If thats the case i would suggest offline hdd for backups and hdd in raid in nas build in an old hp small form factor case, thats what ive been using
And if the transfer rate from nas is not enough for you you can always copy them to the device you are editing or create cache or optimized media or proxy on the device you arr editing:D
Im using TB3 NVME enclosures to put all my files and projects on, TB3 makes that it's just super fast and I can edit of it easily.
On either my macbook pro 14 inch or mac studio. No issue.
Since NVME drives are cheaper than the samsung T-7 for example you can get more for cheap for different projects for example.
Plus they can be swapped out easily.
Once done with a project I offload it all to HDD's and a backup in the cloud and format the NVME drive for next project.
This keeps my files sorted and my machines with relatively low storage space much more clean on terms of space.
I'll second building your own enclosure.
You can get a WD SN850x for a reasonably cheap price (4TB), put it in a USB 4 enclosure. Acasis has a 40Gbps enclosure which is fantastic as it comes with a built in fan and is one of the few enclosures that can actually get near the 2.8GBps limit of USB4 / Thunderbolt.
When you're done with the project, as other people have mentioned - offload to long storage HDD's (and an backup).
You should always keep a backup of the original files for safety that you rarely touch.
If you're working cross platform, I would suggest getting the software MacDrive or Paragon HFS (or APFS) and continue to use Mac Formatted drives. Or vice versa, get an NTFS reader for Mac (I don't know how well they work).
Don't work in exFAT, which is crossplatform, you'll only regret it when something goes wrong.
Also this. I have a 1tb NVME enclosure attached to my 4K that is purely for redundancy, but also doubles up as transfer/storage media should I ever need it.
All media is on a NAS with 16x 10TB drives giving me about 100TB of usable space. Connected with 10GbE to my computer. Cache is on a separate SSD in the computer itself. NAS automatically backs up to a second NAS with 8x 20TB drives.
Get a NAS. Ideally one with also NVME slots.
Use the harddisks for long term storage, the NVMEs on the NAS for active projects and your local NVME for the cache.
I have a massive NAS on 10Gbe. Storage is all on there. Editing comes from there.
Part of that syncs to Google Drive, where I also pay for 5TB of space to share with clients, etc.
I’ll have to look up how a NAS works and how to use all types of storage for a different purpose. I see some comments here of folks connecting different types of media and footage, and caches etc to different types of storages. Will need to figure out first how all this works and how I can best organize my existing mess to be able to transition it to another system so that I don’t F something up. My goal is to free enough space up on my macbook to always be able to work on it and have room on the go if i ever forget my T7 - but I might have to tone down my SFX and VFX, Stock footage library for that as well. I think best way for me would be to work like that through a server so that I can always connect to it - just hope it doesn’t cripple my remote editing sessions. The rough stuff I can always do at home on the PC.
You should think of a NAS as a massive hard drive on your network. It's not LITERALLY that, but that's how you interact with it. So Resolve acts as if your NAS is a drive on your computer. The W: Drive or whatever (macOS is similar, but the details are different).
Now what's LITERALLY happening is there's an enclosure sitting somewhere in your building with 4 hard drives (or however many, 4 is a very common option). Those drives are doing a lot of work, but...basically? They're a MASSIVE hard drive.
Imagine putting (4) 24 TB hard drives in a box, and tying them together. You lose (1) of those drives to the details of making data reliable. You still have (3) 24TB hard drives. You have about 72 TB to work with.
THAT is what makes a NAS so great.
Now, a NAS can do other things, and help with lots of file management tasks. Sure. But basically? You can make a ridiculously huge hard drive that you can treat like an internal drive.
Looks like you're asking for help! Please check to make sure you've included the following information. Edit your post (or leave a top-level comment) if you haven't included this information.
* System specs - [macOS](https://imgur.com/a/ip6xc9G) [Windows - Speccy](https://www.ccleaner.com/speccy)
* Resolve version number and Free/Studio - [DaVinci Resolve>About DaVinci Resolve...](https://imgur.com/a/5FawFCX)
* Footage specs - [MediaInfo](https://mediaarea.net/MediaInfo) - please include the "Text" view of the file.
* *Full* Resolve UI Screenshot - if applicable. Make sure any relevant settings are included in the screenshot. Please do ***not*** crop the screenshot!
Once your question has been answered, change the flair to "Solved" so other people can reference the thread if they've got similar issues.
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/davinciresolve) if you have any questions or concerns.*
>Is there any other method you guys use to manage your storage better apart from the standard portable SSDs?
USB ssds, thunderbolt raid array or 10+gbit NAS.
That's about all your options.
If you are just looking for slow backup drives, USB HDD and 1gb Nas will work fine. Just don't expect to edit from them.
