Tech: Lexicon Omega->Laptop->USB HD (?)

Subject: Tech: Lexicon Omega->Laptop->USB HD (?)
From: Don Firth
Date: 12 Nov 07 - 05:37 PM

I think this is more of a computer question than a home recording question.

"Now, here's my plan. . . ."
             —Shel Silverstein

Setting up a home recording studio on a budget.

My current plan, if I can make it work, is to buy a Lexicon Omego Desktop Recording Studio as a USB interface to my Hewlett-Packard laptop. The Lexicon Omega will take a couple of condenser mics through XLR connectors (with phantom power), and can record directly onto my laptop's hard drive. That's what it's designed to do. Once it's on the hard drive, one can then do the usually tidying, editing, etc.

Problem:   The computer system requirements for the Lexicon Omega include "EIDE/Ultra DMA 7200RPM hard disk type or better."

I'm pretty certain the hard disk in my laptop is more like 5400RPM.

I have been intending to buy an external USB hard drive for my laptop anyway. So if I make sure that the drive I buy is, indeed, an "EIDE/Ultra DMA 7200RPM hard disk type or better," can I bypass the laptop's hard disk and use the external drive instead? And if so, how would I go about doing this?

This little Lexicon Omega unit appears to be exactly what I'm looking for—good quality recording on a tight budget—if I can make it work. Or, to use it, would I have to get a computer with a hotter hard drive?

I'll appreciate anything anyone can tell me.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: Tech: Lexicon Omega->Laptop->USB HD (?)
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 12 Nov 07 - 07:48 PM

Don -

You're venturing into hazardous places here, I think, although the specs for the Omega don't really look all that hard to meet unless you've got a fairly old laptop(?).

Laptops generally do have slower rotation-speed hard drives than desktop machines, partly because higher rotation speed makes the drives more susceptible to damage when they're jostled about. An additional "slow-down" seems to happen with laptop hard drives since they usually appear to "hard park" the heads between each read/write excursion to keep them off the disks when not actually trading data. Desktop drives often just "float" the heads wherever they end up, waiting for the next transaction. The parking introduces a "latency time" that is ignored by the drive specs, but makes laptops generally as much as 10:1 slower (maybe 4:1 typical) than similarly spec'd desktops for sustained data transfers. The drive specs (what they'll tell you) may read identically, but the laptop drives will be much slower for actual data transfer, especially for "sustained transfer" of large files or large numbers of files.

An external USB hard drive will look, to your computer, just like an internally installed one, so you should be able to record directly to the external one - assuming that the software installed with the Omega lets you choose where to put the data. That may or may not completely eliminate the installed hard drive if the machine buffers data (including drive I/O) on the system disk.

System temp space, used by the computer for "virtual RAM" when needed, may be in the system folder on the internal drive even if you're writing to the external one, so the "latencies" that slow down the laptop internal drive may still not be separated completely from the handling of data intended for the external one.

The Omega spec includes a very low RAM requirement, and if you've got "enough" RAM the temp space location (the "virtual memory" thing) may not be a problem(?) if you can just arrange to not use any.

The spec for a 7200 RPM or better hard drive doesn't seem consistent with the "USB-1 or better" also in the spec for the Omega. USB-1 is a lot slower than USB-2, and it's hard to see why a good 5200 RPM drive wouldn't be able to keep up with typical USB-1 data rates. It's possible that the USB-1 speed is sufficient for getting the data from the Omega to the computer, but the software installed on the computer does some "processing" that requires higher disk speed(?). If you add an external USB drive, you would almost certainly need USB-2 (or better) for the external drive, in order to get any benefit from a faster external drive.

Theoretically, you can mix USB-1 and USB-2 devices on the same computer, and each will operate at it's own best rate - if the computer itself has a USB-2 port capable of both modes and can select the mode separately for multiple devices; but in practice any USB-1 device attached often slows all attached devices down to USB-1 rate - especially with "early USB-2" ports. (If the Omega is itself a USB-1 device, it could slow down a USB-2 hard drive attached to the same port(?); although USB-1 has been obsolete long enough that it's unlikely they'd use one, given their other component specs.)

