Do You Need an External Hard Drive For Your Music?

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If you're still saving years of Projects on your Mac's hard drive, you might not be getting the best results. How to pick the best external HD.
00:00 - Intro
00:32 - When Should You Use An External Hard Drive?
2:01 - Reasons You Might Need An External Hard Drive
2:47 - Do You Need an External HD for Day-To-Day Work?
3:!0 - Do You Need an External HD for Back-Ups?
5:28 - Do You Need an External HD for Archiving?
7:11 - HDD or SSD?
8:27 - Pros of HDDs
8:52 - Cons of HDDs
9:25 - Pros of SSDs
10:13 - Cons of SSDs
12:16 - Connection Types & Transfer Speeds
13:29 - How to Decide If You Need an External HD
14:16 - Recommended Hard Drive Setup
15:43 - What About Instruments, Loops, & Samples?

[@dougc84]

FYI: the "3 places" rule doesn't mean three backups. It means: * Original copy on a drive (copy 1) * A local backup (copy 2) * A remote backup (copy 3) The only reason that "rule" exists is because, well... what happens if your house burns down? Your local copy is gone and so is your computer, but you're covered, because you can buy a new computer and restore from your cloud backup. But... what happens if there's data corruption on your cloud backup copy? You've got a local backup to restore from.

[@matteozeke9247]

you prolly dont give a damn but does anyone know a trick to log back into an instagram account? I was dumb forgot my account password. I love any tips you can give me!

[@JohnStockton7459]

Does local copy mean hard drive?

[@dougc84]

@@JohnStockton7459 The medium doesn't matter - it's just that you keep your data in 3 places - on your machine, somewhere local (a NAS, a hard drive, a tape, whatever), and somewhere remote.

[@liquidsolids9415]

Thanks for the rundown! As a follow-up, maybe you could go over the procedure for setting up Logic to use two drives. Also, some folks may not know about the meter that you can display up top that shows the performance of your processors and your drive. Happy new year and keep up the great work!

[@robertmarshall72]

Fantastic stuff, this is the information I have been looking for, it would be great if you could continue with the hard drive topic, and possibly show us the set up and possibly how you have your system working. It would be a real help 😎👍

[@robertl.edwards1753]

Awesome and thank you, I have been searching all over the place for a while for this information.

[@schrandymcschrandface]

Thank you for the channel and especially for this video, Chris. Yesterday on my 1TB MacBook Pro, a project was overloading on playback every 15 seconds or so. I'm running *everything* from the MacBook. Going to spend my upcoming staycation moving all the Logic Projects off my Macbook and running those projects from the external drive I use now as a backup. Also have to get a couple more backups to the backup. I love your channel - it's taught me more useful info about LPX in the last couple months than in the last 6 years I've been using the DAW.

[@AlexanderKorotkov42]

Good timing Chris. I literally searched for this topic after you uploaded it lol.

[@tilleyroadaffairproduction6752]

Thank you very much for this video. I am still looking for a video that will actually show me how to connect and run these external drives. I am really a newbie and need a real simple visual, technical explanation on the steps to choosing, connecting, programming (saving and organizing Logic files) and running this type of set-up ( I have a 2019 mac mini with 32gb ram and 1TB ssd). Crossing my finger someone will go there! Happy new year to you and thank you for the great videos you have produced in 2020, you were a real lighthouse in these dark stormy waters we have been navigating... Good health to you and your loved ones!

[@jamesbaker9342]

Hugely helpful!!!

[@mjb20224]

This channel is amazing!

[@lfisher8154]

Nicely done. Without going too far down the external storage rabbit hole I would also recommend looking the Lacie 2Big Dock Thunderbolt family of drives especially if you use a MacBook. 1 cable connection to RAID drives, external monitor, additional drives, SD card reader. A bit more expensive but tremendous workflow improvement if you travel.

[@bmh1992]

SO HELPFUL, thanks!

[@thormusique]

Great tips! Cheers, mate!

[@jordanrazowskymusician8178]

Great info. Thanks for sharing.

[@WayneDavisDA_ILLESTalive14]

It’s you and imamusicmogul, you two are my go to guys

[@dafingaz]

Great advice!

[@Kosich2]

this has helped a lot, super hero!

