Cash in Hand for a MBP

[mkelly]

So I am digging it, need to find a 400 to 800 firewire cable...but other than that I'll be up and running in no time.

Try getting one of these: http://www.sonnettech.com/product/fw_adapter.html - I picked one up cheap from Amazon recently.

[oblique strategies]

I feel the conversion taking place....

OS X has a lot of really cool innovations like Expose, Spaces, Spotlight, Core Audio & Core MIDI, etc. -explore!

[dysanfel]

Try getting one of these: http://www.sonnettech.com/product/fw_adapter.html - I picked one up cheap from Amazon recently.

This is probably a more elegant solution - considering its 100% backwards compatible.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6812270198

[oblique strategies]

Try getting one of these: http://www.sonnettech.com/product/fw_adapter.html - I picked one up cheap from Amazon recently.

This is probably a more elegant solution - considering its 100% backwards compatible.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6812270198

Might want to skip this option after you read this:

The Intel Apple laptops & iMacs all have one firewire bus which is shared by the various firewire ports.

I'm trying to find a definitive answer, but one person writes:
"In my usage, I have found that if you connect anything to the firewire 400 port, the entire FW bus runs at firewire 400 speed. The only way to get Firewire 800 speed from your drives is to plug any FW 400 devices into a drive that has both FW 400 and 800 ports, and plug the FW 800 drive only into your Mac. You can verify these settings in System Profiler. This also applies to any Express cards you may plug into your Macbook Pro, which also still operate off the same Firewire bus as the internal ports."

More:

"The FireWire bus is shared between all (sending) devices. Furthermore,
the transmission speed of a stream is necessarily the minimum of the
speed capabilities of the sender, of all listeners, and of all repeaters
between sender and listeners."

Thus you lose the benefits of firewire 800.

Anyone have a good resource for info on this?

[mkelly]

Try getting one of these: http://www.sonnettech.com/product/fw_adapter.html - I picked one up cheap from Amazon recently.

This is probably a more elegant solution - considering its 100% backwards compatible.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6812270198

You can't beat a few 400-800 cables especially for a static home setup, but I like to have an adapter - I've had a few occasions where I've had to switch external drives between machines, some with 400 ports, some with 800. One 400-400 cable and an adapter is all I need to bring instead of a 400-800 and a 400-400 cable.

Out of interest, I'm not sure how the adapter is any less backwards compatible than the hard-wired cable. In fact, I'd say the adapter is more backwards compatible as it's more flexible.

[bodhi71]

So if I will be losing firewire speed does that mean that the benefits of recording multiple ins are lost or handicapped?
There will be times I'll be recording real drums, is this going to be an issue?
Live I'll only need maybe a stereo pair, maybe I'll pick up a Duet.
Still having some difficulty installing some software, but still enjoying this exp.
I feel like I've stumbled across some ancient alien artifact that works with all my gear, very glad I chose a MBP instead of PC.

[mkelly]

So if I will be losing firewire speed does that mean that the benefits of recording multiple ins are lost or handicapped?
There will be times I'll be recording real drums, is this going to be an issue?

Relax dude. You said in your initial post that you're using a Presonus Firepod - from what I can see that's a FW400 device anyway. What oblique strategies was warning you about was that when you hook FW800 and FW400 devices to the same bus, the FW800 device will drop to the speed of the FW400 device. As your device is already FW400 you have no real worries. FW400 should easily support enough tracks for you to record a full kit and more.

[bodhi71]

No worries, it is a 400, I'll just get an adapter...
PBS has a contest that I had entered and I wanted to finish my entry on the Mac.
No big deal.

VST... the only thing I have successfully installed is Analog Factory.
Rapture, T Racks, installed not seen within Ableton scanned, rescanned.
I'll get it eventually,