"CONFIRMED" FireWire 2 in Next Wave of Macs

jpfjpf
Posted:
in Future Apple Hardware edited January 2014
Firewire 2 is shipping in new firewire products today!



<a href="http://www.lacie.se/news/news.cfm?id=D01425C3-D6B7-11D6-981C0090278D3ED0"; target="_blank">http://www.lacie.se/news/news.cfm?id=D01425C3-D6B7-11D6-981C0090278D3ED0</a>;



"OXFORD SHIPS ITS FIRST 922 FIREWIRE 2.0 ORDER TO LACIE



October 5, 2002 ? LaCie, a world leader in mass data storage, plans to be first to market with a new range of drives that will deliver data transfer rates of up to 800 Mbps.

The speed breakthrough has been made possible by the use of Oxford Semiconductor?s OXUF922, IDE to Firewire bridge chip. LaCie has placed the first production order for the new device.



LaCie?s next generation of mass storage products will include their new stylish d2 FireWire Hard drives, with capacities over 300GB. "
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Comments

  • Reply 1 of 30
    This is good, I am looking forward to making my own FireWire2 cables out of 10cents/foot CAT5 ethernet cable.



    Is this really a surprise? i mean, we all saw the prototype motherboard on eBay a couple months ago and it had FireWire2 onboard.



    I went to the Apple Store and talked to one of the people there, asked him about that little blank spot on the back of the G4 next to the USB and said "So whens it gonna get FireWire2?" he said "soon" followed by "dont tell anybody"
  • Reply 1 of 30
    Interesting.



    Apple not planning to announce this then? or have LaCie jumped the gun?
  • Reply 1 of 30
    bigcbigc Posts: 1,224member
    and what IDE HD can accept 100MB/s data transfer rate?
  • Reply 4 of 30
    hmurchisonhmurchison Posts: 12,419member
    [quote]Originally posted by Bigc:

    <strong>and what IDE HD can accept 100MB/s data transfer rate?</strong><hr></blockquote>



    Striped IDE in a RAID config.
  • Reply 5 of 30
    bigcbigc Posts: 1,224member
    so their are IDE drives that will do sustained &gt;50MB/s transfers?
  • Reply 6 of 30
    dygysydygysy Posts: 182member
    I wonder when they will be shipping these new hard drives, I just purchased on of their 120gig d2 hard drives.
  • Reply 7 of 30
    snoopysnoopy Posts: 1,901member
    There has been a lot of discussion about USB 2 being "good enough" for all computer devices, so that FireWire 2 will go nowhere. Yet I believe if there is just one application where FireWire 2 can shine, then vendors will use it to beat out competitors who are using USB 2. Is mass storage such an application? Will FireWire 2 give mass storage a significant performance boost over USB 2? I sure hope the answer is yes.
  • Reply 8 of 30
    moogsmoogs Posts: 4,296member
    Typical FH "logic":



    How do you make the leap from LaCie offering FW2 devices, to "confirming" that the next rev of Macs will use FW2?



    You have no information whatsoever and no idea when Apple will introduce FW2. End of story.



    <img src="graemlins/oyvey.gif" border="0" alt="[No]" />
  • Reply 9 of 30
    hmurchisonhmurchison Posts: 12,419member
    [quote]Originally posted by Moogs:

    <strong>Typical FH "logic":



    How do you make the leap from LaCie offering FW2 devices, to "confirming" that the next rev of Macs will use FW2?



    You have no information whatsoever and no idea when Apple will introduce FW2. End of story.



    <img src="graemlins/oyvey.gif" border="0" alt="[No]" /> </strong><hr></blockquote>





    <a href="http://maccentral.macworld.com/news/0210/08.firewire.php"; target="_blank">http://maccentral.macworld.com/news/0210/08.firewire.php</a>;



    It's logical after the latest Firewire Compliane Workshop had a "Plugfest" with FW2 devices in the 63 Node chain. It's fairly obvious that FW2 is coming in january based on the recent events.
  • Reply 10 of 30
    moogsmoogs Posts: 4,296member
    Perhaps, but the rationale and information you posted is not the same information the topic-starter posted. While I can buy into what you say somewhat (still don't think it makes *any* particular date for release in Macs a given, much less January), what he said makes no sense at all.



    You can't guage how soon Apple is going to revise all of its motherboards to include a new technology, based on a 3rd party supplier making peripherals for that technology. Apple isn't going to do anything because of one or two new products. One or two dozen, yes. But not one or two.
  • Reply 11 of 30
    rickagrickag Posts: 1,626member
    Maybe I'm wrong, feel free to correct me.



    But, if Apple moves to the new firewire standard, won't it still be 100% compatible with the old standard. If so, what would prevent Apple from incorporating Firewire 2. So even though there aren't very many, only one now, that offer Firewire 2 devices, so what.



    IIRC, older Firewire devices wouldn't cause the any newer Firewire 2 devices from losing any speed even when on the same chain??



    [ 10-09-2002: Message edited by: rickag ]</p>
  • Reply 12 of 30
    matsumatsu Posts: 6,558member
    Is it going to be strictly limited to 800Mbps (and below) or will the spec include 1600Mbps aswell.



    Native HD (not SD) will require 150MB/s (1200Mbps). 800 isn't quite there yet, though anyone spending the money on drive solutions for real time uncompressed HD streaming will likely have a dual firewire solution to deliver the goods. And really, it's gonna be a while yet before anyone buy high-end pros have the goods to deal with that kind of video stream.



