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Can I add more drives to the onboard storage array? Can I exchange my existing storage drives for drives with a larger capacity?

Possibly, depending on the specific hardware platform that you purchased. Please contact SnapStream sales for options.


Can I use the server with a SAN or NAS? What about a USB storage device?

SnapStream supports a variety of network-attached storage solutions. Unfortunately, at this time we are not able to support locally-attached USB locations due to issues with USB transfer speed that can interfere with SnapStream software.



What do I need to do to configure an external storage location for use with my server?

See Adding a UNC path as a video folder in Enterprise TV.



Can I record directly to an external location?

Version 5 of SnapStream does support recording directly to a UNC location, subject to the specific properties of your network. You will also need to enable the Direct UNC Recording option in the Recordings settings page, as documented in the SnapStream help file. Please contact SnapStream support for more information.

Version 4 of SnapStream does not support recording directly to a UNC location. SnapStream strongly recommends against recording to an external location from an appliance running version 4 of SnapStream software. Doing so may result in recording errors or corruption.



Will I be able to search and play back files that have been moved to an external drive?

Yes. Videos that have been moved to an external location can be used just like files that are located on the server's internal drives. They remain fully searchable. If you are using a UNC location, users may see improved playback performance in Enterprise TV Link if Direct UNC Playback is enabled through Settings=> Playback Settings.



How should I move files to a network or USB-attached location after recording?

SnapStream does not recommend any particular method for moving files to external drives for long-term storage. A couple of options are:

- Automatic ShowSqueeze and Workflows. ShowSqueeze can be configured to copy completed recordings to another video folder. In addition, you can set the target for ShowSqueeze transcode operations to an externally located video folder. The Workflows page in version 5 of SnapStream provides additional options.

- Manual move. You can use the Move command in the web admin Recorded Shows page to move multiple files at once between video folders as a post-process.

- FTP or backup client. You can move video files from the local drives to an external location through Windows by using a third-party backup or FTP client.

Note: closed-captioning and SmartSkip information for video files is located in separate files that are named after the video file. For example:

For the video file: Recording-01-02-17-09-0.mpg

Closed captioning will be located in the file: Recording-01-02-17-09-0.mpg.srt

And chapter info will be located in the file: Recording-01-02-17-09-0.mpg.chapters.xml

These files must be moved along with the video file in order for it to remain searchable and retain chapter information. This is done automatically if the files are moved through SnapStream software.