PowerPC Macs... we are talking APM and thus the 2.2 partition limit... Apple Partition Map (APM) is a partition scheme used to define the low-level organization of data on disks formatted for use with 68k and PowerPC Macintosh computers. It was introduced with the Macintosh II.
Now a quick note on my Mac Pro, I have it setup mirrored (RAID 1) since I like the protection, so I am stuck with a 2 TB limit, I would never stripe them the RAID 0 (too risky for my project backups)... so I cannot get 4 GB... but I can go with 4 (2) TB Drives (2 mirrored sets) = 4 TB
or use RAID 5 with 4 drives and get (2.64 X 2 TB) and get 5.28 TB
As far as Intel macs we are talking GUID (GPT) and no more 2.2 TB limit like you explained ;D
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its easiest to say STAY at 2TB OR UNDER physical disk sizes + all is ok.. and keep focused on music;)
instead of being your own techsupport personnell
we should be happy mac os 9 works with 2TB even..
Yes this is the best recommendation for everyone.
Even more, we should use the DieHard partition advice for further security:
...
Any volumes above the 200GB limit may be a real hassle if they become corrupted or need of a defragmentation
...
so that was the original reason that I suggested all volumes be 190GB or less
...
Most of organize our data into folders, so the additional hierarchy of Volumes seems nice and logical... a Samples Volume (190 GB should be enough for most users), Mac OS (OS & apps), Audio Projects 1, 2, 3... it does not seem unfeasible...
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i find it strange to read that the mac pro raid card would have a limit of 2.2TB as this is obviously a card for intel/guid booting machine.... and its a pci-express card?
anyway i cant find any reason technically for this 2.2TB limit to be imposed on this card (other than the APM limit.. which i find funny that this fact isnt more prominently documented by apple)
makes me think that this is a false limitation somehow imposed by the manufacturer (apple)
perhaps so they can sell u another raid card in a few years time ;D
im not right;) i just post what i look up online.. untill this topic was posted i had no clue of any of this.. so..
at least i know how to avoid problems in the future should my storage needs increase.
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It is confusing again ...
this is the only thing i understand ... and which is even clear on old apple pages.
this file system supports this maximum volume size. (that is not neccessarily correct, since it is from the interwebz :P – but it is pretty clear what is meant.)
the 6 tera info .. pretty sure it was from apple, too. but i just looked, and i cant find it back. there is only info for the new max sizes introduced with 7.5.2 and for 10.2+
p.s. the problem with 1.5 gb disks is that mine are all full. :P
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oh btw, just to make the contradictions complete, firmtek always claimed that their 4-port cards will also boot into OS9, while sonnet says it is impossible. :)
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I've read and re-read this thread a few times, and have also played around with things a bit, so I think I understand everything, but let me just put out my situation in case I've missed anything.
I've got a G4 MDD dual 1.25 GHz, which is running 9.2.2 (primarily) and 10.3.9. Mostly used for ProTools and some other older audio apps. I had an 80 GB drive on the ATA/66 controller and a 500 GB drive on the ATA/100 controller, split into 3 partitions. Unfortunately, those drives are now full.
I purchased a new 4 TB drive along with a PATA/SATA adapter to connect it to the ATA/100 controller. Long story short:
- Both OS9 and OSX seem to see the full capacity of the drive itself at a hardware level.
- OSX attempts to partition the entire drive, but 1) any partitions that extend beyond about 2 TB don't get created correctly and don't mount, and 2) no partitions show up at all in OS9.
- Drive Setup (2.1) in OS9 seems to only attempt to partition the first ~2 TB. I created one ~100 GB partition for booting, and planned on having one ~1.9 TB partition for data, but oddly enough, while this worked fine in OS9, OSX wasn't mounting the data partition. When I split the data area into two partitions, everything seems fine.
So now, I have the following setup:
- 103.64 GB (boot)
- 972.09 GB (data 1)
- 972.09 GB (data 2)
To confirm, 1) APM is necessary to use the drive in OS9, and 2) APM has a limit of ~2 TB across all partitions. Which limits any *drive* to ~2 TB. Correct?
"As we can see, APM is restricted to 32 bits worth of blocks which will limit the total disk size to 2 terabytes."
http://www.mactech.com/articles/mactech/Vol.23/23.03/APMtoGPT/index.html
I'd rather not waste half of the space available on the hard drive if I don't have to, but if that's the way it is, I guess that's the way it is.
BTW, Drive Setup 2.1 clearly wasn't designed with such large drives in mind. The partition size shown often seems to be incorrect, and typing in a number usually doesn't work. And dragging the partitions around sometimes works...until it basically decides to reset everything. Thankfully I managed to figure out a way to (eventually) get everything sized the way I wanted it.
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I purchased a new 4 TB drive along with a PATA/SATA adapter to connect it to the ATA/100 controller
You should try to explore SATA solutions under OS 9 / OS X (see the many posts by Chris & Mactron); a drive of this size with speed/cache/etc. will be seriously hindered with the PATA/SATA adapter on the internal bus. As far as the size and the partitions, remember, this is new territory for OS 9. I know you mentioned your 500GB was full, but as you know you can go up to (4) 500 GBs internally, which all connect to the internal controllers if your setup does not permit the addition on an SATA card; lastly, we posted some awesome solutions for FireWire with RAID in really small enclosures the take 2 laptop hard drives, so that you can move finished products to the RAIDed backup and free up internal drives.
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I purchased a new 4 TB drive along with a PATA/SATA adapter to connect it to the ATA/100 controller
You should try to explore SATA solutions under OS 9 / OS X (see the many posts by Chris & Mactron); a drive of this size with speed/cache/etc. will be seriously hindered with the PATA/SATA adapter on the internal bus. As far as the size and the partitions, remember, this is new territory for OS 9. I know you mentioned your 500GB was full, but as you know you can go up to (4) 500 GBs internally, which all connect to the internal controllers if your setup does not permit the addition on an SATA card; lastly, we posted some awesome solutions for FireWire with RAID in really small enclosures the take 2 laptop hard drives, so that you can move finished products to the RAIDed backup and free up internal drives.
From what I've read here and elsewhere, SATA cards are limited by the speed of the PCI bus, and that the ATA/100 controller should be roughly similar in speed. And the PATA/SATA adapter was about $5, vs. maybe $80 for a SATA PCI card. Hence the decision to go with the adapter.
Unless I'm mistaken, only the ATA/100 controller supports 48-bit LBA, which means the ATA/66 controller (besides being slower) can only address up to 137 GB. And actually, from what I've seen, it won't even recognize larger drives. I'd have to check myself, but I seem to recall that being the case. So that would mean it's only possible to have 2 "large" drives internally if one only uses the internal controllers.
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it will recognize bigger drives, but you can only create partitions of 137 gb with such a controller.
however, this means that if you use e.g. a G4 QS 733, and you dont dont want to trust the software solutions for larger drive support with this controller, a PCI is the only option.
and when i need a PCI card anyway, it is worth thinking about SATA. that it is not much faster than ATA 100 might be true, but it is hmm, "more modern", and allows you to use at least some of the SATA-150 or even SATA-300 functionality/commands. (for example i would not like to connect a BD burner to an IDE controller via adapter.)
and, of course, when you want to connect more than 2 modern SATA HDs you will need a PCI solution in addition anyway.
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it will recognize bigger drives, but you can only create partitions of 137 gb with such a controller.
Are you sure about that? My understanding is without 48-bit LBA, the controller can't physically address the drive. The partition limit would be based on the filesystem and partition scheme, not the controller.
I can verify later regardless.
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hey there lukpac
yep i would take the 4tb back if u could and exchange it for a 2tb drive which is the max u can use with powerpc computers
as noted even if it appears to work.. it was said that once u get to a filled capacity u will experience data corruption or data loss and u will lose data + the drive will screw up etc
this is a physical limit much like the whole 4gb ram barrier of 32bit windows xp ..it just wasnt built to address more then that.. etc if u are using an MDD dual 1.25ghz + a pata adapter u should be ok having it connecte to the aTA100 port.. that is the port next to the cpu on the far right side of the motherboard when viewing it from the side door opening towards u.. which would mean u would probably need the drive installed in that drive carrier near the port on the right side aswell..
heres the deal..
if the drive is just a storage drive...(not a system boot drive)
then u can use it with mac os x using a GPT partition..
im not sure if mac os 9 will recognize GPT partitions as i have not tested this myself.
but i would guess that it doesnt?? if i had to guess.. but i could be wrong.
if the drive is formatted GPT partition type then it can be larger then 2.2TB and u can
get the full capacity of the drive...
for me personally.. to fix a problem like this. i would just move the drive to a server that runs mac os X (intel)
or Unix/FreeBSD (nas4free/FreeNAS).. or 64bit Intel + share the drive using AFP somehow and access the drive over the network.. and voila problem solved... over gigabit ethernet u get speeds of like 70-100MB/s over AFP.
if the drive is used for the system to boot. then u are indeed
limited to 2.2TB in size by the technology of APM.. which is 100% neeeded to boot any powerpc computer.. be it mac os X or mac os 9... if booting mac os 9, best to be on the safe side and keep any bootable partition lower then 137GB.. i would say cap it at 128gb. which is plenty for mac os 9...
has anyone done any experiments with APM partitioned drive larger then 137gb to boot mac os 9?
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wait u said u were using 10.3.9??
the disk utility partition / raid setup in tiger 10.4 was greatly improved over 10.3's version
for example u can set up raid stripes + do things in 10.4 setup that u cant do in 10.3.9
so i would suggest that u use a tiger install dvd to boot + simply dont install but click on utilities to access the newer version of disk utility.. this will allow u to try to see if its formatting + partition types work better then the panther disk utility and im pretty sure that they do..
for example i think tiger supports GPT partition types and panther might not..
u could get the full size of your 4tb drive by partitionining it with GUID partition type.. (GPT)
but u would not be able to have any bootable os on the drive...
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From what I've read here and elsewhere, SATA cards are limited by the speed of the PCI bus, and that the ATA/100 controller should be roughly similar in speed. And the PATA/SATA adapter was about $5, vs. maybe $80 for a SATA PCI card. Hence the decision to go with the adapter.
Unless I'm mistaken, only the ATA/100 controller supports 48-bit LBA, which means the ATA/66 controller (besides being slower) can only address up to 137 GB. And actually, from what I've seen, it won't even recognize larger drives. I'd have to check myself, but I seem to recall that being the case. So that would mean it's only possible to have 2 "large" drives internally if one only uses the internal controllers.
pci card will give higher speed then the ata100 controller
by a small percentage
see this post by mactron
http://macos9lives.com/smforum/index.php?topic=2023.msg10538#msg10538
which shows this graphic made by him to illustrate differences in bandwidth
(http://macos9lives.com/smforum/index.php?action=dlattach;topic=2023.0;attach=1494)
so as u can see.. the ata100 controller will work just fine yes..
what this graphic does not show is the speed of ata66 controller which woiuld be even smaller then the ata100 (of course)
and this port is the port on the left size of the mdd.
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hey there lukpac
yep i would take the 4tb back if u could and exchange it for a 2tb drive which is the max u can use with powerpc computers
as noted even if it appears to work.. it was said that once u get to a filled capacity u will experience data corruption or data loss and u will lose data + the drive will screw up etc
I don't plan on returning it. Right now 2 TB drives cost more anyway. And I see no reason why any data would get corrupt, since "a filled capacity" is ~2 TB, not 4 TB. It's never going to write more than that limit since there are no partitions there.
this is a physical limit much like the whole 4gb ram barrier of 32bit windows xp ..it just wasnt built to address more then that.. etc if u are using an MDD dual 1.25ghz + a pata adapter u should be ok having it connecte to the aTA100 port.. that is the port next to the cpu on the far right side of the motherboard when viewing it from the side door opening towards u.. which would mean u would probably need the drive installed in that drive carrier near the port on the right side aswell..
I believe the physical limit is in the controller, and using the ATA/100 controller (or a SATA card), that isn't an issue. What *is* an issue is the APM partitioning scheme that OS 9 requires.
heres the deal..
if the drive is just a storage drive...(not a system boot drive)
then u can use it with mac os x using a GPT partition..
im not sure if mac os 9 will recognize GPT partitions as i have not tested this myself.
but i would guess that it doesnt?? if i had to guess.. but i could be wrong.
if the drive is formatted GPT partition type then it can be larger then 2.2TB and u can
get the full capacity of the drive...
for me personally.. to fix a problem like this. i would just move the drive to a server that runs mac os X (intel)
or Unix.. or 64bit Intel + share the drive using AFP somehow and access the drive over the network.. and voila problem solved.
if the drive is used for the system to boot. then u are indeed
limited to 2.2TB in size by the technology of APM.. which is 100% neeeded to boot any powerpc computer.. be it mac os X or mac os 9.
I need to run OS 9, so regardless of booting (I currently have a boot partition setup, although in theory I could still boot off of another drive if I wanted to), as far as I know I need to partition using APM, which limits the drive to ~2 TB across all partitions.
ProTools needs direct access to the disk, so just using a file share isn't an option. I do have a server that I access, but one can't run sessions from that.
I may look into 10.4, but 1) I don't use OS X that often, and 2) I would still not be able to use GPT because the partitions need to be usable in OS 9, regardless of bootability.
It looks like a SATA card would be slightly faster, but not night and day. I've had no problems with the ATA/100 controller to this point, so I think I'm good just using the PATA/SATA adapter.
Also, I was apparently wrong about the ATA/66 controller not supporting LBA. I just put my 500 GB drive on there to see what would happen, and it worked fine (currently partitioned into 3 155 GB partitions). Good to know, even if that controller is slower. I must have been confused over the fact that that ATA/100 controller won't work without Mac OS ROM 9.6.1.
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From what I've read here and elsewhere, SATA cards are limited by the speed of the PCI bus, and that the ATA/100 controller should be roughly similar in speed. And the PATA/SATA adapter was about $5, vs. maybe $80 for a SATA PCI card. Hence the decision to go with the adapter.
Well, actually the PATA/IDE is much slower, depending on the SATA card (like a Seritek 1eVE2+2 64 bit card), the speed would actually be "night and day"; even the non-64 bit card would offer a very noticable improvement, you can also read about the real world speeds in these threads.
http://macos9lives.com/smforum/index.php?topic=2023.0
http://macos9lives.com/smforum/index.php?topic=803.0
http://macos9lives.com/smforum/index.php?topic=306.0
Unless I'm mistaken, only the ATA/100 controller supports 48-bit LBA, which means the ATA/66 controller (besides being slower) can only address up to 137 GB. And actually, from what I've seen, it won't even recognize larger drives. I'd have to check myself, but I seem to recall that being the case. So that would mean it's only possible to have 2 "large" drives internally if one only uses the internal controllers.
Looks like you already figured this one out and that both controllers on the MDD work with 500GB drives. My (3) MDD 1.33 Ghz. units all have the same configuration, I chose NOT to use a SATA card since I have a PowerCore PCI, 2496, and a UAD-1 in each unit, so I do not want to use and PCI bandwidth and chose to use the internal controllers. I did opt for a 256 GB SSD as my Primary boot, Samples drive, and current projects (from OWC); then I have (3) 500GB... so I get almost 2 TB on each unit; the speed of an SSD for Booting, loading samples, and recording (current projects only) is incredible. I recommend an SSD at least for the OS.
As an added note, I just got in a used MDD, a 750GB PATA/IDE...
Seagate DB35 Series 7200.3 ST3750840ACE 750GB 7200 RPM 8MB Cache IDE Ultra ATA100 / ATA-6
I confirmed this drive has no issues under OS 9, So the Native MAX (without SATA converters) is 4 X 750GB = 3 TB
Lastly, I have used this adapter/bracket (which is exactly the size of an original PATA/IDE drive)
ACARD ARS-2133 IDE/PATA-to-SATA HDD/SSD Bridge Adapter
http://www.ebay.com/itm/261237296692?_trksid=p2059210.m2749.l2649&ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT
and mounted fast SATA notebook hard drives in MDDs
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lukpac..
if u have partitioned the 4tb drive only utilizing the first 2TB of space then yes, u are safe from data corruption... but u are losing 50% of the capacity of the drive... which i wouldnt be ok with. especially given the price of a 4tb vs a 2tb drive.. even if i was given one for free, i wouldnt be satisfied with having a 4tb drive only 50% utilized
re: "physical limit" this was a poor choice of words on my part.. what i meant was the "real limit"
is due to APM partitioning.. by saying physical i was trying to illustrate that it is indeed a barrier that you simply cannot get around... this is why i compared this to the 4gb limit of 32bit windows systems... there is simply no way around this.
from my research my conclusion is...
