Why two firewire ports on WD My Book

[fatcat23]

Hi, I've had my WD My Book 1TB Essentials for a while know and I have always wonder why there are two firewire 400 ports aswell as the usb. I understand both firewire and usb but why two firewire 400 ports. It also has a eSata port but that is besides the point.

Can I hook up both firewire ports at the same time to one pc/mac or two different computers? how about one usb and one firewire at the same time for faster speeds.

 

[robbieduncan]

You can daisy chain an additional device. So you can connect another drive to the first one for example.

You cannot connect them to different machines. You cannot connect them both to the same machine, or one firewire and one USB for more speed.

 

[bartelby]

Daisy chaining other drives?

 

[saxondale.]

Daisy chaining other drives?

Adding another HDD

 

[SnowLeopard2008]

Adding another HDD

I think he was suggesting that maybe the purpose of two firewire ports was for daisy chaining and not asking what daisy chaining was. But yea, for daisy chaining I suppose.

 

[archesdevil]

daisy-chain

 

[PlaceofDis]

its for chaining fw drives/devices together. its one of the perks of the interface over USB

 

[sushi]

its one of the perks of the interface over USB

That and speed.

 

[r.j.s]

That and sustained speed.

Fixed that for you, because I'm sure someone will claim that USB's theoretical max is faster.

 

[PlaceofDis]

Fixed that for you, because I'm sure someone will claim that USB's theoretical max is faster.

and edited that for you because that is the key word there too.

 

[r.j.s]

and edited that for you because that is the key word there too.

I used that word intentionally, but thanks for the emphasis.

 

[sushi]

Thanks for the clarification edits rjs and PoD.

 

[magiic]

I was always curious about this cool. That's nifty that you can daisy chain.

 

[fatcat23]

Thanks for the clarification. Just need to save some money know and buy another terabyte...

 

[BENI]

does daisy chaining add the extra drive as a new mounted drive or simply add capacity to the drive already mounted.

if the later: does that mean that you could only use the drives all together because files would be split between the different disks?

 

[tbayrgs]

does daisy chaining add the extra drive as a new mounted drive or simply add capacity to the drive already mounted.

if the later: does that mean that you could only use the drives all together because files would be split between the different disks?

Mounts each drive individually, just as if each was directly connected to your computer.

 

[BENI]

ok - so the 1st HD acts as a firewire splitter.

thanks