on 6/5/05 11:12 PM, Martin Hill at [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: > Phillipe, > I didn't mean to sound too negative about the future of Firewire. I would > have no qualms buying a new Firewire 400 drive tomorrow. Like Shay I have > many that I use every day - I also have a Firewire 800 drive which I love > and use with relish. In fact I wish my other drives were Firewire 800 as > well as it is significantly faster than Firewire 400 particularly when > multiple drives are daisy-chained together. And even FW 400 is faster than > USB 2.0 in most real-life situations despite the apparent 80Kbps difference. > > It is only the future versions of Firewire - 1600 and 3200 that sound in > doubt at this point. The fact is, SATA II and standard external connectors > are not here yet to my knowledge and Macs obviously don't have them built-in > yet - in fact, Apple is still including FW 800 on their very latest PowerMac > G5s and PowerBooks. A FW 800 drive and definitely a FW 400 drive bought > today will give you great mileage far ages yet. Most Firewire drives have > USB 2.0 on them as well, so you'll have that added flexibility as well. > > My advice is if you need external storage now, a Firewire 400 or 800 drive > is the thing to go for. >
To all who commented, Mart, Greg, Shay, Craig and others many thanks. I guess that sometimes I tend to be a bit narrow minded and panicky too !! Having said this I am so glad to be in the Apple camp seeing the many problems my relatives and friends who are on the 'dark side' are experiencing. My old Performa 5400 using OS 8.1 (yes, I know its from the dark ages ....) is still working beautifully with all the applications I bought so many years ago. It needed only one re-install in all its working life. And the current G5 is just 'sensationel', overkill for my usage but hey, one has only one go at life! Well I will be picking up my Firewire 400 drive this coming week. Yiiipeeee! Many thanks guys. Regards, Philippe (Call me 'old yellow' I worked hard for this title ;) -- It is not the strongest of the species that survive, nor the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change. Charles Darwin (1809-1882, British Naturalist)