[@truckingrocks2063]

Very helpful! 👍

[@christianemond4286]

I had to change my aging IMac but didn't want to buy a 2020 IMac knowing new M1 versions could be available later this year or early 2022. So I bought a 2019 basic model with 1TB fusion drive with 8G Ram. Upgraded Ram to 40G and bought external 1TB NVME SSD to run System and programs along with a 1TB sata SSD for my libraries. I also have a cheap 3TB external HDD for Time Machine which gives me peace of mind on top of ICloud that also safeguards my projects. The whole rig cost less than half of what a 2020 IMac would have cost with similar specs. My W/R speeds on external NVME 1360/1450 and my logic projects run as smooth as can be :) As Chris mentioned, CCC is a must have and saves me tonnes of time and headaches. Awesome advice Chris!

[@zerberk]

Thanks for the video, now I know whether I need an external hard drive or not. Now, do you know what we need? More videos with facecam. Love your stuff!

[@MrFn65]

Good info Chris, I do the same running 4 ext HDD, 1 TB2 320 gb ssd with my 512 mb int SSD on my 2018 MBP. I run 1 -1 TB HDD for Time machine. Carbon disk cloner has been great over the years especially when I was upgrading to a newer Mac. The int 512 though has been an issue as I’m running out of space. I’ve tried moving libraries to externals but even with 7200 rpm the performance wasn’t great with soft synths. Yes the cost of an ext 1 TB ssd has been cost prohibitive and Keep in mind that later model Macs the ssd interval drive are not typically upgradeable after you buy it.

[@russellbutterfield1419]

Nice one Chris. I use a 1TB SSD for my iMac and 3 x 4GB Seagate External USB 3-0 drives which I split and send to thunderbolt 2. I have to stress that my iMac ports are USB2I keep all my sound files and LPX files separately on different drives, I have never had any drop outs or problems when running a Logic session with loads of audio tracks. I have never had a system overload either or a read write error in Logic. It just works, and it works well.

[@templetonrocks]

great channel. great videos! thank you. seagate backup plus is a 4tb solid state drive that writes at 160megabits per sec at just under $100.

[@thaddeuscorea]

I use SSDs for my external drives. Love them, a little pricey though. I use Sandisk and I've been happy. When I was using HDDs I always checked for the things you mentioned, and also the HD cache. bigger is better. I was using CalDigit drives and I like them very much! I use Carbon Copy Cloner as well! Great program! I use it for daily safety copies of active projects (onto a separate HD). Logic Pro Rules! In these Covid-y times, I would love to hear about WLPR with regard to collaborations across the internet. For the last few years, every client I work with has used tracks sent in from other studios and musicians with varying quality of recording. The two things that are most challenging are the quality of recording and the chaos of a beginner's Logic session (when they send a whole session folder). I have sent musicians (who are about to send tracks to me) to your website for some good tutes!

[@davidk3872]

Thank You

[@jeremysmith9696]

this is so timely. I will watch this in a while. But I just ran out of space, and need an external. Thanks so much. Your channel is fantastic! I have a 2019 iMac 27" 8-Core i9 32GB RAM / 1TB SSD. I got Native Instruments 13 ultimate Collectors edition for Christmas. The full download is 790GB. So I'm looking into external options for Running libraries from. For running over USB-C/Thunderbolt 3 I'm tossing the idea of a large G-Drive 7200rpm vs. 2TB SSD.Another good option between the G-Drive SSD and the G-Drive SSD Pro is the Samsung T7's they R/W at ≈ 1080MB/Sec. and less $$

[@Wizerslapski]

Look at drives from OWC, they’re great

[@chriswftdj]

Have 2 more min. Including one for samples and one for projects I find works well. Great channel.

[@almightytreegod]

Having that many drives could choke your I/O, making it somewhat pointless for the purposes of speed (depending on the system of course), but since samples would primarily read and rarely write I’d bet that drive will last longer.

[@antoniog2854]

Great video! What are you thoughts on storing huge sample library content on an internal drive? I'm looking into a new MBP with 8TB of internal space for storing everything sample related (including large Kontakt orchestral stuff). This way i only need to carry around an external HD (and a backup) for my Logic project files.

[@kaiulrich6185]

I highly recommend Glyph hard drives, they are expensive but really heavy duty and rock solid. Plus first class tech support.

[@bjclenster]

Another great vid! Question.. just got a new MacBook Pro 14 inch. Base model but upgraded to storage to 1Tb. 16 gigs RAM and M1 Pro chip. Given the power of this thing and it’s got 1Tb on board, would you offload your sound lib and loops and third party instruments etc to external drive? All the videos that discuss this are 1 to 3 years old and are talking about older weaker macs. Thanks!!

