Gigabit Ethernet or Firewire 800 to share video using Airport Extreme Base Station?

[bigbaby]

Hi

I want to put all my media (mainly music and movies) on an external hard drive. It will be connected to MacMini media server using Plex. Then I wish to share to a MBP over the network (using Airport Extreme Base station).

Question is what is faster?:
1) a Firewire 800 hard drive connected directly to the MacMini then shared over the network?

2) or a Network hard drive connected directly to the Airport Extreme via CAT5e/CAT6, then shared over the network?

Given the size of some video files I have (High def movies 4GB+) I'd like the smoothest and fastest transfer rate.

Really confused welcome any suggestions!

Thanks!

 

[spinnerlys]

Wireless sharing will give you transfer rates of 6-7 MB/s, cabled sharing can give you 11MB/s (10/100 Ethernet) and up to 70MB/s (Gigabit Ethernet) of transfer speed.

Even HD movies only have a data rate of 1MB/s*, so FW800 or Gigabit Ethernet is not really needed for streaming. USB 2.0 (up to 30-35 MB/s) will suffice, even if connected to the AEBS (6-7 MB/s wireless, 11MB/s via LAN, even Gigabit LAN).

*
To calculate the data rate your self:

(size of video file)*(1024 - to get from GB to MB, if size of file is in the GB)/(minutes - length of video in minutes)/(60 - seconds, to get from MB/min to MB/s)

Example:

(4.7GB*1024)/(80*60) - 4.7GB is size, 1024 is the conversion number, 80 is the minutes and 60 is the seconds.
With those numbers you get a data rate of roughly 1MB/s.