Hard drive space disappearing....

[swendl]

Why is my hard drive space disappearing? I have a Casablanca Solitaire running SmartEdit 4.0A. Recently, we've noticed that our hard drive remaining space is disappearing without any known cause. The amount of video on the system has not increased, but the "busy" percentile has. Efforts to delete material have not improved the situation. Previously, with the amount of footage we have currently on the system, we would stay in the 60-70% capacity range. Now we can't get below 80%. Help!

CPU Pentium 4
Memory - 1024 mb
HD - 280 GB
Sys - 11.7 gb
Data - 267.7
CBPaint - 10 gb

[BobNaughton]

Swendyl:

When you are experiencing the type of problem that you have it is usuallly corrected by doing a full destructive install. Over time as you delete projects add new ones and delete again, even though you have deleted all you can the system somehow retains some of the information on the hard drive. I would be sure that you just havent overlooked a project that may have some video in it or some audio samples that are hiding in a project someplace. If your system still tells you you have xx % of hard drive capacity left, it is time to do a full destructve install. This will cleanse your entire hard drive of everything. Including any projects you may have. Be sure to backup any archived audio or video you dont want to lose, and then do the destructive install. This will take your hard drive back to the day you got it. You will then have to re-install all of you software, but you will get back the full functionality of your hard drive again.

It has the same effect as doing a full system restore on your computer.

[CKNewman]

I would agree with Bob. If my memory serves me correctly , earlier versions of the OS had a problem with giving "false reads" of hard drive use. I believe that newer versions of the OS have addressed this issue.

[swendl]

Thank you two for posting.

This may be a dumb question, but here goes - if I do the destructive install, and then restore data from our 2nd hard drive, will I also be restoring the OS error that caused the problem in the first place? Am I able to just restore data from backup, and not the OS component?

Thanks again.

[CKNewman]

That's a good question. HD Backup is no longer listed on the MSUS website. It might be a good time to consider saving your projects to tape, then upgrading to a more recent operating system that would give you a lot more archiving options. Perhaps you should give your dealer or MSUS in Boulder a call. Chet at Casablancaexpert.com might know.

[BobNaughton]

Swendyl:

I believe,, and I say that with a grain of salt. I am not a casablanca whiz by any means. I have been corrected by people more in the know before and most likely again. Once you post a question, you may get many differing possibilities as to what may be causing you a particular problem. We are fellow casablanca users, that offer our opinion, based on past fixes that solved our own problem or just an idea to pass on to others for them to try and see if it fixes their problem. First of all welcome to the forum and hopefully as a group we can help each other out from time to time as the need arises.

I dont think that the problem is like a virus or glitch that would be passed back and forth between hard drives. Its just that the older Operating systems somehow never quite fully deleted everything they were supposed to. It deletes things so you cant see anything, but there is something that didnt get fully deleted. Over time you can build up a 20% or so ghost of things your solitaire has on the hard drive but cant quite fully get rid of.

If you did the destructive install and then put back the clips you had on the other drive, you would probably be ok.
As craig mentioned The newer OS seems to be ok. OS5 did not work for me at all, I couldnt use it. OS6 on the other hand was a very stable OS. With OS6 you gained the ability to hook up an external drive to your unit and save your projects to it.

[IanPearson]

If you have made a back up using your Solitaire internal drive, then using this to reload your HD is not an option, that is if you have a problem with the original OS.

A Solitaire back up copies everything, OS and data. Therefore if there is an error on the OS, this will be copied and then recopied to the HD on recovery.

It’s a bit of a pain I know, but this back up is only really useful in protecting against a HD failure, or something similar.

I have in the past asked if a data only back-up is possible, but since I have never really had an answer, I guess it’s not that simple.

Ian

[MichaelD]

Hi Ian,

You can with Bogart . . . http://www.macrosystem.de/e/expansions_ ... ogart.html

Better get saving

Note - You can only back-up 'all' projects (and restore same) but you don't save the OS.

[IanPearson]

Hi Michael, this is true and one day soon I will make the jump. I’m currently sitting on the fence, until the S4000 / S4100 issues are sorted. So come on you unofficial beta testers, keep reporting.

The other thing that is holding me back is the purchase of an HD camera. Logic tells me that data capture to flashcard, with the cam having no moving parts is technically the way to go. However, tape still seems to be the proffered medium, but I am waiting to see what develops.

I am also aware that flashcard capture involves greater compression than tape, but I’m not sure the average viewer will notice any difference.

Ian

[PaulBusta]

Unofficial beta tester reporting. All is well, I'm on a moster of a project here, so far 143 minutes or 200 scenes. Have used many different effects and transitions with much audio rubber banding. Have only had one crash, it was my fault, tried to use a 2 second fade in on a 1 frame scene with Twixter....OUPS. Havn't needed any of the programs that arn't available yet. Transfered all 143 minutes to tape just to be safe. My Pro with 2.1e is working fine. The more I use it the more I feel I can trust it.