[@strykeback1]

Love your videos. Took a 10 year hiatus from doing audio and I have a slight issue. I've been running both Logic and UADs Luna as my daws and I've ran into an issue with Natives Komplete Library. Mainly their drum systems start choking when i have the entire library on a 1TB solid state SanDisk drive from costco, and a second one is the recording drive for the daw while my macbooks solid state drive keeps apps and plugins. It doesn't look like anyone's using the western digital 10k raptor drives of past

[@drbassface]

I updated my mid 2010 iMac from an internal 256SSD to a Two TB SDD, and the Two TB 7200 internal to a 4TB Internal. Great machine. Got a dual Six TB Raid external backup. Only drag is I can’t get to a 13.4 update. Stuck at 13.6.8 No more Logic Updates Can’t use Final Cut Pro. Oh well.

[@RapperSozial]

Thank you Chris for your informative video, I just had this question because my samples start to overload my internal drive (1 TB). I have never had an external SSD, just HDDs and they all have a lot of fan noise (or from something else that generates noise inside). How is that with external SSDs? I suppose they are totally quiet, is that right?

[@MartinDHayes]

So, I'm running Catalina on my iMac, and also have 4 external hard drives with all my LPX data, plus plugin sounds on them. I'm thinking of adding a 2TB HDD drive to run Mac 10.15 from. Do I need to copy all files from my internal drive to the new external bootable Mac OS drive? Thanks for any info on this one. And thank you for all your videos on LPX, they're super helpful!! Martin

[@cpshafer1]

Great Video. Thank You for the info. Quick Question: What about saving your logic files and your sample library to the same drive? Would there be "traffic jams" in say, a thunderbolt 3 connection, or is it fine? Basically, should I have one hard drive for the logic files and one for my samples, or is that over doing it? Thank You!

[@francissreckofabian01]

Very good advice. Never forget. back up!!! Agree with replacing internal HDs with SSDs. My mac is 2010. I now have 2 X 2TB SSDs. Much better performance. Also, 48GB RAM (maxxed out). Chris, currently I have enough space but do you think if I put all the Logic libraries back onto the internal SSDs I will get better performance or is it just a space saving idea?. Because of how old it is I am stuck on High Sierra although my brother thinks I might be able to get to Catalina with some changer. No Logic 10.6 for me just yet. I must admit I get the spinning beach ball regularly now and the multicore & HD in Logic sometimes crash. I have taken to turning all unnecessary apps off when using Logic. Especially certain VPN & Protection software. Turns out they can slow Logic down.

[@accentontheoff]

Thanks! On another, perhaps related, note how much RAM do you recommend with a Mac M1 / M2 machine for full blown music production using Logic or maybe Cubase. Is 16 GB enough. Or should one try and get 32 GB.

[@darvish2776]

Does this apply to the new M1 macs since they use the internal HD as a ram sub anyway. I’m not too tech savvy but I heard they use the ssd to help with the ram load. So wouldn’t the HD be under stress regardless?

[@CassStevens]

Good video. Question: I have a mac mini (late 2012) with an internal 1TB hdd and I'm using an external Seagate 2TB hdd for my projects (both drives say they are 5400rpm). I noticed that when I'm recording, the Logix screen will freeze up and then suddenly jump ahead. it doesn't seem to cause any problems with the recording. Any idea why it does this, or is it normal? thanks. (I'm thinking of replacing the internal drive with a solid state)

[@DavidRavenMoon]

Regarding the Mac doing all that work and reading and writing from the internal drive (which is what it was designed for)... now it’s reading and writing to TWO hard drives! Twice as much work. 😉 It doesn’t really work that way. In the past it was common to say you should use an external drive... back in SCSI days. If you have a fast external drive, faster than the internal, that can be an advantage. Of course lots of Macs today use and SSD. I have an external Thunderbolt enclosure with three 3TB drives. I could record to those, but I generally record to the internal drive and use those as backup and storage.

[@rapthamizhan4779]

Sir, please make a video abouts NAS & RAID Storage Systems...

[@jordanrazowskymusician8178]

Do I want to be sure to remember to unplug these ext.hard drives when I'm not using them? Up until now, I used to keep them plugged in all the time. But once I had a few external HD's crap out on me, I heard that it's recommended to unplug them when not in use (if not only unplugging the power cord where applicable, but unplug USB cord from it's connection). Thanks

[@gios7752]

I use a RAID from OWC with 4 hard drives, 3 gigs per drive. Two drives do the backs (raid), another loops and virtual instruments and finally a project drive. If one fails, it can be easy replaced.

