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Firewire Card troubles
Hi Folks,
We’ve recently purchased the ioHD, using it on a Mac Pro 8-core. I’ve purchased a PCIe FW800 card so that I can see our older FW800 drives on the same system as the ioHD. However, the card I’ve got, pyroAV PVC-815, is not seeing the ioHD, and is flaky even just with the drives. This is the second card I’ve had. My question to those of you that have installed this or similar cards: Can the PCIe card be powered simply from the PCI bus, or should I connect it to an “optional” PC power cable (4-pin molex power connector). The card comes with no documentation and tech support does not seem to answer emails. I’ve noticed that while trying to boot with ioHD connected (I know, I should use the internal bus for this) I’m getting intermittent communication flashes on the front of the ioHD.
I’m wishing I had just bought the Sonnet, but have already invested in this one, though I’m close to giving up.
Also, just a note, we do not capture or play back HD from the 800 drives (eSATA for that), I just need to see them.
Thanks!
Dan -
8 Replies
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Are there any special drivers for it? (There shouldn’t be, but best to check).
Any other PCIe cards in your machine? Have you tried a different slot? is your MacPro pre2008 or post 2008?
The ioHD should go on your computer and your drives on the PCIe. No other power should be necessary, especially if your drives are already powered by another power supply.
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Hi Jeremy,
No special drivers according to Pyro. I’m pretty sure this is a pre-2008 Mac Pro, 3 Ghz processors, 1.33 ghz bus speed. I have tried the card in multiple slots, no luck. even with the ioHD not connected, the card will only see the first couple of drives in the chain, then even those will mysteriously disappear. There are no other PCIe cards in the machine, except the display. Have you had good luck with another brand? -
What kind of drives and how many? Keep the ioHD on your internal computer bus. (the front or back fw800 port on the MacPro itself).
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There are quite a few drives on the chain, Lacie FW800, i think 7 drives. AJA is going directly into the computer, which works fine. The problem is that only 2 drives show up, they are slow to react, and eventually disappear. I should note that system profiler sees the card as IEEE 1394 Open HCI, and Expansion Slot Utility sees it as “unknown IEEE 1394 Open HCI Card” running maximum speed at 1x. thanks!
Dan
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Are any of the drives bus powered or do all drives have power supplies in themselves? What happens if you take off a few drives? DOes each drive work individually? You have a lot of points of failure in that chain!
Jeremy
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Each drive has it’s own power supply, and the chain works perfectly when connected to the built-in bus. I will try each one individually on the card just to see if they work that way.
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You said the card can take power as well?
I am suspecting a faulty card if all the drives work on the internal bus. I’d suggest a Sonnet card.
Jeremy
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yeah, i’m about ready to give up and go with the sonnet. the thing is, this is the second card i’ve had (i suspected a faulty card and got a replacement). there is a four-pin power connector on the card, described as an “optional 12V internal connector for power from PC power supply” but i just called tech support again and they say it shouldn’t be needed. i’ll let you know what i find out, but i think i’m just gonna move on. thanks so much for your help.
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