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Is Apple ever gonna include an eSata port on the iMac?
- Thread starter dschiller
- Start date
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I don't think for a while, there isn't a need. It would appear in the MP first. The iMac is geared toward consumers, (yes yes I know they are very powerful and all but thats who they are geared for), and the average consumer knows nothing of an eSata port or whats it's even used for.
I was wondering whether I should buy an external HD with FW400/USB + FW800 or FW400/USB + eSata. Should I go for one with FW800? The 20'' model I'm gonna buy has neither of them..
How much of a price difference is there to the quad-interface model?
You could just get this very meant-to-be-near-a-Mac one and you'll have all the interfaces you could want!
http://eshop.macsales.com/item/Other World Computing/MEFW924AL1K/
i would probably go for the 800 firewire.
to me, the huge advantage of firewire over esata, is that with firewire, you can boot a mac from a firewire disk drive.
(i read of someone trying to boot off of a express card slot in the macbook pro, and they were unsuccessful)
to me, the huge advantage of firewire over esata, is that with firewire, you can boot a mac from a firewire disk drive.
(i read of someone trying to boot off of a express card slot in the macbook pro, and they were unsuccessful)
How much of a price difference is there to the quad-interface model?
You could just get this very meant-to-be-near-a-Mac one and you'll have all the interfaces you could want!
http://eshop.macsales.com/item/Other World Computing/MEFW924AL1K/
I was thinking of buying this one, which is the same, except it can take two drives and hasn't got eSata
i think this is the major advantage of FW...however, most eSATA drives also have FW, too, so that shouldn't be an issue.
You know, I was thinking about this... I guess the iMac has kind of a unique motherboard in the sense that certain aspects of it are taken from notebook designs and certain from desktop designs, but has anyone scoured it carefully? Is there any possibility it would have appropriate ports to allow for someone to create an eSATA modification kit like this $25 one for the Mac Pro?
http://www.newertech.com/products/esata_cable.php
http://www.newertech.com/products/esata_cable.php
Well you need an extra sata port. I don't think there is a extra sata port on the motherboard? not that i know of atleast.
I'd say they're pretty low. I really want an eSATA port on all new Macs. FW800 just doesn't cut it in my opinion. You can say what you like about the typical consumer's knowledge, but eSATA is fairly mainstream for DVR owners. Although you can't often boot from eSATA drives, I believe that's a problem with OSX and not eSATA.
No, it's a problem with the drivers having to load from the boot drive before the third party SATA interface will read the eSATA drive.
If Apple were to include an eSATA interface, it would be from the motherboard SATA controller, and presumably would have no problems booting / no drivers required.
would it be likely for apple to offer some kind of expansion slot on any new imacs (specifically expresscard)...I think this would be a good idea, so that us 'consumers' who do know what esata could benefit from it.
I can link to at least 10 products available on consumer level retail stores (beast buy) that have eSata ports. Very weak excuse. It makes expanding storage on iMacs, and Mac mini a real PITA.
Doubt it. Like others have said, the iMac is more of an 'average consumer' machine, and most people will never have heard of an eSata port, let alone ever used one. FW800 should be fast enough for almost everything tho...
FW800 can only transfer data 100Mb/s. It's 800MBit not bytes (100*8=800). It's not fast enough for having a external boot drive