Samsung T5 or T7 for use with a 2020 iPad Pro with LumaFusion

[iAdamator]

Hey all

Been driving myself nuts trying to research this topic today and really don't have a clean answer. Figured I'd try my luck here.

As my title would indicate, I have a very specific use case: I have an iPad Pro 2020. I'm considering either a Samsung T5 or T7 SSD. The use case is for editing FROM the drive in LumaFusion. What I edit is home videos of my family shot exclusively on iPhones. My editing is by no means fancy.

Where I am torn is on which of the SSDs to get. The T7 is "faster" but something tells me that going through the iPad, I wont benefit from those speeds. I only want to drive to be able to keep up as I work from it.I am not too worried about how fast I can import and export and things like that.

Currently my choice are:

$80 for a 500 GB T7
$120 for a 1TB T5

Would I see any performance gains in the T7? If not, I wouldn't mind investing a bit more for double the storage which is always useful.

Has anyone used both of these on an iPad Pro 2020? I found comparisons for a 2018 iPad and a 2021, but not 2020.

Thanks.

 

[sparksd]

I have a 5000GB T5 and 1TB T7 and have used both with my 2021 12.9 Pro. I have not done any speed tests with reads/writes on the iPad but while the T7 is a faster drive, for the purpose of LumaFusion edits, I doubt the difference in performance would be significant.

 

[Slartibart]

I use both with a 11” iPP 2020 - the T7 is faster. I recommend to format the SSD (any) using APFS to avoid any file system inconsistencies or data loss. For copying from and to (any) external SSD FileBrowser Pro or Go is highly recommended (as well as a USB-C hub like this - to copy videos from your camera directly to the SSD using your iPad).

 

[iAdamator]

I use both with a 11” iPP 2020 - the T7 is faster. I recommend to format the SSD (any) using APFS to avoid any file system inconsistencies or data loss. For copying from and to (any) external SSD FileBrowser Pro or Go is highly recommended (as well as a USB-C hub like this - to copy videos from your camera directly to the SSD using your iPad).

Appreciate the reply. If you don’t mind me asking how are you able to determine the T7 is faster?

I don’t have a mac so I don’t know if I could format the SSD As APFS. Is there a way to do that without a Mac?

 

[Slartibart]

Appreciate the reply. If you don’t mind me asking how are you able to determine the T7 is faster?

I don’t have a mac so I don’t know if I could format the SSD As APFS. Is there a way to do that without a Mac?

If you use FileBrowser to copy many or larger files it gives you an estimate of transfer time and speed and a T7 is faster for larger files than a T5.

There is anecdotical evidence that ExFat as a file system is not as robust as APFS when used with an iPad (there are several threads here on MR). I personally had once a problem where I worked directly on an ExFat SD-card and after saving my edits back, it became unreadable (iPadOS 14, things seems to have improved).

I do edits directly on a T7 with ExFat - but I make sure that everything on this drive is available as backup. If you don’t have a Mac (or you move a lot between different systems) ExFat is the file system of choice.

One problem you‘ll encounter for sure is that iPadOS 13/14/15 not always disconnect an external drive “clean” (well, there is no “eject”-button). you just pull it off and if you connect the external drive to e.g. a Windows machine it will ask you wether the inconsistencies should be repaired. Which you should. ?

 

[iAdamator]

If you use FileBrowser to copy many or larger files it gives you an estimate of transfer time and speed and a T7 is faster for larger files than a T5.

There is anecdotical evidence that ExFat as a file system is not as robust as APFS when used with an iPad (there are several threads here on MR). I personally had once a problem where I worked directly on an ExFat SD-card and after saving my edits back, it became unreadable (iPadOS 14, things seems to have improved).

I do edits directly on a T7 with ExFat - but I make sure that everything on this drive is available as backup. If you don’t have a Mac (or you move a lot between different systems) ExFat is the file system of choice.

One problem you‘ll encounter for sure is that iPadOS 13/14/15 not always disconnect an external drive “clean” (well, there is no “eject”-button). you just pull it off and if you connect the external drive to e.g. a Windows machine it will ask you wether the inconsistencies should be repaired. Which you should. ?

