macOS Tahoe Beta Drops FireWire Support

[MacRumors]

A bit of sad news for old iPods: Macs might be losing FireWire support.

The first macOS Tahoe developer beta does not support the legacy FireWire 400 and FireWire 800 data-transfer standards, according to @NekoMichi on X, and a Reddit post. As a result, the first few iPod models and old external storage drives that rely on FireWire cannot be synced with or mounted on a Mac running the macOS Tahoe beta.

Unlike on macOS Sequoia and earlier versions, the first macOS Tahoe beta does not include a FireWire section in the System Settings app.

Of course, this could all end up being a false alarm. It is still early in the macOS Tahoe beta testing cycle, and FireWire support could return in a later beta version, or in time for the final release. We reached out to Apple for comment about the matter shortly before publishing this story, and we will update this story if we hear back.

FireWire was primarily developed by Apple, but it was later standardized as IEEE 1394 and licensed for use in non-Apple devices.

iPods started to transition from FireWire to USB for data transfer in 2003, so the standard is very outdated, but it would still be the end of an era if macOS Tahoe drops it. The last Mac with a FireWire port was released in 2012, so connecting older iPods and FireWire drives to newer Macs has long required the use of adapters.

Article Link: macOS Tahoe Beta Drops FireWire Support

 

[MacUserFella]

W- no… 💔, my… MY IPOD

 

[vertsix]

That's unfortunate. Although, TBH, I was honestly surprised how long the legacy I/O is still being supported. I still regularly sync my iPod video to my Mac to this day and it works great.

 

[seek3r]

A lot of older audio gear uses firewire, there’s going be a lot of musicians and studios upset by this if it turns out to be how the final release goes

I do wonder if the settings tab shows up if you plug in a firewire device though, it may just hide it to declutter when there’s nothing detected, anyone running the beta who has a TB to firewire adapter want to test?

 

[TechEsquire]

Wait, does this mean we won't be able to plug in a digital 8 camcorder? I still have tapes that I need to capture but they have not been mailed to me yet.

 

[drlocomotive2088]

This is really sad news despite not having a FireWire iPod anymore. Really the end of an era

 

[blw777]

I still have a disk enclosure that has regular SATA spinning rust in it. It's connected today to an M4 Studio via an adapter. Will this still work even if they remove the support? I'm guessing it's fine, since even now on Sequoia the Firewire section of the System Report is empty.

Yes I realize that this is old. It is holding 60TB of archive drives. Working data (this year and last year) is on a different box with SSDs, connected via Thunderbolt/USB-C.

 

[lazyrighteye]

Holy hell - I thought that protocol was dropped already. Wow. When FW landed, it was such a game changer.

I just found that same iPod box. I have the iPod as well. A super fun era at Apple.

 

[MrRom92]

Complete stupidity like this is why I will never let up on Apple. There’s zero reason for them to be removing functionality in software that hardware is otherwise capable of. There are still many use cases and industries relying on legacy FireWire devices.

 

[QuantumPulse]

The last FireWire iPad was discontinued in...2004.

Great tech.

 

[StanleyOmar]

I wonder how many people this will really affect as anyone who's been around Macs long enough and still regularly uses Firewire devices likely has an old Mac more than capable of doing what they need with that device (or is using odd workarounds with the Firewire device more as a satisfying challenge than out of necessity).

 

[WarmWinterHat]

Weird to drop it...I'm guessing it's an oversight or a bug, but who knows. Funny that macOS still supports floppy drives and zip disks, but would drop this.

I never used Firewire. I had a 4th gen iPod, but it had USB and I always used that.

 

[b17777]

I'll always have an old Mac around to do stuff like this. I recently blew the dust off an old 13 MacBook Pro on the shelf, hooked it up to an old Avid sound board and multitracked off of it. 2012 iMac is sitting here also from upgrading to M1 Studio.

 

[StanleyOmar]

I'll always have an old Mac around to do stuff like this. I recently blew the dust off an old 13 MacBook Pro on the shelf, hooked it up to an old Avid sound board and multitracked off of it. 2012 iMac is sitting here also from upgrading to M1 Studio.

I've had to do this a lot over the years with a 2012 MacBook Pro and an old iMac. It's a testament to Macs generally just never dying and still being fine for running old gear.

 

[jahsavi]

Well, that’s bad news for those of us using Thunderbolt to FireWire 800 adapters to transfer HDV tapes into Final Cut Pro. I’m wondering if they’re dropping support for the adapters themselves, or if this change only affects apps like Music and others.

