So is Apple really abandoning Firewire?

So is Apple really abandoning Firewire?

The Intel Minis have Firewire ports, so they're not doing a big job of abandoment.

Thanks for the architecture advice, ND. I remembered readin on the side of a product box that they recommended Firewire for maxiumum performance, but they never said why.

Speaking of product boxes, the Microsoft iPod box video was created inside Microsoft.

So is Apple really abandoning Firewire?

If Apple were really abandoning Firewire, they wouldn't have put it in the new Intel boxes, let alone giving these new boxes the ability to boot from a Firewire drive (a feature that no other x86 box has).

So either I was misinformed, or I misunderstood, and got that idea from iPods abandoning Firewire.

They've made no announcements to that effect. They've dropped FW800 off the MacBooks, but it's still on the towers. They are also still happily selling the iSight, which is Firewire only, and promoting the features that it adds into iChat. My suspicion is that they are re-positioning FW800. FW400 will remain on the laptops, and if folks need 800 for their editing work on laptops they can add a card for it. I do fairly large multitrack editing on a laptop and FW400 more than handles the traffic, so I think the demand at the portable level for FW800 just isn't there.

Beyond that, I believe they share a controller on the laptops, so the FW800 and the FW400 port can end up fighting for bandwidth. As a result heavy users are already better off adding a third party FW800 interface.

The same thing that makes Firewire fast (the separate controller chip), was the same thing that was preventing Apple from making the iPods as thin as possible.

The same thing that makes Firewire fast (the separate controller chip), was the same thing that was preventing Apple from making the iPods as thin as possible.

Ah. OK, now I don't mind that my two newest iPods don't have Firewire.

Firewire also provides more power. So, for example, if you have one of the small, svelte, portable external drives, most can do both power and data through a single Firewire connection, but it requries two USB cords - one for power, one for data.

Same for the laptop enclosures. One cord for Firewire, two for USB.

caltech store is having an enormous sale. 12" iBook for 849...which includes tax.

Damn. WANT. If I had done my taxes earlier, I could buy...I could buy by charging it and then use my taxes to pay it off.

Decisions...

I SO love that store, Allyson. For such a small space, they sure have a lot of nice Mac stuff.

That sale is on because there will probably be new iBooks (with Intel chips) released within the next month. There have been rumors that the new iBooks will be released at a significantly lower price point than old ones, so there may be a new, modern, $899 widescreen iBook that is much faster available in a month at the same store. OR, they may not lower the price at all, so this may be your only shot at that figure. Not to intentionally make your decision harder or anything.

It's always a gamble with Apple.