2.2TB is the absolute largest size that can be assigned to a single hard drive device usable within the mac os 9 operating system. and also the largest
you can assign to a multi-disk RAID partition aswell (either via hardware raid controller or SOFTRAID)
GUID partitions are able to surpass this size in addressable space but are only supported on mac os x 10.4 and higher. PowerPC based Macs that are running OS X 10.4 or later can mount and use a drive formatted with the GUID Partition Table, but cannot boot from the device
the only way around this "2.2TB limit per drive device" rule is to install the drive into a server of some sort and share the drive via AFP as a network drive... i have tested this personally with a RAID array of 4 1TB disks, in a software ZFS RAID5 formation, with a capacity of 3.68TB and am fairly certain that i had more then 2.2TB of data on this drive.. and its performance was very satisfactory, and the experience of using the drive, felt the same as using a local drive. there were no pauses or wait times. Using it over gigabit ethernet w/ AFP i think its arguable that its faster then firewire 400...but this may have been because the raid array had 4 disks and read + wrote data very fast compared to a single drive connected via firewire.
i think that lukpac was just sharing his experience for the benefit of others.. we often get in the routine of answering peoples questions.. we must remember not everyone is 'asking for help' but merely 'contributing information to help the cause' ;)
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Are you sure about that?
sure, i´ve been using several 160, 200 and 250 gb HDs in such computers. or to be exakt, the first 137 gb of them ;)
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the 6 tera info .. pretty sure it was from apple, too. but i just looked, and i cant find it back.
btw, to clear that up, this "6 TB" i have heard of was a slip.
this limit exists, but this is only the theoretical limit for the G4 hardware. because 6 TB drvies is what OSX 10.5 can do, and 10.5 is the latest these computers can run.
or in other words: this is off topic, because it has nothing to do with OS9 :)
secondly this limit does not automatically mean that you can reach it e.g. with usb, firewire, or the built-in IDE controllers - it might need a certain interface.
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10.5 can do a helluva lot more then 6tb with GPT
http://knowledge.seagate.com/articles/en_US/FAQ/218579en
Apple System and OS Support for Disk Drives Beyond 2.2 TeraBytes (TB)
Discussion of and instructions for updating your computer to be able to use the entire capacity of your larger-than-2TB internal drive in MacOS.
Macintosh systems with OS X 10.6 (Snow Leopard) and OS X 10.5 (Leopard) support direct attached disk drives greater than 2.2TB in size using GPT (GUID Partition Table).
Macintosh Power Mac G5, MacPro and iMac systems with the above versions of OS X can support 3.5” disk drives greater than 2.2TB in non-RAID configurations.
Software RAID 0 (striped) and RAID 1 (mirrored) with OS X 10.6.6 should work.
Other related categories of storage with possible 2.2TB limitations:
-OS X 10.4 (Tiger) appears to recognize disk drives larger than 2.2TB and has GPT support for additional drives. However, it is reported to be unable to setup or boot a partition larger than 2.2TB.
-Apple Software RAID prior to OS X 10.6
-Apple Bootcamp (including Windows 7 64-bit)
-Apple RAID cards
-Software based full disk encryption tools
-SoftRAID (a third-party application)
http://wdc.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/2754/~/hard-drives-greater-than-2-tb-do-not-work-on-existing-operating-systems
Below are some things to keep in mind when considering the use of drives larger than 2 TB's:
Mac OSX 10.4.x (Tiger) and higher will read drives larger than 2TB. However, you must format the drive using the GUID partition scheme for the drive to be properly recognized.
Windows 2000/XP (32-bit) has no issues with Network storage drives larger than 2 TB's since they are accessed indirectly through the network.
Windows XP (64-bit) only recognizes external hard drives larger than 2 TB's that are connected by USB.
You need to know in which partition scheme, MBR or GPT, your Windows Vista operating system is installed. If it's MBR, you will still have the same issues as in Windows 2000 and XP.
Windows 2000/XP will have no problems formatting a 2 TB Raid 1 (Mirrored) drive in the MBR format. However, it will not be able to convert that 2 TB RAID 1 drive to a 4 TB RAID 0 drive.
Likewise, Windows 2000/XP will not be able to convert a 4 TB RAID 0 external drive to a 2 TB RAID 1 drive. You will need the use of a computer running Windows Vista (using a GPT partition), XP (64-bit), or Mac 10.4/10.5 to convert the drive from 4 TB RAID 0 to 2 TB RAID 1.
Windows 2000/XP will not be able to convert any 2 TB, or smaller, GUID partitioned drive to an MBR partition through Window's Disk Management. This will require a utility, such as DLG Diagnostics, that can write zeros to the drive so it can be partitioned and formatted through Windows 2000/XP.
http://wdc.custhelp.com/ci/fattach/get/110946/0/session/L2F2LzEvdGltZS8xNDIyNjM5NDgxL3NpZC82WG12Mk1kbQ==/filename/Operating_System_Boot_Partition.pdf
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/946557
http://www.wdc.com/wdproducts/library/WhitePapers/ENG/2579-771501.pdf
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So, anyone still running ProTools 5? I ran into a bit of a snag.
Everything is now booting fine, and I'm not having any issues accessing or opening files on any partition. However, while PT 5 is opening up sessions on the 100 GB partition just fine, if you copy them to one of the 970 GB partitions it isn't properly reading the files. Sometimes playback results in noise, while other times it results in a different file being played.
I can open the files in other editors, and they are fine. But PT 5 is having problems accessing them.
My question is, before I go too far trying to troubleshoot this, are there any known partition and/or disk size limits for PT 5? I'm hoping I can just repartition and have more smaller partitions, but I'm wondering if anyone knows offhand.
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i think its been explained pretty clearly.
you are asking for trouble using that disk with a mac os 9 computer
period.
you are on your own with this man!
u are in unexplored unsupported territory;)
good luck
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i think its been explained pretty clearly.
you are asking for trouble using that disk with a mac os 9 computer
period.
Well...no.
From the OS side, the files are there, intact, and can be opened with other programs. Even Pro Tools reads them fine to create the waveforms. It is purely an issue with playback within Pro Tools.
While the physical disk is larger than what can be addressed by OS 9, the partitions are not.
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... yet u have a problem... and we are telling u over and over that what u are doing is not reccommended or supported 100%
not everything is black + white (works vs doesnt work).. there is a grey area of (works 90% except has an issue.) or (works as long as i dont try to do X)
u are in the grey area man.. this is the reason why digidesign always was very EXPLICIT about requirements for hardware + software..
u are working with an ata controller that was designed to handle 200gb drives not 4tb drives
why u would need soooo much space for protools ..doesnt make sense to me..
http://archive.digidesign.com/compato/os9/stg/drivereqle.html
"Hard Drive Minimum Requirements" With Pro Tools for Mac OS 9
Requirements for both IDE/ATA or SCSI drives:
Minimum speed of 7200 RPM & average seek time of less than 10.0 ms
For 24-32 tracks, drives must be dedicated for audio (internal or external)
Boot drives may be used for audio tracks, however performance/track count may vary
Mac OS file system: HFS or HFS+. SCSI drives should be initialized with ATTO ExpressPro-Tools v2.3.2 or higher, IDE/ATA drives should be initialized with Apple's Drive Setup.
Note: Mac OS 9.2 requires ATTO ExpressPro-Tools v2.7 or higher, available from www.attotech.com/software or Digidesign/Support/Downloads/Utilities
ATTO ExpressPro-Tools settings: Synch Transfer Rate set to 20 (10) and PCI Burst Rate set to 32 bytes
If using non-ATTO ExpressPro-Tools initialized drives, click here for options
For supported SCSI HBA cards check the compatibility document of your specific computer model.
says clear as day "drive must be dedicated for audio" ..
u want to use a single drive.. with 1 partition for use with pro tools.. with nothing else on it.
thats my understanding of it.
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... yet u have a problem... and we are telling u over and over that what u are doing is not reccommended or supported 100%
Considering OS 9 has been dead for years, nothing is supported anymore.
My problem is specific to Pro Tools, and my question is if anyone knows of a specific limitation or problem with that. If, for example, the issue is with partition size, then not only would the problem have nothing to do with the drive, but it could/would happen on a sub-2.2 TB drive with similar partition sizes. And if it is a partition size issue, it would be nice to know what that limit is, so I don't have to repeatedly repartition and test.
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while PT 5 is opening up sessions on the 100 GB partition just fine, if you copy them to one of the 970 GB partitions it isn't properly reading the files. Sometimes playback results in noise, while other times it results in a different file being played.
your solution is to use a single drive.. dedicated for pro tools.. with a single partition (being the first partition on the drive)
most people would reccommend u use a drive under 1tb in size for this PT-dedicated drive.
and use your 4tb drive as storage/backup.
***you should not have your os running on the same drive as the pro tools audio drive.***
regardless of whether its a different partition...
Considering OS 9 has been dead for years, nothing is supported anymore.
im not talking about "Support" in the call someone up sense.. i meant documented as working... and reccommended as a viable option.
certain hardware configurations work.. and others dont.. this is what im referring to as supported vs unsupported..
works / doesnt work. for example mac os 9 machines only support 1.5gb - 2.0gb of ram. mac os 9 machines support Ata hard drives.
anyway.. u have all the answers you need.. question is whether u are willing to actually listen to whats been told to you!!
i dont make the rules man.. lol im jsut telling u how it is.. u may not like it but thats how it is because thats how it was..
and thats not going to change.
you are using a computer from 2002 with a hard drive capacity that didnt exist before Fall 2011... think about that for a second
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u are working with an ata controller that was designed to handle 200gb drives not 4tb drives
200 GB drives? According to what/who? I used a 500 GB drive for years without a problem. Where is there any indication that the controller can't handle such large drives? We already know there's a limitation due to the partition map, but that has nothing to do with the controller.
why u would need soooo much space for protools ..doesnt make sense to me..
Because audio files are large and I have a lot of them. What's hard to understand about that?
http://archive.digidesign.com/compato/os9/stg/drivereqle.html
"Hard Drive Minimum Requirements" With Pro Tools for Mac OS 9
Requirements for both IDE/ATA or SCSI drives:
Minimum speed of 7200 RPM & average seek time of less than 10.0 ms
For 24-32 tracks, drives must be dedicated for audio (internal or external)
Boot drives may be used for audio tracks, however performance/track count may vary
Mac OS file system: HFS or HFS+. SCSI drives should be initialized with ATTO ExpressPro-Tools v2.3.2 or higher, IDE/ATA drives should be initialized with Apple's Drive Setup.
Note: Mac OS 9.2 requires ATTO ExpressPro-Tools v2.7 or higher, available from www.attotech.com/software or Digidesign/Support/Downloads/Utilities
ATTO ExpressPro-Tools settings: Synch Transfer Rate set to 20 (10) and PCI Burst Rate set to 32 bytes
If using non-ATTO ExpressPro-Tools initialized drives, click here for options
For supported SCSI HBA cards check the compatibility document of your specific computer model.
says clear as day "drive must be dedicated for audio" ..
u want to use a single drive.. with 1 partition for use with pro tools.. with nothing else on it.
thats my understanding of it.
That's for 24-32 tracks. I'm limited to 24 tracks anyway, and most sessions have no more than 8 tracks. That isn't an issue. It even states "Boot drives may be used for audio tracks".
I've been running Pro Tools for years with sessions stored both on my 80 GB boot drive (1 partition) and my 500 GB data drive (3 partitions). Single drive, 1 partition, dedicated, is not an issue. Your understanding isn't correct.
your solution is to use a single drive.. dedicated for pro tools.. with a single partition (being the first partition on the drive)
See above.
most people would reccommend u use a drive under 1tb in size for this PT-dedicated drive..
and use your 4tb drive as storage/backup.
And yet "most people" don't seem to know if there's a partition size issue or not. At this point it's just as possible that I would have the same problem using a 1 TB drive with a single partition.
im not talking about "Support" in the call someone up sense.. i meant documented as working... and reccommended as a viable option.
certain hardware configurations work.. and others dont.. this is what im referring to as supported vs unsupported..
works / doesnt work.
Yet nobody here has provided those answers. "I probably wouldn't do that" isn't the same thing as "Pro Tools will not work correctly with partitions larger than 190 GB" or "Pro Tools will not work correctly with drives larger than 1 TB". Guesses are not "documented as (not) working".
anyway.. u have all the answers you need.. question is whether u are willing to actually listen to whats been told to you!!
i dont make the rules man.. lol im jsut telling u how it is.. u may not like it but thats how it is because thats how it was..
and thats not going to change.
you are using a computer from 2002 with a hard drive capacity that didnt exist before Fall 2011... think about that for a second
See above. I don't have the answers I need. I have a lot of guessing.
Hard drive capacities are always increasing. Simply saying "that drive size didn't exist when the computer was made" doesn't inherently mean anything.
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Sounds like issues I had when I had a dodgy TDM ribbon cable. Wrong channels where muted, sound played back distorted and half of the tracks where silent. Replacing the TDM cable did the trick.
Back then I was using a 400gb drive in my MDD. Never had any issues except Norton Disk Utilities refusing to defragment the drive. Replaced it with a 200gb drive when it broke down.
Are the errors consistent (the same tracks gets distorted/played even after a reboot etc), or are the errors different each boot? How is the DAE playback buffer set?
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Sounds like issues I had when I had a dodgy TDM ribbon cable. Wrong channels where muted, sound played back distorted and half of the tracks where silent. Replacing the TDM cable did the trick.
Back then I was using a 400gb drive in my MDD. Never had any issues except Norton Disk Utilities refusing to defragment the drive. Replaced it with a 200gb drive when it broke down.
Are the errors consistent (the same tracks gets distorted/played even after a reboot etc), or are the errors different each boot? How is the DAE playback buffer set?
I'm leaning towards it not being a cable since 1) the 100 GB partition on the same drive doesn't have any such issues and 2) the issues are only in Pro Tools (and then only when playing files; reading the files to generate the waveforms seems to work fine).
The issues seem to be consistent.
I will take a look at the DAE settings when I get home. I don't know offhand, other than that I haven't changed them.
Thanks, and I'll keep you posted.
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u are working with an ata controller that was designed to handle 200gb drives not 4tb drives
200 GB drives? According to what/who? I used a 500 GB drive for years without a problem. Where is there any indication that the controller can't handle such large drives? We already know there's a limitation due to the partition map, but that has nothing to do with the controller.
look bud,
i dont know how old you are.. or anythign about u.. but what i can tell is you are a bit uneducated on the history of hard drives... but in 2002 (when your computer was built) they had JUST surpassed the 137gb limitation... that explains why one controller is ata-100 and the other ata-66.. i dont think u really fully comprehend what this means lol but let me spell it out for you.. in 2002 there wasnt any drives larger then 200gb.. thats why i said it was designed for 200gb drives.. which would be "the next size coming soon" from what was widely the norm.. 80gb + 120gb drives were the norm in 2002 .. 160gb probably were introduced later into the year.. theres a slight possibility that 200gb drives were introduced in late 2002.. but more likely in 2003.
good for u that your disk works.. but if u are having problems.. Like its been outlined her numerous times for your benefit.. its because u are dealing with unexplored territory in other words u are the only one bat shit crazy enuff to try to use a 4tb 2011+ capacity drive on a hd controller that was built long before 250gb + 500gb drives even existed.
i dont know how much more illustrative i can get man lol
if u pay attention to anyone elses comments on this entire site u will see that noone here has really tried to use such a large drive not even close.. look at knez comments above he just made to you.. 400gb drive, replaced with 200gb drive..
why dont u go ahead and ask knez if he would do what u are doing? he will probably respond to say that he doesnt feel that its a good idea... ask anyone else..
u are pushing the boundaries of whats right for the machine.. and as a result u should prepare for wierd things to occur because u are not within a fully supported configuration... theres a reason why people stick to the reccommendations.
they dont want to deal with strange problems
im not here to be 100% correct and have all the answers.. im just trying to tell u whats common sense.. and whats reccommeneded from a common sense perspective... and that common sense is telling me u arent really seeing that u are using hardware thats an innappropriate size for the machine.
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look bud,
i dont know how old you are.. or anythign about u.. but what i can tell is you are a bit uneducated on the history of hard drives... but in 2002 (when your computer was built) they had JUST surpassed the 137gb limitation... that explains why one controller is ata-100 and the other ata-66.. i dont think u really fully comprehend what this means lol but let me spell it out for you.. in 2002 there wasnt any drives larger then 200gb.. thats why i said it was designed for 200gb drives.. which would be "the next size coming soon" from what was widely the norm.. 80gb + 120gb drives were the norm in 2002 .. 160gb probably were introduced later into the year.. theres a slight possibility that 200gb drives were introduced in 2002.. but more likely in 2003.
Again: the fact that larger drives were not available in 2002 does not mean that there was no expectation that larger drives would be available in the future. On the contrary: the fact that the G4 MDD supports 48-bit LBA indicates there *was* an expectation of larger drives in the future. There are many documented limitations regarding drive and partition size. The ATA controllers in the G4 MDD is not one of them.
