ATOCH SSD

Got something to discuss that's not about Blackmagic products? Then check out the Off-Topic forum!
  • Author
  • Message
Offline

Daniel Retz

  • Posts: 4
  • Joined: Wed Jun 28, 2017 5:59 pm

ATOCH SSD

PostWed Aug 09, 2017 3:08 pm

guy.pinto wrote:Hi,

I'm using my Ursa Mini Pro with the Atoch C2S (CFast to SSD adapter) and Samsung 850 Pro SSD's.
After upgrading to firmware v4.4 the camera is dropping frames only on CFast slot 1. The frames are being dropped even with lower CODECs, something that never happened in the past even not when recorded 4.6K RAW.

Slot 2 is working fine as usual.

Tried to check with other SSD's - still drops.
Tried connecting the SSD's to slot number 2 on the Atoch C2S and the cable to CFast slot 1 on the camera - still dropping frames, so it's not the Atoch.

What do you suggest?


Any news on that subject? I'm facing the same problem.

Haven't tried slot 2 yet.

Mini Ursa Pro + Atoch 2 + Samsung 850 pro 512gb
Offline

guy.pinto

  • Posts: 10
  • Joined: Fri Jun 30, 2017 8:31 am

Re: Camera 4.4 Update drops frames

PostFri Aug 11, 2017 7:22 pm

Daniel Retz wrote:
guy.pinto wrote:Hi,

I'm using my Ursa Mini Pro with the Atoch C2S (CFast to SSD adapter) and Samsung 850 Pro SSD's.
After upgrading to firmware v4.4 the camera is dropping frames only on CFast slot 1. The frames are being dropped even with lower CODECs, something that never happened in the past even not when recorded 4.6K RAW.

Slot 2 is working fine as usual.

Tried to check with other SSD's - still drops.
Tried connecting the SSD's to slot number 2 on the Atoch C2S and the cable to CFast slot 1 on the camera - still dropping frames, so it's not the Atoch.

What do you suggest?


Any news on that subject? I'm facing the same problem.

Haven't tried slot 2 yet.

Mini Ursa Pro + Atoch 2 + Samsung 850 pro 512gb


I have downgraded to v 4.3 and still frame drops. It has nothing to do with the v4.4 firmware.
Frames are being dropped with slot 2 as well, but less often (with my luck I guess I'm dealing with two simultaneous problems) . I decided to check all my 850 Pro SSD's.

All my Samsung 850 Pro SSD's (8 of them, bought from various places over the last past year), show inconsistent transfer rate by several benchmark softwares (on Linux and Windows 10). None of them keeps sequential write speeds above 450MB/s as advertized and sometimes speed drops even below 350MB/s. No wonder the camera is dropping frames. Is it normal behavior of the 850 Pro's? Does Cfast behave the same?
Offline
User avatar

Robert Niessner

  • Posts: 4946
  • Joined: Thu Feb 21, 2013 9:51 am
  • Location: Graz, Austria

Re: Camera 4.4 Update

PostSat Aug 12, 2017 9:17 am

http://www.anandtech.com/show/8216/sams ... e-3d-era/7

"The first set of graphs shows the performance data over the entire 2000 second test period. In these charts you'll notice an early period of very high performance followed by a sharp dropoff. What you're seeing in that case is the drive allocating new blocks from its spare area, then eventually using up all free blocks and having to perform a read-modify-write for all subsequent writes (write amplification goes up, performance goes down)."
Source

Austrian company Angelbird has dedicated AV SSDs for continuous recording. Those SSDs make use of larger over-provisioning. This means that you have less free capacity and more hidden space dedicated to improving the write performance.

https://www.angelbird.com/category/av-modules-79/

All modules are certified by Blackmagic.

You could try to use Samsungs Magician Tool for increasing over-provisioning and test if this helps with dropped frames.
Saying "Thx for help!" is not a crime.
--------------------------------
Robert Niessner
LAUFBILDkommission
Graz / Austria
--------------------------------
Blackmagic Camera Blog (German):
http://laufbildkommission.wordpress.com

Read the blog in English via Google Translate:
http://tinyurl.com/pjf6a3m
Offline

guy.pinto

  • Posts: 10
  • Joined: Fri Jun 30, 2017 8:31 am

Re: Camera 4.4 Update

PostMon Aug 14, 2017 10:50 pm

Robert Niessner wrote:anandtech.com/show/8216/samsung-ssd-850-pro-128gb-256gb-1tb-review-enter-the-3d-era/7

"The first set of graphs shows the performance data over the entire 2000 second test period. In these charts you'll notice an early period of very high performance followed by a sharp dropoff. What you're seeing in that case is the drive allocating new blocks from its spare area, then eventually using up all free blocks and having to perform a read-modify-write for all subsequent writes (write amplification goes up, performance goes down)."
anandtech.com/show/6433/intel-ssd-dc-s3700-200gb-review/3]Source

Austrian company Angelbird has dedicated AV SSDs for continuous recording. Those SSDs make use of larger over-provisioning. This means that you have less free capacity and more hidden space dedicated to improving the write performance.

angelbird.com/category/av-modules-79/

All modules are certified by Blackmagic.

