Best SSD setup for video editing?

Report · Feb 18, 2017

hello,

i just recently purchased a dell xps 15 laptop and I'm getting into video editing. It has a 1TB hard drive and 32GB RAM.

someone told me I should get an external SSD(Samsung T3) to do all my photo and video editing on.....?

And I'd then another hard drive to store all of my finished projects on....?

[Moderator note: moved to appropriate forum]

Report · Feb 18, 2017

hopefully your laptop came with a ssd for the os/apps to use... yes, you can use an external usb 3.0 ssd as you describe, then to save space archive them to a hdd or other safe storage solution. if you don't want an external drive, you would have to see if you could add or upgrade the storage inside the laptop.

Report · Feb 18, 2017

Yes it came with a really fast 1TB SSD. Do I use the same external SSD for storing the cache.....?

Report · Feb 18, 2017

if the 1tb ssd it came with is a pcie ssd and capable of around 2gb+ read/writes (you can check with crystaldiskmark), then you could use it for your media and projects as well, as long as everything fits on that one drive. that would skip the need for an external ssd, and instead just worry about the backups/archives with an external hdd or nas, etc. if its around those speeds and you still plan on using an external ssd for media, then you could use the internal 1tb ssd for cache. if the internal ssd is around sata ssd speeds at 500mb, then it may not matter as much, but might do slightly better on the external ssd.

Report · Feb 18, 2017

2800 read

1300 write

is that good? It is a PCIe based SSD

Report · Feb 18, 2017

those are good numbers, it should be able to run everything off the 1tb internal.

Report · Feb 18, 2017

Thanks for all the help guys. Does cache take up a lot of space?

Report · Feb 19, 2017

not generally, proxies or rendered previews could start to add up. you can delete the cache after each project is finished if you want.

Report · Feb 20, 2017

Does your laptop have an additional internal drive bay for another drive ? If so, you can save a lot of space on that 1TB NVMe drive.

Bill has found with testing that there is NO reduction in performance when the PPro "media cache" and "cache" files are left in their default location , on the boot drive. So, provided you have some other additional HDD bay in your machine, you could install a Samsung 850 Pro SATA III SSD and make it the boot drive with only the OS, programs, Windows page file on it. As Bill has said, once the OS and any program are loaded, they are now "memory resident" in the system memory, so the boot drive speed becomes almost irrelevant, except for many small writes and reads by the page file and other small operations. Those PPro cache files can thus stay in the default location and are easily erased when a project is complete. PPro will automatically recreate them if ever needed again.

Having all other files on the NVMe PCI SSD will provide the fastest performance with PPro, ( i.e. media, project, , and exports).

Some type of large external drive would be recommended for use as an archive of completed projects, for original media, and for general backups.

Report · Feb 21, 2017

It does not have an additional bay. It it's the new Dell XPS 15, it has a larger battery now which occupies the "empty bay" where I could of possibly put the additional SSD.

I we a review in YouTube saying that I could go with the older smaller battery from last years model and have room for an extra SSD. But I kind of like the idea of having the extra battery life.

So so obviously I'm going to use the 1TB PCI SSD that is in it for OS, Programs, and Pagefile.

how i.e. do I set my other storage up? Do I have my media , project files, media cache, and media cache database on the Samsung external SSD?

Im so confused on how to set this all up. I do have a Lacie 4TB external that I am going to put all of my exports and backup stuff on.

Report · Feb 21, 2017

if your projects/media are small enough to fit on the internal 1tb ssd you can use that for everything. that will be the fastest drive and can save you money from having to buy an external ssd. if you need more space or just want to be able to quickly move projects between computers, the samsung t3 offers up to 2tb external ssd to hold your project files & media. you can leave the cache and database on the faster internal 1tb ssd, which would also help keep more free space on the external ssd. if space is really tight on the external ssd, you can set any preview renders to the internal ssd too.

Report · Feb 21, 2017

Yea I won't have really big files. Mostly photos and short videos, maybe 10 minutes max on final export. I guess to save money right now I can hold off on the external T3. I just want to keep my computer running smooth and snappy.

I guess once im done with projects....is there a way to go in and delete all of the media cache and media he database files since I won't need them...?

Report · Feb 21, 2017

based on the 1tb pcie ssd performance numbers you listed earlier, the external samsung t3 is going to be several times slower than the internal pcie ssd. so the reason isn't to save money, but to use a faster ssd. the one you already have...

you can use the "clean" button in the preferences to remove cache files, but it doesn't always get all the files. you can look at the preferences to see the location assigned to the cache and database. adobe staff also posted how to manually delete cache files. its become a big issue since bad cache has been contributing to lots of problems for a long time now.

FAQ: How to clean media cache files?

Report · Feb 21, 2017

Awesome, thanks for the info man!!! I really do appreciate it. I'm pretty computer savvy but new to the whole editing world so this has helped me a lot. I'll just keep track of my exports and after I export the finished projects to ky external. I'll then go in and clear the cache folders and such, to keep the computer running smooth. Thanks again for all the help. You've answered whatvi needed to know!

Report · Feb 18, 2017

Just remember not all USB 3.0 drives and ports are the same. Early I found a fairly good USB drive from PNY and the second buy of them was lousy, I guess they changed the components inside to save money.

If you want a good one here are the significant Sequential read and write results on my Samsung 500 GB T3 on a USB 3.1 interface, a USB 3.0 interface is slightly less but still great.

There probably are other brands now jumping on this type of product but Samsung was first and is well tested.

Report · Feb 18, 2017

Gotcha....so does this sound good....

use my internal SSD 1TB - OS/Apps

external Samsung SSD T3 - cache/project files/

or or since I have a 1TB internal, use that to store project files and such.....?

Then in when I'm done with everything, like finished files...offload to an External 4TB or something....?

Report · Feb 18, 2017

...in my case, I use an external Samsung T1 drive, which is almost the same as the t3 drive, like Bill recommends to provide performance while editing. In addition, I have a cheap USB 3 dock connected to another USB3 port which takes both 2.5" and 3.5" Hard drives in the slots. This allows me to take one of many 3.5" hard drives I bought for cheap, and plug it in like a cartridge for use as a backup drive. I only need labels on them to keep track of what is on each "cartridge"

The 1TB SATA !!I Seagates were going for only $40 a piece and run at almost 200MB/sec. to provide cheap mass storage. Of course, there are better deals now on larger drives...the USB3 dock was only $30 and runs up to 200MB/sec with SSDs plugged in.

The T1s and T3s use whats called "UASP" protocol on the USB3 port to achieve higher than normal speeds....over 400MB/sec., like Bill's test has shown.

It is very important to have the media files you are editing on a fast drive, A slow spinning conventional hard drive will be a "bottleneck" and should only be used for archiving and backups.