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Firewire 800 cards on Mac Pro necessary?
Just upgraded to a MacPro 4 core 2.66 with FCP 7, I am using the AJA Io as am interface. I have 4 G-Raids with uncompressed media on all 4. Do I need to add PCIe Firewire cards in the slots or can I daisy chain the drives and use the two available Firewire 800 Ports on the MacPro? If the PCIe Firewire cards are necessary, which brands are trouble free? Thanks.
Jeff Weiser
Director/Cinematographer
Directors Syndicate
je********@*******nk.net -
5 Replies
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The Io will hog the entire FW bus on your Mac. It only has one with two ports to it…
So you do need a card. I’ve never heard a bad thing about any of them… so pick one based on numbers of ports… I have a Siig card that just works fine.. you’ll need a PCIe based card.
Jerry
Apple Certified Trainer, Producer, Writer, Director Editor, Gun for Hire and other things. I ski.
8-Core 3.0 Intel Mac Pro, Dual 2 gig G5, AJA Kona SD, AJA Kona 2, Huge Systems Array UL3D, AJA Io HD, 17″ MBP, Matrox MXO2 with MAX Cinema Displays
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To add to what Jerry said, I’d get a FW card from Other World Computing. I think they even have the one he mentioned.
As for daisy chaining your G-RAIDs, they will probably show up on your Desktop, but I’ve heard daisy chaining will reduce throughput between drive. That could be problematic with uncompressed material.
Rob Grauert, Jr.
http://www.robgrauert.com
command-r.tumblr.com -
With a fw800 PCIe card, they will give you multiple ports, some even have 4 ports, so daisy chaining should be able to remain at a minimum.
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Great. Problem solved. Thanks. I’ll go for the card. In the meantime I am able to digitize at a DVCPro setting with no dropped frames.
Jeff Weiser
Director/Cinematographer
Directors Syndicate
jeffweiser@earthlink.net -
Yeah, bur it’s best to separate the busses. You might have success now, but later it might stop workin and you’ll be writing back saying, “It was working but now it’s not. Help?”. 🙂
Jeremy
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