After several months of debugging, it looks like the newest and fastest Mac Pros have serious issues with the Final Share SAN system. For whatever reason, the Mac Pro keeps disconnecting itself from the SAN, usually at the end of a render, though it can happen when launching FCP, launching a project that uses the SAN or a myriad of other reasons.
It started out happening once in a while but it's at the point now where it has really put a crimp in our feature documentary and causing delays in deliveries to our client. Because it's so unstable, I'm actually going to move the entire project to a local SAN for the remainder of the project through completion.
All evidence points directly at Apple for causing the issues with something in the latest Mac Pros. Unfortunately I just can't wait any longer for a solution and will be looking to bring in another local 8TB RAID to complete the job. We'll decide at a later date whether to keep or replace the entire SAN system.
To paraphrase a famous author, "I have seen the future of shared storage and his name is Ethernet."
Last month we invested in the new Final Share system from MaxxDigital and after some tweaking, we now have 16TB of shared storage supported a high definition workflow with 6 workstations all running Apple's ProRes HQ in high definition, both 720p and 1080i. And actually it's not "workstations" in the traditional sense of the word, since we're running ethernet, we can connect any Mac computer to the array.
So in our case, we have three Final Cut Pro desktop workstations and three iMac's all connected. In our testing today we configured the three FCP workstations to capture approx. 3 hours of 720 and 1080i ProRes HQ material each. As that was happening, all three iMacs were playing back 20+ minute clips in Quicktime Player in a loop. After all the capturing, we had all three FCP workstations set up with 90 minute timeline playing in a loop while the iMacs kept playing their clips. We left it all alone for several hours and all way still playing. 6 streams of high definition from one storage array and all via simple ethernet cable!
We plan to use the iMacs both to allow Producers to review footage immediately upon capture and also for Assistant Editors working on upcoming series. Once the footage is in the system, anybody can access it at any time and since it's not Fibre Channel, I don't have to invest in top of the line desktop editing systems for the assists.
Watch for a full article on this system coming up shortly, but wow, this thing really works and it's really affordable!
Professional Video Editor, Producer, Director since 1990.
Credits include multiple Emmys, Tellys, Aurora and CableAce Awards.
Owner / Operator of Biscardi Creative Media, a full service video and film production company with about 65% of our work in HDTV. The show you know us best for is "Good Eats" on the Food Network. I developed the HD Post workflow and we also create all the animations for the series.
Favorite pastime is cooking with pizza on the grill one of my specialties. Each Christmas Eve we serve the Feast of the Seven Fishes, a traditional Italian seafood meal with approx. 30 items on the menu.
If I wasn't in video production I would either own a restaurant or a movie theater.
