[paris1886]

Is it possible to work on an iMovie file from an external hard drive?
Here's my situation:
I recently bought an external hard drive (it's a 160GB, 7200RPM, External USB 2.0/FireWire Hard Drive. Manufacturer: Acomdata) to store my photo and movie files. Connected to my PB G4 via USB, it took 4 hours to copy a 10GB movie file (which I can deal with if I must), however, i was hoping to be able to be able to work on the movie from the external hard drive--but when i open it in iMovie it won't play the clips (they stutter, stop, etc.) I'm guessing this is because of the slow transfer from the external drive.
So is what I want to do impossible--or do I just need a better/different external drive/connection?
Also, with just iMovie, is there a way to reduce the size of my movie (raw footage) file?
Thanks for the help.

[Arne]

Hi paris1886,
Sounds to me like you connected the external USB 2.0 HD to the USB 1.1 of your PowerBook. This way, you lose all the advantage of USB 2.0
I recommend you connect the HD via FireWire or, if your PowerBook provides this connection, via USB 2.0; you will experience a speed increase of about 40x.
This way it is also possible to do Video editing on your external HD. I am doing the same and it works perfect for me.
Cheers from Tokyo,
arne

[paris1886]

arne, thanks for your reply.
i guess i still have a lot to learn because i wasn't aware that i have one USB 1.1 and one USB 2.0 port (i just assumed they are both USB 2.0); i'll have to check my specs on that.
no matter, though, because last night i connected the HD via FireWire and it worked beautifully! it took just several minutes to copy a 7GB movie over and i was able to edit the movies from the HD without a hitch.
thanks again.

[sandrakahn]

Hi,
I bought an external hard drive to store my imovies. It an iomega 149.01 GB.
Info says that I have 109,44 available but when I try to transfer my imovie the computer says that there is no more space available.
I have 3 imovies (about 20 min each) in there using 44,47 GB
Do I need a new external hard drive?
I need some better way to store my family imovies. DVD also say there is not enough room for a 20 minute imovie.
Thanks for your help,
Sandra

[aarongr]

I received this spam email in my in box...

From: drakahn@aol.com
Subject: iMovie file in external hard drive
Date: August 8, 2008 12:05:56 PM CDT

To: aaronduffy23@yahoo.com, aaron1192@gmail.com, aaron@aaronmarks.com, fanning.aaron@gmail.com, aryck@charter.net, aarongizabo@yahoo.com

Return-Path:

Hi,

I bought an external hard drive to store my imovies. It an iomega 149.01 GB.
Info says that I have 109,44 available but when I try to transfer my imovie the computer says that there is no more space available.
I have 3 imovies (about 20 min each) in there using 44,47 GB

Do I need a new external hard drive?
I need some better way to store my family imovies. DVD also say there is not enough room for a 20 minute imovie.
Thanks for your help,

Sandra

-- sandrakahn

Just follow this link to see the thread:
http://forums.macwor...om/thread/35323

(If the link doesn't work, try copying and pasting it from this email into your browser's address bar.)

[mac_user21]

It is very good idea to use Firewire due to higher speed vs USB 2.0 accord This.

I will quoite what wiki has said
h2. Comparison to USB
Although high-speed USB 2.0 nominally runs at a higher signaling rate (480 Mbits/s) than FireWire 400, typical USB PC-hosts rarely exceed sustained transfers of 280 Mbit/s, with 240 Mbit/s being more typical. This is likely due to USB's reliance on the host-processor to manage low-level USB protocol, whereas FireWire delegates the same tasks to the interface hardware. For example, the FireWire host interface supports memory-mapped devices, which allows high-level protocols to run without loading the host CPU with interrupts and buffer-copy operations.^[18]^

FireWire 800 is substantially faster than Hi-Speed USB. ^19]^