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Steve Jobs on Lack of Firewire in MacBooks

What about the Cinema Displays

It seems everyone is forgetting about the new cinema display made for the mac books. Does this have firewire conenctors on it? Isn't this a more advanced docking station? Dont we get the best of both in a macbook and an "imac"?

I must admit, I originally was bummed about a 17 in not being released but then thought that it would be better to put the money towards a docking/dispaly station with a larger screen. A 15 in is more portable.

Just my 2c.
 
corinhorn said:
Yes, I have seen many USB cameras and their quality. Some suck and some are decent. If you used USB with DV content, you would get tons of dropped frames. Unless iMovie has changed in recent weeks, the only cameras you can import from are DV cameras with FireWire.
Click to expand...

That confuses me because, the Canon I just used about an hour ago imports AVCHD via USB from there is not even a FW connector on it. Now it does not have a tape, but a hard disk.
 
tslewis said:
It seems everyone is forgetting about the new cinema display made for the mac books. Does this have firewire conenctors on it? Isn't this a more advanced docking station? Dont we get the best of both in a macbook and an "imac"?

I must admit, I originally was bummed about a 17 in not being released but then thought that it would be better to put the money towards a docking/dispaly station with a larger screen. A 15 in is more portable.

Just my 2c.
Click to expand...
No, there is no FireWire connectors on it. Even if there were FireWire ports on it they would be pointless for the MacBook since you would have to have a FireWire port on the MacBook itself for them to work.
 
Steve has low oxygen levels to his brain going on.

USB2 flat out SUCKS for storage speed, even CF card readers are way faster using firewire, much less hard drives and RAID arrays (you don't see eSATA there either, do you).

And there are MANY of us who own Firewire cameras and MANY camcorders sold today STILL use firewire and not USB. If he thinks I'm upgrading all my equipment just to get a glossy screen macbook, think again.

He is SO wrong, it's pathetic. Just another example of Apple's Ipodization away from what used to be a computer company into a toy company.
 
corinhorn said:
Um, tapes are used for DV content. Hard drives are usually used for compress content. If you want DV, tape is the most financially viable option.
Click to expand...

Who said you had to have it compressed?! Removable hard disks on a sled, 2.5" in size; 320gb is the largest size - you're telling me that DV content couldn't fit on it?! really?! come on now. Stop your attachment to the tape and get with the programme.
 
localoid said:
Oh Ok.

Just trying to clarify, since there's been so much talk about the mythical $5 "adapters" in this thread that will fix the Firewire "problem". They pop up again and again on every other page. ;)
Click to expand...

I know, some people seem to think that FireWire and USB are the same thing only with a different connector. They don't seem to understand that they are completely different protocols. :) Oh well.

robanga said:
That confuses me because, the Canon I just used about an hour ago imports AVCHD via USB from there is not even a FW connector on it. Now it does not have a tape, but a hard disk.
Click to expand...
That is compressed content, not DV.

kaiwai said:
Who said you had to have it compressed?! Removable hard disks on a sled, 2.5" in size; 320gb is the largest size - you're telling me that DV content couldn't fit on it?! really?! come on now. Stop your attachment to the tape and get with the programme.
Click to expand...

No, DV cameras are uncompressed and are tapes. Hard drive based cameras compress their content.

Edit: I realize that HD based cameras are fine, but I have a FireWire DV camcorder. I'm simply torked that the new MB is not compatible with my camera.
 
Firewire aint dead yet!

Lack of FW on the MacBook will sell more MacBook Pros. Most all of the complaints are coming from consumer-level users who are likley to eventually "get over it" and buy the MacBook anyway - and/or to entice new cutomers who will probaly buy (or already have) an HDD consumer camcorder. There are still many professional HDV camcorders on the market from Sony, Panasonic, Canon and JVC. Firewire will be around for some time, and the Apple pro products will continue to support it.
 