And the 137 GB limit has nothing to do with the 2 controllers, since both can address drives larger than that.
good for u that your disk works.. but if u are having problems.. Like its been outlined her numerous times for your benefit.. its because u are dealing with unexplored territory in other words u are the only one bat shit crazy enuff to try to use a 4tb 2011+ capacity drive on a hd controller that was built long before 250gb + 500gb drives even existed.
i dont know how much more illustrative i can get man lol
The point is, you don't know what's causing my problem. It's possible it's an issue with the controller not liking that large of a drive, but that is pure speculation on your part. It's just as possible that Pro Tools doesn't like partitions above a certain size. The fact that Pro Tools doesn't have a problem with the 100 GB partition on the same drive makes that a distinct possibility.
Would a 2 TB or 1 TB drive not have this problem with similar partition sizes? I don't know, and based on your replies, you don't know either.
Again, there's some sort of issue or limitation with Pro Tools 5 that isn't present in OS 9 itself. Whether that has to do with a drive or partition above a certain size, I don't know. But that's why I'm asking. I will experiment and try to come to my own conclusions, but I thought if somebody already had some knowledge on the subject it would help quicken that process.
And for the record, I've been dealing with Macs for close to 25 years.
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I told you before: this is a confusing topic. I have to admit that now I'm more confused about this thread also.
But I'll try to briefly what we know about this over 2 TB Hard Drives:
- Using this big drives is mainly an unexplored territory.
- There are some report about this hard drives saying that they don't work.
- Regardless of whether is on a Firewire, SATA or ATA 100/133 controller.
- Partitioning it into less than to 2 TB seems that don't solve the problem.
- In some cases 4TB HD seems to work, but when they are half filled are problematic.
All this seems point us to an absolute upper limit on Mac Os 9 of a physical hard drive: 2TB.
This is what we know... Until someone could prove the opposite.
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I told you before: this is a confusing topic. I have to admit that now I'm more confused about this thread also.
But I'll try to briefly what we know about this over 2 TB Hard Drives:
- Using this big drives is mainly an unexplored territory.
- There are some report about this hard drives saying that they don't work.
- Regardless of whether is on a Firewire, SATA or ATA 100/133 controller.
- Partitioning it into less than to 2 TB seems that don't solve the problem.
- In some cases 4TB HD seems to work, but when they are half filled are problematic.
All this seems point us to an absolute upper limit on Mac Os 9 of a physical hard drive: 2TB.
This is what we know... Until someone could prove the opposite.
To be clear: the upper limit imposed by OS 9 is not based on a hardware limitation, but APM, which can only address 32 bits worth of blocks (for ~2 TB total).
I'm still not understanding the last concern ("but when they are half filled are problematic"). Because of the limitation of APM, it's impossible to partition more than ~2 TB of space, and thus it's impossible to fill the disk past that point.
I've read about (but not experienced, since I haven't tried it) size limitations for boot volumes. I wonder if there is a similar issue with Pro Tools.
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loook everyone is trying to tell u.... u are asking for trouble using this disk with a g4
things may 'appear to be working' but we have warned you.. that it has been reported that things were just fine and then BAMM! out of nowhere the drive all goes corrupt.. we arent stupid here.. we have told u what we know.. u make the decision on what to do.. given the information we have shared..
it isnt about us being right.. we dont exist to provide a correct answer to every question or problem u might have...
we keep telling u over and over the reasons why..u just dont want to accept it.
yes u CAN use this disk
but SHOULD you?
CAN and SHOULD are two different things
noone else here would be as foolish to attempt what u are doing because we understand this introduces + increases the chance for problems.
besides that its over kill. and YOU ARE WASTING 50% OF THE DRIVES CAPACITY!!!
use a normal size drive. (500gb, 750gb, 1TB, 2TB --- NOT 4 TB)
make a fileserver.
store your files on your server
copy them to your dedicated audio drive when u need to.
for me personally i wouldnt even try to put a drive above 1TB into any of my mac os 9 powerpc macs
the largest i would even attempt to do would be a striped raid volume with 2 x 1TB drives (obviously adding up to 2TB)
when the protools 5 documentation was written.. these drive sizes didnt exist..
as with anything to do with computers.. sometimes u get lucky and things are compatible
but have BUGS.. because of how the program is written.. if there is some type ofcalculation done inside the program
to ensure drive size for recording. etc etc this math gets performed and booom!! your system crashes because now the formula is different
this is how computer bugs happen.... theres many variables involved.. u are introducing an unknown element into your setup
we have tried to tell u that what u are doing is not reccommended.
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loook everyone is trying to tell u.... u are asking for trouble using this disk with a g4
we keep telling u over and over the reasons why..
u just dont want to accept it.
There's nothing to accept. All you are offering is "you have an old computer and a large new drive, that's bad". That doesn't help.
Computers don't run on magic. When something doesn't work, there's a reason for it. We already know that on OS 9, only ~2 TB of partitions will be available on large drives. That's a limitation of APM. But that doesn't mean that large drives won't work, just that you can't access their full capacity. And outside of Pro Tools, that's been exactly my experience.
Would I be having the same problem with a 2 TB drive? A 1 TB drive? A 750 GB drive? What about the 500 GB drive I was previously using, but partitioned differently? I don't know, and at this point, nobody else seems to know either. You're saying I'm "asking for trouble", but you don't really know why. I ran for years with a 500 GB drive, split into 3 partitions, without any issues. What's the cutoff, and why?
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loook everyone is trying to tell u.... u are asking for trouble using this disk with a g4
we keep telling u over and over the reasons why..
u just dont want to accept it.
There's nothing to accept. All you are offering is "you have an old computer and a large new drive, that's bad". That doesn't help.
Computers don't run on magic.
LOL u are cracking me up bud..
u just dont want to give up eh?? :D hahaha i admire that.. but this is the wrong thing to be a stubborn bullheaded donkey about.
read the other threads on this forum where diehard explictly says not to use volumes larger then 190gb
and that volumes larger then this size cannot be properly defragged without corrupting the file system with "b tree" errors, + the reason why he ABSOLUTELY refuses to run mac os x on the same machine as mac os 9 .. why he reccommends using a 500gb drive divided into 120 /190 /190 parts..this advice was given to us based on the guys experience having run into the same problems over nad over and over.. setting up many mahcines for other people.. which translates into 30 x the lifetime experience of your average user..
yes the underlying technologies support larger drives, but the OS hasnt been updated since 2002.
perhaps if we could talk to a mac os 9 developer from the core dveloper team heor she could make some quick additions to the code to allow for many new things but sometimes u have to learn to accept some limitations in order to achieve stability + expected performance. rather then unexpected problems..
of which there have been MANY MANY 'strange problems' that our users have encountered.. mac os 9 can be buggy as hell.. if u make the mistake of doing something wrong in your configuration, be it hardware or software.
u must be a gambler..
im not.. i play it safe. risk is not exciting for me.
either that or you are a "more is better" obssessive compulsive... MUST have the biggest....
biggest does not always equal best
http://www.canadacomputers.com/product_info.php?cPath=15_1086_210_212&item_id=057970
4tb drive = Our Price $189.99
http://www.canadacomputers.com/product_info.php?cPath=15_1086_210_212&item_id=042241
2tb drive = Our Price $99.99
u are wasting literally 100$ by even having this disk in the g4.
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Since you keep editing your posts after the fact...
noone else here would be as foolish to attempt what u are doing because we understand this introduces + increases the chance for problems.
besides that its over kill. and YOU ARE WASTING 50% OF THE DRIVES CAPACITY!!!
So what? Drives are cheap, and this particular model has been noted as being quite reliable. What does it matter to you if all of the capacity isn't used?
Why would a large drive increase the chance for problems if the "extra" space is never being accessed in the first place?
use a normal size drive. (500gb, 750gb, 1TB, 2TB --- NOT 4 TB)
"normal size"? What exactly is that? Is that defined somewhere?
Do you know that a 2 TB drive will work with Pro Tools? How about a 1 TB drive? Do you have experience with this? How about partition size? How large of a partition can Pro Tools handle successfully?
If nobody knows those specifics, that's fine. But it's pretty foolish to simply say "it wont work lol" when you don't know.
make a fileserver.
store your files on your server
copy them to your dedicated audio drive when u need to.
When sessions can be 5 GB or larger, that isn't ideal.
LOL u are cracking me up bud..
u just dont want to give up eh?? :D hahaha i admire that.. but this is the wrong thing to be a stubborn bullheaded donkey about.
See above. Do you actually have answers to my specific questions or are you just going to LOL all day? You suggested using a 2 TB drive instead. If I partition that the same way, is it going to work with Pro Tools? Do you have experience? What about a 1 TB drive?
Asking specific questions isn't being stubborn. It's called troubleshooting.
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read the other threads on this forum where diehard explictly says not to use volumes larger then 190gb
Now we're on to something (maybe).
My 500 GB drive was split into volumes that were (if memory serves) about 155 GB. So it's possible that something around 190 GB is a problem for ProTools. Which, if true, is good to know.
It would mean the problems I've seen likely don't have to do with the drive size at all, but the fact that my data partitions are 970 GB each.
Tonight I'll see if I can find a spare drive and play with the partition sizes, using 190 GB as a benchmark.
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- In some cases 4TB HD seems to work, but when they are half filled are problematic.
This may be due to a erroneous format or any other weird cause, but the the Mac os 9 seems to deal ok with this drive until his capacity is filled up to 2TB, and afterwards everything goes wrong with this hard disk.
To be clear: the upper limit imposed by OS 9 is not based on a hardware limitation, but APM, which can only address 32 bits worth of blocks (for ~2 TB total).
Yes, this is the point.
I've read about (but not experienced, since I haven't tried it) size limitations for boot volumes. I wonder if there is a similar issue with Pro Tools.
Well, I don't know how Pro Tools was developed, but from my little experience as a Mac programer, it is usually, to have to choose between "old procedures" and "new procedures" for most of the things you wish to coded in Mac Os 9, this old routines usually have even more limits than the new ones, that's will explain some weird behavior of some Apps with large RAM partitions (over 1 GB) or big hard drives ( over 128 GB), while in other Apps, there isn't any problem, while the actual limits aren't reached.
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Do you know that a 2 TB drive will work with Pro Tools? How about a 1 TB drive? Do you have experience with this? How about partition size? How large of a partition can Pro Tools handle successfully?
From experience I can add that a 400gb drive partitioned with one partition that takes up the whole drive works just fine in Pro Tools 5.1.3cs11. No issues to report what so ever. The only problem was defragmentation, but that got solved anyway.
The only reason I put in the 200gb drive when the 400gb failed was because it was what I had laying around.
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yes the underlying technologies support larger drives, but the OS hasnt been updated since 2002.
As I've repeatedly noted, OS 9 itself seems to be working fine. The issue is Pro Tools specific.
u must be a gambler..
im not.. i play it safe. risk is not exciting for me.
either that or you are a "more is better" obssessive compulsive... MUST have the biggest....
biggest does not always equal best
No, it's called I needed more space.
http://www.canadacomputers.com/product_info.php?cPath=15_1086_210_212&item_id=057970
4tb drive = Our Price $189.99
http://www.canadacomputers.com/product_info.php?cPath=15_1086_210_212&item_id=042241
2tb drive = Our Price $99.99
u are wasting literally 100$ by even having this disk in the g4.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822145912
$179.99, and when I bought it a few weeks ago it was only $164.99. And it's also been noted as being very reliable. Plus, I can use it in another machine in the future if I wish.
So again, why are you concerned with how much I spent for the drive?
- In some cases 4TB HD seems to work, but when they are half filled are problematic.
This may be due to a erroneous format or any other weird cause, but the the Mac os 9 seems to deal ok with this drive until his capacity is filled up to 2TB, and afterwards everything goes wrong with this hard disk.
What do you mean? It literally isn't possible to fill it up any more than 2 TB. It's not as if you have a 4 TB volume available that stops working at 2 TB; 2 TB is all that's available in the first place.
I've read about (but not experienced, since I haven't tried it) size limitations for boot volumes. I wonder if there is a similar issue with Pro Tools.
Well, I don't know how Pro Tools was developed, but from my little experience as a Mac programer, it is usually, to have to choose between "old procedures" and "new procedures" for most of the things you wish to coded in Mac Os 9, this old routines usually have even more limits than the new ones, that's will explain some weird behavior of some Apps with large RAM partitions (over 1 GB) or big hard drives ( over 128 GB), while in other Apps, there isn't any problem, while the actual limits aren't reached.
As far as I know, Pro Tools uses its own routines for disk access and bypasses the OS. This almost certainly explains why PT has a problem but other apps don't. I just don't know what the specific issue/limit with PT is.
Do you know that a 2 TB drive will work with Pro Tools? How about a 1 TB drive? Do you have experience with this? How about partition size? How large of a partition can Pro Tools handle successfully?
From experience I can add that a 400gb drive partitioned with one partition that takes up the whole drive works just fine in Pro Tools 5.1.3cs11. No issues to report what so ever. The only problem was defragmentation, but that got solved anyway.
The only reason I put in the 200gb drive when the 400gb failed was because it was what I had laying around.
Thank you. Good to know. Although, FYI, I believe I'm using 5.0.1.
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Thank you. Good to know. Although, FYI, I believe I'm using 5.0.1.
No problem. Have you tried updating to 5.1.3cs11? Would be interesting to see if this issue is due to the 5.0 version of Pro Tools. There is alot of new features in 5.1.3, so I really recommend you to upgrade or at least try 5.1.3cs11 if you have a spare boot drive laying around for experimenting purposes.
Are you running a 24-system or a 24 MIX-system BTW?
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24 lengthy replys ive made to this thread already....
im done responding to this thread. this guy is trolling hard.
seriously .. noone answer this guys questions anymore.. hes just going to go on and on.
we dont work for digidesign + we arent your customer support.
everyone here has already gone head over heels to provide u with the information u need to know.
but its not good enough, because u are too stubborn to listen to whats being told to you.
but why.? but why?
f*&kin read.. for your damn self.
how f**king ignorant u must be to ask these questions when everyones told u not to do what you are doing and u keep doing it
and then make us go further out of our way to help u.. because u cant be bothered to listen to us.. the people who have gone out of our way to help people we dont even know... obviously im not answering in this thread JUST to help u but to make sure that the info is publicly available somewhere on the site..
and it will be found via search engines for others in the future.
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Thank you. Good to know. Although, FYI, I believe I'm using 5.0.1.
No problem. Have you tried updating to 5.1.3cs11? Would be interesting to see if this issue it due to the 5.0 version of Pro Tools. There is alot of new features in 5.1.3, so I really recommend you to upgrade.
Are you running a 24-system or a 24 MIX-system BTW?
It's actually LE, with a Digi 001 system. I guess I'm not sure exactly what updates are (were) available.
I see 5.1.1 is available here:
http://secure.avid.com/services/avid/kb/downloads.cfm?digiArticleId=43852
Maybe I'll check that out tonight and see what happens. It would be nice if that solves the issue.
I'll keep you posted, and thanks again.
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OK I'm going to shoot myself in the foot here but from my assessment of it, here goes.
you're using this as a media server right? ok here's an idea that really will make a difference. as is highlighted here. any hard drive above 2TB is pointless because of the various partition map formats not being able to handle anything over 2.2tb, here's a rather direct solution to this. find an X-Serve RAID which can handle basically more than a 4tb max of a single SATA 4TB, a fibre channel PCI-X card and set your G4 as a server to handle the X-Serve RAID as a media centre storage array. have the drives configured as RAID 1 striped or whatever you need depending on your drive capacity. bear in mind my suggestion links to using a stock of 500GB 7200RPM IDE drives loaded into an X-Serve RAID to give about 6TB or more storage. They are reliable as I've used one in a client's studio and often thought of owning one. still am thinking of it but did own an HP SureStore via SCSI as a system backup solution for the old G3.
it's just a thought of mine. please don't shoot me for the suggestion. trying to influence a G4 mac to handle top of the range brand new hardware is like telling a budha to paint and decorate a mantion! lol
ed
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you're using this as a media server right?
Nope. 95% is for audio production, and maybe 80% of that is Pro Tools.
Thanks for the thought anyway, though.
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why do u i feel like im in a legal battle in a court case??
being asked to provide evidence... ORDER IN THE COURT..
i will find you in CONTEMPT!!
(http://www.frumforum.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/06/judge-gavel.jpg)
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OK I'll give you a set of solutions that will work and you're talking to a protools tdm pro user that's worked with TDM 5.1.3 on a g3 beige for 14 years. in that time, I've designed a few mac setups for clients and friends depending on their needs and trialed them before they left.
It would be handy to be reminded of what mac you're using? if I understand it right an MDD?
OK here's a number of solutions available.
if it's a G4 MDD we're talking about then here's a spec I recommend.
Internal setup of your mac.
4 x 146GB or higher 15krpm SCSI HDD's either 68 pin or SCA80 (using SCA80 to HD68 pin connector adaptors and ATTO SCSI dual head controller. Set 1 as mastter, 3 as RAID for project support.
