epson p-3000 problem

rosselliot

My Epson should come in tomorrow, and I just went and bought a new external hard drive so I can back up straight from the epson p-3000. I can do that RIGHT!? Epson technical support (AKA, someone with English as a 5th language) told me "well, it's no garuntee, it probably won't work" even though it says on the site that you can back up straight to an external hard drive and on some reviews I've read, it said it should be fine! please someone tell me they were wrong!!!

also, let's say that it does work, when I plug it in the first day (on vacation) and back up the photos, then I plug it into my epson the second day with more photos added, it won't write AGAIN what it wrote yesterday, will it? it would just add to it?

I'd REALLY appreciate y'all's assistance, I know there's someone here who can answer this question!!

- RE

P.S. - the external hard drvie I just bought is the WD passport 120 GB (only $125!!!!! and it's TINY)

- RE

Art Scott

First of all what does the specs for the HDD say....will it back up without a computer??? There in lies the prob with purchasing so close to take off time......If I was truly worried about it I would have purchased a portatble standalone DVD burner and purchased some of the fantastic "gold" dvd's for backing up......or just don't be so paranoid about the epson failing....any of them could fail at any time......

As for it overwriting.....well if there is no computer to tell it that those files are alredy there then I would presume it would keep overwrite each time...it is just STORAGE....also remember it it overwritess who cares....do while your sleeping....it is a backup of your files .......

rosselliot

wait...you can hook up a standalone DVD burner to the epson p-3000 and burn a DVD?!

- RE

LuckyBob

rosselliot wrote:

wait...you can hook up a standalone DVD burner to the epson p-3000 and burn a DVD?!

- RE

Seriously doubt it. According to the documentation for the P3000, it has USB host support (which means you can sucessfully plug other USB devices into it) and a USB mass storage driver (which is the driver that >90% of external hard drives use, but no DVD burner does). This means it should work, as long as the external HD uses the standard mass storage driver. Burning a DVD would require that the P3000 (a) had driver support for external DVD burners, and (b) that it had the proper software embedded to lay out and master a burnt disc; it has neither according to the documentation.

rosselliot

it wouldn't back up to the hard drive I bought.

do you think I'll be okay in France with this as my only backup?

- RE

claudermilk

I would think so. Since you have a new drive in it and they are pretty darn reliable these days, really just make sure you don't beat it up--especially while accessing the drive & you should be fine.

My PD70X/HD80 has been rock solid for me & has gone on several trips as my sole imagetank. I have yet to lose a single image file from that unit (knock on wood).

I'm seeing a whole lot of extreme paranoia with DSLR users thse days. It's like everyone has turned into a Chicken Little and runs around terrified that the sky is going to fall (what if my shutter fails? what is something else on the body fails? is my lens backfocusing? what if my memory card corrupts? what if my quadruple-redundant-backed-up drives all melt into slag simultaneously? while my 3 DVD copies all spontaneously shatter? OMG, the sky is falling!). Did people really worry that much in the film days? Really take some basic precautions, use some commen sense, and take photos. If some get lost, the world will not end; it will be disappointing & frustrating (worst case, if for a paying client you will lose some money), but you won't die from it.

I have mixed up some CF cards while waiting to download to my PD70X/HD80 & erased them by mistake; I have had a drive fail immediately after moving some files & before a backup got run (really bad luck & timing there, 1-in-a-million chance compounded with some poor data management--backup THEN erase, not the other way around) and lost a month's shooting. I'm still here. It's frustrating & pisses you off, but you get over it & move on.

stevo.k

The Epson P3000 and P5000 have two USB ports and will allow you to back up to or from an external USB drive. This way you can offload your cards to the Epson and at the end of the day, backup to another drive.