Toyota is phasing out manual transmissions (c.f. the Camry, Tundra, Rav4, 4Runner, etc...); Apple is phasing out Firewire.

The world is coming to an end. QED.
 
corinhorn said:
I know, some people seem to think that FireWire and USB are the same thing only with a different connector. They don't seem to understand that they are completely different protocols. :) Oh well.
Click to expand...

Perhaps we need a meme so that we can accelerate the handling of such responses. How about:

There Is No Adaptor™

One could even abbreviate is as TINA™ and cause even more confusion :D
 
Why on earth deprive Macbook users of the facility to daisychain external drives or other devices, via the firewire port? Makes no sense to me, in the absence of an alternative. Or have I missed something?
 
dizzy13 said:
dolphin842 said:
There Is No Adaptor™
Click to expand...
Yet.
Click to expand...

But... that's not as catchy.... :p

Seriously, though, from what I've been able to ascertain so far, all attempts at FireWire->USB conversion seem to be kludgy at best. Perhaps you could feasibly get some passage of data, but the whole point of FireWire is the 'guaranteed data stream, low latency, etc' which is why many pros invested in such hardware in the first place. I doubt any converter would be able to keep these qualities intact over USB. That said, I'm not an electrical engineer, and would love to be proven wrong over this point by more knowledgeable people. After all, the fuss is about not being able to *use* the perfectly good products we already have. If it can be done, let it be done. :)
 
robanga said:
That confuses me because, the Canon I just used about an hour ago imports AVCHD via USB from there is not even a FW connector on it. Now it does not have a tape, but a hard disk.
Click to expand...

Hard disk cameras are highly compressed mpeg and they have to be captured with proprietary software, and then if you want to use a good editor like FCP the video has to be transcoded first. These are cameras for those consumers who use it for holidays and birthdays and will never edit their videos of Junior drooling down the front of his shirt for hours on end. And if I had to suffer through using one of those pieces of junk I would soon be drooling down the front of my shirt for hours on end.

At some point in the future all cameras will probably use some form of flash memory and professional non linear editors will handle all of it natively. That day is not here, and until it is video editors need firewire. We also need it for our dedicated firewire capture hard drives.
 
kaiwai said:
Who said you had to have it compressed?! Removable hard disks on a sled, 2.5" in size; 320gb is the largest size - you're telling me that DV content couldn't fit on it?! really?! come on now. Stop your attachment to the tape and get with the programme.
Click to expand...

It's not your choice. The hard disk cameras use their own compression scheme and it is highly compressed mpeg. And the only way you can get the content from a DV camcorder to an external hard drive is through firewire. So, you're back to the same problem. The computer needs a firewire port. Also, tape is a very inexpensive and reliable archive medium.
 
iMeanIt said:
Lack of FW on the MacBook will sell more MacBook Pros. Most all of the complaints are coming from consumer-level users who are likley to eventually "get over it" and buy the MacBook anyway - and/or to entice new cutomers who will probaly buy (or already have) an HDD consumer camcorder. There are still many professional HDV camcorders on the market from Sony, Panasonic, Canon and JVC. Firewire will be around for some time, and the Apple pro products will continue to support it.
Click to expand...

Some maybe. But they have lost me unless they make a MBP the size of the MB, and that's not going to happen. People have been asking for it since the demise of the 12" Powerbook and Apple has ignored the pleas.
 
So would I be correct in saying that memory stick, HDD or DVD based camcorders record as MPEG 4 which isn't as versatile as the mini DV tape format, in terms of editing?
That poses two questions:
1) These cameras were created with FireWire because USB 1.0/1.1 couldn't handle the 25mbps bitrate (36mbps with error correction/allowance). Why can't USB 2.0 handle that speed steadily now? (Sure it never stays anywhere near 480, but it should be able to manage at least 36 steadily).
2) Why can't the same Mini DV format be recorded onto an HDD in the camera to begin with, then transferred to a computer via USB in real time or otherwise?