For large projects using a mass array, I would use an external SCSI storage base with approx 16 drives (HP Storageworks or similar, or an X-Serve RAID. set up the X-Serve as your audio pool / scratch setup. IDE drives are fine for this. the reason I advise SCSI within the mac itself is due to efficiency of data in the mix system. SCSI has been used as the recommended standard for ProTools Mix based systems up until protools 8 where SATA became an open standard.
What is your protools setup consisting of? what cards are you using in your mac? are you connected to a magma chassis? how many channels of data are you working with in total?
When working with projects, larger drives aren't always the best options. work on spreading your data over a SAFE RAID ARRAY where data redundancy can be factored into the equation so that if a drive fails, the raid will rebuild once a new drive is installed.
this is what I'd consider a working spec.
If, however you wanted to upgrade to Protools TDM 6.4, I could help you there. that's if your mix system can handle that.
ed
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it's ok chris. I know how you feel. me reading this with voiceover is the ultimate headache lol. wow, coffee anyone? think I'm going to chime out of this. the specifications proposed are not exactly stable and from experience, PT is a real drive breaker on the road. always worth having an emergency box of hard drives sealed safe.
anyway, how's it going?
ed
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OK I'll give you a set of solutions that will work and you're talking to a protools tdm pro user that's worked with TDM 5.1.3 on a g3 beige for 14 years. in that time, I've designed a few mac setups for clients and friends depending on their needs and trialed them before they left.
It would be handy to be reminded of what mac you're using? if I understand it right an MDD?
OK here's a number of solutions available.
if it's a G4 MDD we're talking about then here's a spec I recommend.
Internal setup of your mac.
4 x 146GB or higher 15krpm SCSI HDD's either 68 pin or SCA80 (using SCA80 to HD68 pin connector adaptors and ATTO SCSI dual head controller. Set 1 as mastter, 3 as RAID for project support.
For large projects using a mass array, I would use an external SCSI storage base with approx 16 drives (HP Storageworks or similar, or an X-Serve RAID. set up the X-Serve as your audio pool / scratch setup. IDE drives are fine for this. the reason I advise SCSI within the mac itself is due to efficiency of data in the mix system. SCSI has been used as the recommended standard for ProTools Mix based systems up until protools 8 where SATA became an open standard.
What is your protools setup consisting of? what cards are you using in your mac? are you connected to a magma chassis? how many channels of data are you working with in total?
When working with projects, larger drives aren't always the best options. work on spreading your data over a SAFE RAID ARRAY where data redundancy can be factored into the equation so that if a drive fails, the raid will rebuild once a new drive is installed.
this is what I'd consider a working spec.
If, however you wanted to upgrade to Protools TDM 6.4, I could help you there. that's if your mix system can handle that.
ed
G4 MDD 1.25 GHz DP, 2 GB RAM
Pro Tools LE 5.0.1 with a Digi 001 interface
Mac OS 9.2.2
I was previously running an 80 GB drive on the ATA/66 controller as a boot drive (although I did have some data on it), plus a 500 GB drive on the ATA/100 controller, split into 3 equal partitions. Performance was never a problem.
I also have an M-Audio Audiophile 2496 card installed (not for use with Pro Tools), as well as a SCSI card for a Plextor CD-RW drive and a film scanner. So 3 PCI cards total.
I got a new drive due to lack of space.
The new drive is on the ATA/100 controller (connected via a SATA to IDE adapter). Currently split into 1 100 GB volume and 2 970 GB volumes (leaving the upper ~2 GB unused). All 3 volumes work fine outside of Pro Tools. Files can be opened, moved, copied, etc.
Inside of Pro Tools, the 100 GB volume also works fine, exactly as it did with the previous drives. However, the 970 GB volumes have issues. Sessions open up fine, files import fine, and waveforms are displayed correctly, but during playback, the actual audio heard is often either noise or audio from a different file. The problem is not performance, the problem is Pro Tools accessing the wrong data.
"Use a smaller drive" isn't an answer, since at the moment nobody seems to know exactly what is causing the problem. I know a 500 GB drive split into 3 partitions works, and I know a 4 TB drive works with a 100 GB partition but not a 970 GB partition, but that leaves a lot of wiggle room in between, both in drive size and volume size. I'm guessing PT (at least LE 5.0.1) has a problem with volumes over a certain size (and 970 GB being over that size), but that isn't entire clear yet. As noted, a smaller drive may have exactly the same problem depending on how it is partitioned.
I appreciate your thoughts regardless, even if we're not really talking about the same thing.
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The new drive is on the ATA/100 controller (connected via a SATA to IDE adapter). Currently split into 1 100 GB volume and 2 970 GB volumes (leaving the upper ~2 GB unused). All 3 volumes work fine outside of Pro Tools. Files can be opened, moved, copied, etc.
Inside of Pro Tools, the 100 GB volume also works fine, exactly as it did with the previous drives. However, the 970 GB volumes have issues. Sessions open up fine, files import fine, and waveforms are displayed correctly, but during playback, the actual audio heard is often either noise or audio from a different file. The problem is not performance, the problem is Pro Tools accessing the wrong data.
Because the first 100gb is within NORMAL DATA RANGE that was CURRENT when the FUCKING PROGRAM WAS WRITTEN. god u are thick bud..
WE DONT KNOW THE SOURCE CODE OF PRO TOOLS DUDE SO IM SORRY THE LEVEL OF EVIDENCE YOU ARE *REQUIRING* FROM US ISNT GOING TO BE EXPLICIT + HARD EVIDENCE
"Use a smaller drive" isn't an answer, since at the moment nobody seems to know exactly what is causing the problem. I know a 500 GB drive split into 3 partitions works, and I know a 4 TB drive works with a 100 GB partition but not a 970 GB partition, but that leaves a lot of wiggle room in between, both in drive size and volume size. I'm guessing PT (at least LE 5.0.1) has a problem with volumes over a certain size (and 970 GB being over that size), but that isn't entire clear yet. As noted, a smaller drive may have exactly the same problem depending on how it is partitioned.
I appreciate your thoughts regardless, even if we're not really talking about the same thing.
re read the damn thread
im not about to write a fucking 20,000 page report (oh but i almost have havent i?) to you illustrating the other 100's of threads where we hve covered topics relative to this. but trust me we have.. and thats why i said.. READ.. for your *Damn self*.. the info is here on this site.. we have all worked hard to ensure that..but even re-reading your own posts you have written yourself there is evidence enough to come to the right conclusion... that u refuse to accept.
just because it appears to be 'workng fine' doesnt mean that it will continue to do so once u get past x% capacity on the partitions u have made..
bugs are always like this in this operating system.. because there is no subsystem to handle such problems.. things will go from "Seemingly ok" to
"critical failure" in an instant.. which is why i told u.. you are asking for trouble even using this disk in a g4.. mactron told u.. u are in unexplored territory..
i told u u are a gambler.... u are asking for UNPREDICTABLE RESULTS.... most people with common sense by then would listen and say.." ok my data is important to me.. im not going to push my luck.."
everyone take note hes also got 2gb of ram installed in mac os 9..
*facepalm*
hold on while i knock my head against the wall repeatedly
RECCOMMENDATIONS:
take out 1gb of ram.. and lose the 4tb drive.
MORE does not always equal BETTER (ie this is one of those times)
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solved your problem in a flash my friend. here's the issue. you've just given some key areas of the problem. you're connecting a 4tb hdd to the ATA/100 bus via an IDE to SATA drive adaptor so that protools uses this drive. here's the problem. that type of adaptor isn't stable for data caching for projects and isn't recommended. my advice here is to use a silicon image compatible PCI SATA controller card. I've recently acquired one from Ebay with 4 channel support for a very good price. the issue also surrounds the drive in question if the drive speed is below 7200rpm which most 4tb drives are, there's your other problem. Digidesign hardware needs to work with 7200rpm drives or higher, hence my SCSI recommendations.
as for hard drive space, my heavens, I've recorded full 48 track live sessions in protools TDM 5.1.3 via a series of scsi 146gb drives at one time and still had plenty to work with.
I'd seriously consider looking into moving to tdm 5.1.3 with a mix plus system. you'll get more out of it.
ed
to clarify my comment. I would use 4 x 2TB HDD's SATA spec on a 4 channel PCI SATA controller and run from that point.
ed
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Because the first 100gb is within NORMAL DATA RANGE that was CURRENT when the FUCKING PROGRAM WAS WRITTEN.
WE DONT KNOW THE SOURCE CODE OF PRO TOOLS DUDE SO IM SORRY THE LEVEL OF EVIDENCE YOU ARE *REQUIRING* FROM US ISNT GOING TO BE EXPLICIT + HARD EVIDENCE
I require nothing. But if you don't know the answer, which you clearly don't, why do you keep responding? Especially when you already stated that you wouldn't be responding anymore.
Previously you've recommended a 2 TB drive, which is presumably outside of the "normal data range" when PT 5.0.1 was written. Heck, 500 GB was too, but we already know that works fine.
There are plenty of known limitations with old hardware and software. We know exactly why only ~2 TB of the drive can be used with OS 9, for example. There are various other known issues. But what we're talking about now - Pro Tools not reading files correctly that other programs can - isn't a known issue.
"Use a smaller drive" isn't an answer, since at the moment nobody seems to know exactly what is causing the problem. I know a 500 GB drive split into 3 partitions works, and I know a 4 TB drive works with a 100 GB partition but not a 970 GB partition, but that leaves a lot of wiggle room in between, both in drive size and volume size. I'm guessing PT (at least LE 5.0.1) has a problem with volumes over a certain size (and 970 GB being over that size), but that isn't entire clear yet. As noted, a smaller drive may have exactly the same problem depending on how it is partitioned.
I appreciate your thoughts regardless, even if we're not really talking about the same thing.
re read the damn thread
im not about to write a fucking 20,000 page report to you illustrating the other 100's of threads where we hve covered topics relative to this. but trust me we have.. and thats why i said.. READ.. for your *Damn self*.. the info is here on this site.. we have all worked hard to ensure that.
I've read the thread. The answer doesn't lie here. Hence the continued conversation.
solved your problem in a flash my friend. here's the issue. you've just given some key areas of the problem. you're connecting a 4tb hdd to the ATA/100 bus via an IDE to SATA drive adaptor so that protools uses this drive. here's the problem. that type of adaptor isn't stable for data caching for projects and isn't recommended. my advice here is to use a silicon image compatible PCI SATA controller card. I've recently acquired one from Ebay with 4 channel support for a very good price. the issue also surrounds the drive in question if the drive speed is below 7200rpm which most 4tb drives are, there's your other problem. Digidesign hardware needs to work with 7200rpm drives or higher, hence my SCSI recommendations.
as for hard drive space, my heavens, I've recorded full 48 track live sessions in protools TDM 5.1.3 via a series of scsi 146gb drives at one time and still had plenty to work with.
I'd seriously consider looking into moving to tdm 5.1.3 with a mix plus system. you'll get more out of it.
ed
to clarify my comment. I would use 4 x 2TB HDD's SATA spec on a 4 channel PCI SATA controller and run from that point.
ed
It's a 7200 RPM drive.
Have you run into this problem with a SATA adapter before? If it was the adapter, why would the 100 GB partition work without problems?
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just because it appears to be 'workng fine' doesnt mean that it will continue to do so once u get past x% capacity on the partitions u have made..
Past what capacity? As previously noted, it isn't physically possible to write any data past ~2 TB, since there are no partitions in that space.
And as for 2 GB of RAM, 1) that was the way the machine came when I got it (used), and 2) I also use OS X sometimes. So facepalm away.
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just because it appears to be 'workng fine' doesnt mean that it will continue to do so once u get past x% capacity on the partitions u have made..
Past what capacity? As previously noted, it isn't physically possible to write any data past ~2 TB, since there are no partitions in that space.
And as for 2 GB of RAM, 1) that was the way the machine came when I got it (used), and 2) I also use OS X sometimes. So facepalm away.
DUDE WE HAVE TOLD U>> MANY TIMES
ITS NOT RECCOMMENDED TO USE A 4TB DRIVE
U ARE ASKING FOR PROBLEMS
U ARE ASKING FOR UNPREDICTABLE RESULTS & HEADACHES
^^^^ RE-READ THESE LINES
why dont u call up digidesign + ask them if its ok to use a 4tb drive with pt5
i cant wait for u to post back..
"hey guys i reduced my ram + my drive capacity + Alls good now! whaddya kno!! maybe the guy with 5000 posts on the forum might have a fuckign clue what hes talkijng about afterall"
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also;
pro tools le 5.01 also was made during or just before the time that the B&W G3 was brand new...
this would be sometime in ***1999***
2-3 years before the mdd was even made
please meditate on that fact for abit
carefully re-examine
http://archive.digidesign.com/compato/os9/001/
(http://macos9lives.com/smforum/index.php?action=dlattach;topic=1941.0;attach=1884;image)
gee i wonder why theres no MDD on this list..
by the time the mdd was out.. pro tools 5 was old news to the digi development team and they were working to get up to speed on developing for osx...
the program u are using wasnt even written to be used on that computer.. because that computer didnt even exist when it was written.
during the whole time that 9.2.2 was the current os there was no pro tools major revisions at all.. it was still running off the old code.. (that dated far back into the early 90s) they did some small work (ie putting out the 32 track update.. updates to the tdm systems etcc) but really this app was the same old pro tools from yeras before that had been updated ever so slightly..
EVEN THE DIGI002 page doesnt mention so much as a QS Model
http://archive.digidesign.com/compato/os9/002/
now.. examine THIS page;
http://archive.digidesign.com/compato/osx/001/g4.cfm
notice how THIS PAGE references the MDD...
pro tools 6 was written pretty much 100% for the MDD..
truth be told. mac os x was very much already in the picture before they designed + created the mdd machines... they were totally invented + created to run mac os x!!!! originally tested probably running puma + cheetah.. jaguar would come out end of summer 2002
there is a good possibility that the 5.1.1 update can solve some of your problems..... and it is definately reccommended that u use 5.1.1 over 5.0.1
ESPECIALLY if you are using an MDD...
http://archive.digidesign.com/support/readme/PT_5.0.1_ReadMe.pdf
dated 05/16/2000
examine this document closer
http://archive.digidesign.com/support/compat/compatodocs501.pdf
and u will see that pt 5.01 REQUIRES mac os 8.6 or 9.0 (ie: these are versions of the os that came before 9.2.2 or the hardware that runs on 9.2.2) and the ram requirements were spelled out in a few hundred MEGAbytes not Gigabytes..
http://archive.digidesign.com/support/compat/compatodocs53.pdf
this document seems to be updated to mention 9.2.2 but interesting to note they still reccommend G4 (AGP) as the highly reccommended option... i guess they extendended the definition of this, which orignally referred to the sawtooth 400/450/500 AGP... to also include the QS/MDD machines which as we know are also G4 + also use AGP graphics ports.
more support docs here:
http://archive.digidesign.com/support/docs/
u can read thru all of these documents..the "answer" lukpac is looking for doesnt exist..
in a document because nowhere will they mention an upper limit of partition size because there wasnt one... because there were no 1tb or 2 tb or 4tb drives existing then.. in 1999 when pro tools 5.01 was written, 20gb was a large drive size, and there was barely 40gb drives. do u understand how radically different the internals of a 4tb sata drive is compared to a 40gb ata hard drive?
see this article: http://www.cnn.com/TECH/computing/9901/21/honkin.idg/
Hard drive experts often talk of a "sweet spot," the drive capacity where dollars-per-megabyte and supply converge to create the most popular configuration. "In 1998, the sweet spot was around 4GB," says Robert Katzive, an analyst at Disk/Trend. "In the next year, it should be somewhere in the 5GB to 10GB range," Katzive says, with 6GB or 8GB the most likely capacity.
The top size of the most expensive desktop drives could easily be nearly two times the 16.8GB that IBM reached in early 1998 with its DeskStar 16GP drive. "We're looking at a 30GB drive by the time the year 2000 rolls around, and for $200," predicts Martin Reynolds, another Gartner Group analyst.
so there u go - when pro tools LE 5.01 was put on the market... a 30gb drive was the normal size. 80gb drives would be coming out in the months that followed.
heres another article on hard drives from summer of 1999
http://www.storagereview.com/articles/9907/990719ataroundup1999.html
(http://macos9lives.com/smforum/index.php?action=dlattach;topic=1941.0;attach=1886;image)
so there u go. summer of '99 300-400$ cost for a 20gb hard drive..
like ive said a bazzilion times in this thread MORE DOES NOT ALWAYS EQUAL BETTER
ESPECIALLY WHEN IT COMES TO SOFTWARE on 15 year old computers....
WITH THINGS REGARDING INTERACTION BETWEEN SOFTWARE + COMPUTER HARDWARE ENVIRONMENTS.. change is not GOOD..
introducing unexpected changes to software or hardware results in unexpected results..
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it's ok chris. relax. you and I are masters in this business. we've got our fingers burnt with apple hardware and software and the whole digidesign thing. so to us, this is old hat but cozy old hat at that lol.
now to try and resolve this hickup politely.
