Western Digital My Passport Studio FireWire 400

[rishi13]

Hello,

I am contemplating buying this drive http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/produ...ital_WDMS3200TN_320GB_My_Passport_Studio.html (at a much lower price from another seller) to use on my Macbook Pro 2.2 SR. I have an Apple 4-pin to 6-pin FW 400 cable and was wondering if this would power the hard drive? The FW400 cable that it comes with has a USB2.0 and FW400 split, which is leaving me to believe that it may need to draw power from the USB bus. Does anyone know if it will draw this solely from one FW 400 cable? Thanks for the information!

 

[iphonematt]

You must use the included cable. The hard drive draws power from the USB port and the data goes over the firewire port. You might want to check out the new My Passport Studio drives that have FireWire 400, 800 and USB2.
I picked one up and it is great!

 

[Jaro65]

I have two 320GB WD My Passport Studios with FireWire 400 and also two 500GB ones with FireWire 800. These are really nice drives. They are also more compact than the similar Seagate drive (which I ended up returning). As stated in the other post, you do need to use the included cable with the FireWire 400 drive.

 

[xcaliber84]

So with the newer Passport 500gb w/firewire 800 you dont need to run the extra power cable? This is excellent because I have been shopping around and doing some research for a while. I recently had been leaning toward the Lacie 500gb "rugged" drive, but upon further research I have found out that their drive still requires you to use the usb power adapter and has some issues with OS X. I do a lot of video editing so I am looking for the best portable option to work with my MBP. From everyones statements this seems to be the Passport Studio. Would everyone agree? Or are there other options out there?

 

[xcaliber84]

oh also i have been hearing issues with the firewire ports on the WD studios. People are saying after a short period of time the firewire ports stop working. Has anyone had these issues yet? I dont wanna throw down close to $200 on a drive and have the ports that are the reason I get it stop working...

 

[Marvin1379]

oh also i have been hearing issues with the firewire ports on the WD studios. People are saying after a short period of time the firewire ports stop working. Has anyone had these issues yet? I dont wanna throw down close to $200 on a drive and have the ports that are the reason I get it stop working...

I've had my WD4000MT (400 gb passport studio) connected via FW800 and it drops occasionally. I tried FW400 and also USB 2.0, but it keeps happening. i can't find on WD or Apple's knowledge bases anything about what the problem is. anyone have specifics? i have the updated WD Drive Manager and other WD software.

The drive disconnects and OS X gives me the "you didn't eject your drive" error and i say, "i didn't want it ejected either." It typically does it while itunes is doing something important with the drive, as the drive stores all my music. while syncing apple tv, or my iphone, and maybe streaming to an airport express, itunes becomes non responsive bc of the drive. Does anyone else have this problem or do I have a bad drive?

Thanks