Originally posted 1/16/04
Scroll to bottom for info update on SoftRAID.
Not a whole lot to say here about using the software. If you have a legal CD, you have all the manuals.
What I have found out is that the SCSI busses on my Radius 81/110 are just too slow to digitize more than a couple minutes of video before they can't keep up with the data and Media 100 quits and complains about it. It doesn't seem to matter if the drive itself is nice and fast.
The way to cure this is with RAID. No, not the bug spray. ;)
I have a set of the May 1999 System and Application Recovery CD-ROMs from Apple, and on the Application disc is Apple RAID 1.0.2 for NuBus Workgroup Servers. It supports RAID 1 mirroring and RAID 0 striping.
Mirroring is no good for digitizing video on NuBus systems because it'd just be sending twice as much data to two identical volumes that are both too slow.
RAID 0 striping is the ticket. Apple RAID 1.0.2 supports a maximum volume size of 4gig, so here's a great use for those 1 and 2 gigabyte drives that are so inexpensive these days. This version only supports HFS Standard but you can use it to initialize HFS+ volumes (as HFS) to prepare them for linking into a RAID array.
I happened to have a pair of identical IBM 1gig drives, a 2gig Apple ROM Seagate and a 2gig Quantum. I used Apple RAID to initialize all four drives then linked the 1gig drives together then the 2gig drives. That gave me a single 2gig striped volume and a single 4gig striped volume.
Using the media settings in Media 100, I directed the video to the 4gig stripe and the audio to the 2gig stripe and it worked perfectly. No more stopping after a couple minutes.
Here's a link to the Readme for this version of Apple RAID.
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=18098
The Workgroup Server 8150/110 Server Manual. Just save to disk, then open.
http://manuals.info.apple.com/Apple_Support_Area/Manuals/servers/0307041AWGS8150110ADG.PDF
If someone can find a link to the "Apple RAID Software Administrator’s Guide", I would really appreciate it! The program is pretty easy to figure out, but I'm sure there are some tips and tricks that would be interesting to know.
Other older RAID software should work as well, but may not support Mac OS 9.1. Some newer RAID software will run on a NuBus Powermac but doesn't fully support the hardware. SoftRAID 2.2.2 supports Mac OS 9.x.x but runs a 68k code driver and only supports the internal SCSI on NuBus Macs. Softraid will sell you an older version but be sure to ask what the newest Mac OS is it supports and whether or not it supports both SCSI busses. Click here then scroll to the bottom to see some other RAID software product names. Keep in mind they're all obsolete products which likely do not support OS 9.1 and/or may not support HFS+ amongst other limitations. You don't _have_ to run OS 9.1 to use Media 100 on your NuBus Macintosh, it's just nice if you can. :)
Update: I had an e-mail discussion with the owner of SoftRAID about compatability with the NuBus Macs. The skinny is that if you really want version 1.5 they'll sell it to you. If you have version 2.x.x there's a free upgrade download to 2.2.2. The must upgrade to 2.2.2 _before_ upgrading to OS 9.x.x applies only to PCI PowerMacs because on NuBus machines it runs a 68k code driver which was already debugged and didn't have OS 9 issues like the pre-2.2.2 PPC code driver. If you don't already have version 2.x.x, the upgrade price to 2.2.2 is $99, since SoftRAID owns the code copyright to Apple RAID I suppose the upgrade price to 2.2.2 applies to it also. Contact sales@softraid.com for more info as prices may be changing in the future. And finally, SoftRAID 2.2.2 still works with System 7.1 through 9.2.2!
Another Update: Since the May 1999 Application Recovery CD also had some version of SoftRAID 2.x.x on it, I installed it and then updated to 2.2.2 then rebuilt the RAID 0 drive pairs. The result was that the System would not boot unless extentions were disabled using Shift. The RAID 0 pairs still mounted but of course I couldn't use the Media 100. The 68k driver used on NuBus PPC machines is still version 1.5 in SoftRAID 2.2.2 so I removed it and went with Apple RAID 1.5 then updated it to 1.5.3 just because the CD-ROM has the updater on it. :) The RAID driver is still version 1.5 though. The RAID 0 arrays can then be changed to HFS+ using the normal menubar option but you're still limited to 4gig volumes.
If anyone knows of a PPC code RAID driver that'll run on a NuBus PowerMac or Mac Clone, I'd love to hear about it, especially if it supports volumes larger than 4gigs.