Firewire 400 vs 800
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- pushin' record
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Firewire 400 vs 800
My PC has a great motherboard with FW800 and I run a MOTU 828mkII with it. No problems with stuttering or bad latency. However, I'm going to be getting a new Mac Book Pro (the 15") and it only has FW400. Will I notice a difference when recording? Overall (just to make note) the specs on the PC and the specs on the Mac Book are almost the same. 2GHz, 1 gig of ram, 100GB harddrive, etc...
Thanks!
Thanks!
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- george martin
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- buyin' a studio
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Even if you're running the 828 off a FW800 port, the 828 itself is only FW400. You shouldn't notice any difference running it from a FW400 port.
thething...800 is backward-compatible with 400, and you can get an adapter to run FW400 devices on an 800 port.
thething...800 is backward-compatible with 400, and you can get an adapter to run FW400 devices on an 800 port.
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- george martin
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- pushin' record
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what about fireface
I have fireface 800 and always wondered if I should be using the 800 firewire port.
For now the cost of an appropriate cable is prohibitive. But I have never had any problem with the 400FW line running all 8 analog AD/DA
anyone use these?
For now the cost of an appropriate cable is prohibitive. But I have never had any problem with the 400FW line running all 8 analog AD/DA
anyone use these?
- Jeff White
- ghost haunting audio students
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I have found that FW800 is better for read/write to disk than FW400. Obvious, right?
I use a Lacie D2 external FW800 (also has one FW400 and one USB2.0) as the record drive for my Powerbook G4. I run my MOTU 828mkii through a FW PCMCIA card so that audio and read/write data are running on separate FW busses. My PB is a 1.5ghz G4 with 768MB of RAM. I record everything at 24bit/44.1kHz and can easily record 8 tracks simultaneously while playing back up to 24 additional tracks. I'm using Digital Performer 4.61.
Jeff
I use a Lacie D2 external FW800 (also has one FW400 and one USB2.0) as the record drive for my Powerbook G4. I run my MOTU 828mkii through a FW PCMCIA card so that audio and read/write data are running on separate FW busses. My PB is a 1.5ghz G4 with 768MB of RAM. I record everything at 24bit/44.1kHz and can easily record 8 tracks simultaneously while playing back up to 24 additional tracks. I'm using Digital Performer 4.61.
Jeff
G4 FW bus
An odd bit of architecture on the G4 PowerBooks: FW800 and FW400 are on the same bus, which acts as an 800 bus if the only thing connected on it is 800, but acts as a 400 if an 800 and a 400 thing are both connected to it. This bit of arcana cost me several nights of anguish. Long may you run.
Never let the perfect be the enemy of the good.
- Jeff White
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Re: G4 FW bus
This is why I picked up a PCMCIA FW400card. It keeps my drive and 828mkii on separate busses, and allows me to use FW800 for read/write. I have zero complaints regarding this setup.street wrote:An odd bit of architecture on the G4 PowerBooks: FW800 and FW400 are on the same bus, which acts as an 800 bus if the only thing connected on it is 800, but acts as a 400 if an 800 and a 400 thing are both connected to it. This bit of arcana cost me several nights of anguish. Long may you run.
Jeff
does your D2 external FW800 make a hell of a noise. Mine does, and has done since i got it years ago. no problems with it other than the noise. thinking of replacing it with a quieter porsche drive.
on the other topic, crazy that the new macbook pros haven't got fw800, maybe the next revision will, well, revise this......
on the other topic, crazy that the new macbook pros haven't got fw800, maybe the next revision will, well, revise this......
- Jeff White
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I haven't had any problems with it getting on my nerves yet. How are the Porsche drives?griff505 wrote:does your D2 external FW800 make a hell of a noise. Mine does, and has done since i got it years ago. no problems with it other than the noise. thinking of replacing it with a quieter porsche drive.
The 17" version has FW400 & FW800. I wish that the 15" had it as well. However, you can just get a FW card for the expansion slot and run a second FW buss. Those computers are so much faster than PBs that I can't see read/write being a problem at all. I guess that they are marketing the 17" with the FW800 for video producing guys and gals.griff505 wrote:on the other topic, crazy that the new macbook pros haven't got fw800, maybe the next revision will, well, revise this......
Jeff
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