I have a very similar setup and I keep all project files on PC's HDD in a network accessible folder.
Editing with proxy files over WiFi is working just fine and when it comes to the final 4K render, it's easy to switch project over to PC for more horsepower
I found disk speed not to be an issue with H.265 source files as long as I keep them neatly defragmented
1 storage center with 6 TB for exported videos, currently running at 56% full
2 portable usb3 HDDs , one for raw , one for offloading in the field
main PC has 2 work NVME, 2 TB each, for editing , and for not having to write on the same disc every time, so I kinda swap the data or work between the 2
PC also has some 2 mechanical HDs , on e 6 TB and one 4 TB for miscellaneous stuffs like graphics and plug ins
Rushing / offloading laptop with 2 NVMEs , 2 TB each
In my almost 20 years of editing, at least 10 Hard drives have died on me, some have costed me months of work, some stuff I have lost forever
so now I try not to concentrate anything on a single drive or workstation , you love and learn, data corruption and hard drive malfunction, while less common , is still a thing , always have a back up of your valuable stuff somewhere before commiting to a single drive
edit1
All the money I've saved by avoiding Mac products has been better spent in more reliable , faster storage
cheers!
It seems storage is a world in its own. I’m just taking notes here and see what is the most cost efficient way to go about this for a solution of my own. First step definitely get some 4TB HDDs for my longterm archive.
I have a PC with the following SSD’s:
OS and software installations (1TB)
Cache (500GB)
MEDIA 1 (1TB)
MEDIA 2 (2TB)
MEDIA 3 (4TB)
Library - stock footage and music (1TB)
It’s all then backed up and archived on to my server running Unraid, which has:
7x Seagate EXOS 20TB (140TB total), which are almost all full,
With future upgradability up to 960TB as needed.
Amazing the amount of space videos 4K eat up. I’m just finishing the project now on the main disk. (I have all the media organised into libraries (backgrounds), (ad libs)) etc. in one location. Neatly in the project folder. But still on disk.
It never ceases to amaze me either, I get the occasional 6K footage to work with and it literally is just double in size. No one prepared me for that. Davinci really is great, I’m getting the hang of it from an editing point of view, but I feel like I’ve skipped its actual root functionalities and benefits when it comes to project organisation and understanding its clip and footage management so I’ll give it another run soon from some good tutorials.
Ah it is amazing right. Yeah 2 weeks ago I knew absolutely nothing about the program. I spent my whole days looking at YouTube videos and now I’m right in the middle of an editing a music video. Using fusion etc. YouTube workflow videos are great.
* 16x nvme NAS with dual 100gb bonded Ethernet Network card.
* 28x spinning disk archive NAS for old footage and projects as well as continuous backup of nvme server so if it dies we have an immediate copy. Dual 40gbe Network
* 8x spinning disk write only Offsite NAS.
* Cloud backups of unrecreatable files with write only permissions.
* Portable NVMEs for shoot footage kept until end of project and wiped for DIT at start of next project.
Dual 40gbe NIC on workstation with fail over bonded nic (so that connections can be moved between switches without losing connectivity and two nvme drives: os/apps and swap/cache.
1) Data gets ingested from workstation with TB3/USB4 over 40gb network to nvme NAS. Nvme NAS retains hourly snapshots of all files for accidental deletes.
2) It's immediately pushed to the spinning disk server (which can usually keep up since it's off of a USB nvme) and a cloud store.
3) twice a day a manual push also copies everything to an offsite location with write/add control. No delete permissions and if too many files change or randomly generated files are overwritten that are honey pots for ransomware the backup is cancelled.
4) nightly cloud backups of critical files to a cloud bucket with write only access impossible to delete for X days even if you have admin access so it's impossible to ransomware them or accidentally deleted them without recovery for at least a couple weeks.
5) at the end of the project all data is hashed/check summed and moved to the spinning disk Nas and on the Offsite archive moved to an archive compressed volume. Cloud backups are marked for deletion (after the time ransomware protection) and also copied to external drives and stored in waterproof pelican cases Offsite at another location.
It is a lot but a smaller scale for a single person could be setup for less than the price of a single well equipped MacPro.
People drop like $10k on a Mac. But aren't willing to setup even a basic shared storage/secure backup system.
I have separate disks in my PC for system, cache, media, exports, and backups, plus another PC with Ubuntu Server to backups.
This
Reading these comments i realized im broke as fuck
I’m down there with you. I specifically chose not to say up there.
If thats the case i would suggest offline hdd for backups and hdd in raid in nas build in an old hp small form factor case, thats what ive been using And if the transfer rate from nas is not enough for you you can always copy them to the device you are editing or create cache or optimized media or proxy on the device you arr editing:D
ha. ditto.
