Blackmagic Forum

Hi everyone,

I was just wondering: the official list of supported Solid State Drives mentions the Samsung SSD 830 512GB (MZ-7PC512N/AM) as being fast enough for capturing RAW (see http://www.blackmagicdesign.com/support/detail/faqs?sid=27541&pid=27542&os=mac). I was wondering why the 512GB was listed and not the 256GB? Is it slower?

The AnandTech review of the 830 series states the same read/write speeds for the 256 as for the 512GB version, however slower speeds for the 128 and 64GB versions. I bought the 256GB version a week ago, was this a mistake? Maybe somebody here knows or someone from BMD could clarify this?

-Chris.

Your list refers to the support web page but the list in the recently published BMCC Manual is actually more accurate. And the Samsung is no longer on that list. It's been many weeks since this was pointed out to BMD and they still haven't made it a priority to update their support web page. Play it safe and exchange for a Sandisk Extreme 480GB (SDSSDX-480G-G25).

rick.lang wrote:Your list refers to the support web page but the list in the recently published BMCC Manual is actually more accurate. And the Samsung is no longer on that list. It's been many weeks since this was pointed out to BMD and they still haven't made it a priority to update their support web page. Play it safe and exchange for a Sandisk Extreme 480GB (SDSSDX-480G-G25).

Ok, thanks for the info! I will have to exchange it once it's received then. BMD should really update that FAQ page. How much RAW footage will fit on 480GB, 60 mins? Although the price difference will be about £140 pounds, I guess it's better to play it safe and the extra capacity can't hurt.

cschmeer wrote:

rick.lang wrote:Your list refers to the support web page but the list in the recently published BMCC Manual is actually more accurate. And the Samsung is no longer on that list. It's been many weeks since this was pointed out to BMD and they still haven't made it a priority to update their support web page. Play it safe and exchange for a Sandisk Extreme 480GB (SDSSDX-480G-G25).

Ok, thanks for the info! I will have to exchange it once it's received then. BMD should really update that FAQ page. How much RAW footage will fit on 480GB, 60 mins? Although the price difference will be about £140 pounds, I guess it's better to play it safe and the extra capacity can't hurt.

If you shoot 30fps, you may get about 50 to 52 minutes of video and allow some space for the audio files.
If you shoot 25fps, you may get about 60 minutes.
If you shoot 24fps, you may get about 62 minutes.
I'm not sure how much space the separate audio files will take and that will depend on how you are recording of course.

You also shouldn't fill an SSD to capacity (it needs some breathing room to do its internal data management and that's why the Sandisk drive is defined as 480GB rather than the actual 512GB physically present). Of course you also don't want to fill it to capacity as you might lose a beautiful shot when the camera stops recording because its full! Hope a future firmware revision will indicate how many minutes remain on the drive as its recording.

you really should go get a Sandisk Extreme 480GB (SDSSDX-480G-G25).

jasonxinzhou wrote:you really should go get a Sandisk Extreme 480GB (SDSSDX-480G-G25).

Why choose the SanDisk Extreme 480 over the also (listed in the manual) Crucial 512 M4?

Until you have a BMCC in hand, it may make sense to wait to buy a SSD for it.

Prices on SSDs continue to drop, and BMD may revise the list of tested/recommended drives by the time you receive your camera.

I speak from first-hand experience: I bought a OCZ Vertex 3 240GB SSD months ago, which used to be on BMD's list for the Hyperdeck Shuttle, but no longer is because that particular SSD proved to be an unreliable piece of junk. It cost me about $250 back in May. A waste of money.

My advice is: Wait.

When your BMCC finally arrives (!) you can buy a recommended SSD drive locally or have one shipped to you by most dealers 1-3 days relatively inexpensively if you need it right away.

Cheers.

I agree Peter that it's best to wait for off-the-shelf commodities such as SSDs until you either receive the camera or until its shipping in volume and other people confirm a drive you want works well. It's a shame that SSDs seem to be like the snake oil of the late 19th century with wild claims of miraculous cures. Now the last man standing based on comments I've read in forums is the Sandisk Extreme 480GB SSD. And you should reformat (but do not securely erase) it after you have safely transferred the media to your permanent storage and backup. If you wait until needed, you may have other options that are new to the market.

Peter, your drive may not go to waste though as you could repurpose it for use on your computer. That Fusion drive looks interesting if you are running Apple's Mountain Lion: using the OS, you can make one logical volume out of an SSD and a conventional hard disk and then Mountain Lion does all the fancy work to keep your frequently used data on the fast SSD portion of the logical volume and moves things you don't need to the slower hard disk. All in the background!

Oh, well I have already returned the 256GB Samsung and got a SanDisk Extreme 480GB instead. Judging from what I've read so far it seems to be a solid performer.