[@sylvainalain6637]

For my offsite backup , I use backblaze for 6$/month

[@rossdonald594]

Hi Chris, Wondering if the answer to this topic is still relevant now, given the speed of hardware and capacity of internal SSDs?

[@almightytreegod]

It used to be the case that 7200rpm HDDs were far more common even in the consumer market and 5200s were mostly in notebooks, but that doesn’t seem to be the case anymore. You can still get them cheap though, and for archiving you don’t really need speed necessarily so for that purpose you could get a slower drive anyway, and some of them are more reliable and have a larger cache, like server drives. So what I do, and I know this isn’t the ideal but it’s within my budget, is I have a good external SSD for projects that’s relatively small (in comparison) for what I’m working on at the moment (this might change if I start using more samples), a HDD for Time Machine, and a HDD for archives, which is synced to a cloud system using a raspberry pi and the storage is managed by a developer friend of mine and we share a subscription so it’s cheap (was a difficult setup tho, tbh). I’d recommend to look primarily at the warranty for HDDs (I haven’t had enough experience to speak to SSDs in this regard and although I assume it would be the same, there’s some cost-benefit analysis by the manufacturers that could change that). If it’s anything under 5 years warranty I don’t buy it, and I’ve been very satisfied with that strategy.

[@almightytreegod]

Oh, and more RAM helps damn near everything performance-wise

[@romodrummer]

I use SuperDuper. It both creates a bootable drive, and a copy of the drive.

[@Max-122]

are there any practices to make SSD last longer?

[@allourep]

I'm trying to understand something here but I'm not sure if I have it right. I run the DAW software (Logic) on my boot drive. But I have all my Logic projects saved on an external. When I work on a Logic project, I run the project from the external. This is good, right? And lastly, when it comes to Sound Libraries/samples, (Kontakt) should those be on a second external drive? So basically any time I want to work on a project I have two external SSDs plugged into my computer. One with the Logic file, and the other with the sound libraries? Is it a big deal if instead I also have all my samples and sound libraries running from my boot drive so that I only have to plug in the SSD with my Logic projects in? Thanks

[@samuelmaylor6634]

Hello how are you able to run your OS off of external drive, I didn’t think that was possible. I need to upgrade my Mac but the space they are offering for base models, doesn’t cover what’s on my Mac now.

[@elbiso2004]

Any thought on a Samsung T7 external SSD?

[@brendanmccurry428]

A cheaper way to get a thunderbolt external drive is to buy an NVME m.2 SSD and a thunderbolt enclosure. Just make sure to buy a decent SSD. I've never tried but I suspect thunderbolt 3 would have enough bandwidth to run plugins from the external enclosure.

[@stuffnuns]

Please, either post a vid, or provide a link to a GOOD tutorial, on how you set up an SSD to be the “internal” boot drive. I’ve watched several, and I some things are left out in some of the videos, and there are different ways of doing it. I just want the safest, and hopefully Luddite-proof, way of doing it. My poor internal HD is working too hard!

[@clowncarqingdao]

Interesting video. A little peculiar for people who have static discs with large amount of RAM with respect to internal HD access. Otherwise good.

[@timothy5974]

Hello, I’m a bit late to the game. I was gifted a 2018 Mac mini I7,16 gigs of ram, but only 128g of internal storage😩 I have been thinking of Logic Pro and I have a ssd in my thunderbolt port. Would I benefit from getting another ssd and running my new Mac from it? I will most likely run out of space fast If I don’t figure out how to make Logic store and use the external ssd for all recording projects. Thank you. What would we do without content creators like yourself. I’m here from Pete Johns community.

[@stephenrosanelli6164]

Are you backing up your projects to Maniac Mansion? It seems like that would only be useful when you have Bernard in your party...?

[@DaBeatsFreak]

I’m shocked by the amount of external drive you have sir. 😱🤣 Moreover I’m totally shocked by the experitian unknown time SSD have. This very important info should be shown on a display just like the energy level of your battery. I also have some SSD and I use them a lot. Tnx for the info.🙌🏾🙌🏾🙌🏾

[@focusinvestor4787]

The hard drives collector lol

[@normjones6916]

How are getting this usb C into your computer?

[@santimaspons]

Answer at minute 2:57 to 2:59

[@emanuel_soundtrack]

I SAY YES. after loosing projects for a fiilevault password i lost. Just for the current project use the computer. And do always bounce and send project and audio to mail .