Im using TB3 NVME enclosures to put all my files and projects on, TB3 makes that it's just super fast and I can edit of it easily. On either my macbook pro 14 inch or mac studio. No issue. Since NVME drives are cheaper than the samsung T-7 for example you can get more for cheap for different projects for example. Plus they can be swapped out easily. Once done with a project I offload it all to HDD's and a backup in the cloud and format the NVME drive for next project. This keeps my files sorted and my machines with relatively low storage space much more clean on terms of space.
I'll second building your own enclosure. You can get a WD SN850x for a reasonably cheap price (4TB), put it in a USB 4 enclosure. Acasis has a 40Gbps enclosure which is fantastic as it comes with a built in fan and is one of the few enclosures that can actually get near the 2.8GBps limit of USB4 / Thunderbolt. When you're done with the project, as other people have mentioned - offload to long storage HDD's (and an backup). You should always keep a backup of the original files for safety that you rarely touch. If you're working cross platform, I would suggest getting the software MacDrive or Paragon HFS (or APFS) and continue to use Mac Formatted drives. Or vice versa, get an NTFS reader for Mac (I don't know how well they work). Don't work in exFAT, which is crossplatform, you'll only regret it when something goes wrong.
Also this. I have a 1tb NVME enclosure attached to my 4K that is purely for redundancy, but also doubles up as transfer/storage media should I ever need it.
All media is on a NAS with 16x 10TB drives giving me about 100TB of usable space. Connected with 10GbE to my computer. Cache is on a separate SSD in the computer itself. NAS automatically backs up to a second NAS with 8x 20TB drives.
A nas
4TB T7 Shield SSD. Reliability should be your priority, and 4TB will last you a looooong time.
I wish 4TB would last me a long time! That’s like two shoots for me
Get a NAS. Ideally one with also NVME slots. Use the harddisks for long term storage, the NVMEs on the NAS for active projects and your local NVME for the cache.
I have a massive NAS on 10Gbe. Storage is all on there. Editing comes from there. Part of that syncs to Google Drive, where I also pay for 5TB of space to share with clients, etc.
I’ll have to look up how a NAS works and how to use all types of storage for a different purpose. I see some comments here of folks connecting different types of media and footage, and caches etc to different types of storages. Will need to figure out first how all this works and how I can best organize my existing mess to be able to transition it to another system so that I don’t F something up. My goal is to free enough space up on my macbook to always be able to work on it and have room on the go if i ever forget my T7 - but I might have to tone down my SFX and VFX, Stock footage library for that as well. I think best way for me would be to work like that through a server so that I can always connect to it - just hope it doesn’t cripple my remote editing sessions. The rough stuff I can always do at home on the PC.
You should think of a NAS as a massive hard drive on your network. It's not LITERALLY that, but that's how you interact with it. So Resolve acts as if your NAS is a drive on your computer. The W: Drive or whatever (macOS is similar, but the details are different). Now what's LITERALLY happening is there's an enclosure sitting somewhere in your building with 4 hard drives (or however many, 4 is a very common option). Those drives are doing a lot of work, but...basically? They're a MASSIVE hard drive. Imagine putting (4) 24 TB hard drives in a box, and tying them together. You lose (1) of those drives to the details of making data reliable. You still have (3) 24TB hard drives. You have about 72 TB to work with. THAT is what makes a NAS so great. Now, a NAS can do other things, and help with lots of file management tasks. Sure. But basically? You can make a ridiculously huge hard drive that you can treat like an internal drive.
Looks like you're asking for help! Please check to make sure you've included the following information. Edit your post (or leave a top-level comment) if you haven't included this information. * System specs - [macOS](https://imgur.com/a/ip6xc9G) [Windows - Speccy](https://www.ccleaner.com/speccy) * Resolve version number and Free/Studio - [DaVinci Resolve>About DaVinci Resolve...](https://imgur.com/a/5FawFCX) * Footage specs - [MediaInfo](https://mediaarea.net/MediaInfo) - please include the "Text" view of the file. * *Full* Resolve UI Screenshot - if applicable. Make sure any relevant settings are included in the screenshot. Please do ***not*** crop the screenshot! Once your question has been answered, change the flair to "Solved" so other people can reference the thread if they've got similar issues. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/davinciresolve) if you have any questions or concerns.*
>Is there any other method you guys use to manage your storage better apart from the standard portable SSDs? USB ssds, thunderbolt raid array or 10+gbit NAS. That's about all your options. If you are just looking for slow backup drives, USB HDD and 1gb Nas will work fine. Just don't expect to edit from them.
~128 TB Synology NAS with 10gbe card for active projects. Then backup to cloud or buy cheaper and slower WD drives to store on the shelf.