You could try to use Samsungs Magician Tool for increasing over-provisioning and test if this helps with dropped frames.


Hi Robert,

I know sequential writes does not effected by over provisioning. And after formatting the media in the camera, the data is being written sequentially, right? Any way, I'll try to test over provisioning further.

After reading your link and (luts) more, I found that deep/ secure format the drives maybe solves the dropped frames problem, I formated 2 SSD's and succeeded to capture 4.6K RAW 60fps using two SSD's simultaneously!
It introduces two new problems: 1) It takes hours to secure format SSD's (I use several of them every day), and 2) It shortening significantly the SSD life span.

I guess Cfast cards should work the same, have any of you Cfast users encountering similar problems when recording in high bandwidth video like RAW/ or Prores 444 in slow motion?

Please, can someone from Blackmagic share his profesionale input about that?
Offline
User avatar

Robert Niessner

  • Posts: 4946
  • Joined: Thu Feb 21, 2013 9:51 am
  • Location: Graz, Austria

Re: Camera 4.4 Update

PostWed Aug 16, 2017 7:52 pm

guy.pinto wrote:I know sequential writes does not effected by over provisioning. And after formatting the media in the camera, the data is being written sequentially, right? Any way, I'll try to test over provisioning further.

After reading your link and (luts) more, I found that deep/ secure format the drives maybe solves the dropped frames problem, I formated 2 SSD's and succeeded to capture 4.6K RAW 60fps using two SSD's simultaneously!
It introduces two new problems: 1) It takes hours to secure format SSD's (I use several of them every day), and 2) It shortening significantly the SSD life span.

I guess Cfast cards should work the same, have any of you Cfast users encountering similar problems when recording in high bandwidth video like RAW/ or Prores 444 in slow motion?

Please, can someone from Blackmagic share his profesionale input about that?


We've discussed and successfully tried out over provisioning here:
viewtopic.php?p=151024#p151024
viewtopic.php?f=2&t=24019#p151559

And sequential vs. random write here:
viewtopic.php?p=151824#p151824

In short: Recording to ProRes would be sequential write, recording of RAW DNG files is more like random write because lots of small files are written.

Regarding CFast:
No, I haven't encountered any problems with my CFast cards yet.
I have two Lexar 3400 256GB and one Transcend XF650 256GB.
Saying "Thx for help!" is not a crime.
--------------------------------
Robert Niessner
LAUFBILDkommission
Graz / Austria
--------------------------------
Blackmagic Camera Blog (German):
http://laufbildkommission.wordpress.com

Read the blog in English via Google Translate:
http://tinyurl.com/pjf6a3m
Offline

guy.pinto

  • Posts: 10
  • Joined: Fri Jun 30, 2017 8:31 am

Re: Camera 4.4 Update

PostWed Aug 16, 2017 10:44 pm

Robert Niessner wrote:
guy.pinto wrote:I know sequential writes does not effected by over provisioning. And after formatting the media in the camera, the data is being written sequentially, right? Any way, I'll try to test over provisioning further.

After reading your link and (luts) more, I found that deep/ secure format the drives maybe solves the dropped frames problem, I formated 2 SSD's and succeeded to capture 4.6K RAW 60fps using two SSD's simultaneously!
It introduces two new problems: 1) It takes hours to secure format SSD's (I use several of them every day), and 2) It shortening significantly the SSD life span.

I guess Cfast cards should work the same, have any of you Cfast users encountering similar problems when recording in high bandwidth video like RAW/ or Prores 444 in slow motion?

Please, can someone from Blackmagic share his profesionale input about that?


We've discussed and successfully tried out over provisioning here:
viewtopic.php?p=151024#p151024
viewtopic.php?f=2&t=24019#p151559

And sequential vs. random write here:
viewtopic.php?p=151824#p151824

In short: Recording to ProRes would be sequential write, recording of RAW DNG files is more like random write because lots of small files are written.

Regarding CFast:
No, I haven't encountered any problems with my CFast cards yet.
I have two Lexar 3400 256GB and one Transcend XF650 256GB.


Thank you for all that info.

So if I understand correctly, I should "ATA Secure Erase" every time before recording RAW (random write is more challenging). Should I leave some free space for over provisioning too? or ATA SE is enough?

What about Prores (sequential write), should I ATA SE /OP or both?

Is the HFS+ journaling creating overhead compared to the more simple exFAT?
I'm using linux to format HFS+ (mkfs.hfsplus), so what's the recommended journaling size? What's the allocation block size? I guess it's different for RAW (small files) compared to MOV's big ones.
Partition should be GPT or MBR?
Fascinating.

And lastly, how come CFast does not suffer from those problems? it's the same type of memory, the same interface, and slower compared to Samsung's 850 pro SSD.

Return to Off-Topic

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: Peter Chamberlain and 17 guests