Edit: Apparently it's an issue of crappy, proprietary software. Am I correct in saying that the videophiles out there would only recommend FireWire, Mini DV tape camcorders as the only option under $1000?
 
iEdd said:
So would I be correct in saying that memory stick, HDD or DVD based camcorders record as MPEG 4 which isn't as versatile as the mini DV tape format, in terms of editing?
That poses two questions:
1) These cameras were created with FireWire because USB 1.0/1.1 couldn't handle the 25mbps bitrate (36mbps with error correction/allowance). Why can't USB 2.0 handle that speed steadily now? (Sure it never stays anywhere near 480, but it should be able to manage at least 36 steadily).
2) Why can't the same Mini DV format be recorded onto an HDD in the camera to begin with, then transferred to a computer via USB in real time or otherwise?
Click to expand...

In answer to your number one: USB is burst rate, so it varies widely. Firewire is sustained rate.

Number two: miniDV is a tape format. A DV camera can record to a hardrive but it needs a controller that records in the codec the editing system uses. There are companies that make harddrive systems that do this. They run ion the range of $1000, and they also need firewire. What you're descrivbing is basically what the hard drive cams do, but they compress to mpeg.
 
dolphin842 said:
But... that's not as catchy.... :p

Seriously, though, from what I've been able to ascertain so far, all attempts at FireWire->USB conversion seem to be kludgy at best. Perhaps you could feasibly get some passage of data, but the whole point of FireWire is the 'guaranteed data stream, low latency, etc' which is why many pros invested in such hardware in the first place. I doubt any converter would be able to keep these qualities intact over USB. That said, I'm not an electrical engineer, and would love to be proven wrong over this point by more knowledgeable people. After all, the fuss is about not being able to *use* the perfectly good products we already have. If it can be done, let it be done. :)
Click to expand...

Although I did start college as an electrical engineer I switched after the Linear Circuits & Signals class over to computer engineering....

So I have no idea if there will every be a converter, but according to wiki it seems like there is a glimmer of hope. I have heard that FW > USB will never happen due to some technical reasons that I don't know about.
 
editguy said:
In answer to your number one: USB is burst rate, so it varies widely. Firewire is sustained rate.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the reply. Yeah I knew USB was a burst rate, I just thought it wouldn't matter if it's minimum speed in any one burst was faster than the bit-rate of the tape. Actually now that I think about it, that would probably mean the tape would have to keep changing speeds, which is likely to be impractical as it increases the chance of damage. Unless you had some sort of buffer, but I don't know much about video cameras.
 
syndalis said:
as a musician... I have a mac pro, and a macbook pro.

I would never ever ever consider running reason, logic, drums from hell, etc. on a macbook. You are creating a situation that does not exist.
Click to expand...

Actually a MacBook has been perfectly adequate for me. I use Reason and Ableton Live with a firewire soundcard in live settings very happily. Until now... I have no desire to spend extra $$ on the Pro version when the difference in processing power is only slight.
 
luminol74 said:
Actually a MacBook has been perfectly adequate for me. I use Reason and Ableton Live with a firewire soundcard in live settings very happily. Until now... I have no desire to spend extra $$ on the Pro version when the difference in processing power is only slight.
Click to expand...

you are right and i can't stand it when people like syndalis say a macbook is not good enough
this means they never even used products like reason, logic, cubase etc

thnx for clearing things up

you can even make music on a ipod touch or iphone so syndalis please stop talking BS
 
Logic x Apogee = Firewire

Apple has teamed up with Apogee and there Firewire audio interfaces.
Look on the Logic software page on the Apple website.
And yes, they all use Firewire.

Does Apple now think that all musicians are rich enough to buy a MBP ???

Apple and Jobs are really out of sync (probably because of a data stream failure in there USB-heads).
First they made my Arcam rDock's video output obsolete by putting a stupid an unneeded chip in the new iPods and now this.

(and don't get me started on those terrible mirror screens)
:mad:
 
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