Hasselblad X5 - slow save

[matthewturley]

I just got a used Hasselblad X5 scanner to replace my Precision II. The scan itself is super fast (1'6'' for a 4x5"@2040dpi), but it's taking an additional 60-90 seconds for the file to finish saving the file (I assume) after the film is returned from the drum. While writing, Flexcolor is locked up as the progress bar indicates whatever's going on.

This never happened with the PII, and I think it didn't do this when I first set up the X5 last week. I'm wondering if I changed some weird setting?

I know, I know - at 2.5 minutes this is crazy fast compared to 20min scans on the PII, but I want to make sure it's not just something stupid. Anyone have an idea of what's going on?

thanks in advance!
-Matthew

[Ash]

I'm used to the Epson V700 taking up to a minute to dump a smaller file into photoshop (via Silverfast) so maybe it's just a normal write speed issue? It has to transfer the data at some point.

[matthewturley]

Ok, I'm sure it's slow now. Two days I was doing straight-in 3F scans (via the hardware button) and was able to start a new scan as soon as the carrier returned. Now I have to wait 90 seconds or so before the button-light goes off. Also, the same delay exists on super low-res scans (~72dpi / 11MB file). Weird, right?

Starting to wonder if my firewire bus is having an issue. I tried resetting the PRAM (I'm on Mac OS X 10.6.7), no dice. Help!?!

[matthewturley]

Ok, more mystery and intrigue... I just installed Flexcolor on my MacBookPro and it scans at full speed, no delay. I think the MacPro firewire controller is more and more suspect

[matthewturley]

Ok, I'm almost done talking to myself on here :) Turns out the problem only exists when any of my FW800 hard drives are plugged in and on (G-TECH GRAID 4TB). So, unfortunately it looks like connecting things to your MacPro's FW800 port severely limits the bandwidth on your FW400 port. Whodathunk?

[Ed Kelsey]

You are too high tech for 95% of the people here. They are more interested in dunking huge pieces of film in soup and making contact prints.

[Kimberly Anderson]

He does that too...

[matthewturley]

Well, I figured that at least here most people would know I wasn't talking about a BMW :)

Wish that was still the case, Michael. Btw, Ilford is delaying again on my paper delivery, so I've got a bunch of chemistry just rotting away. Of course, not that I have the time anyway...

[Preston]

I'm not a MAC guy, but doesn't FW400 (1394A) use a different controller than FW800 (1394b)? If that's the case, you might check to see if you've got a conflict going on somewhere.

Just a thought.

--P

[matthewturley]

I'm not sure. I've read some stuff online that seems to indicate they're linked. Something about how if you use both ports, the FW800 port is limited to 400 speed. Not sure if that's related to my issue or not. No idea about how to sort out conflicts. Been a long time since I messed with that on a PC - no clue how to do it on a mac.

[Evanjoe610]

Mathew,
Take a look at this information I pasted below from this website.
The way I remember it, there is a maximum length allowed for the cabling. Anything over that certain length will affect the overall performance.

http://8help.osu.edu/1249.html

FireWire 800 and FireWire 400


FireWire, also known as IEEE 1394, was designed to be a universal interconnect, eliminating the need for many different input/output connectors. The 1394 bus is a versatile, high speed, and inexpensive way to connect a wide variety of consumer electronic devices such as computers, digital camcorders, hard drives, scanners, printers, audio recorders, and videoconferencing cameras. With FireWire, it's possible to connect up to 63 devices together. When 1394.1 bus bridges become available, it will be possible to connect over 60,000 devices together on a common bus.

There are currently two standards: the original FireWire, now referred to as FireWire 400 or IEEE 1394, and FireWire 800 or IEEE 1394b. As the names imply, the maximum speed of FireWire 400 is 400 Mbits per second, whereas FireWire 800 tops out at 800 Mbits per second. FireWire 800 is backwards-compatible, and unlike USB the FireWire bus speed is not diminished when a slower FireWire 400 device shares a FireWire 800 bus. The maximum cable length is currently 4.5 meters or around 15 feet.

There are three types of connectors associated with FireWire. The standard FireWire 400 connector for ports found on Macintoshes is a six-pin connector that looks like this:

A FireWire 400 6-pin connector

Four of the connectors on the six-pin connector are used for the transmission of data, while the other two provide power to devices that are bus powered. FireWire can provide up to 45 watts of power through the connect, thereby eliminating the need for separate power supplies for peripheral devices.

Another popular FireWire 400 connector, found on devices such as camcorders and Windows PCs, is the 4-pin connector:

A FireWire 400 4-pin connector

The four pins provide a data path to and from the device but not power.

Finally, there is the the 9-pin FireWire 800 connector:

A FireWire 800 9-pin connector

Three of the pins provide power and the other six provide data channels for external devices.

Note: Several companies make FireWire 800 to 400 adaptors, which allow users to plug devices with FireWire 800 into FireWire 400 ports and vice versa.

--------------------
Evan

[matthewturley]

Thanks Evan. I've had cable length issues in the past, so this was actually one of the first things I tried in troubleshooting. I swapped out my usual 10' IEEE1394 cable for a 2'. Not sure if it matters, but the hard drive cable was a 3', so the total FW cable length was only 5'.

[cosseboom]

When I am going for speed (with any scanner or working with large files in PS) I work from my internal drives and transfer to external after the fact. Transfer rates are much faster for internal than external depending on the connection.

USB 1.1 = 12 Mbit/s
Firefire 400 = 400 Mbit/s
USB 2.0 = 480 Mbit/s
FireWire 800 = 800 Mbit/s
USB 3.0 = 5 Gbit/s
eSATA = Up to 6 Gbit/s right now as it depend on the internal SATA chip.

[matthewturley]

Yeah, but this issue affects even writes to the local internal drives. Even if my external FW800 drive is unmounted, if it's plugged in and on it will slow down the FW400 bus.

I actually save all my scans to my desktop initially for the very reason you mention, and that's why this took me so long to diagnose - I couldn't imagine a drive on (what I thought was) a completely different interface getting in the way.

[Evanjoe610]

Mathew,

Why not call into Hasselblad USA in New Jersey to have go over your configuration to see what is causing the slow speed? They are very helpful.