Control/Dimming EOS Harddrive

[Nobrakes15]

Can you put a SSD in an EOS or an ION to replace the internal hard drive? Our HD has gone bad and ETC will send us a new one but I think cloning it to a SSD and dropping that in would make more sense in the long run... comments, concerns?

 

[DuckJordan]

That would be a question for etc, I doubt the drivers for an add are in the eos xp embedded, (they tend to remove the ones you aren't likely to use)

 

[techieman33]

The only reason for an ssd would be to speed up the boot time, other than that it would be wasted on a console. A rotating drive would be more reliable though, most ssd drives only have a 2 or 3 year lifespan.

 

[zmb]

A rotating drive would be more reliable though, most ssd drives only have a 2 or 3 year lifespan.

Where did the 2 to 3 year estimate come from? In theory, a SSD would last longer since it has no moving parts.

That would be a question for etc, I doubt the drivers for an add are in the eos xp embedded, (they tend to remove the ones you aren't likely to use)

Any internal SSD would just work assuming it used the same connections as the only harddrive.

 

[jglodeklights]

The only reason for an ssd would be to speed up the boot time, other than that it would be wasted on a console. A rotating drive would be more reliable though, most ssd drives only have a 2 or 3 year lifespan.

Ummmm... an SSD is basically a super high capacity flash memory device. In other words, not much different than an SD card, CF card or RAM. I have CF cards from 2003 that still function properly. One of my cards from 2005 was run through the washer and dryer and also still functions. I have SmartMedia cards (!!) that are from the 90's that even function. The entire point of SSD is not just the additional speed, but the LACK of moving parts to fail or to cause damage to the storage media during a shock event.

 

[traxman25]

The only reason for an ssd would be to speed up the boot time, other than that it would be wasted on a console. A rotating drive would be more reliable though, most ssd drives only have a 2 or 3 year lifespan.

Actually with the lack of moving parts SSDs are significantly more reliable. That is the main reason they are going into a quality laptop computer. It is possible to kill a hard drive while it is off from shock and vibration, so if a console gets moved around a lot an SSD is an excellent solution (rentals and road shows).

ETC will install an SSD drive. I have no idea what kind of money you're looking at, certainly a lot more than a $300 drive. I did see an article that the last group of consoles PRG purchased they purchased with SSDs to eliminate hard drive damage due to vibration. I've also heard tell that all GIO consoles come with SSD, but I've not seen that in writing.

 

[cpf]

An SSD would be a possible option for reliability, but you should talk to ETC first.

You can get a more-than-adequate sized SSD for $30-$60 bucks: a few gigabytes for XP, maybe a couple for the console software, barely 1 for all the show files you'll ever save, some space for saved updates, and lots left over for games to play during slow shows Installation is a snap, the drive will come with an adaptor to make it fit a full-sized HDD bay if required, and you just clone across.

The only concern would be how well XP plays with SSDs (not well at best), hence the ask-ETC comment, they might have some tips or drivers or tweaks to perform to maximize performance and lifetime of the SSD.

 

[starksk]

Hi Nobrakes15,

While it is possible for a custom built console to have a Solid State Drive, it is not something that we typically do because of the concerns that cpf voiced. SSDs were simply not designed to work well with XP. The concerns come into play about proper driver support as well as the nature of SSDs and how the data is stored. There have been reports from the computing world that repeated read/writes to the same sector over and over again can cause that sector of the SSD to fail prematurely. Unlike Windows 7 (or later), Windows XP has no provision to move the file location on the disk sectors to avoid this issue. Therefore, because the same locations are being read and written to within the OS, you may see premature failures.

Yes, it is true that Gio consoles use a SSD instead of a magnetic spinning disc. Gio consoles also use Windows 7 Embedded instead of Windows XP Embedded as the underlying operating system.

The only benefit that I could see in switching HDD types is in the extreme cases of the console being subjected to lots of bouncing/physical abuse. However, I would not recommend going with a SSD over a standard spinning disc drive in Eos/Ion/Element consoles in 99.998% of use cases.

 

[tayklor]

I'd say it's not worth it. The processor in the Eos, Ion and the like are, by modern PC standards, slow, but the Eos software has very minimal system requirements. Moreover, the Eos software runs almost entirely in RAM except to save show files and boot up.

EDIT: I missed that Kirk already answered this one..

 

[z2oo]

We just did this with an Ion last summer. Works like a charm!

 

[tdrga]

We just did this with an Ion last summer. Works like a charm!

Was this an ETC retrofit or on your own? I would be worried about long-term stability from the issues described above.

-Todd

 

[SteveB]

We just did this with an Ion last summer. Works like a charm!

Why ?. Did the HD fail or was there another reason ?.

 

[z2oo]

Was this an ETC retrofit or on your own?

I wasn't there when it happened, but I believe that it was in-house. Not exactly sure, but our IT department is closely linked with our theatre/tech program. It's a fairly easy swap as far as I know. (Don't actually listen to me - just speculating on this one)

Why ?. Did the HD fail or was there another reason ?.

I believe that the Ion started blue screening in the middle of either programming or a tech... Again, not sure on the details, but it was determined that the HDD was the root of the problem, and that the SSD had solved whatever was wrong.

 

[zmb]

I believe that the Ion started blue screening in the middle of either programming or a tech... Again, not sure on the details, but it was determined that the HDD was the root of the problem, and that the SSD had solved whatever was wrong.

Any faulty drive, either SSD or HDD, will easily make Windows blue screen if it is defective. A new HDD would have fixed that too. Windows 7 will interface with a hard drive to predict if it is close to failure and warn you very well. Do Windows 7 based consoles (Gio) allow this to work?