[@Redeemingthetimestudios]

Ok ok ... now I gotta figure out how to set up an external SSD as the “internal main system drive”

[@Redeemingthetimestudios]

Felt a door in my mind just open

[@Made0nEarth]

its very easy! you have to download the last version of macOS in apple store then you have to create one USB install (the pen must have 16GB) you have tutorials about that online, next format the external SSD drive you want to use as Mac OS Extended (Journaled) , now reboot your Mac and press the "command" key during boot , you will see a menu with the drives you want to boot (select the USB PEN you have created with the new MacOS install) now during the installation select to install the MacOS in the new external SSD drive, after the install your Mac will always boot from the external drive!

[@hettovennik2887]

Not kidding. haven't watched yet, but i smell my 2013 27" iMac getting just another significant bump one more time!

[@Redeemingthetimestudios]

@@Made0nEarth awesome thanks. That was succinct and clear.

[@Made0nEarth]

@@Redeemingthetimestudios thanks for your words! English is not my mother language (im Portuguese)

[@sifer2407]

Love carbon copy it save my entire system and external drives.

[@nelsonmaciel7611]

Hi Chris it's possible to update logic pro 10.6 without have to upgrade from Catalina to big sur? Thanks for your help, cheers

[@WayneDavisDA_ILLESTalive14]

Yea it is, I updated mine about a week ago actually

[@nelsonmaciel7611]

​@@WayneDavisDA_ILLESTalive14 thanks, you do that on App Store right? its the first time I update, I am a new user of logic :D

[@WayneDavisDA_ILLESTalive14]

@@nelsonmaciel7611 it’s no problem and yup

[@nelsonmaciel7611]

@@WayneDavisDA_ILLESTalive14 Thanks a lot for the help 😁😁

[@antoniog2854]

@@nelsonmaciel7611 yeah ...from the App store. Also, LP 10.6's base OS is Catalina going forward. I'm still on Mojave so i can't update to 10.6 unless i install Catalina.

[@scott-in-the-lou]

WD "G" drives might be ok now but I've had nothing but problems with WD external drives lately - they seem to want their own special drivers and software... just using them as a Time Machine drive - forget it... they "fall asleep" then time machine fails - I have several in my basement collecting dust... gave up on them (including a 10TB!). I also had HORRIBLE USB clickity noises coming out of my Scarlett i8 when I had a mechanical HD on the bus. Every once in a while - it was horrible the noise it made out of the speakers. I switched to a SSD and STILL had the problem. I then hooked theSSD to the other side of the macbook (different USB bus) and the noise went away.

[@francissreckofabian01]

Me too. I had everything on a 16TB drive that failed (luckily still under warranty). According to the net it was a regular problem. It cost me a lot to have the contents recovered. No more WD for me. To be fair I've only had 2 failures in over 30 years and the first one failed after I knocked it off a table! I now have all info inside the Mac Pro's internal 2 X TB SSDs (2010 needs further upgrading, if possible. Or replacing), and on a 32TB OWC HD. On various smaller HDs. (which will live at my brother's house in case something really bad happens!) I will soon purchase a 2nd 32TB HD to act as as proper backup. They aren't cheap. Not sure I could afford the cloud (not time machine, thanks.) I used to use Super Duper which worked well (like Carbon Copy Cloner) I'm lucky that my brother can write programmes that get the HDs to backup regularly). This a long winded way of saying make sure you have a BACKUP plan. And don't ask why I need 32TB when I'm an amateur. Just.Don't.Ask.OK! I just do!

[@UltimateMoralizer]

It’s very important to use an external hard drive especially if you use a MacBook Pro as almost everything is extremely expensive. Also, if you bought an internal drive that’s 512 gigs let’s say ... and you can’t replace it, then putting Logic Pro projects on an external hard is ideal as the files are pretty big. It’s important to back up projects on another external hard drive too. Overall, I’m satisfied with my workflow and my MacBook Pro despite the fact I’m still on Mojave. I have no intentions on updating personally as I still use some 32 bit plugins that are irreplaceable. When Apple starts caring about music producers and applies common sense to their decisions, I may upgrade, haha. I don’t see that happening anytime soon though.

[@andrewpadilla4507]

You look like Cypher from the Matrix.

[@WayneDavisDA_ILLESTalive14]

Lmfao how convenient I looking for a new one too

[@6teeth318]

Yes you do if your pc only have 250g ssd. Thats it. Did not take 16 minutes. Youre welcome. Dont waste time watching, time is presious.