"Disk Too Slow" - simple hidden causes

[zoolane]

You may want to create a new "user" for capturing, with nothing loaded in the task bar, or running in the background.

Sometimes you have to go back to basics. Start by turning off "indexing" for each disk in Windows CONTROL PANEL. Windows turns this on by default when you install a new drive. "Indexing" is a Windows background task that catologs the files on your hard drive for faster searches.

Go into TASK MANAGER (Ctrl-Alt-Del) and take a look at what PROCESSES are taking CPU power. Do you need all of them???

For instance, "aaCenter.exe" is an example of an ASUS motherboard program intended for power management, but it can be responsible for 30% to 50% of your CPU's usage. If you don't recognize a PROCESS (program), look it up on the internet - it could be a virus, malware, or trojan.

Shut down VIRUS SCANNERS. You don't need data from your camera being inspected for trojan horses.

If you use Windows, re-assign the SWAP FILE to a seperate drive other than "DRIVE C" or your Project File drive. Use a seperate, fast, state of the art drive if you can.

Adding more than 3.5 gig of RAM to a 32 bit Operating System generally does no good, because the operating system cannot address it. You must upgrade to a 64 bit Operating System for Windows to use more than 3.5 gigs of RAM.

Enter BIOS config during computer bootup and DISABLE "SPEED STEP" and "C1E" in the CPU or Power Management menu. "Speed Step" is used to throttle back the CPU multiplier, while "C1E" is designed to throttle back individual cores of dual and quad core processors during idle or low CPU usage. This is the reason your CPU indicates a slower speed when idle.

A hard disk or RAID system that uses an MBR (Master Boot Record) table is limited to 2 TERABYTES in size.

If you use RAID 5, don't forget to use a 32k disk offset, and 128k "stripes." This can improve troughput 5 to 10 times.

A "RAID 10" array, using 4 hard disks, is one of the most efficient storage configurations for video editing.

The SAMSUNG "SpinPoint," SATA, 1-Terabyte drive is one of the best hard drive choices for fast, efficient, high throughput read/write intensive applications such as video editing, especially with their 32mb buffer. These 7200 RPM drives have higher transfer rates than some higher RPM drives, yet currently sell for just over $100.

Finally, but most important, FORMAT your work drive(s) for a 32k or 64k cluster size. Bigger is better. Having your computer use CPU power to compute and slice mult-megabyte video files into 4k blocks (clusters) makes no sense. 4 k clusters (NTFS FORMAT default) may be efficient for a word processing program, but not for video files.

[SRsupport]

All the vodoo in the world can't stop disk too slow at the moment.
No matter how much tweaking one does.
This has been proven over and over again.

This problem happens on system which captured perfectly fine with other versions of Edius.
Systems exhibiting this problem capture fine use moviemaker, vegas, premiere and any micky mouse free capture utility you can find on the web.

But your post can help some people looking for some extra performance.

[merlinthegray]

This disk too slow message thread seams to be taking up a lot of posts in the forum. Switch to native HDV file import rather than going through the software HQ codec - and I bet you don't see the message. I honestly believe the problem is in the processing power needed to decode the m2t steam into avi - have the engineers messed with the codec with this update as I never got it with 4.52c. Is there some buffer that overflows becausre the processing can't output faster than the firewire pushes it in. Come on an ultrascsi320 drive or a sata2 drive will eat the video stream with room to spare - drive too slow no poor decoding algorithms more likely - like you say any other nle input from hdv handles the conversion without such errors. Come on GV admit the truth.

[DigitalDave]

Originally Posted by merlinthegray

This disk too slow message thread seams to be taking up a lot of posts in the forum. Switch to native HDV file import rather than going through the software HQ codec - and I bet you don't see the message. I honestly believe the problem is in the processing power needed to decode the m2t steam into avi.

