Using Old Firewire/ USB 2.0 Drives With 2019 iMac

[mikey8811]

Hi

I am awaiting the arrival of my 2019 iMac (the base 2017 model) with 256 Gb SSD.

I plan on using my existing WD My Book Studio firewire and USB 2.0 drives with all my media, iTunes and Photos libraries on it. I have about 6 of them.

I currently daisy chain as many of them as I can and then have the rest on a USB hub.

I guess daisy chaining is no longer possible.

Is it feasible to run 2 USB hubs with 4 slots each on 2 of the 4 USB 3 slots?

Thanks

 

[Rockadile]

You could try Apple's FW to TB2 adapter and connect with TB2 to TB3 adapter.

Or older TB2 dock (Akitio, CalDigit, OWC) with FW and connect to TB2 to TB3 adapter.

 

[mikey8811]

You could try Apple's FW to TB2 adapter and connect with TB2 to TB3 adapter.

Or older TB2 dock (Akitio, CalDigit, OWC) with FW and connect to TB2 to TB3 adapter

Can I still daisy chain the firewire drives if I use an adapter?

 

[Rockadile]

Can I still daisy chain the firewire drives if I use an adapter?

No idea. You may be the first one to try.

 

[TheyCallMeBT]

You could try Apple's FW to TB2 adapter and connect with TB2 to TB3 adapter.

Or older TB2 dock (Akitio, CalDigit, OWC) with FW and connect to TB2 to TB3 adapter.

To my surprise, this will work. This guy shows it all working, with links to the dongles.

@mikey8811 If you don't mind me making a suggestion-- you might think about upgrading to a new hard drive. Even a cheap bus-powered one should run way faster than those. It looks like you have to use the Apple brand adapters (don't mistake a mini display port to TB3 adapter as a TB2 to TB3 adapter-- it's not the same, even though the plug is). So that's $80 in adapters that you could put into a new hard drive, and migrate the data to the new one. But just a suggestion.

No idea. You may be the first one to try.

Haha, my thought, as well!

 

[marioman38]

I would recommend an 8tb drive you can find them for 140 or so. Then consolidate your 6 drives to one. They also have 4tb and 5tb 2.5” portable bus powered drives that would be worth a try for around 100 to 140. I just threw away a 5x500GB RAID because it weight 20 pounds, sucked tons of power, and loud fans. Seemd silly to keep it around with the cheap price of storage these days.

As said above you can buy a TB to FW800 adapter and daisy chain your FireWire drives. But you’ll be spending some $ on cables and adapters.

 

[xgman]

I suggest you yank that drive out of the firewire and buy a simple usb3 enclosure.