Glyph AtomSSD and AtomRAID SSD Reviewed at Doddle.com
By Heath McKnight and Danny F. Santos (doddleNEWS)
As we move further and further into an ultra HD world of video acquisition, storage once again becomes a premium. Just a 6 second clip of 4K footage from the Blackmagic URSA tops out at 700 MB, though your mileage may vary. Now imagine you need to move these files from one location to another for post-production. That’s where the Glyph Atom SSD Pocket Drive and the Glyph Atom RAID SSD come in.
The Glyph Atom SSD is a portable solid state external hard-drive, it’s extremely compact and you could easily fit it in your pocket, but it packs a lot of space. The Atom SSD is available in 275GB, 525GB, and a full 1TB and will get you transfer rates up to 480 MB/s. It also features a bus powered USB 3.1 Gen 2 connector which is backwards compatible with USB 3.0 and Thunderbolt 3.
The design is elegant, and the unit I have for this review is the gold 1TB model. It comes with a small rubber case that still shows off the top and bottom, much like one for a smartphone. This keeps it safe in your pocket.
For my review of the Atom SSD, I created a scenario: I have to transfer several Raw 4K 24p clips of footage from my home office and Final Cut Pro X edit system to my friend a few miles away who is color correcting it. It would take days to upload several gigabytes of footage, and we’re under a tight deadline on the project.
I plug the Glyph Atom SSD into my iMac and transfer the Raw clips. Using the USB 3.0 connection, I transfer 3.34GB in a matter of seconds, as a test. I then transfer about 36GB, which only takes a few minutes, along with an XML of my edited project. I eject the drive and drop it into my pocket and drive to my friend the colorist’s house.
The colorist plugs the drive into his late-2013 Mac Pro and transfers all 36GB to his RAID and he pulls up DaVinci Resolve, opens the XML and links to the footage, and he’s ready to go. From there, he can export another XML of the final color corrected footage, or we can export the final project for the client.
The Glyph Atom SSD made transporting the footage quick and painless when working on a tight deadline for a client, when uploading to the cloud isn’t possible. Especially if we were dealing with 336GB of footage, and not 36GB.
For faster speeds and a higher capacity you have the Gylph Atom RAID SSD. It features two RAID 0 SSDs, which can give you either a 1TB or 2TB capacity. Speed-wise, that will give you a lightning fast transfer of up to 770 MB/s all in a form-factor not much bigger than an iPhone 7. The Atom RAID SSD also features the same USB 3.1 Gen 2 connection that supports Thunderbolt 3 and USB 3.0.
The review unit I have is 1TB and silver in color, and again, the design is elegant, and it comes with a special rubber case for extra protection. Plus it’s small enough to transport in a pocket or a bag with a laptop.
The scenario I described above works just as well with the AtomRAID SSD, with transferring a quick 3GB taking less than 8 seconds. 36GB took just a few minutes, it’s that fast.
Another scenario that is very ideal for the AtomRAID SSD is transferring files while on set. Our Assistant Camera or DIT (Digital Imaging Technician) is busy dropping unprocessed 4K 24p files from the URSA to our on-set drive, and the AtomRAID SSD is ideal to drop those files on, or perhaps as the editor, I want to get a jump on things and transfer a copy for myself, and I can start doing a rough cut on my MacBook Pro on set, or at home.
Conclusion
4K UHD footage is here now, and even with fantastic compression schemes and codecs, the unprocessed files or raw footage is still very large, especially when you’re talking clips from a long-form shoot, like a corporate video or narrative (TV show, film, etc.). The Glyph Atom SSD and AtomRAID SSD are perfect for storage and transporting clips quickly. Transfer speeds are extremely fast.
Here are the specs of the Atom RAID SSD 1TB:
As we move further and further into an ultra HD world of video acquisition, storage once again becomes a premium. Just a 6 second clip of 4K footage from the Blackmagic URSA tops out at 700 MB, though your mileage may vary. Now imagine you need to move these files from one location to another for post-production. That’s where the Glyph Atom SSD Pocket Drive and the Glyph Atom RAID SSD come in.