The reason that there have been so many posts is that too many people have posted well meaning magic cures that in the main are totally naff! I have, smugly, not eluded to this trap having established that what works best for me, (APART FROM CAPTURING IN 3.61) has not worked consistently for others.
FACT- the error occurs with SD firewire capture. (which blows your theory out of the water)
FACT- As Steve has stated, the same system using any other capture tool does not show the message.
FACT- to date the engineers have not located what got broke in 4.61 and is still broke in 5*

It continues to be a 24 carat PIA....as am I !!!

DD

[kruzer]

Oh, man... that's gotta be it !
Not use the AVI capture. I was wondering about why am suddenly having AVI files and not m2t after my captures!
Damn!

This makes a lot of sense and am going to try it tomorrow.
So far anything I've tried didn't work.
thanks for the tip :)
I'll make a report if it worked.

cheers

[Stereodesign]

On Thursday last week I attended the GV Edius 5 Roadshow as asked a rep if they had found a cause for, and fixed, the "disk too slow" problem.
He said that they had identified the cause and that it was only on a few machines with ASUS MOBO (even though they were approved boards), and that a beta patch had been circulated internally that fixed the error but as v5.0 was due to be launched and this had the patch built in GV were not going to make the patch available.
He said that GV UK had been able to re-create the error, Japan were aware as to what was causing it, and the problem was not as widespread as was made out.

[skier-hughes]

Originally Posted by Stereodesign

On Thursday last week I attended the GV Edius 5 Roadshow as asked a rep if they had found a cause for, and fixed, the "disk too slow" problem.
He said that they had identified the cause and that it was only on a few machines with ASUS MOBO (even though they were approved boards), and that a beta patch had been circulated internally that fixed the error but as v5.0 was due to be launched and this had the patch built in GV were not going to make the patch available.
He said that GV UK had been able to re-create the error, Japan were aware as to what was causing it, and the problem was not as widespread as was made out.

Ho Ho Ho

And they'll be telling us Father Xmas isn't real next.


Gigabyte Mobo in mine.

[pjsssss]

Originally Posted by Stereodesign

On Thursday last week I attended the GV Edius 5 Roadshow as asked a rep if they had found a cause for, and fixed, the "disk too slow" problem.
He said that they had identified the cause and that it was only on a few machines with ASUS MOBO (even though they were approved boards), and that a beta patch had been circulated internally that fixed the error but as v5.0 was due to be launched and this had the patch built in GV were not going to make the patch available.
He said that GV UK had been able to re-create the error, Japan were aware as to what was causing it, and the problem was not as widespread as was made out.

I hate to say it but that is total BS. I would like to know the name of the person that gave that info (PM me if possible. Do not put it on the regular forum!) because it is not accurate at all.

[Martin_Gleeson]

Originally Posted by kruzer

Oh, man... that's gotta be it !
Not use the AVI capture. I was wondering about why am suddenly having AVI files and not m2t after my captures!
Damn!

Afraid not. Capturing to M2T also give the problem.

Originally Posted by Stereodesign

On Thursday last week I attended the GV Edius 5 Roadshow as asked a rep if they had found a cause for, and fixed, the "disk too slow" problem.
He said that they had identified the cause and that it was only on a few machines with ASUS MOBO (even though they were approved boards), and that a beta patch had been circulated internally that fixed the error but as v5.0 was due to be launched and this had the patch built in GV were not going to make the patch available.
He said that GV UK had been able to re-create the error, Japan were aware as to what was causing it, and the problem was not as widespread as was made out.

Afraid not again again: Also happens (more actually) on my ABIT board.

There are multiple problems with Capture in Edius, this is not the only one. The real heartbreaker for me is that it splits files when it shouldn't.

I just started using HDV Split and that captures much better than Edius. Batch Capture in Edius has been bad since day 1.

Finally, why doesn't switching off italics work for me in this post!

Martin

[Stereodesign]

We think there has been some cross wires about the information you have been given.

Care to explain a bit more?