[cmeisenzahl]

http://tinyurl.com/9wsrd

"Will Firewire Survive The Switch To Intel?
Arik Hesseldahl

One of the very best things about being a Mac user over the last several years has been Apple’s persistent support of the Firewire interface. It was Firewire that made the first iPod a success because it loaded music so much faster than other MP3 players on the market that used only a USB connection (USB at that point was still in its earlier, slower iteration at the time).

All but one of my external backup hard drives are Firewire drives. My newest one – a portable drive from Seagate runs on USB 2.0. It’s a fine drive, but it hooking it up to my Powerbook means using up both my USB ports. The connection cords is this strange Y-shaped affair. One port handles data, the other power. This is not nearly as elegant and simple as the portable Firewire drives I have come to enjoy over the years from vendors like Iomega, LaCie, SmartDisk and others.

So this is why I strongly dislike the idea of losing the Firewire ports on Intel-based Macs, as The Apple Core Blog suggested Thursday. Apple has migrated the iPod family of products away from the Firewire interface, and that to me is a troubling sign of things to come."

[iDaver]

I was all for Apple dumping floppy disks, ADB, NuBus and ADC. These were technologies that were either obsolete or proprietary and didn't make sense. Firewire is not obsolete; it has many useful purposes. If Apple eliminates Firewire from new Macs, I'll be very unhappy with them. I doubt this will happen, however. It would be ridiculous.

[nelliott]

The whole reason for apple migrating the iPods to USB2 only was to reduce costs. There is simply no point in supporting firewire when all new macs and pcs ship with USB2 as standard nowerdays, even though it is the more elegant solution.

Removing firewire from any apple computer would cause the whole digital hub / iLife strategy to implode upon itself.

[production_coordinator]

Originally Posted by nelliott

The whole reason for apple migrating the iPods to USB2 only was to reduce costs. There is simply no point in supporting firewire when all new macs and pcs ship with USB2 as standard nowerdays, even though it is the more elegant solution.

Removing firewire from any apple computer would cause the whole digital hub / iLife strategy to implode upon itself.

The reason they switched to USB 2 was because many PCs don't have Firewire. Cost was a secondary factor.

It's nearly impossible to sell a novice user an iPod and a Firewire PCI card.
Customer: "You mean I have to open up my computer!"

[nelliott]

Originally Posted by production_coordinator

The reason they switched to USB 2 was because many PCs don't have Firewire. Cost was a secondary factor.

It's nearly impossible to sell a novice user an iPod and a Firewire PCI card.
Customer: "You mean I have to open up my computer!"

True, but previous iPods supported both firewire and USB2 through the dock connection. It was cheaper for them to remove the firewire controller chip than keep support for both (and in turn sacrifice those mac users with pre-USB2 computers).

[mduell]

There are plenty of bus-powered USB enclosures that only require one plug. His has two plugs to support more power hungry drives. I also doubt his claim that one is for data and one is for power; if only one was supplying power he'd be fine running data and power on the same cable and not need the second. The drives I've seen with two plugs have one for data and power and the other for additional power.
I think the next major revision of Apple's laptops will have more than 2 USB ports; these days two just isn't enough (mouse, hard drive, digital camera, PDA, phone, etc).

[ghporter]

Also note that USB hosts manage the amount of power provided to each port and budget the available power accordingly. Using two USB ports gets about twice the available power.

Firewire, by the way, doesn't manage power as well as USB; you can easily plug in a firewire device that pulls more than the adapter can provide, causing problems. USB simply won't let such a device turn on.

I've read a lot of threads about "Apple abandoning firewire." It all sounds like a lot of aluminum foil beanie talk to me. It was a financially-based business decision from all I can tell; supporting the more common connectivity standard only saves components, and that saves money.

[iDaver]

Originally Posted by ghporter

I've read a lot of threads about "Apple abandoning firewire." It all sounds like a lot of aluminum foil beanie talk to me. It was a financially-based business decision from all I can tell; supporting the more common connectivity standard only saves components, and that saves money.

As if this is a fact and not a baseless rumor.

