[X4U] firewire hub

[Eddie Hargreaves]

On 6/23/06 8:40 AM, Jan Melichar <janmel at mac.com> wrote:

> On 23 Jun 2006, at 01:22, Philip J Robar wrote:
> 
>> On Feb 9, 2006, at 10:29 AM, Randy B.Singer wrote:
>> 
>>> And, by the way, I wouldn't put two FireWire hard drives on the same
>>> chain or attach them to a FireWire hub, I would instead purchase a
>>> multi-port FireWire PCI card.
>> 
>> I second Randy's recommendation of not sharing FireWire (or  USB)
>> bandwidth between simultaneously operating high-speed devices, but
>> want to add a cautionary note. Multiple ports on a FireWire (or
>> USB) PCI card do not guarantee or even imply that each port has
>> it's own unshared bandwidth. I would recommend that unless you can
>> find documentation to the contrary that you assume that all ports
>> on a card will share the same bandwidth.
> 
> Mine sometimes develop a life of their own (much as SCSI drives used
> to) and there seems to be no logical way to restore previous order.
> So every few months when one or other drives does not mount I spend a
> irritating hour or so pulling cable out and replacing them in a
> different order only to go through the same procedure a few months
> later.
> 
> I assumed that as with SCSI this was just part of life and was only
> the other day wondering if a firewire hub would solve this
> irritation. `Until now I assumed that daisy chaining was normal and
> proper practice but if not could someone please give me/us the
> lowdown on this as my hard drives are multiplying!

Daisy chaining Firewire drives is certainly normal and using a hub is
probably not going to solve the irritations you are experiencing because a
hub is basically doing the same thing. Of course, if your Mac only has one
Firewire port and no expandability, then you have no choice but to daisy
chain or use a hub.

-- 
Eddie Hargreaves