I'll demonstrate the faults in question with your setup, chris knows where I'm coming from here.
you're using an IDE to SATA Slice adaptor and not a PCI SATA HOST controller. here in lays the problem. ok you've 4TB 7200rpm drive as you say, at the time when PT 5. came out, we were working with SCSI hard drives, not IDE for data recording. Why? at the time of SCSI, we were using 10,000rpm or 15,000rpm drives for recording because of greater reliability, ok less capacity than today's SATA or ide relatives, but it was more to do with data stability in a studio. in the days when PowerPC G3's and earlier were driving TDM and earlier via early PCI or NUBUS cards with inbuilt SCSI controllers to internal and external SCSI drives, this is what protools was designed for. 5.1.3 echoes this sentiment by relying on SCSI as the main area for recording. though it's capable of SATA 1.5gbps rev 1 capability SCSI is better for this task.
now, your drive in question is a SATA 6GBPS setup and not backwards compatible to 1.5gbps because of the platters, etc in question, read write heads and the amount of data handling needed both host controller and applications supported by it. therefore your HD is not performing what it needs to do.
in our time, we never bothered with multiple partitions per drive as most drives on the field were RAID set so a bank of drives were mirrored RAID 1 or Raid 5 so we had storage requirements capable within the SCSI framework. if something went wrong, retrospect was there to help solve the problem.
you're still going to face this regardless of what version PT up until PT7 onwards / officially PT8.
you need to rethink your storage plan. you should have 2 drive sleds in your G4. time to properly utilise them as apple designed it.
ed
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dont bother explaining it again ed
its been explained..
many people have tried to tell this guy the multiple errors of his approach..
and yet he shrugs off the advice.. as though were trying to tell him that pigs fly...and he wants proof..
its like a guy trying to update his toyota with ford parts.. wondering why it doesnt work
lol
but good point re: sata3 (6gbps)
the drive i have connected to my pci sata card is jumpered to adhere to sata150 speeds..
this isnt 100% neccessary imho but again, its a safety precaution... when u are dealing
with outdated technology interacting with newer technology there is always going to be undocumented
wierdness that can occur EVEN IF IT SEEMS TO BE FINE.. becuase these items were never tested + debugged
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I'll demonstrate the faults in question with your setup, chris knows where I'm coming from here.
you're using an IDE to SATA Slice adaptor and not a PCI SATA HOST controller. here in lays the problem. ok you've 4TB 7200rpm drive as you say, at the time when PT 5. came out, we were working with SCSI hard drives, not IDE for data recording. Why? at the time of SCSI, we were using 10,000rpm or 15,000rpm drives for recording because of greater reliability, ok less capacity than today's SATA or ide relatives, but it was more to do with data stability in a studio. in the days when PowerPC G3's and earlier were driving TDM and earlier via early PCI or NUBUS cards with inbuilt SCSI controllers to internal and external SCSI drives, this is what protools was designed for. 5.1.3 echoes this sentiment by relying on SCSI as the main area for recording. though it's capable of SATA 1.5gbps rev 1 capability SCSI is better for this task.
now, your drive in question is a SATA 6GBPS setup and not backwards compatible to 1.5gbps because of the platters, etc in question, read write heads and the amount of data handling needed both host controller and applications supported by it. therefore your HD is not performing what it needs to do.
in our time, we never bothered with multiple partitions per drive as most drives on the field were RAID set so a bank of drives were mirrored RAID 1 or Raid 5 so we had storage requirements capable within the SCSI framework. if something went wrong, retrospect was there to help solve the problem.
you're still going to face this regardless of what version PT up until PT7 onwards / officially PT8.
you need to rethink your storage plan. you should have 2 drive sleds in your G4. time to properly utilise them as apple designed it.
Again, as above, performance isn't, nor has ever been a problem. I've been using IDE drives with Pro Tools (both the free version and LE) for over a decade, across several different Macs, without any problems. That was even true when using the ATA/66 controller.
Nor is performance a problem with my new drive using the SATA adapter. When running a session from the 100 GB partition, Pro Tools performs perfectly. It's only on the 970 GB partitions where there is a problem, and it isn't one of performance. It's that Pro Tools isn't reading the audio files correctly during playback.
FYI, I updated to Pro Tools LE 5.1.1, and the behavior is the same.
I'm going to play around with adjusting the partitions, although I may first need to find some extra space to move things around.
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There are plenty of known limitations with old hardware and software. We know exactly why only ~2 TB of the drive can be used with OS 9, for example.
yes u know it because i took the time to research it + detail it explictly.
There are various other known issues. But what we're talking about now - Pro Tools not reading files correctly that other programs can - isn't a known issue.
if u know anything about pro tools.. u should know that it is very pariticular and supports only certain hardware..
by you using the sata/pata adapter in combination with a drive of that size... u have brought these problems upon yourself.
it was reccommended to you that you change your setup for best results.
you chose to ignore this + now u are here still asking for help..
if only u could step outside of yourself and take a look to see how you look..
the empirical evidence you are looking for is all here.
you are exhibit a.
I'm going to play around with adjusting the partitions, although I may first need to find some extra space to move things around.
^^^ LOL ;D
u are too much ::) unbelievable
if your drive was connected to a pci sata controller such as a SIL3112 (like we told u within the first few replies) you would most likely be ok.
go back and re-read diehards first response to you in this thread above ^^ http://macos9lives.com/smforum/index.php?topic=1941.msg12051#msg12051
You should try to explore SATA solutions under OS 9 / OS X (see the many posts by Chris & Mactron); a drive of this size with speed/cache/etc. will be seriously hindered with the PATA/SATA adapter on the internal bus. As far as the size and the partitions, remember, this is new territory for OS 9. I know you mentioned your 500GB was full, but as you know you can go up to (4) 500 GBs internally, which all connect to the internal controllers if your setup does not permit the addition on an SATA card; lastly, we posted some awesome solutions for FireWire with RAID in really small enclosures the take 2 laptop hard drives, so that you can move finished products to the RAIDed backup and free up internal drives.
why do u think people keep offering u advice that u dont like? do u think this is a conspiracy for us to take away your 4tb drive? lol
u could have easily afforded a pci sata controller + a 1 or 2 tb drive for the same price as this 4tb drive u bought..
i cant understand why u are being so ignorant... im sorry we dont have time to recover all of the "case studies" that led us to know the information that we know for your review... but trust me. we have come to know this info thru alot of consistant effort.. make this easier on yourself + everyone else here and just take us at our word. we arent here to steer u wrong. u can buy a fucking 1tb driev for 50-60$ sell the 4tb drive to someone else for 120$ get a pci sata card.. possibly even get another sata/pata adapter.. as some of these can be cheap.. im prettty sure mactron had some problems with some different sata/pata adapters.. i remember someone saying they are not all the same.. and some can cause problems
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to everyone else reading this thread
heres some tips for avoiding problems + getting best performance
- use a 30-120gb SSD (or flash DOM) dedicated for just your boot drive (if u dont have an ssd use a 80-120gb fast drive such as a 10krpm, or 7200rpm drive)
- use a dedicated drive reserved for read/write for pt audio
- dont use drives larger then 1TB (500gb would be even safer, but 1tb is the new lowest baseline (60$) of drives available to purchase new as of early 2015)
- read and understand all the compatibility info documents related to your product http://archive.digidesign.com/compato/
- dont use mac os x on the same boot drive/partition/machine
- dont use more then 1GB of ram
some of u might not agree with what ive said here but these are the guidelines i would use for myself, given what ive learned from interacting with people + researching many times the related info.
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lukpac.......
let me just say..
I respect the fact that u question what other people tell you
i think this is a must have trait for anyone to really know wtf they are talking about u have to find out for yourself...
but like i said this is the wrong thing to "take a stand on"
but please understand, the reason everyone has suggested that you dont use this 4tb drive (whether its formatted to 2tb or not)
was for your own benefit... to avoid wierdness + problems. I have nothing to gain from you listening to me... other then you having no problems
and merrily going about your business!!!
the question is.. do u want to live the next 2 weeks of your life doing tech trial + error to find the real limit + specifics of this problem?? or do u just want
everything to work fine.. now.. + in the future?
we would love to hear from you after u spend 2 weeks problem solving to find out the real specifics of as to why the problem u had happening ocurred..
this will only add to what we have to offer the community here at macos9lives.... another mystery solved is always great to have on the belt..
reading your last comment , its easy to see that u are thinking that the problem is simply to do with partition size... (somewhere between 750gb-970gb?)
and that there is a partition size limit that is just a hard limit no matter what... if this was the case this would (should) be a well documented fact by now..
I believe you need to consider
-its possible the drive itself has slight differences in the technology involved regarding the physical platters themselves (being how they got the capacity up to 4tb)
-its possible that the partition being a 2nd or 3rd non-primary partition has something to do with it
-a combination of the above (im leaning towards this one)
it could be that your session files work from the first partition simply because its the primary partition (first on the drive) regardless of its size
or it could be that your session files work from the first patition because the size is before the 137gb LBA limit or 190gb defag limit (but we all know this isnt the case as larger drives are known to work...
which leads to the question, whats the largest partition size / drive u have successfully used with pro tools? (http://macos9lives.com/smforum/index.php?topic=2263.new#new))
i have a 2tb drive here thats blank, also have a sata to pata adapter, also have a digi 001... also have a genuine sonnet Tempo Sata pci adapter
im tempted to do some tests...
as of right now before even trying anything, my thoughts are that despite the fact you have formatted only the first half of the drive (Within th 2.2tb limit of APM partition map) the physical make-up of this drive is to blame .. (regardless of the sata/pata adapter being used) pro tools obviously is trying to access the drive using a direct method that is bypassing the os itself.. and its not accessing the right area of the disk.
this is exactly WHY most of us said do not even try to use this disk, because we know therse already so many freaking things that can go wrong without even having a disk thats larger then 2tb.... yes achieving the "MAX" is fun, but its not worth the headaches alot of the time.. and definately not worth spending 160$ + on a disk that u cant even use 50% of the capacity on.. its just a waste.. not the right fit for the device... would u wear XXL size pants when u usually take a Medium? :D or would u find the pants that naturally fit.. without having to use a belt :D
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http://archive.digidesign.com/compato/os9/sw/macos501.html
one more note .. see the bottom of this page.. for all versions of 5.0x (TDM vs LE vs FREE) it says
Pro Tools 5.0.1 and OS 9.1:
Mac OS 9.1 will only be tested with Pro Tools 5.1 or higher. While Pro Tools 5.0.1 may work with OS 9.1, this configuration is untested and therefore not supported.
so officially 5.01 was only supported on Mac OS v8.6, v9.0, v9.0.2, and v9.0.4
8.6 being only supported on pci graphics macs + 9.0/9.02/9.04 supported on both PCI + AGP graphics macs..
which would mean that it was only officially supported on the sawtooth + gigabit/mystic models.. (http://www.everymac.com/systems/by_capability/minimum-macos-supported.html check this page for any macs that support 9.0/9.02/9.04 the last to support 9.04 on this chart appears to be the cube... digital audio models all required 9.1+ which meant the digital audio models require running pro tools 5.1.1+)
the reason it doesnt say anything about 9.2.2 is probably because this document is from the time that 9.1 was out and 9.2.2 was not out yet...
but already u could see the attitude of digidesign "9.1 will only be tested with 5.1 or higher"
this keeps in tradition of digidesign only debugging + supporting specific version of os, and most of the time specific updates of that version of os. for example on mac os X they would go 'on record' saying they support only 10.3.7 and not 10.3.8 + 10.3.9 etc etc and if u had called them for support they would not help u if u werent running the specific version of os they said they support!!!
the first mdd was released august 2002
see my timeline here: http://www.oldschooldaw.com/forums/index.php?topic=389.0
u can see they never released any updates for pro tools 5 after the release of the first mdd
all of these 5.1.1 updates listed below happened when the digital audio models were the latest & greatest
http://avid.force.com/pkb/articles/en_US/readme/en207687
pro tools 7 was released Oct 28th 2005
pro tools 6 was released February 3rd 2003
pro tools 5 was released November 19th 1999
Release Dates for Pro tools 5
06/06/2002 5.3.1 (HD)
01/17/2002 5.3 (Pro Tools|HD)
11/09/2001 5.1.3 (second interop release - Unity + DT)
09/13/2001 5.2 (DigiStudios release)
08/xx/2001 5.1.1cs5 (TDM Mac only - MC & Airport issues)
08/xx/2001 5.1.1cs4 (SDII Timestamp)
08/01/2001 5.1Ucs1 (Unity issues)
06/15/2001 5.1.1cs3 (MC for CB SR, breaks Soundmaster )
06/15/2001 5.1.1cs2 (SoundMaster ATOM)
06/15/2001 5.1.1cs1 (Time Stamp problem)
06/15/2001 5.1.1
05/03/2001 5.1U (first Unity release)
01/26/2001 5.1cs2 (slow load with large OMS setup)
01/26/2001 5.1 (surround, beat detect, added Control|24, dropped PTIII)
09/12/2000 5.0.1cs6 (slow launch)
09/12/2000 5.0.1cs1 (Region/Fade loss)
05/30/2000 5.0.1 (Win98, CP change to Serial #)
12/16/1999 5.0 AV (for AVoption)
11/19/1999 5.0 (dropped PT Project engine)
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RECCOMMENDATIONS:
take out 1gb of ram.. and lose the 4tb drive.
MORE does not always equal BETTER (ie this is one of those times)
Chris... I guess you can't help yourself from being helpful!!!! ;D
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mr happy..
all this version stuff drives me mad.. i hate it really i do.. thats why im 'helping' because the info is relevant to all of us.. and its a complete head f**k and my whole purpose here + with my own site was to try to put all the info in one place .. where people can see the details simpler then having to do all the ground work of digging up obscure documents... its a real pain in the ass... especially when people just want to make some music!!!!! and all this technical bullshit gets in the way all the time !!!!!!! some people get lucky and pick all supported hardware + software .. but most of us get tangled in the neverending web of issues...
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On Large Audio Volumes, it might pay to initialize Volumes as "Mac OS Standard" since when using Audio files (that are big in nature), it is beneficial to have a larger "Block size" upon volume initialization. Let me explain...
Since audio files are large... a block size of 64K (like under Mac OS Standard) would be preferred over a block size of 4K (like Mac OS Extended) with all volumes over 4 GB in size that will store audio files. The default bock sizes are directly proportional to the volume size and they differ greatly between Mac OS Standard and Mac OS extended.
Under Mac OS Standard we are limited to 65 Thousand files (assuming most are Audio, this might be OK) per volume. A small block size is STORAGE efficient, but not System efficient. The larger the block size, the smaller the number of blocks the system has to track and load in memory and this is a huge benefit, and thus much more efficient in terms of the NUMBER of blocks needed to store a file. Do you really care if at the end of an audio file that you waste 64K of disk space ? It is miniscule; if you need to store 2 billion text files of 2K in size, then the clear answer is Mac OS extended, Number of files goes up to 4 Billion plus per volume and much more disk efficient.
Maybe a good approach would be to make as many 190GB Volumes, each Mac OS Standard for the volumes that will have Audio recordings and making the one that will store samples and OS Files Mac OS extended.
OK, so I just re-copied this from a post I made... Format the 970GB as Mac OS Standard (Rather than Extended) and give it a try... the system overhead for ProTools should go down drastically; and since you are storing large audio files, the limit of 65 Thousand files on the volume should be fine.
I would recommend having at least one other volume (or a bootable FW drive) in case you have to emergency boot off another volume. Be aware the volumes over 200GB will not boot the system and also will not defrag unless you boot to a form of OS X via CD/DVD.
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would be interesting if it made a difference..
i think i scared lukpac away tho (lol)
wouldnt defragging an os9 volume in osx screw it up?
didnt u say before not to ever even touch the partition from osx...?
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wouldnt defragging an os9 volume in osx screw it up?
didnt u say before not to ever even touch the partition from osx...?
I wont. I have been defraging my drives this way for years. No problem what so ever.
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i dont do "defrag" id sooner just copy the data somewhere else and wipe the drive + copy it back
defrag makes me think of norton commander on dos circa 1986-87-88
im actually really kind of surpised u guys take the time to do that
(https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/zh/a/a2/Microsoft_Defrag_for_MS-DOS.png)
in fact i remember people telling me back in the mid 90s that u dont need to defrag on a mac
but on my pc back in the 486 + early pentium days i did this religiously every night before bed
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Removing large chunks of data and then adding new data on top makes the drive really fragmented.
Fragmented drive = lower performance because the head has to search for information in a lot of different places on the drive.
Lower performance = less audio tracks playable at the same time.
You do indeed need to defrag a Mac's hard drive if you want to maximize it's performance in performance critical applications. Such as DAW's running large projects with lots of audio tracks.
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i dont do "defrag" id sooner just copy the data somewhere else and wipe the drive + copy it back
If he is really going to use 500GB Plus volumes in OS 9, then this solution would suck. Also, if other volumes are on the same physical disk, then re-initializing would wipe the other volumes also; so defrag under OS 9 is an absolute must if you use a DAW... UNLESS...