The Glyph Atom SSD is a portable solid state external hard-drive, it’s extremely compact and you could easily fit it in your pocket, but it packs a lot of space. The Atom SSD is available in 275GB, 525GB, and a full 1TB and will get you transfer rates up to 480 MB/s. It also features a bus powered USB 3.1 Gen 2 connector which is backwards compatible with USB 3.0 and Thunderbolt 3.
The design is elegant, and the unit I have for this review is the gold 1TB model. It comes with a small rubber case that still shows off the top and bottom, much like one for a smartphone. This keeps it safe in your pocket.
For my review of the Atom SSD, I created a scenario: I have to transfer several Raw 4K 24p clips of footage from my home office and Final Cut Pro X edit system to my friend a few miles away who is color correcting it. It would take days to upload several gigabytes of footage, and we’re under a tight deadline on the project.
I plug the Glyph Atom SSD into my iMac and transfer the Raw clips. Using the USB 3.0 connection, I transfer 3.34GB in a matter of seconds, as a test. I then transfer about 36GB, which only takes a few minutes, along with an XML of my edited project. I eject the drive and drop it into my pocket and drive to my friend the colorist’s house.
The colorist plugs the drive into his late-2013 Mac Pro and transfers all 36GB to his RAID and he pulls up DaVinci Resolve, opens the XML and links to the footage, and he’s ready to go. From there, he can export another XML of the final color corrected footage, or we can export the final project for the client.
The Glyph Atom SSD made transporting the footage quick and painless when working on a tight deadline for a client, when uploading to the cloud isn’t possible. Especially if we were dealing with 336GB of footage, and not 36GB.
For faster speeds and a higher capacity you have the Gylph Atom RAID SSD. It features two RAID 0 SSDs, which can give you either a 1TB or 2TB capacity. Speed-wise, that will give you a lightning fast transfer of up to 770 MB/s all in a form-factor not much bigger than an iPhone 7. The Atom RAID SSD also features the same USB 3.1 Gen 2 connection that supports Thunderbolt 3 and USB 3.0.
The review unit I have is 1TB and silver in color, and again, the design is elegant, and it comes with a special rubber case for extra protection. Plus it’s small enough to transport in a pocket or a bag with a laptop.
The scenario I described above works just as well with the AtomRAID SSD, with transferring a quick 3GB taking less than 8 seconds. 36GB took just a few minutes, it’s that fast.
Another scenario that is very ideal for the AtomRAID SSD is transferring files while on set. Our Assistant Camera or DIT (Digital Imaging Technician) is busy dropping unprocessed 4K 24p files from the URSA to our on-set drive, and the AtomRAID SSD is ideal to drop those files on, or perhaps as the editor, I want to get a jump on things and transfer a copy for myself, and I can start doing a rough cut on my MacBook Pro on set, or at home.
Conclusion
4K UHD footage is here now, and even with fantastic compression schemes and codecs, the unprocessed files or raw footage is still very large, especially when you’re talking clips from a long-form shoot, like a corporate video or narrative (TV show, film, etc.). The Glyph Atom SSD and AtomRAID SSD are perfect for storage and transporting clips quickly. Transfer speeds are extremely fast.
Here are the specs of the Atom RAID SSD 1TB:
- Interface: USB-C (3.1, Gen2); Compatible with USB 3.0; Compatible with Thunderbolt 3
- Transfer Rate: Up to 770 MB/s
- Capacity: 1TB 2TB
- Compatibility: MAC OS X 10.4+, Windows Vista+
- Cooling: Fan-less heat dissipation
- Dimensions: 2.7” x 4.8” x .59”; 69 x 122 x 15 mm (WxHxD)
- RAID: Hardware RAID-0
- Interface: USB-C (3.1, Gen2); Compatible with USB 3.0; Compatible with Thunderbolt 3
- Transfer Rate: Up to 480 MB/s
- Capacity: 1TB
- Compatibility: MAC OS X 10.4+ and Windows Vista+
- Cooling: Fan-less heat dissipation
- Dimensions: 1.88” x 4.8” x .59”; 48 x 122 x 15 mm (WxHxD)
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