Question about hard drives and ssd

Questions? Suggestions? Need help? Talk about anything related to Yawcam...
Post Reply
bsyawcam
Posts: 8
Joined: Fri Oct 02, 2015 10:51 pm

Question about hard drives and ssd

Post by bsyawcam »

Hi. I've been using Yawcam to capture images outside of my office window. I don't always work from my office so it's nice to know if and when someone comes while I'm not there. Mostly, I want to know when the post office or UPS has made a delivery so I go and pick it up.

Anyway, I have Yawcam configured to save the captured images to my hard drive and to send them to my email address. There are 2 images captured per event. This happens anywhere from 5 to 20 times per day. I recently had the side panel off of my computer and noticed how taxing running the webcam is on my hard drive. Is there any settings that can be manipulated to minimize this? Is there a certain type of hard drive or solid state drive that works best and lasts longest in this situation? Thanks!
bsyawcam
Posts: 8
Joined: Fri Oct 02, 2015 10:51 pm

Re: Question about hard drives and ssd

Post by bsyawcam »

Been searching for some answers on this and found Seagate has a product that I believe is more suited for surveillance use. Anyone have experience with these drives?
www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=9SIA24G2NU5084
z3r0c00l12
Moderator
Posts: 1210
Joined: Wed Jan 14, 2009 3:50 am

Re: Question about hard drives and ssd

Post by z3r0c00l12 »

Yawcam barely uses the hard drive, unless it's constantly saving but even then, it would be in the KB/s not MB/s that your hard drive can handle.

An SSD would be much better, since SSDs typically achieve 500MB/s so Yawcam would barely affect it.

Unless your hard drive is really old, I would just stick with it. Just make sure you have a backup of your important files in any situation, you never know when a hard drive can suddenly die, and that applies to new hard drives too.
bsyawcam
Posts: 8
Joined: Fri Oct 02, 2015 10:51 pm

Re: Question about hard drives and ssd

Post by bsyawcam »

Oh. It must be the CPU that's making the sound that I thought was coming from the hard drive. That's good, I guess. Thanks!

My hard drive is a bit old (it's IDE) but the SMART reports and surface scans show it's healthy.
z3r0c00l12
Moderator
Posts: 1210
Joined: Wed Jan 14, 2009 3:50 am

Re: Question about hard drives and ssd

Post by z3r0c00l12 »

If you are hearing noise, it's either a fan or your hard drive, considering it's IDE, it's old enough that I would consider replacing it very soon and make sure you have backups. Hard drive noises typically mean incoming hard drive failure.
bsyawcam
Posts: 8
Joined: Fri Oct 02, 2015 10:51 pm

Re: Question about hard drives and ssd

Post by bsyawcam »

No, no "noises." I said I "noticed how taxing running the webcam is on my hard drive" and "it must be the CPU making the sound." I don't want anyone to think I meant noise in the sense that noise is a "bad" thing.
z3r0c00l12
Moderator
Posts: 1210
Joined: Wed Jan 14, 2009 3:50 am

Re: Question about hard drives and ssd

Post by z3r0c00l12 »

Well, the CPU doesn't make any noise, ever. Only the CPU fan could. Like I said above, any sound coming from your PC is either a fan or a hard drive, anything irregular, likely means one of the 2 is about to fail.

What I am saying is that in a desktop, and a laptop for that matter, the only two components that can make noise, because they are the only 2 components of a computer with moving parts is the fan and the hard drive.
bsyawcam
Posts: 8
Joined: Fri Oct 02, 2015 10:51 pm

Re: Question about hard drives and ssd

Post by bsyawcam »

It's the fan. :) Thanks for your help.
Post Reply