    What is more interesting is that the 922 chip incorporates USB2.0 and firewire2. This is very interesting cause a little fancy driver work may be all that's needed for a cheap in-line firewire-to-USB2.0 bridge. Even if Apple chooses not to supply USB2.0, there may be (maybe) a cheap solution for iMac/eMac/iBook owners.
  • Reply 13 of 30
    matsumatsu Posts: 6,558member
    PS it's programmable and cheap ($15 dollars in quantity) so hopefully someone can work out a firewire to USB2.0 bridge for all those poor macs without PCI or Cardbus slots.



    I wonder if serial ATA will make an appearance as an external port? SCSI used to be on Powerbooks, so even though Serial ATA doesn't carry power (i think???) it is thin, suppots decent lengths and it is hot pluggable. It could save the need for any kind of bridge, and it could allow for video pros to have cheaper external HDD systems.



    Just a thought.



    Firewire remains the video camera interface of choice (along with HAVi) in the digital A/V era, but an external serial ATA port could be extremely useful for storage (say on a video pro's TiBook, mebbe?)
  • Reply 14 of 30
    [quote]Originally posted by IceMinion:

    <strong>This is good, I am looking forward to making my own FireWire2 cables out of 10cents/foot CAT5 ethernet cable.



    Is this really a surprise? i mean, we all saw the prototype motherboard on eBay a couple months ago and it had FireWire2 onboard.



    I went to the Apple Store and talked to one of the people there, asked him about that little blank spot on the back of the G4 next to the USB and said "So whens it gonna get FireWire2?" he said "soon" followed by "dont tell anybody"</strong><hr></blockquote>



    That is such BS. I know for a FACT that the Apple Retail store employees know NOTHING about what is coming next from Cupertino. What does ANYONE have to back up this rumor?
  • Reply 15 of 30
    snoopysnoopy Posts: 1,901member
    [quote]Originally posted by Matsu:

    <strong>



    . . . What is more interesting is that the 922 chip incorporates USB2.0 and firewire2. . .



    PS it's programmable and cheap ($15 dollars in quantity) . . .



    </strong><hr></blockquote>



    Likely, it can do only one job at a time, either USB 2 or FireWire 2. What is interesting to me is a possibility that vendors can offer a choice of interface with just an extra connector, and maybe a jumper. The cost difference for providing both FireWire 2 and USB would be very low.



    Many are concerned that USB 2 is now the standard, and FireWire 2 does not have a chance. This little chip may be the thing that gets FireWire 2 accepted quickly. For the strategy to work, Apple would have to keep USB 2 off the Mac. If Macs have USB 2, what is the incentive to put an extra connector on peripherals?
  • Reply 16 of 30
    wmfwmf Posts: 1,164member
    I'm sure the 922 is a USB slave, so it couldn't be used as a FW-to-USB converter.



    I don't think Serial ATA is supposed to be used outside the case. A big downside of external Serial ATA is that you can only attach one drive per port. I think the future is FireWire external, Serial ATA internal.
  • Reply 17 of 30
    Yeah I talked to that dude I know at my campus computer store about this FW2. He tipped me off to some new Powerbooks coming out soon, so I reckoned he might spill the beans on FW as well. Sure enough he squealed like a stuck pig when I asked him a few questions.



    I lit into him like this; I started globbering all over a FW CD burner at the store, and suggested that I'm going to buy it to use with my new Powerbook (that he thinks I'm buying as soon as the dps come out). He says, "No, don't buy that one. Hold off until you get your powerbook. It'll be worth the wait".



    I asked point blank if he meant FW 2, and he just looked at me all blank, but then he opened a file and threw a pile of Firewire 2 peripheral preview catalogs on the counter. Let me look for a few seconds and then put them away.



    So yeah, figure on FW2, at least on the new Powerbook.
  • Reply 18 of 30
    kecksykecksy Posts: 1,002member
    [quote]Originally posted by Matsu:

    <strong>Is it going to be strictly limited to 800Mbps (and below) or will the spec include 1600Mbps aswell.



    Native HD (not SD) will require 150MB/s (1200Mbps). 800 isn't quite there yet, though anyone spending the money on drive solutions for real time uncompressed HD streaming will likely have a dual firewire solution to deliver the goods. And really, it's gonna be a while yet before anyone buy high-end pros have the goods to deal with that kind of video stream.



    What is more interesting is that the 922 chip incorporates USB2.0 and firewire2. This is very interesting cause a little fancy driver work may be all that's needed for a cheap in-line firewire-to-USB2.0 bridge. Even if Apple chooses not to supply USB2.0, there may be (maybe) a cheap solution for iMac/eMac/iBook owners.</strong><hr></blockquote>



    Where did you get 150MBps from? Even the fastest hard drives have trouble sustaining 40MBps transfers. FW2 will provide plenty of bandwidth.



    I do realize burst transfers can be much faster than 40MBps, but if moving from ATA100 to ATA133 offers almost no performance improvement, I don't think moving from 800MBps FireWire to 1600MBps will be any different.



    Burst transfers are unimportant. It's substained tranfer speeds that count and current hard drives are just begining to reach the limit of what FW1 can offer.
  • Reply 19 of 30
    ed m.ed m. Posts: 222member
    [[[You can't gauge how soon Apple is going to revise all of its motherboards to include a new technology, based on a 3rd party supplier making peripherals for that technology. Apple isn't going to do anything because of one or two new products. One or two dozen, yes. But not one or two. ]]]



    I disagree with you here. I think it's better to look at it from the reverse perspective.



    Why would a vendor offer a devise that has essentially no home yet? On the other hand, if some company was *close* to offering a solution that could make use of said devices then it makes perfect sense.

    \t

    --

    Ed M.
  • Reply 20 of 30
    aquaticaquatic Posts: 5,602member
    I think it's inevitable. I was surprised the new DDR PowerMacs didn't have FW2.
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