[mduell]

Originally Posted by ghporter

Also note that USB hosts manage the amount of power provided to each port and budget the available power accordingly. Using two USB ports gets about twice the available power.

Firewire, by the way, doesn't manage power as well as USB; you can easily plug in a firewire device that pulls more than the adapter can provide, causing problems. USB simply won't let such a device turn on.

Mmm, crispy Firewire ports.
In addition to USB not letting a power-hungry device overload the bus, most USB HCIs will send a message to the OS letting it know that a device tried to pull too much power so the OS can inform the user why their device isn't working.

[slugslugslug]

Originally Posted by iDaver

As if this is a fact and not a baseless rumor.

It's a bit confusing based on his response, but I don't think Glenn actually believes it at all (hence the tinfoil helmet reference). I'm assuming the financial decision he mentions is the decision to drop FW from iPods, not from any computer.

Correct me if I'm wrong, gh

[iDaver]

Originally Posted by slugslugslug

It's a bit confusing based on his response, but I don't think Glenn actually believes it at all (hence the tinfoil helmet reference). I'm assuming the financial decision he mentions is the decision to drop FW from iPods, not from any computer.

If that's the case, the comment makes sense. The iPod is merely a single peripheral. The Mac is the hub. It would be inexcusable to remove Firewire from the hub, IMO.

[ajprice]

No Firewire would not be good. People have invested in Firewire equipment (hard drives, iSights, iPods, scanners, DV cameras). I can't see why Apple would drop Firewire, its hardly a dead duck like floppy drives were. I can see why they have dropped it from iPods because of space, especially on the Nano, but Mac's shouldn't have this problem. If its for costs, maybe they should drop a few keys from keyboards, I mean, I've never pressed the key to the left of 1, so that could go....

[Eriamjh]

If Apple dumps FW on the iBook, it is saying that NO CONSUMER needs to edit DV on his iBook and should either buy a desktop or a powerbook.

If Apple is saving money on the processors (they most certainly are buying Intel chips for a bundle less than the PPCs) then there should be PLENTY leftover to continue firewire on the iBook. How much could they really save?

Perhaps the rumors are not complete. Maybe the iBooks without FW are really the super-sub notebooks with only the bare necessities (with or without an optical drive)? Maybe the iBook isn't losing its FW port, but we are getting a smaller laptop without the port as a way to REALLY saving space and money.

Has anyone ever seen anything that indicates how much USB costs compared to FW? Chipsets, port connector, etc.?

[ghporter]

Originally Posted by iDaver

If that's the case, the comment makes sense. The iPod is merely a single peripheral. The Mac is the hub. It would be inexcusable to remove Firewire from the hub, IMO.

Yup. The tinfoil reference was intended to show how much faith I put in conspiracy rumors; I'd be buying stock in Alcoa and bauxite mines otherwise!

Further, I can't see a business benefit from Apple actively eschewing a connectivity path THEY created. It's just nuts to think that. On the other hand, while very few companies make firewire interface chips, a kazillion companies make USB interface chips, and there's been a whole lot of miniturization and integration going on with them; I do not see anyone marketing a firewire "flash drive" for example, while you can even get a USB one that's barely more than the connector itself. Why? Miniaturization of the USB interface and CHEAP USB interface chips.

[slugslugslug]

Originally Posted by Eriamjh

If Apple dumps FW on the iBook, it is saying that NO CONSUMER needs to edit DV on his iBook and should either buy a desktop or a powerbook.

Well, then, I think we're all in agreement here. On the off-off-chance that the next iBook drops FireWire, we can all come back to this thread and flagellate ourselves (in some metaphorical, "cyber" way, of course..

Originally Posted by ghporter

Further, I can't see a business benefit from Apple actively eschewing a connectivity path THEY created. It's just nuts to think that.

It's nice to think that, but I don't know if that's really the issue. They dropped ADB and ADC (I kinda wish they'd pushed the industry to adopt the latter; it seemed to have its merits). I think they'd be pretty likely to consider dropping FW on consumer Macs if it weren't the standard for consumer camcorders.

But otherwise, we pretty much all agree, eh?