firewire vs. usb

[t-man152]

it all depends. do you have USB 2.0 support on your mobo or on a PCI card? if so go with USB 2.0. USB 2.0 is more widely spread so I think you should go with that. also if you change computers its sure that they will have usb but might not have firewire. go with USB. :thumbsup:

[snakebyte]

FireWire is faster and better overall. FireWire is uninterruptible while Usb is, hence the reason DV cameras are almost always FireWire.

[MadMax]

Firewire is a far better interface.

look at new motherboards, Firewire is all over the place. Seems like everyone is including Firewire ports on the motherboards.

High end video hardware uses firewire. Why? because it is better and faster.

I wouldn't touch USB.

defintiely go firewire.

[dvornik]

Firewire or both.

[CgFX]

It doesn't really matter. The HDD's themselves are all IDE internal to the enclosure and the performance limit is still the internal read/write rate of the single drive.

It is often cheaper to buy one of the enclosures (firewire or USB 2.0) and a drive (with a giant rebate) separately and put it in the case yourself.

[cheney]

USB 2.0 is more common than Firewire and about 5 times faster. But, be sure that your mobo's USB ports are 2.0 compliant. If they are not you can buy a PCI card with a bunch of USB 2.0 ports for around $15.

[MadMax]

Originally posted by cheney
USB 2.0 is more common than Firewire and about 5 times faster.

From usb.org:
USB 2.0 is 480 megabits per second.

from a 1394 whiepaper:
1394a is 400 megabits per second.

That is not even 25% faster, let alone 5 times faster.

1394b, which is available now, is 800 megabits per second.

[dvornik]

Pardon my ignorance but my impression is that firewire controllers are way more efficient than USB controllers, like, they use far less processor resourses and all of that. And I would guess when you are concerned about sustained transfer rates and stuff that would be a major issue. I kind of think of it as an ide vs scsi debate - ide may well be about as fast but it's not as efficient and is dependant on some things you would rather avoid.

[Maven]

I just want to put my 2cents in...don't buy Maxtor. I am begining to really hate there HDD's, but I don't have any experience with the external Maxtors.

I do have experience with the WD externals, I have one here at work, I think it is great. It is FW and very fast, fast enough that I can even work off of it with either PS, MAX, and Premiere. All large files, with no real difference in speed.

[sumatra]

Im in the same proccess too.,

I ve had a first hand experience with one of the 200gb unibrain(http://www.unibrain.com) offers, the disk came with a pci64 1394b card and it was lightning fast utterly equal as the same disk attached to an ide cable., If cost wasnt an issue i would surely go with this one (http://www.unibrain.com/1394_products/fd800/fire_disk_800_pc.htm)

[imashination]

Originally posted by cheney
USB 2.0 is more common than Firewire and about 5 times faster.

They are on par, both around the 400mbit area. In real use, you will not find any difference between a firewire and usb2.0 version. You can stream, record etc with firewire and usb2 without a hiccup.

Given the choice I would go with usb because of its wider adoption, if a machine doesnt have usb2, it will at least be able to fall back to usb1 speeds.

[deepinspace]

Go with firewire especially for external drives. It is much more efficient, and like dvornik said, it uses a lot less processor resources than USB. And you can daisy chain (connect up to 63 devices)!!!!!!!!

[primal101]

Thanks for all you guys help:beer:

[ZrO-1]

Originally posted by cheney
USB 2.0 is more common than Firewire and about 5 times faster.
Sorry, but that is completely wrong.

Here are the rated speeds as supplied by the ISO:

USB 1.1: 12 Mb/s
USB 2.0: 480 Mb/s
1394a (firewire): 400 Mb/s
1394b (firewire2): 800 Mb/s

Now if you are looking at this and thinking "but then why do internal hard drives have only 100/133 MB/s?" the answer is because USB and Firewire are rated in megaBITS/second whereas hard drives are rated at megaBYTES/second.

So to make things easier I have converted the USB and Firewire speeds to megaBYTES/second:

USB 1.1: 1.5 MB/s
USB 2.0: 60 MB/s
1394a (firewire): 50 MB/s
1394b (firewire2): 100 MB/s
and for easy comparison:
IDE UATA 100: 100 MB/s
IDE UATA 133: 133 MB/s
IDE Serial ATA: 150 MB/s

I felt it was important to straighten that out. Now to answer primal101's question:

Since there aren't very many devices out yet that use 1394b (firewire2); and those that are out there are mostly for the Mac, your next fastest choice is USB 2.0. What cheny did get right in his statement is that USB 2.0 controller cards are cheap and plentiful for the PC, if you don't already have it built-in to the motherboard.
Also: USB 2.0 devices can work with computers that have USB 1.1 ports, however they will only work at USB 1.1 speeds (12 Mb/s). You need USB 2.0 both in the device (hard drive in this example) and in your computer to get the 480 Mb/s speed.
Important: Firewire2 is NOT compatible with Firewire1. So if you did get a firewire2 device, it would only work in computers with firewire2 ports.

Hope that helps.

[MadMax]

You can buy a 1394b card for 50.00 or less.......

[primal101]

ZrO-1,

Thanks for the info. I did not know that firewire 2 is not compatible with firewire 1.:banghead:

[CgFX]

Originally posted by primal101
ZrO-1,

Thanks for the info. I did not know that firewire 2 is not compatible with firewire 1.:banghead:

That needs to be clarified a bit:


FireWire 800

Backwards compatibility. Manufacturers have adopted FireWire for a broad range of devices, such as DV cameras, hard drives, digital still cameras, professional audio, printers, scanners and home entertainment. Adapter cables for the FireWire 800 9-pin connector let you use these FireWire 400 products on the FireWire 800 port.

[DaForce]

Originally posted by ZrO-1


USB 1.1: 1.5 MB/s
USB 2.0: 60 MB/s
1394a (firewire): 50 MB/s
1394b (firewire2): 100 MB/s
and for easy comparison:
IDE UATA 100: 100 MB/s
IDE UATA 133: 133 MB/s
IDE Serial ATA: 150 MB/s



And note that all these speeds are the peak speeds not the constant, most ATA 100/133 drives operate at around 40-50MB/s in every day use.

<EDIT>
oooo the devils post....666

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