As I suggested...
Use a good sized SSD for all current projects and Sample libraries, and thus NO defrag ever needed. Of course, copy the finished project to your Huge OS9 volume and also no defrag needed since you will not be constantly recording new tracks and deleting files. It would also be wise to copy all current projects as a backup to another volume that you defrag very rarely.... For Example...
256GB SSD -> (3) Volumes (Never defrag. access to all files is the same speed)
Mac OS, 40GB for Mac OS 9, DAW & Plugins
Samples, 60GB for Often used Sample libraries
Current, 150GB for Current Projects
1 to 2 TB Large Mechanical Drive/s (RAID/MIRROR if possible to prevent DATA loss)
Mac HD, 190GB Emergency Boot with entire DAW Clone and Sample libraries, this is to be used
if SSD fails during a session
Backups, 300GB for Current Backups, is case SSD Fails with multiple versions of current projects
Library, 500GB Library for All Software Archives, All Sample libraries, Commercial Music and Video Media, etc.
Archive 1...2...3...etc, 200 to 500GB x (as many as you need), for all Finished, Archived Projects, Another suggestion would be to go with an external Mirrored FireWire solution for all Archived Project Backups
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i dont do "defrag" id sooner just copy the data somewhere else and wipe the drive + copy it back
If he is really going to use 500GB Plus volumes in OS 9, then this solution would suck. Also, if other volumes are on the same physical disk, then re-initializing would wipe the other volumes also; so defrag under OS 9 is an absolute must if you use a DAW...
I don't need to use volumes that large, that's just what I setup initially. I'm still juggling things around at the moment, so I haven't yet been able to test different volume sizes with Pro Tools.
And of course, it's possible to wipe individual volumes without wiping the entire drive.
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And of course, it's possible to wipe individual volumes without wiping the entire drive.
not with drive setup in mac os 9 - this is probably what he was referring to
if u use drive setup it makes u wipe all partitions + start over to recreate the partitions on the drive
but if u are rebooting to X to defrag.. u can just as easily format the partition in disk utility;)
probably alot faster then defragging and easier on the disk itself... (less reading + writing)
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here's the problem. that type of adaptor isn't stable for data caching for projects and isn't recommended.
hi ed,
that would also be my guess, that this (or any?) IDE to SATA solution could be the problem with protools custom disk access.
at this point i wonder if there are any other applications beside protools which suffer from this. because some day i also would like to add some more SATA drives to my main G4 without the need of another PCI SATA controller.
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at this point i wonder if there are any other applications beside protools which suffer from this. because some day i also would like to add some more SATA drives to my main G4 without the need of another PCI SATA controller.
there are probably more that have issues - any app with specialized direct disk access..
i should do a test with an 80gb sata + my addonics sata-pata adapter + my digi 001 + pt 5.1.1
to find out if it is indeed the adapter.. but like i said in my earlier comments.. i really think that some of these sata/pata are built differently from each other... alot of them are most likely identical... but i think that more then a few companies implemented their design of adapter differently
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there are probably more that have issues - any app with specialized direct disk access..
i should do a test with an 80gb sata + my addonics sata-pata adapter + my digi 001 + pt 5.1.1
to find out if it is indeed the adapter.. but like i said in my earlier comments.. i really think that some of these sata/pata are built differently from each other... alot of them are most likely identical... but i think that more then a few companies implemented their design of adapter differently
Thus far Pro Tools has been working fine both on the 100 GB partition of the 4 TB drive and another smaller (under 150 GB) SATA drive, so at this point I'm thinking the adapters aren't the issue. At the very least, the adapters are not an issue in all cases. I may yet see if a PCI SATA card would behave any differently, although depending on utilization of the PCI buss that may not be a good idea anyway.
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lukpac: excuse me when i didnt read the whole thread, but weren´t you mentioning you use 970 gb partitions? this could be the second alternative why things dont work. would be interesting to see if the protools problem goes away when you partition 4x500 on that 4000 disk.
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lukpac: excuse me when i didnt read the whole thread, but weren´t you mentioning you use 970 gb partitions? this could be the second alternative why things dont work. would be interesting to see if the protools problem goes away when you partition 4x500 on that 4000 disk.
Correct. I'm definitely going to play around with the partition sizes, I just haven't gotten that far yet. I had to do some shuffling to get everything to the point where I could wipe the 4 TB drive. I haven't done that yet, but when I do I want to see if there's a particular point where Pro Tools stops working correctly. I figure I'll just partition, copy a session to the first and last partitions on the drive, rinse, and repeat. I'll definitely pass along what I find out.
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Thus far Pro Tools has been working fine both on the 100 GB partition of the 4 TB drive and another smaller (under 150 GB) SATA drive, so at this point I'm thinking the adapters aren't the issue. At the very least, the adapters are not an issue in all cases. I may yet see if a PCI SATA card would behave any differently, although depending on utilization of the PCI buss that may not be a good idea anyway.
yes but .. understand the reasoning of the logic that is being thrown out.
for example: it could be a combination of the factors
-physical drive size (exceeding 2tb, 1tb, 500gb etc)
-sata/pata adapter (brand name/mfg/chipset)
-partition size
-filesystem (As put forth by diehard)
-location of the partition on the drive (ie: 1st,2nd,3rd)
like mactron said this is unexplored territory
quite often problems can be a combination of factors
+ not just the result of 1 of the factors but rather the combination of 2..
many problems we have seen here on the forums cant be explained and result from wierd combinations
of hardware/software..
for example.. consider the possible scenarios:
-partition size (970gb) found to work fine without an adapter on the 4tb drive
-partition size (970gb) found to work fine without an adapter on the 2tb drive
-partition size (970gb) works fine with the adapter as the *1st* partition on the drive
etc etc there are many combinations + factors to be checked to fully diagnose this issue
i have tried to do searchs to find other people with this problem related to partition size + my searches came back empty.. my logic in thinking its a bit more complicated is based on that fact.. i would expect someone would have ran into this issue by now and documented it SOMEWHERE if there is indeed a hard limit of partition size.. if it was so simple a problem
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As I suggested...
Use a good sized SSD for all current projects and Sample libraries, and thus NO defrag ever needed. Of course, copy the finished project to your Huge OS9 volume and also no defrag needed since you will not be constantly recording new tracks and deleting files. It would also be wise to copy all current projects as a backup to another volume that you defrag very rarely.... For Example...
256GB SSD -> (3) Volumes (Never defrag. access to all files is the same speed)
Mac OS, 40GB for Mac OS 9, DAW & Plugins
Samples, 60GB for Often used Sample libraries
Current, 150GB for Current Projects
1 to 2 TB Large Mechanical Drive/s (RAID/MIRROR if possible to prevent DATA loss)
Mac HD, 190GB Emergency Boot with entire DAW Clone and Sample libraries, this is to be used
if SSD fails during a session
Backups, 300GB for Current Backups, is case SSD Fails with multiple versions of current projects
Library, 500GB Library for All Software Archives, All Sample libraries, Commercial Music and Video Media, etc.
Archive 1...2...3...etc, 200 to 500GB x (as many as you need), for all Finished, Archived Projects, Another suggestion would be to go with an external Mirrored FireWire solution for all Archived Project Backups
I like this whole MO DieHard! I'm going to take that route in the near future! ;D
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I may yet see if a PCI SATA card would behave any differently, although depending on utilization of the PCI buss that may not be a good idea anyway.
its no different then a scsi card..which was used on the 'pci bus' since back in the early 90s..
i really dont understand this logic.. it was a rumor made up back in the days of bad hard drives to explain their bad performance... as we have documented here the true bandwidth of the pci bus far exceeds teh actual thruput.. by the devices.. the pci bus is not the limiting factor
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I may yet see if a PCI SATA card would behave any differently, although depending on utilization of the PCI buss that may not be a good idea anyway.
its no different then a scsi card..which was used on the 'pci bus' since back in the early 90s..
i really dont understand this logic.. it was a rumor made up back in the days of bad hard drives to explain their bad performance... as we have documented here the true bandwidth of the pci bus far exceeds teh actual thruput.. by the devices.. the pci bus is not the limiting factor
Considering someone in this thread contacted me personally (they can post more here if they wish) and told me they specifically had issues with throughput with a PCI SATA card when used in conjunction with their interface used for Pro Tools, I would say it isn't just a rumor. If the SATA card is the only device on the buss, throughput should be great, but if other devices are using bandwidth, that may not be the case.
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its no different then a scsi card..which was used on the 'pci bus' since back in the early 90s..
i really dont understand this logic.. it was a rumor made up back in the days of bad hard drives to explain their bad performance... as we have documented here the true bandwidth of the pci bus far exceeds teh actual thruput.. by the devices.. the pci bus is not the limiting factor
Yes, this is definitely NOT a rumor, as I discussed in many threads, the issue is NOT having a single SATA card in a G4 with nothing else, but having a SATA card combined with other PCI bus mastering Cards; when you start adding PCI audio interfaces or PT cards, UAD-1 cards, and powercore cards, you are pretty much PCI bus maxed out, adding a SATA card or PCI Bus mastering SCSI card will lead to audio drop outs and artifacts as explained many times before... when the company I worked for was building DAWs back in the day, there were many combinations we avoided, when SCSI cards (SATA the same thing) were used.
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Looking at the PCI activity bar in the "System Usage" panel in Pro Tools is a good indication on how much overhead you have left on the PCI bus. My bar is pretty maxed out on a relativly standard Pro Tools session of mine.
I have tried adding a PCI SATA card to my system, and it doesn't work. I get dropouts etc.
The standard ATA100 controller of the MDD can take alot of activity as it is (recording 40 tracks at once is no problem on my system for instance).
I have 7 MIX cards in a Magma chassis though, and I don't know what the limit is for using DSP cards and SATA controllers at the same time is.
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yawn.. rumour.. ok a better word would be "misnomer" or "not entirely accurate hypothesis"
i understand that people have experienced problems *in the past* and put the blame on the pci bus
i personally think that this was not 100% accurate as the root of the problem.. my opinion is that was much more likely a limitation of the CPU's ability to handle and process what was being done on pci bus then the actual pci bus itself.. i mean the very fact that you can use a magma PCI bus expansion chassis should be proof enough that the pci bus is capable of much more then it is used for.. the pci bus architecture in computers (both mac & pc) have remained relatively the same for years and years... if it was indeed such a huge "limiting factor" then it would have been replaced long before the advent of pci-express
i think if u were to examine closely the device tree in openfirmware you would see that the built in ATA controller most likely interfaces/connects with the exact same pci bus anyway.. so there REALLY is no difference except the fact that you are losing an expansion slot
but lets not let this turn into a discussion about the limitations of the pci bus PLEASE
remember ALL of the things u just mentioned die hard are OBSOLETE + abandoned products.. because of what? advances in CPU technology... Powercore/UAD all are discontinued and deleted products.. and PCI audio interfaces.. do they really utilize that much bandwidth? look at the motu 424 card.. the thing can be expanded to 24 x 4 (96) channels..(on one freaking card) they wouldnt even have tried to design that if the pci bus couldnt handle it...
Diehard.. i would bet u cash doing tests with different levels of macs would reveal the cpu to be the mitigating factor.. comparing a 450mhz sawtooth to a 933 qs to a 1.42mdd and finally a 2.0ghz upgraded cpu.. when teh higher models have no issue at all would u say that its because their pci bus is "better"???? seriously think back to which macs were actually in use back in the day when u recall these problems... guaranteed it was back around 1998-2001 when they had a dog of a cpu
another point is..
FIREWIRE vs USB
the reason why steve jobs limited his macs to not having USB 2.0 is that USB 2.0 is a cpu dependant technology ..
and firewire doesnt require any CPU handling.. thats the real reason why usb 2.0 is disabled and was never "allowed" in mac os 9... it was a tactical decision.. to not make the machines look bad.
final point is..
i have a sata card + a digi 001 and i know damn well they work 100% fine together and theres absolutely no issues with using an mdd with this combination.. so what the hell? :)
i dont even know why im bothering to respond... u guys are just arguing for the sake of trying to prove me wrong or something.. like what is your goal here? lol .. you and me after school.. lets fight.. kid gloves.. ;D lol
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We are talking about when you hammer the PCI bus, like I do for instance. 7 MIX cords with pretty much all the DSP's used up with TDM plugins. The CPU activity of the machine stays at a modest 1-5% all the time, so that's not the limiting factor.
If I used the SATA card I couldn't get over 30 tracks or so with TDM plugins without getting dropouts, drive too slow errors etc. Now with a harddrive on the internal ATA100 controller I can easily do 60 tracks without any problems at all.
You won't get the problem with your Digi 001 and SATA card. Not enough stuff going on.
The bus is not ONE PCI port, it's the sum of all the data traffic of all the ports, and the bus is the bottleneck going to the CPU.
Read up on basic computer architecture if you don't belive me. This is basic shit.
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and how do u think the ata controller interfaces with the computer? by magic?
(http://www001.upp.so-net.ne.jp/medicalmac/im2/pbg4mdd.b.gif)
mactron stated previously that MDD's contain *2* pci bus
http://macos9lives.com/smforum/index.php?topic=1964.0
lets not go on and on on this pci bus debate .. or we will be here for years...
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The PCI bus of the MDD for example is connected to the same controller as the ATA100 controller, but they do not share bandwidth in any other way. Tons of activity on the ATA100 controller does NOT slow down the PCI stuff. Adding a controller to the PCI bus makes it use up bandwith there insted of where it's "supposed to be", and thus leaves less bandwidth to the other stuff on therse.
In my case 7 MIX Core & Farm cards.
Basic architecture diagram taken from the MDD developer docs:
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Knez..
the secondary bus is attached to the primary bus aswell.
thats why its called a secondary bus.. because its second to the primary.
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Yes. So the same fenomenon happens when I for instance run my projects from my SSD boot drive, connected to the ATA66 bus. Im clogging the PCI bus with too much data, so audio drops out, I can't bounce stuff etc.
It's real Chris. Get over it. Im not debating this any more. I know what I have experienced and I know that im right. If you can't take that in, it's your problem.
All the best :)
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lol "get over it" :o "all the best" ::)
I know what I have experienced and I know that im right.
yes u know what u have experienced.. but i dont believe u are right that it is a *limitation of the pci bus*.
im pretty sure the definition of the term "PCI Bus Mastering" means that this "bus mastering" card *TAKES OVER* control of a portion of the pci bus...
http://www.pcguide.com/ref/mbsys/buses/types/pciMastering-c.html
so it cuts off the data pipeline from being available to the other device..
the same way note polyphony of 1 would cut off any other notes in a sampler.. because its only letting one note thru at a time...
perhaps there is some type of jumper or software setting to disable "bus mastering" from occuring and therefore stopping the problem.. and stopping the device from hogging full control of the bus.
i understand the problem. but thanks for your explicit description. like i said.. i hold to my opinion that the problem is not a result of a *limitation of the pci bus*. If you can't take that in, it's your problem. "All the best ;)"
blaming the pci bus is like blaming the highway for a car crash...
the highway is not to blame.. the cars + intelligence behind driving those cars is to blame... improper timing + handling of events.. you cant blame the highway..
re: your ssd on the ata-66 bus..
IIO recently brought up the need to jumper SATA devices to adhere to sata150 spec..
http://knowledge.seagate.com/articles/en_US/FAQ/193991en
a similar problem happens when using a sata2 device on a sata1 connection. maybe its possible your problem isnt related to the pci bus at all but rather is a mismatch or lack of downward compatibility between the drive + the capability of the connection...
but yea in your case.. with 7 cards via expansion chassis. this is a hugely different configuration then a digi 001 + mdd + sata card, trying to have all those cards + an ssd flooding the ata-66 = traffic jam on the highway.. but yet if u replace the ssd with a normal ata-66 hard drive.. teh problem probably goes away right??? because the ata-66 connection can handle this device... a sata150 card is able to handle.. a sata150 device.
(http://www.futurestorage.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2013/02/diskspeeds.jpg)
look at the difference of sata150 to ata66...
of course its going to fuck up trying to stuff the data thruput of an ssd that can do more than sata150.. into an ata-66 controller..
how can u say you are clogging the pci bus.. when mactron has reported speeds of 190MB/s using 2 SSD in raid.. the difference? his controller could properly regulate the data in + out from this drive... the pci bus isnt being clogged. 190MB/s is pretty fuckin fast for a g4 with a "limited pci bus" lol
out of curiousity im wondering which sata card do u have knez..
i dont remember you ever saying that u had tried one.
disk controllers behave very differently + of different quality + performance
based on how their chips handle + regulate the flow of data.
and in mactrons case, difference of connection (64bit vs 32bit, 33Mhz vs 66 Mhz)
i read about an issue recently to do with pci graphics cards causing audio dropouts on the pc platform.. and u know what the cause was? 100% because of the GRAPHICS DRIVER of the pci graphics device - to speed up "video performance" the manufacturers had "Cheated" and the driver had been written in a way that caused it to forgo some type of fail-safe check before starting a data transfer.. to make the graphics quicker.. so u see there is often more than meets the eye....
this issue i actually found in a README file from cubase 4 or 5 on pc.. where they had included someones testimonial explanation of the real cause of the audiodropouts.
i can find it and post it if u like. the problem was 100% caused by the logic of the driver
and NOT the pci bus but yet in the same regard.. it was common belief that the pci bus was to blame. in this readme file the guy quoted by steinberg explicitly says that its not the pci bus... and that this popular belief is not accurate.
