Thunderbolt to Firewire Adapter experience?

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CmdrLaForge

CmdrLaForge

macrumors 601
Original poster
Feb 26, 2003
4,379
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around the world
Hi,

I would like to know if anyone has experience with the Thunderbolt to Firewire Adapter with

--> HDDs
--> Firewire Audio Interfaces

Upon that I need to decide wether to buy or not to buy a new retina MBP.

Thanks a lot.

- LaForge
 

C

ColdCase

macrumors 68030
Feb 10, 2008
2,962
142
NH
I have the Apple TB to FW adapter for my rMBP. It and the rMBP case where it connects to gets quite warm during use.

I happen to have one of the OWC guardian eSATA/USB3/FW800 enclosures configured for redundant RAID. For grins I connected it through the FW adapter and ran the blackmagic benchmarks. Then connected directly to the USB3 port. Both offer stable performance but FW is noticeably slower than USB 3. Benchmarks comparison shows USB3 about 130 MBps for large sequential type data where FW through the adapter is 80MBps. Dunno what is inside the Guardian enclosure, perhaps the FW implementation is weak. Its the same enclosure and RAID/drive, just connected via the different interfaces using quality cabling. I would expect eSATA to be better as that is the native drive format, but the rMBP does not have an eSATA port, not that I'm bitter :)

No issues, however.
 
Last edited:
gr8tfly

gr8tfly

macrumors 603
Oct 29, 2006
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Running daisy-chain of 6 FW800 drives off the TB adapter. Seem to run fine. Speeds seem about what they were on the native FW800 on my 2009 MBP.

USB 3 speeds are definitely capable of faster speeds. If the drive is fast enough, it would saturate FW800 and you would see much higher transfer rates (say, 80 MBps v 115 MBps). Slower drives, like the 2TB WD Green (3.5"), not so much.
 
CmdrLaForge

CmdrLaForge

macrumors 601
Original poster
Feb 26, 2003
4,379
2,486
around the world
Hi all,

thanks a lot for your replies. Sound really good so far for HDD usage.

Anyone who tried it with a Firewire Audio Interface?

Cheers
LaForge
 
O

opinio

macrumors 65816
Mar 23, 2013
1,171
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CmdrLaForge said:
Hi,

I would like to know if anyone has experience with the Thunderbolt to Firewire Adapter with

--> HDDs
--> Firewire Audio Interfaces

Upon that I need to decide wether to buy or not to buy a new retina MBP.

Thanks a lot.

- LaForge
Click to expand...
I have heard, but do not have experience with this, that the t-bolt to FireWire adapter is problematic with bus powered devices like 2.5" drive enclosures. I think I read that on the reviews on the apple site when I went to buy one and decided not too after seeing that comment a few times.
 

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