How do I set up a basic network for FCP?

Hi. I have 2 G5 2.5 quads and may soon be getting a third as I have a 26 part 1 hour drama heading my way. In advance I would like to find out how to set up an effective, efficient system to manage all the media that will be coming in. In other words to set up an efficient small network so that media can be captured on one machine and easily accessed by the others. Can anyone help or point to recent articles written about this. I searched in the FAQ section and didn't see much.

Alan.

Some tools that may give you some ideias...

GALLERY

SIENNA

Rui Barros
Editor Colorist Trainer
Lisbon, Portugal
RTP Post-Production
Apple Certified Trainer FCP 7
Apple Certified Pro FCP 7

Alan,

There are many choices available to set up your "mini network". It all comes down to how much you want to spend and what kind of performance you need.

On the high end there's Apple's "X-SAN". It can scale from three systems to 64 systems with many, many terrabytes of data, but it's NOT cheap and a little complex to set up.

On the low (or simple to use) end, there's solutions like Facilis' "Terrablock". Just do a google search for "FCP SAN" and you'll turn up plenty of information. The big differance in price is between "volume based" file systems and "file based". Once you dig deeper, you'll understand. If you workflow can handle the "volume based" limitations, that may be a cheap solution for you.

This is a very popular question, since network based workflows seem to be where editing is headed.

Good luck.

Mark

Thanks guys,

Will follow up on those suggestions.