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blaming the pci bus is like blaming the highway for a car crash...
the highway is not to blame.. the cars + intelligence behind driving those cars is to blame... improper timing + handling of events.. you cant blame the highway..
[youtube]mkBS4zUjJZo[/youtube]
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PCI bus is a cake. ;D Let's say a 8 piece cake.
A Protools HD rig takes 6-7 pieces
A Protools TDM rig easily takes 5-6 pieces.
A Protools LE rig takes 3-4 pieces
Any IDE-SATA PCI card takes 1-2 pieces
Any SCSI card takes 1 piece
All graphics card takes 1-2 pieces
If your OS9 install has a bad choice of extensions/control panels it can take a piece of cake.
There isn't cake for everyone... So choose wisely who are you going to give the cake. ;D
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yes protools guy u are right.. easy fix is to take out the graphics card :D
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but yet if u replace the ssd with a normal ata-66 hard drive.. teh problem probably goes away right??? because the ata-66 connection can handle this device... a sata150 card is able to handle.. a sata150 device.
Nope. Does not matter. You are clogging the bus with too much traffic. Adding a SATA150 card clogs it as well. "Highway jam" describes it very well. It just does not work. Get over it, there's nothing you can say to talk me out of it, since I have tried on a first hand basis and know how computers work :)
I can make a quick video tonight that demonstrates what happens so you can see with your own eyes.
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From the Avid Knowledge Base, for Windows, but concerns all systems: http://avid.force.com/pkb/articles/en_US/Error_Message/en326991
This error has many potential causes, all of which relate to overtaxation of your computer's PCI buss.
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http://duc.avid.com/showthread.php?t=15603
Here the tip seems to be to remove the second PCI graphics card to free up some bus bandwidth.
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knez this isnt a fight man.. there is no winning lol this is just conversation... with the added benefit of sharing information that might benefit others..
u dont have to make a video i understand + believe that you have problems.. im not trying to say that you dont..
but your not getting my point at all dude..
"pci bus too busy"... is the explanation assigned to teh error code YES
but that actual error isnt being triggered because of a lack of bandwidth of the pci bus.
its that its being denied access because another pci "Bus mastering" card has "taken over" and gained precedence..
http://www.techopedia.com/definition/299/bus-mastering
If a computer contains several components that support bus mastering, hierarchical structure needs to be implemented to prevent several components from trying to use the bus at the same time.
knez is a genius and knows all so he knows already but
for other readers (+ cake eaters)
pci bus mastering.. read the definition on the page..
this is not the normal pci bus.. this is an "enhanced mode"
of a single card that is functioning on the pci bus..
which offers "elevated priority" + direct access to memory etc
The bus master is the “master” and controls the bus pathways that contain the transmission signals and address.
having more than ONE card that has this ability causes PROBLEMS
in a similar way to having more then one ISA card on an oldschool pc using a IRQ
they are both competing for using the same resources.
my comment to pro tools guy above about removing the graphics card *WAS A JOKE*
below is a quote from cubase 5 troubleshooting pdf:
ftp.steinberg.net/Archives/Cubase_VST/Docs_English/Troubleshooting_Cubase_VST_5.pdf (ftp://ftp.steinberg.net/Archives/Cubase_VST/Docs_English/Troubleshooting_Cubase_VST_5.pdf)
page 15
Graphic cards
Graphic card drivers (e.g for Matrox cards) can block the PCI bus when screen up-
dates occur. Some graphic card manufacturers have discovered that they can in-
crease the card’s performance by designing drivers that send commands over the
PCI bus without checking whether the card is ready to receive them or not (ignor-
ing the queue check of the graphic card). If the card is not ready, the PCI bus is
blocked until the card can receive the commands. As a result no other activities can
occur in the computer, which in turn may cause crackling/clicks (as well as tempo-
rary dropouts and channel swapping)
In order to solve this problem, you can either simply turn off the PCI performance
enhancements in the graphic card driver, get a new and better driver (if available)
or change the settings in the driver so that it doesn’t send commands to the card
until it is ready to receive them
this cubase thing is JUST AN EXAMPLE of how the logic of the operation of the devices is really at fault.. not the devices themselves. there was a more detailed explanation of this like i said that came with cubase 3.7 or 4.0 for pc in the readme file.. they included it with the 5.0 documentation because its a hugely important peice of information to people who at the time were experiencing audio drop outs..and the reason was because their graphics driver was the cause of blocking the pci bus.. but everyoen at the time thought it was that the pci bus was clogged.. and this was found to be incorrect.
this is only relevant because this is exactly the same type of error that causes audiodropouts in other types of configurations aswell.... when a certain device takes complete control of the pci bus + leaves it unavailable to another...
this is not a data thruput limitation of the pci bus.. but rather a resource conflict due to improper hierarchial precedence.
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yes protools guy u are right.. easy fix is to take out the graphics card :D
Chris, don't kill (blame) the messenger... XD
To be more accurate with my example, an Sawtooth/Gigabit ethernet is a cake with 8 pieces
Any 133MHz bus G4 has a cake with 10 pieces.
A MDD w/166 bus is a cake that has 12 pieces.
And about "bad behaviour", bouncing a mix to another drive different from the audiotracks takes 1-2 pieces.
Some services, like AFP or Indexing a drive in background can take 2-4 pieces.
It is normal to get some more errors (At least on LE systems) when protools is set to make "quick punch" recording. It takes 2-3 pieces.
Using 2 graphics cards take 2-4 pieces.
I had tested my G4 DA w Dual GHz CPU with an Rage 128 and DIGI001 in one setup (for more than a year), and Rage+Digi001+AMIII+USB2card+Sonnet ATA66 interface (for more than a year too) and the first setup gives less -6042 DAE errors.
Chris have a valid point that is Bus Mastering protocol is very powerful and has a lot of headroom for audio tasks, but if Knezzen has first hand experience with the quickest MDD with MIX +++++++ system with a Magma Chassis, how you dare to question it?
The shame is that our more wise-experienced members MacTron and DieHard are Cubase fans and noone has/had a TDM rig. But they have their own troubles mixing M-Audio with UAD-1, Powercores and GeForces 4 Ti aside ATA-SATA cards.
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knez theres a good chance
http://duc.avid.com/showthread.php?t=15603
that link u posted.
that guys problem was probably 100% related to his video card driver
just like the cubase documentation, one of his graphics cards probably had the driver that was bypassing the ready check.... resulting in a timing fuckup + causing a "Device not ready" error for the other devices (which resulted in PCI BUS too busy digidesign error)
the other readme that i read said that they graphics card companies did this to compete with each other starting around 1998 they bypassed this ready check to make the graphics appear quicker then the competitions.. and only a few graphics cards drivers had the ability to toggle this on or off.. most (ati included) had this hardcoded into the driver
this is just speculation on my part
the scsi card could be to blame too.
https://www.google.com/search?q=Adaptec+3940UW+pci+bus+busy&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8
funny that theres so many results about the adaptec card + the problem
seems to be a relationship there
http://comments.gmane.org/gmane.comp.audio.emagic.logic.tdm/8639
but alot of them also include 2 graphics cards.. + the scsi card like this guy ^^
anyway.. not my problem.. but having 2 seperate graphics cards + a scsi card seems to be a recipe for disaster
http://osdir.com/ml/audio.emagic.logic.tdm/2000-08/msg00285.html
I think the troublemaker is the Adaptec. Digi has
> commented that this SCSI accelerator is really hard on the PCI bus.
> The Atto that they recommend supposedly uses 1/4 of the PCI bus
> resources that the Adaptec does. Next, I would suspect the video
> cards.
im not trying to say that im right FOR YOUR EXACT SITUATION
im just sharing complicated information.
for you to contemplate... im not arguing + fighting with u bud..
get a grip
maybe if u people truelly spoke english you could understand what im saying instead of skimming the copy + picking out bits and jumping to conclusions about what im saying
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they have their own troubles mixing M-Audio with UAD-1, Powercores and GeForces 4 Ti aside ATA-SATA cards.
Diehard has never had a silicon image PCI SATA CARD.. and is basing all of his comments on past experiences from yeras ago
as far as i know Knez also hasnt got a pci sata card... at least not one that he has talked about publicly on the board. which is why i just asked him which card he claims to have tested.
i was going to send diehard a pci sata card but he refused it because hes fucking traumatized from past experiences lol the same reason he refuses to have osx installed (even on a 2nd partition or drive) on any g4.. because he believes the mac boogie man will inject btree errors into his filesystem..
(did u take your chris vitamins?)
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Diehard has never had a silicon image PCI SATA CARD.. and is basing all of his comments on past experiences from years ago
DieHard worked on NY city building DAWs for first class studios at least since mid 90s. His building DAW notes are priceless. Those studios probably were based on first class SCSI systems, not cheap SiI 3112 cards... ;D In a studio that charges 200-300$ an hour a zero-fail tolerance DAW is a must. Probably a dual channel SCSI setup were the bare minimum then.
Some magma-bit3 users say to use ATA-SATA-SCSI cards on the expansion box while others say to use those cards on the host.
If Brian (SonikArkitech BT) were so kind to put some light on this darkness... He uses Mix + system with Korg cards and all the shit we dream about having on our machines.
I would love to hear Protools nubus users talking about that, because they really doesn't have all the headroom we quicksilvers/MDD users have.
From what I readed on D.U.C. (digidesign user conference) SCSI is preferred over ATA66-100 and SATA interfaces (SCSI takes 1 piece of the cake) ;D Probably 10.000 rpm from SCSI vs 7200 rpm on ATA is the clue.
i was going to send diehard a pci sata card but he refused it because hes fucking traumatized from past experiences lol the same reason he refuses to have osx installed (even on a 2nd partition or drive) on any g4.. because he believes the mac boogie man will inject btree errors into his filesystem..
Better safe than sorry. He has no problems using pure OS9 setups. Probably himself or various clients had that btree error with OS9andOSX while some pure OS9 setups never had that trouble.
BEWARE! Sarcasm at 11!
(did u take your chris vitamins?)
So you are selling blue pills for erection? Or Matrix pills? I thought you were vegan and drug-free, but your House music has make me wonder if you abuse some substances.
Coconut water is a drug. ;)
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Chris. I don't have to prove anything to you. Rant all you want. My english is excellent BTW, thanks for bringing it up.
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so yea knez what brand of sata card is it that you have?
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listen guys..
to me, its very obvious the goal/motive of each person is clearly viewable from the content they post..
some people genuinely want to help.. and share + talk about actual usefull information
some people want to boast about what they know
some people just want to be right + change everything into an argument
u just make me lose respect for you when you attack me personally because u cant think of anything else to say.. its really pathetic..
knez..
lukpac..
protoolsguy
im always trying to help people.. im sorry that you seem to want to interpret what words i say as me being boastfull + knowitall.. im not a knowitall.. i actually looked up + researched what i say before i say it..
im not here to shoot my mouth off .. off the cuff... on a whim..
you all have very little good energy to share
perhaps its time i take a break from macos9lives
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so, now since there is nobody left who wants to discuss the original topic, this thread could be closed.
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so, now since there is nobody left who wants to discuss the original topic, this thread could be closed.
I was going to report on my experiences once I wiped/repartitioned. I just haven't gotten that far yet.
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:)
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so, now since there is nobody left who wants to discuss the original topic, this thread could be closed.
IIO, sorry for offtopicing this 2TB'4TB long post. A few post after BT asked it was really clear somehow that You should not buy a drive bigger than 2TB for a PowerMac and that we should partition it in slices no bigger than 220 Gigs...
I was just joking somehow on my own way about who to blame... the boogie
My biggest drive is a 5400rpm SATA II seagate that is only 1.5 Terabytes. And is inside my hackintosh. I cant give any advice about giant drives.
On the PowerPC side, my MDD has 4 ata drives conected. 3 of them are in APM. Nothing strange. But the bigger, a 230 Gig 7200rpm seagate drive only partition is only saw in OSX.
The 4th drive is an ATA drive partitioned on GUID (Yes, you all can call me ignorant) and it appears only on Leo (not sure if Tiger sees it) Panther do not see it, that is sure.
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so, now since there is nobody left who wants to discuss the original topic, this thread could be closed.
IIO, sorry for offtopicing this 2TB'4TB long post.
i wasnt exactly thinking about you.
but while we are on topic again, while it is uncertain if the size of his drive could be the reason for his protools problem, it is also uncertain if it is not.
personally i think ed is much closer with his idea that it can happen from using such a fast disk on an ATA bus. s
something which worries me a bit, because if it can affect protools´ disk reading, it might also effect stuff it or toast or my favorite video editing apps.
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I am making this last response in reference to the whole PCI bus mastering discussion so that newbies or people building a DAW can make so quick notes to avoid problems; this is not a debate, this is just real world observations.
Some Background:
The term "Bus Mastering" describes a protocol where the device itself performs the basic computations necessary to perform input/output, thus freeing the CPU for other tasks. UltraDMA (ATA-33) was the first version of IDE to fully use the Bus Mastering protocol. Bus Mastering interfaces and devices are usually faster than PIO.
From Chris: My opinion is that was much more likely a limitation of the CPU's ability to handle and process what was being done on pci bus then the actual pci bus itself.
Diehard.. I would bet u cash doing tests with different levels of macs would reveal the cpu to be the mitigating factor.. comparing a 450mhz sawtooth to a 933 qs to a 1.42mdd and finally a 2.0ghz upgraded cpu.. when the higher models have no issue at all would u say that its because their pci bus is "better"???? seriously think back to which macs were actually in use back in the day when u recall these problems... guaranteed it was back around 1998-2001 when they had a dog of a cpu.
No, the CPU has very little to do with the issues and problems we are discussing. Firstly, these issues on older hardware is not unique to macs... remember, back in 2003, my company not only made between 5 to 15 DAWs a week, but we also made Novell Servers (we were Novell Gold certified) on rack based PCs that served both PCs and Macs. Some of our accounts in New York City had between 100 to 150 workstations both mac and PC connecting to a single server to store files, these systems worked great as long as guidelines with the PCI bus were established.
So, now I'll get to the point, these systems (with not much CPU power) worked perfectly as long as there were ONLY 1 to 2 Bus mastering cards installed in the server... additional SCSI cards used for Tape storage and other media were all either configured as non-bus mastering, or were created from the factory as non-bus mastering cards. (Sometimes the NIC cards were bus mastering also). The point is that the moment too many bus mastering PCI cards were used, all sorts of performance issues on the server would crop up; including slow Hard drive writes, NIC packet issues, and many other problems. Remember, to add to the confusion, some cards can be either be configured as bus mastering or not and some systems have dedicated non-bus mastering slots... so read about the actual cards and system you have.
Back to the Macs... the issue regarding too many Bus mastering PCI cards that tax the PCI bus are very real on ALL MODELS OF POWERMAC G4s from Sawtooth thru MDD EVEN with CPU upgrades; hope that makes it clear enough. On newer macs (like a Mac Pro with snow leopard), this, or course is NOT an issue. We are specifically talking about older Mac Hardware in the G4 era.
From Knez: The PCI bus of the MDD for example is connected to the same controller as the ATA100 controller, but they do not share bandwidth in any other way. Tons of activity on the ATA100 controller does NOT slow down the PCI stuff. Adding a controller to the PCI bus makes it use up bandwith there insted of where it's "supposed to be", and thus leaves less bandwidth to the other stuff on therse.
This is 100% correct and that is why my MDD systems that all have a UAD-1, PowerCore, and Audio Interface PCI card, all have an SSD drive on on the ATA bus, NOT a SATA card. So the bus mastering of the internal IDE is done by the CPU itself, while the cards do their own, this balances the load on a fast G4 very well with disk I/O bus mastering being done by the CPU and audio data blocks being done by the bus mastering PCI Audio interface
so to summarize...
To all reading these crazy posts that want some real-world guideline and NOT opinions and theories; as a rule of thumb (without going into specific G4 models and configurations that I have tested and built for DAWs)
1) Keep the number on Bus mastering PCI cards (Like SATA, Audio Interfaces, and SCSI) to a Max of 2, in rare cases 3, but test the system; (non bus mastering PCI cards like extra USB will have no effect and add as many as you want, research or test each card)
2) If your interface is FW, then SATA/SCSI Cards will be fine and not cause any issues
3) Always Initially test the system with just Hard Drive I/O and Audio interface, then add cards like PowerCores, UAD-1, and other PCI one at a time and test again
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Going to original post questions
Under a pure OS 9 environment, one main issue that has been discussed in other threads is hard drive maintenance; Any volumes above the 200GB limit may be a real hassle if they become corrupted or need of a defragmentation (audio recording volume).
