Re: Another port for firewire 400 on xp pro?
- From: "Patrick Keenan" <test@xxxxxxxx>
- Date: Sun, 4 Jan 2009 01:02:41 -0500
"Mark G." <askmefirst@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:elfGE0YbJHA.5412@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
So I got another external drive that will run either USB, firewire, or
express sata. My current mobo does not support the lader. With my other
Western Digital external drive I used firewire and it proves to be faster.
Only problem is that my outputs from my mobo only gives me 1 firewire
connection. With that said, I have a Creative sound card that had a
firewire port and opted to use that. But now I am wondering if I can get
much improvement on my system running XP Pro if I get a PCI expansion card
for firewire 400/800? if so, will be fast enough to support spending the
money? For usage, most of this new drive (1.5tb) will be for backing up
data (about 1tb worth). Any and all input is much appreciated!
While eSATA may be a better option, to answer you question about another
FireWire Card - a lot of the result depends on the drivers. Be absolutely
sure that the drivers will work at full speed on your version of XP. And
it seems that the chip on the card does matter.
In the past, MS FW support has not been particularly good, and at one point
MS tried to solve the timing problems in their drivers by crippling the
speed. Expect to have to look for a hotfix if you encounter any problems.
I will also mention that I have found FW devices to be a questionable
proposition if they are ever intended to be moved. Officially, FW supports
hot-plugging. In my experience, this can cause permanent damage to the
ports on the devices.
I've had a number of external FW drive cases, *all* of which failed due to a
known problem with hot-plugging FW devices. You'll find a white paper on
this problem if you look, and you will find that some manufacturers, for
example M-Audio, urge users to *never* hot-plug firewire devices due to the
risk of permanent port damage, damage that will require replacement.
I've had to send for service (replacement) a $1000+ FW audio interface for
the same reason, and seen a failed FW port (on a MacBook) blow up the port
on a brand-new interface.
On my desk I do have a FW audio interface; it's been plugged in since the
system was assembled, and never moved, which prevents the problem.
If you are having to transfer large amounts of data, yes you want both the
highest speed and greatest sustained throughput, which will mean either
eSATA or FW.
-pk
.
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