 

[eRondeau]

Nobody is FORCING you to upgrade to the latest version of MacOS, nor should upgrading be done blindly and without due diligence. With each new version take an objective look at what features you get and what you lose and decide if upgrading will fit your workflow. If connecting to a FireWire device is essential to your business then don't upgrade. Or keep a different Mac around just to keep it connected. Or find a replacement device that connects via a supported interface. It's not the end of the world, there's always a reasonable solution.

 

[JosephAW]

Wasn’t there also a hybrid cable where you can use USB instead?

Waiting for the other shoe to drop and Apple to drop USB A 1&2 and older iOS devices using 30 pin connector or iOS 11 and below.

 

[sevoneone]

Seems trivial for them to include the driver. There are all kinds of old hard drives and even pro video and pro audio equipment out there that are still functionally relevant/useful. It really is to their benefit to maintain compatibility.

 

[Lounge vibes 05]

Complete stupidity like this is why I will never let up on Apple. There’s zero reason for them to be removing functionality in software that hardware is otherwise capable of. There are still many use cases and industries relying on legacy FireWire devices.

While I agree with you on principle, it’s also very true that legacy drivers still take up system resources and time.
The “Snow Leopard” update people wax poetic about in every other comment section, the one that was famous for shrinking the storage size of Mac OS X… was pretty much only possible because Apple spent that entire update cycle dumping old legacy drivers and bundles from the power PC and classic Mac OS 9 days.

You can’t really have it both ways.
If you just keep supporting every legacy device, you end up with a mess like Windows, where compatibility is great, but actually using the operating system you’ll quickly run into bits that feel like they’ve barely been touched since Windows 95.
Meanwhile macOS is basically the opposite, and within the next two years, them leaving both Intel and Rosetta in the past is both going to be very sad and annoying for consumers, but also very great for the operating system.

 

[b17777]

I've had to do this a lot over the years with a 2012 MacBook Pro and an old iMac. It's a testament to Macs generally just never dying and still being fine for running old gear.

I just got a great deal on a 2019 MacPro to put a Dante PCI card in. I'll never get rid of it and probably won't upgrade past Sequoia ever. Right now everything works exactly as I want it to.

 

[FoxyKaye]

It costs really pennies to keep support for these standards, especially since they’re not being actively developed. Yes, it’s niche, but it’s an important niche.

 

[Nekomichi]

For those of us still using an iPod, I went ahead and tested every other generation model. The good news is, most of them will still communicate with Finder and music tracks can be synced through the Music app. The iPod Classic 4th generation (monochrome model) and iPod Mini 1st generation are detected by Finder but won't load correctly and music won't sync (both of these models share the same chipset).

Another bug is that usually when you select a device in the Music app it will show you the tracks stored on it so you can manage and delete tracks, but on iPods it doesn't work so once you sync tracks onto it you won't be able to delete them from macOS Tahoe.

Also I haven't tested erasing and restoring iPods from macOS Tahoe so that's on my to-do list.

As for FireWire support, I really hope it's just a bug but we will see with the oncoming beta releases.

 

[jahsavi]

Nobody is FORCING you to upgrade to the latest version of MacOS, nor should upgrading be done blindly and without due diligence. With each new version take an objective look at what features you get and what you lose and decide if upgrading will fit your workflow. If connecting to a FireWire device is essential to your business then don't upgrade. Or keep a different Mac around just to keep it connected. Or find a replacement device that connects via a supported interface. It's not the end of the world, there's always a reasonable solution.

It may not be outright forced, but if you don't keep your system updated, you'll eventually struggle with compatibility and security—it just becomes unsustainable.

 

[WarmWinterHat]

I just got a great deal on a 2019 MacPro to put a Dante PCI card in. I'll never get rid of it and probably won't upgrade past Sequoia ever. Right now everything works exactly as I want it to.

I see those big Intel Mac Pros (the ones with the PowerMac case) on sale on Marketplace quiet often, and for fairly cheap. I have no use for one, but they sure do look nice.

 

[Shirasaki]

Seems trivial for them to include the driver. There are all kinds of old hard drives and even pro video and pro audio equipment out there that are still functionally relevant/useful. It really is to their benefit to maintain compatibility.

Thing is, Apple was never known for having amazing backwards compatibility. That is what Windows was doing and still doing to this day. Instead, Apple drops old stuff all the time. While keeping driver might be trivial, idk if said driver would otherwise be incompatible with whatever new security feature Apple had in Tahoe, or for another reason.

Regardless, there would be no need to upgrade the macOS if FireWire is needed. What could happen is newer Mac released after Tahoe would also remove hardware support for FireWire. That would be the true bummer, since you can’t install Sequoia onto those newer Mac.