I appreciate the follow up, thank you. My only other computer is a Windows 10 PC so exFAT would probably be best from me. My plan is to edit on LumaFusion straight off the drive, be it a T5 or T7 exclusively. The only thing I plan to put on the drive is the original media, copies of the projects from LumaFusion and a final copy of the video I make. All my original footage (Years ano years worth of home videos) will be copied from my main computer to the T5/7. The original drive on my computer is also backed to OneDrive so I should be covered with my stuff being safe.

Do you edit with LumaFusion? Sorry I might have missed that. My editing needs will be simple, it’s all just iPhone footage so I don‘t imagine my projects are going to tax anything much. Between the T5 and T7, I’m not so much worried about straight transfer speeds as I am just general random access performance, which is what I’ll need as I edit directly off the drive. Is the T7 still the better choice for performance in that regard?

Thanks again.

 

[Slartibart]

I edit occasionally short videos from GoPros, DLSR and mirrorless cameras with LumaFusion, iMovie, CapCut, VN. Depending on occasion* I do this on an external SSD and/or after copying the videos onto the iPP.
Thinking of it, the latter is probably while I “established” the T7 as my “go-to-video-edit”-drive: copying from and to the iPP is faster. A T5 isn’t slow, of course. ?

One other thing: the T5 and T7 will directly mount under Windows, but when you select them in an explorer window or the sidebar you’ll find that there is no “Eject”-command available from the right-click-menu. The way to eject them is to open the hardware&devices system panel and do it there.

*nota bene: I edit videos copied onto the iPad when I’m on an airplane or train, because then there isn’t so much “dangling around“ if I have to move. In that occasions I copy everything before hand on the iPP.
When at home, hotel, or basecamp - let’s say “more stationary” somewhere ? - I usually connect a hub, power, SSD and, if possible a display, keyboard and mouse. I write-protect the SD cards from the cameras, put them into the SD reader integrated in the hub (which is connected to the IPP), connect the SSD and preselect and copy the videos from the camera storage media directly to the SSD.

 

[sparksd]

Right now, the 1TB red T7 without touch protection is only $139.95 on Amazon -

https://www.amazon.com/SAMSUNG-Portable-SSD-1TB-MU-PC1T0R/dp/B0874YDQ9K/

It's a short-term deal.

 

[jjd]

I appreciate the follow up, thank you. My only other computer is a Windows 10 PC so exFAT would probably be best from me. My plan is to edit on LumaFusion straight off the drive, be it a T5 or T7 exclusively. The only thing I plan to put on the drive is the original media, copies of the projects from LumaFusion and a final copy of the video I make. All my original footage (Years ano years worth of home videos) will be copied from my main computer to the T5/7. The original drive on my computer is also backed to OneDrive so I should be covered with my stuff being safe.

Do you edit with LumaFusion? Sorry I might have missed that. My editing needs will be simple, it’s all just iPhone footage so I don‘t imagine my projects are going to tax anything much. Between the T5 and T7, I’m not so much worried about straight transfer speeds as I am just general random access performance, which is what I’ll need as I edit directly off the drive. Is the T7 still the better choice for performance in that regard?

Thanks again.

Out of interest, how do you get your iPhone video clips onto the SSD? Airdrop to the iPad then from there to the SSD?

 

[iAdamator]

The videos I’m working with aren’t recent. Each month I plug my phone into my PC and back up all my photos and videos and organize them for Long term back up on OneDrive. The videos I put on my T7 since getting it were all actually copied from my PC as I’m very backed up on home videos to edit.

I have iCloud Photo Library so if I ever needed to get “new” videos from the iPad to the SSD, id just get them that way once the copy over from the iCloud Photo Library.

Edit: I guess I should add that I did in fact get the T7. It was a better deal and more storage that I’m gonna need for awhile. 8-9 YEARS of family videos isn’t even filling up half a 500 GB SSD and I don’t need to keep them on there once I’m doing editing my video since all the footage on the SSD is a copy.