What can you do with Firewire 400, 800 Ports?

[uMac]

Ok, I am looking at buying the MBP (ok, who isn't?) but it only comes with a few USB ports, and 400 & 800 Firewire ports.

I am looking for things that use these ports (Harddrives for example) as I want to maximize there use. Also who makes/sells good firewire components?

Can you get a Firewire to USB adapter/hub? For more USB ports?

Thanks In advance!

 

[swiftaw]

External Hard Drives
Connecting peripherals, like Video Cameras

 

[scotpole]

Fire Wire

USB is great for keyboards and joysticks and digital cameras.
Fire wire is great for anything else.
Fire wire 400 allows you to connect up to 64 devices on a single daisy chain although I have never heard of anyone actually doing this. You can chain scanners, hard drives, and printers together. And you can use fire wire to dump the video on your handycam into Imovie and create your own citizen Kane.
Fire wire 800 may not have the linking connections on each device and you may not be able to plug as many devices into a chain. Fire wire 800 is a fat pipeline that is throughputting 800megabits/sec. This is great for an external drive with large files because the transfer of data happens quickly. i.e. a scratch disk for video, or your Iphoto library.
If you attach a firewire drive to either port, you may want to install an operating system on this drive. If you ever have problems you can by choosing system preferences, choose this drive, then under the apple logo in the upper left corner choose restart. When your external drive comes up you can repair your internal disk and your disk preferences in disk utility.

 

[jkwuc89]

My Maxtor external hard drive connected to my MBP via the Firewire 400 port. I have not run any tests to verify this but it appears to be faster than connecting this same drive via USB 2.0.

 

[uMac]

Any Suggestions?

If you attach a firewire drive to either port, you may want to install an operating system on this drive. If you ever have problems you can by choosing system preferences, choose this drive, then under the apple logo in the upper left corner choose restart. When your external drive comes up you can repair your internal disk and your disk preferences in disk utility.

My plan was to buy a Firewire HD (any suggestions) to hold all my files while the Internal is for OS, Programs, and Files I need on the road. I like your Backup OS idea, is this easy to do?

Any suggestion on who makes a good firewire HD?

Thanks for the info.

 

[panoz7]

Can you get a Firewire to USB adapter/hub? For more USB ports?

No, but you can get a USB to USB hub for more USB ports while you're at your desk. Just because you have a port doesn't mean you necessarily have to use it. While my powerbook is at my desk I only use one USB port and one Firewire 800 port.

Firewire is usually used for external hard-drives, digital video cameras, audio interfaces, and in some other equipment where constant high band-width is important.

 

[Lovesong]

My plan was to buy a Firewire HD (any suggestions) to hold all my files while the Internal is for OS, Programs, and Files I need on the road. I like your Backup OS idea, is this easy to do?

Any suggestion on who makes a good firewire HD?

Thanks for the info.

LaCie makes some good stuff. So does G-tech. Both those companies have models that have a FW800 port on them. I personally prefer using a small SATA RAID box such as this. I have a pair of Maxtor SATA drives in there, and it holds most of my stuff.

Running an OS from a FW drive used to be great. I believe (and you can yell at me if I'm wrong) that the intel machines can only boot off a USB drive.

 

[uMac]

Firewire Hubs?

No, but you can get a USB to USB hub for more USB ports while you're at your desk. Just because you have a port doesn't mean you necessarily have to use it. While my powerbook is at my desk I only use one USB port and one Firewire 800 port.

Firewire is usually used for external hard-drives, digital video cameras, audio interfaces, and in some other equipment where constant high band-width is important.

Yeah, I have a bunch of USB peripherals that I would like to plug in (I also need to get a mouse + KB) + Wacom Tablet, USB BackupDrive, Digital Camera, Webcam (ok, no more), but only 3 slots.

Is there such thing as a Firewire Hub (For RAID backups, etc)?

 

[panoz7]

Shoot! I was hopping that could be done.
Yeah, I have a bunch of USB periferals that I would like to plug in (I also need to get a mouse + KB) + Wacom Tablet, USB BackupDrive, Digital Camera, Webcam (ok, no more), but only 3 slots.

Is there such thing as a Firewire Hub (For RAID backups)?

Each of those USB ports supports multiple USB devices (127 to be exact). Unless you have a couple hundred USB peripherals (and it doesn't sound like you do) you should have no problem as long as you purchase a hub or two.

Here's my current peripheral tree (to illustrate the hub concept)

USB
1 - Card-reader or flash drive (usually empty though)
2 - Hub
    1 - Printer
    2 - Scanner
    3 - Tablet
    4 - Keyboard (contains a hub)
        1 - Mouse
        2 - Empty

There are Firewire Hubs. Most Firewire drives support daisy chaining though, so a hub isn't always necessary.

 

[uMac]

Thanks Panoz7 (and everyone else)

I think I got what I needed know.