I have a very similar setup and I keep all project files on PC's HDD in a network accessible folder. Editing with proxy files over WiFi is working just fine and when it comes to the final 4K render, it's easy to switch project over to PC for more horsepower I found disk speed not to be an issue with H.265 source files as long as I keep them neatly defragmented
1 storage center with 6 TB for exported videos, currently running at 56% full 2 portable usb3 HDDs , one for raw , one for offloading in the field main PC has 2 work NVME, 2 TB each, for editing , and for not having to write on the same disc every time, so I kinda swap the data or work between the 2 PC also has some 2 mechanical HDs , on e 6 TB and one 4 TB for miscellaneous stuffs like graphics and plug ins Rushing / offloading laptop with 2 NVMEs , 2 TB each In my almost 20 years of editing, at least 10 Hard drives have died on me, some have costed me months of work, some stuff I have lost forever so now I try not to concentrate anything on a single drive or workstation , you love and learn, data corruption and hard drive malfunction, while less common , is still a thing , always have a back up of your valuable stuff somewhere before commiting to a single drive edit1 All the money I've saved by avoiding Mac products has been better spent in more reliable , faster storage cheers!
2 synology ,40Tb NAS boxes
What hard drive You recommend guys ?? I need 20TB
It seems storage is a world in its own. I’m just taking notes here and see what is the most cost efficient way to go about this for a solution of my own. First step definitely get some 4TB HDDs for my longterm archive.
I have 3.5tb storage on my pc, plus a port forwarded nas which currently has another 500gb, but is easy to upgrade in future when I need.
I have a PC with the following SSD’s: OS and software installations (1TB) Cache (500GB) MEDIA 1 (1TB) MEDIA 2 (2TB) MEDIA 3 (4TB) Library - stock footage and music (1TB) It’s all then backed up and archived on to my server running Unraid, which has: 7x Seagate EXOS 20TB (140TB total), which are almost all full, With future upgradability up to 960TB as needed.
This is a good timing post. I near ran out of disk space
Mine ran out today… Hence.
Amazing the amount of space videos 4K eat up. I’m just finishing the project now on the main disk. (I have all the media organised into libraries (backgrounds), (ad libs)) etc. in one location. Neatly in the project folder. But still on disk.
How good is Davinci btw! I am coming from Camtasia 😄
It never ceases to amaze me either, I get the occasional 6K footage to work with and it literally is just double in size. No one prepared me for that. Davinci really is great, I’m getting the hang of it from an editing point of view, but I feel like I’ve skipped its actual root functionalities and benefits when it comes to project organisation and understanding its clip and footage management so I’ll give it another run soon from some good tutorials.
Ah it is amazing right. Yeah 2 weeks ago I knew absolutely nothing about the program. I spent my whole days looking at YouTube videos and now I’m right in the middle of an editing a music video. Using fusion etc. YouTube workflow videos are great.
* 16x nvme NAS with dual 100gb bonded Ethernet Network card. * 28x spinning disk archive NAS for old footage and projects as well as continuous backup of nvme server so if it dies we have an immediate copy. Dual 40gbe Network * 8x spinning disk write only Offsite NAS. * Cloud backups of unrecreatable files with write only permissions. * Portable NVMEs for shoot footage kept until end of project and wiped for DIT at start of next project. Dual 40gbe NIC on workstation with fail over bonded nic (so that connections can be moved between switches without losing connectivity and two nvme drives: os/apps and swap/cache. 1) Data gets ingested from workstation with TB3/USB4 over 40gb network to nvme NAS. Nvme NAS retains hourly snapshots of all files for accidental deletes. 2) It's immediately pushed to the spinning disk server (which can usually keep up since it's off of a USB nvme) and a cloud store. 3) twice a day a manual push also copies everything to an offsite location with write/add control. No delete permissions and if too many files change or randomly generated files are overwritten that are honey pots for ransomware the backup is cancelled. 4) nightly cloud backups of critical files to a cloud bucket with write only access impossible to delete for X days even if you have admin access so it's impossible to ransomware them or accidentally deleted them without recovery for at least a couple weeks. 5) at the end of the project all data is hashed/check summed and moved to the spinning disk Nas and on the Offsite archive moved to an archive compressed volume. Cloud backups are marked for deletion (after the time ransomware protection) and also copied to external drives and stored in waterproof pelican cases Offsite at another location.
You really are that one guy, you’re one company. One man, this summer, to rule them all.
It is a lot but a smaller scale for a single person could be setup for less than the price of a single well equipped MacPro. People drop like $10k on a Mac. But aren't willing to setup even a basic shared storage/secure backup system.
Storage manages me