Norton Speed disk and other defragmenting (OS 9 programs) will produce "Out of RAM errors" and NOT work. A work around suggested by some members was to create an OS X bootable DVD with a defrag utility and use that method. Many OS 9 disk maintenance (repair file/volume issues) will also bomb on volumes greater than 190 to 200GB; so that was the original reason that I suggested all volumes be 190GB or less was because I was under the assumption that the data put on these volumes was important audio project data (or hot pics of sexy babes).
IMO huge volumes that are not repairable are not the way to go. Most of organize our data into folders, so the additional hierarchy of Volumes seems nice and logical... a Samples Volume (190 GB should be enough for most users), Mac OS (OS & apps), Audio Projects 1, 2, 3... it does not seem unfeasible. Remember, when you put all the eggs in one basket (or on 1 volume), don't bitch if you crack a few. :D
Where is that OSX solution to defrag hard drives ? I have done the maths and your 190 Gb maximum partition size easily beat the 21 partitions limit on a 2Tb drive. You or someone mentioned that that DVD need a Leopard compatible hardware to boot. I guess all G4 users (But apple says 733+ IIRC)
What are your concerns about letting that tool defrag the drive because OS9 just cant handle them?
It could be interesting to install that DVD on a partition and boot that defragger instead an OSX partition that could lead to BTree errors. On a pure OS9 environment. Or better called a OSX free environment.
It is questionable if that defragger should be considered OSX on not ;D
To all reading these crazy posts that want some real-world guideline and NOT opinions and theories; as a rule of thumb (without going into specific G4 models and configurations that I have tested and built for DAWs)
1) Keep the number on Bus mastering PCI cards (Like SATA, Audio Interfaces, and SCSI) to a Max of 2, in rare cases 3, but test the system; (non bus mastering PCI cards like extra USB will have no effect and add as many as you want, research or test each card)
2) If your interface is FW, then SATA/SCSI Cards will be fine and not cause any issues
3) Always Initially test the system with just Hard Drive I/O and Audio interface, then add cards like PowerCores, UAD-1, and other PCI one at a time and test again
Did you enjoyed the cake example? ;D :D
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Thanks for that Diehard.
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we are deeply off topic again but somehow it is funny how the thread evolves.
Where is that OSX solution to defrag hard drives ?
you dont really need to defrag disks in OSX, but iDefrag works very well if you dont like norton.
I have done the maths and your 190 Gb maximum partition size easily beat the 21 partitions limit on a 2Tb drive.
it is not exactly a limit. it is just that you have to mount the 22th partition by hand.
and i think it would be fine to create 3x192 for OS9 and audio files, and then make some bigger partitions, like 3x400 in addition.
Did you enjoyed the cake example? ;D :D
i did. it was the most helpful contribution so far.
btw. "defrag on dual boot."
there is a simple trick how you can avoid repairing or defragmenting your OSX install into pieces: simply run your norton apps in OS9 from the same partition where your OSX install is – then they wont allow you to operate on that partition by accident.
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Thanks IIO, Knez originally posted the iDefrag info...
DieHard: I use a bootable DVD of iDefrag and defragment my drives that way. Never tried Norton or any other OS9-only defragmentation application on my drives...
...it only works on Mac capable of booting 10.5.x though, since the iDefrag DVD uses a custom version of 10.5 to boot into...
Try it out, it works great and is a great workaround. Might post the DVD image here for all the people not using OSX. Then they can at least burn the DVD and boot into iDefrag :)
Maybe Knez can post an ISO or Toast image of the DVD he uses... since I am a creature of habbit, I will still keep volumes at 190GB and use Norton Speed Disk when needed. The use of an SSD for current projects, makes defraging obsolete, since I copy the finished project to the non-SSD drive (and thus most files are written linear and not edited after they are finished); eventually, I delete stuff, and recopy, so I will still occasionally defrag; but the days of having to defrag your main audio project drive are over now that SSDs are available. More recording and less maintenance :)
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Sure, I can upload the iDefrag DVD. It's only downloadable from the iDefrag application, so it's quite hard to come by.
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Sure, I can upload the iDefrag DVD. It's only downloadable from the iDefrag application, so it's quite hard to come by.
Did you tried to use that iDefrag ISO restored to a drive? It would make loading in iDefrag quick enought to be 2015 acceptable, I guess.
http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=1847415 (http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=1847415)
No, you wouldn’t need to buy seven copies. One would suffice, though we do ask that you don’t run more copies simultaneously than you have licenses.
As for versions, we can’t guarantee that anything past version 2.0.5 will run on 10.5.8. Newer versions (including 2.2.8) might work, but also might very well not. It’s unlikely to be a case of disk corruption problems — it’s more likely that some features will simply fail to work (e.g. the reboot-and-defragment mode might not work, or the Create Boot Disk window might fail for some obscure reason).
Version 5 certainly isn’t going to work on PowerPC machines — it doesn’t have any PowerPC code in it any more.
As for getting back-versions, at the moment they’re available — once you’ve bought iDefrag — via the release notes link on the My Account page. I’m intending to maintain access to older versions for those who need it, but that might not be possible on day one of our new website when it finally arrives (in which case I could probably send copies by e-mail given the tiny number of people who want older versions).
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The use of an SSD for current projects, makes defraging obsolete, since I copy the finished project to the non-SSD drive (and thus most files are written linear and not edited after they are finished)
i am not even sure how it would affect the reading speed of an SSD when the files are written consequently instead of spread around. it probably depends on how many reading heads the SSD has. no, wait ...
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Sorry Knez,
Just give the link if it is a public download :)
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You have to buy a iDefrag license if you want to download the ISO. Their server checks for pirated serials when trying to download, so using warez won't work either, at least not when I tested the last time.
I have bought a legal copy of it, hence why I can get to the ISO :)
Try downloading it from the usual warez sources if you want. If that doesn't work, then I'll upload the DVD ISO ;)
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Try downloading it from the usual warez sources if you want. If that doesn't work, then I'll upload the DVD ISO ;)
[suspicious]https://thepiratebay.se/search/iDefrag/0/99/0 (https://thepiratebay.se/search/iDefrag/0/99/0)[/suspicious]
[suspicious]https://thepiratebay.se/torrent/3576451/iDefrag_1.5.8_%28Intel%29_with_license_file (https://thepiratebay.se/torrent/3576451/iDefrag_1.5.8_%28Intel%29_with_license_file)[/suspicious]
Pretty useless without CDmaker, can you please upload it. If you want to defrag your single hard drive you need to boot up OS X from a disc created by CDmaker.
Yep, I aggree with seattle29. The CDMaker is a must. However, that would require a username/password. :X
Apparently, having "a copy" of iDefrag do not means having the iDefragger bootable DVD ISO needed.
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I have iDefrag 2.2 on my MacBook Pro. I created the bootable DVD using the "Create a boot disk" option from the menu. It does not let me save the image file though, so I have to burn it from iDefrag and then make an image of that DVD and upload it here.
See the attached files as well.
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Ok, finally got around to revisiting this. Spent a few hours repartitioning and testing. First thing's first: all setup was as follows:
Drive Setup 2.1 under OS 9.2.2
HFS+ partitions
While the suggestion was made to use HFS partitions instead, I did try that at one point, but ran into a (repeated) freeze when copying files, so I didn't bother any more with it.
At any rate, to recap, I had the drive partitioned into 100 GB and 970 GB volumes. All volumes worked fine for most programs, but Pro Tools (LE 5.0.1 and 5.1.1) wasn't working correctly on the 970 GB volumes:
So, anyone still running ProTools 5? I ran into a bit of a snag.
Everything is now booting fine, and I'm not having any issues accessing or opening files on any partition. However, while PT 5 is opening up sessions on the 100 GB partition just fine, if you copy them to one of the 970 GB partitions it isn't properly reading the files. Sometimes playback results in noise, while other times it results in a different file being played.
I can open the files in other editors, and they are fine. But PT 5 is having problems accessing them.
My question is, before I go too far trying to troubleshoot this, are there any known partition and/or disk size limits for PT 5? I'm hoping I can just repartition and have more smaller partitions, but I'm wondering if anyone knows offhand.
And some previous comments/suggestions:
Do you know that a 2 TB drive will work with Pro Tools? How about a 1 TB drive? Do you have experience with this? How about partition size? How large of a partition can Pro Tools handle successfully?
From experience I can add that a 400gb drive partitioned with one partition that takes up the whole drive works just fine in Pro Tools 5.1.3cs11. No issues to report what so ever. The only problem was defragmentation, but that got solved anyway.
The only reason I put in the 200gb drive when the 400gb failed was because it was what I had laying around.
lukpac: excuse me when i didnt read the whole thread, but weren´t you mentioning you use 970 gb partitions? this could be the second alternative why things dont work. would be interesting to see if the protools problem goes away when you partition 4x500 on that 4000 disk.
What I ended up doing was partitioning the drive, copying a session to a volume, and testing. With 5 volumes (419,430 MB volume size), Pro Tools wasn't working correctly, but with 6 (349,525 MB volume size), Pro Tools worked fine. From there I kept playing around with the size of the last partition (which, due to a bug in Drive Setup, would resize partitions 1-5 to 32 MB) until I found where the cutoff point was. And that point seems to be 418,815 MB. With a volume that size, Pro Tools seemed to run without problems. However, with a volume size of 418,816 MB, Pro Tools was playing back noise/incorrect audio/etc.
I also played around a little bit with volumes of different sizes. While there was some variability, it would appear that any partitions *after* a volume larger than 418,815 MB are likely to not work correctly. That said, I didn't play around with this too much; it seems much more prudent to make sure all of your volumes are below that size anyway.
At any rate, right now I've got the disk setup with 1 150 GB partition, 2 341 GB partitions, and 3 405 GB partitions. The reason the last 5 partitions aren't all the same size is Drive Setup has a bug where trying to make partitions 1-3 larger causes the UI to blow up, but doing the same for 4-6 is fine. So I made 1 smaller, left 2 and 3 at their default size, and expanded 4-6. I'm going to run a few things through the paces before I consider this 100% resolved, but so far so good: both 9.2.2 and 10.3.9 are booting from the 150 GB partition, and Pro Tools has been working fine with everything I've thrown at it from any partition.
Also worth noting that the maximum size you can allocate across all partitions is 2,097,152 MB.
Right now I don't have another large free drive to experiment with, but it would be interesting to see if anyone else could see if they are seeing the same thing with the 418,815 MB limit. My guess is that would see be an issue even with an old IDE drive, but again, I haven't been able to test that, yet anyway. It's at least something to work from though.
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And that point seems to be 418,815 MB. With a volume that size, Pro Tools seemed to run without problems. However, with a volume size of 418,816 MB, Pro Tools was playing back noise/incorrect audio/etc.
now that is what i call a proper report. always nice to know that the OP is actually interested in the philosophical truth. :)
Also worth noting that the maximum size you can allocate across all partitions is 2,097,152 MB.
yes, 2 tera is the maximum file length limit for HFS+
My guess is that would see be an issue even with an old IDE drive, but again
that would be interesting indeed. otoh, IDE drives larger than 400gb are rare.
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that would be interesting indeed. otoh, IDE drives larger than 400gb are rare.
My previous "data" drive is a 500 GB IDE drive. Once I have everything copied back off and I'm comfortable with the new setup, I may try wiping that and playing around with the partitioning to see if I can replicate the issue. Not quite ready to do that yet, however. If/when I do, though, I'll report the results here.
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Thank You for your detailed report.
Just to note a very important point:
Also worth noting that
the maximum size you can allocate across all partitions is 2,097,152 MB.
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Thanks lukpac
For the detailed info :)
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i love how u take it asw absolute truth.... lol
it could still be 100% because of the drive hes using + sata/pata adapter
like i said in my previous post.. if there was a specific hard limit it would be documented by now..
IIO said 400gb+ ide drives are rare.. lol they made tons of 500gb ide drives.. from 2005 onward
u would think someone else on the internet would have documented a specific size limitation by now
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Well, the detailed reports are very valuable, I highly doubt that many PT users under OS 9 have used partitions that large; yes 500 GB drives have been used for quite some time, but many partition these drives into several volumes under OS 9, so the idea of having single partitions of even 400GB is an extremely rare scenario under OS 9 IMO.
After testing many configurations, back in the day, the recommendation was to keep the volumes below the 200GB threshold for the reasons previously mentioned (disk repair utilities, OS 9 defrag utilities, and the ability to make the volume bootable) all go south when using partitions that are too large. Yes there are work arounds (like iDefrag), yes some may not care if they can boot in an emergency to an audio volume, and yes, the file system may never need repairing… but I have grown conservative with age :)
Still, the documentation will help others that are pushing the OS 9 limits under PT. And yes, there may be conflicting info. when tests are done on another system with PT under OS 9, but this is an interesting starting point. We can only hope other PT users will setup some late volumes and run a few tests to either support the current data, or post different findings.
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Still, the documentation will help others that are pushing the OS 9 limits under PT. And yes, there may be conflicting info. when tests are done on another system with PT under OS 9, but this is an interesting starting point. We can only hope other PT users will setup some late volumes and run a few tests to either support the current data, or post different findings.
agreed, totally...
if they can read 120 replies into the thread :) lol
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Good Point... I'll Start a New Thread
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What I ended up doing was partitioning the drive, copying a session to a volume, and testing. With 5 volumes (419,430 MB volume size), Pro Tools wasn't working correctly, but with 6 (349,525 MB volume size), Pro Tools worked fine. From there I kept playing around with the size of the last partition (which, due to a bug in Drive Setup, would resize partitions 1-5 to 32 MB) until I found where the cutoff point was. And that point seems to be 418,815 MB. With a volume that size, Pro Tools seemed to run without problems. However, with a volume size of 418,816 MB, Pro Tools was playing back noise/incorrect audio/etc.
My previous "data" drive is a 500 GB IDE drive. Once I have everything copied back off and I'm comfortable with the new setup, I may try wiping that and playing around with the partitioning to see if I can replicate the issue. Not quite ready to do that yet, however. If/when I do, though, I'll report the results here.
I just tested with my 500 GB IDE drive. Exactly the same results (418,815 MB partition works fine, 418,816 MB partition causes problems). So it would appear the large (4 TB) drive and PATA to SATA adapter had nothing to do with it.
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Good to know, can you post results in the new thread I made under Protools for other PT users
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So I wanted to test out some of the above suggestions, using a Quicksilver DP 1GHz (2002) with a Seritek dual external E-SATA PCI card, an Iomega 1TB boot drive with about 10 partitions (APM) and an OWC Mercury Elite Pro with a 3TB drive, formatted in 16 partitions (GUID).
I have continually used the Iomega 1 TB as the primary boot drive, both OS9 & Leopard. Some have commented re the speed difference of ATA vs E-SATA & without more detailed tests I can say copies from one E-SATA drive to the other seems to average about 1GB per minute, which came in useful cloning multiple partitions from one drive to the other, it is also noticeably faster than the internal ATA drive, I'd guess twice as fast at least.
The 3TB OWC doesn't seem to show up in Startup Manager so that is likely the limitation of its GUID partitions, but otherwise is fine for data backups and tests fine in Disk Utility.
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it is also noticeably faster than the internal ATA drive, I'd guess twice as fast at least
this is why i suggest this [sata pci cards] to people..
the performance increase for the price is worth it if you are actually using your mac..
using older os with newer technology = marked performance increase
using a new drive with a sata/pata adapter is just slowing down [bottlenecking] the performance of the drive
when u finally use it.. and see just how much quicker it is.. u find a way to make room for that pci sata card
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I did my tests on the limits and i found 2tb is the end of the line under os9. Even with my fibre connection os9 chrashed when i bumped the workspace up to 3 or just slightly above 2tb.
Besides for efficent recording you should use either a scsi raid or firewire drives which can be newer or even a sata card in the machine with added drives. Protools seems to be a headache when it comes to drives. It has to be internal. There are few versions that let you record external but thats on avid hardware. Protools unity.
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I did my tests on the limits and i found 2tb is the end of the line under os9. Even with my fibre connection os9 chrashed when i bumped the workspace up to 3 or just slightly above 2tb.
Besides for efficent recording you should use either a scsi raid or firewire drives which can be newer or even a sata card in the machine with added drives. Protools seems to be a headache when it comes to drives. It has to be internal. There are few versions that let you record external but thats on avid hardware. Protools unity.
I haven't played around with a SATA card, but others have pointed out that depending on one's setup, a SATA card might not be ideal or even a problem, as it can hog the PCI bus.
I haven't done much recording, but I've mixed sessions with 16+ tracks with my setup (new SATA drive, SATA <> IDE adapter), and haven't run into any issues. Other than the volume size limit, I haven't had many issues with ProTools at all, fingers crossed.