[G4] Firewire Fatique

[Tracker at aol.com]

The short answer to the question is:  NO, it will not wear out the FireWire socket. There is not enough friction to cause serious damage to either port or plug unless you are terribly inept and can't insert Tab A into Slot A without physical assistance.

The long answer is partly correct but omits certain data that would have clarified itself.

If the back-up drive has a separate power connection, you can dismount the hard drive icon from the desktop and then turn the back-up drive off to remove the constant noise of its motor.

You do not have to remove the FireWire cable from either device, the computer or the hard drive. It can simply remain connected and will not perform any task until you restart the hard drive for another back-up session.

This will eliminate the noise of the hard drive while it is not being used and will give the added benefit of not causing sustained wear and tear on the FireWire port because of repeated insertions and removals.

Hope that this clears up some of the confusion that the instructions caused.