3 way dance: PCI vs. Firewire vs. USB2

Ethan Holdtrue · Post by **Ethan Holdtrue** » Tue Nov 22, 2005 6:09 pm

Any recomendations or thoughts on these 3 mediums?

My exp has been that PCI box tends to 'skip' less during play back, and record less 'matrix' sounds if your running a system with less ram than if your running a firewire box.

Milkmansound · Post by **Milkmansound** » Wed Nov 23, 2005 10:35 am

I have used all three - and I really like firewire cause I can take the converter out and use my laptop. USB is unusable, and PCI - while great, is somewhat limited.

Ethan Holdtrue · Post by **Ethan Holdtrue** » Tue Nov 29, 2005 9:57 am

I dunno... I just switched ovr to a firewire system and I think I liked my PCI waaaay better. It seems the larger my files become, the more 'buzzs' I get going to disk (which I never had with pci), and the more skips I get on playback (which I almost never had with pci). I'm guessing this has something to do with firewire's limit of only 400megs a sec? Ither than that the sound quality is pretty awesome, but I am becoming quight dissapointed with firewire as a main unit.

Milkmansound · Post by **Milkmansound** » Wed Nov 30, 2005 7:38 am

I think its 400 megabits, not megabytes. So it would be closer to 4 megabytes per second.

I am not sure what the bus speed is for PCI but would be interested to know I supppose.

joel hamilton · Post by **joel hamilton** » Wed Nov 30, 2005 7:47 am

Milkmansound wrote:I think its 400 megabits, not megabytes. So it would be closer to 4 megabytes per second.

I am not sure what the bus speed is for PCI but would be interested to know I supppose.

Firewire: It is mega BITS not bytes.

PCI: bus speed depends on the computer.

I really have only used protools, ever, in all the years. I have never had any skips, but i have had plenty of DAE errors when there is not enough buffer available, or on lesser computers in general like a laptop. Drive speed, and cache seem to make a huge difference with FW based scenarios. Even with the PTHD3 rig I use these days, a 5400 rpm drive will bum out on a high track count session. It will "work" but not really well.

My Mbox works fine with a laptop.... Keeps the FW port free for a drive as well...

Marc Alan Goodman · Post by **Marc Alan Goodman** » Thu Dec 01, 2005 2:31 pm

Also, last time I checked USB2 was faster than Firewire 400. I don't have the numbers in front of me though...

Really, nowadays there's not too much difference except for mobility. They're all fast as hell.

joel hamilton · Post by **joel hamilton** » Thu Dec 01, 2005 2:47 pm

Marcocet wrote:Also, last time I checked USB2 was faster than Firewire 400. I don't have the numbers in front of me though...

Really, nowadays there's not too much difference except for mobility. They're all fast as hell.

USB2 claims higher rates and i have never once seen them in practice. Someone brought in a drive to back up to that was USB2, and we got like 1/2 the throughput of a standard 7200rpm, nothing fancy LaCie FW400 drive!

JohnDavisNYC · Post by **JohnDavisNYC** » Thu Dec 01, 2005 2:58 pm

funnily enough, i'm about to go get a firewire800 drive because i'm getting disc too slow errors in logic with this phonograph record. yay 88.2.... yay >30 tracks..

shitty little lacie porsche drive has been wierd about mounting a few times, too, so i'm a bit worried it might be on it's way out.

john

joel hamilton · Post by **joel hamilton** » Thu Dec 01, 2005 4:20 pm

toaster3000 wrote:funnily enough, i'm about to go get a firewire800 drive because i'm getting disc too slow errors in logic with this phonograph record. yay 88.2.... yay >30 tracks..

shitty little lacie porsche drive has been wierd about mounting a few times, too, so i'm a bit worried it might be on it's way out.

john

Those porche drives are slower than the D2 case jammers. Too bad. i got one because it doesnt have a fan, but i just didnt get the performance I needed. With the D2 case LaCie, i just mixed a 54 track session in PT at 88.2. Granted, not host based, but whatever. the drive held up. Even printing a few overdubs so I guess it was more like 56 tracks by the time we were done...

Shaka · Post by **Shaka** » Mon Dec 05, 2005 1:52 pm

Marcocet wrote:Also, last time I checked USB2 was faster than Firewire 400. I don't have the numbers in front of me though...

Really, nowadays there's not too much difference except for mobility. They're all fast as hell.

USB 2.0 is faster technically, it is not full duplex. That means that it cannot read and write data at the same time. Firewire can duplex and is a better solution if you need to record more than four tracks at once.

Eric

Ethan Holdtrue · Post by **Ethan Holdtrue** » Tue Dec 06, 2005 9:54 am

If you were to think of firefire and USB in terms of water, USB would be like getting 480megs worth of ice cubes per second. As where Fire Wire would be liking getting a constant 400 Meg per sec stream of water.

Message Board

3 way dance: PCI vs. Firewire vs. USB2

3 way dance: PCI vs. Firewire vs. USB2

Who is online