Since you're using a laptop, the assumption would be that you're planning to be able to "take it out" with you(?). "External USB" IS NOT THE SAME THING as "TRANSPORTABLE External USB." Typical external USB drives are intended for use with desktop machines and DO NOT TOLERATE being moved about, no matter how carefully they're handled. If you're looking for something you can take with you, you should get an external drive that's specifically rated as "transportable." - and then STILL handle it gently.

The specs for the Omega look like it's intended to be "usable" with machines that meet pretty primitive specs, so there's a good chance it will work with what you've got, even if you ignore the disk speed minimum. If you have USB-2 ports on the computer, an external USB drive should act just like another internal one, but a "faster external drive" won't be much faster if it's tied into a USB-1 port, or to an "older" USB-2 port that's locked down to USB-1 speed by other connected devices.

More questions here than answers, but you'll have to do most of the thinking anyway.

John

Subject: RE: Tech: Lexicon Omega->Laptop->USB HD (?)
From: Don Firth
Date: 12 Nov 07 - 10:26 PM

Thanks a million, John! Good information there and lots to think about. And as you say, lots of questions!

I do have an option or two. Right now, my laptop is my computer of choice primarily because my desktop is in need of some extensive upgrading. The laptop has USB-2 ports, the desktop's are USB-1. Right now, I use the desktop mostly for storage—and the attached printer. I don't really intend to pack the recording equipment around; I want to set up a home studio, within a necessarily tight budget, and judging from the reviews I've read of the Omega, it appears that it does more than some of the recorders I've been looking at and is a bit less expensive.

I was looking at some of the portable flash card recorders, like the Marantz PMD660 or the Zoom H-4, which would be convenient for "field recording" (indeed, that's what they're for), but for my purposes, I thought they might be kind of "iffy." My serious recording would be done at home.

Possible course of action:   get the Omega, try it with the laptop or the laptop-external hard drive combination, and if it doesn't work or gives less than satisfactory results, go ahead and either get my desktop upgraded or bite the bullet and get a new desktop, making sure it has the specs I'll need. I've been planning to upgrade or replace it anyway, but using the laptop has allowed me to procrastinate. . . .

Just thinkin' out loud. Anyway, thanks for the info, John.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: Tech: Lexicon Omega->Laptop->USB HD (?)
From: EBarnacle
Date: 12 Nov 07 - 10:51 PM

Since you seem to be handy, why not just buy the components for your upgrade and install them yourself. Unless the CPU is from a local maker, Dell and others provide any telephone consultation you might need much more cheaply than paying the mechanic.

Make sure you insert parts gently but firmly. One of my early embarassments was not inserting the power cord as well as I thought I had and, after an hour with the tech from Panasonic tech, he told me that either my computer was dead or disconnected. He was right.

Subject: RE: Tech: Lexicon Omega->Laptop->USB HD (?)
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 13 Nov 07 - 01:33 AM

If the original desktop has USB-1 ports, it's probably quite a bit out of date for some other specs as well. Starting from scratch might be about as sensible as trying to do a lot of upgrading. Going from Win98 may be something of a "culture shock" too, since for sound you'll probably want at least 250 GB hard drives and 2 GB of RAM.

Take a look at ExtremeTech and click on the "Build It" tab. Look at a few of the examples, and you might find something that fits your needs better than an upgrade. They put together a "sound system" (recording studio?) machine that looked pretty good a few months ago, although I don't know if it's still on the front page listing; and it did have a lot of bell$ and whi$tle$ in it.

If you get into newer machines, you'll likely find most offered with SATA hard drives rather than EIDE. The newer ones offer a little more "flexibility" than the old ones, but it's difficult to mix the two types in one machine. Even WinXP is now in "limited support," and most new computers (the cheapest ones, at least) often don't offer it as an option, so you could be stuck with Vista.

There's been much more market emphasis recently in computers set up specifically for "multimedia" - almost to the point that it's hard to do much traditional "computer stuff" on the new ones. You might find something reasonably budget-compatible in a new computer, with some of them selling for about 4x(?) the price of a good new hard drive.

All sorts of possibilities. One can worry so much about doing the "right thing" that nothing ever gets done.

John