Firewire Versus USB

braincell · Post by **braincell** » Thu Nov 03, 2005 4:04 pm

I just got a fast external hard drive and I notice that it has firwire as well as USB. Should I get a firewire card? This would be for my laptop not my Creamware computer. I wonder what the difference would be in performance. It is 7200 RPM with 16 megs of cache.

bassdude · Post by **bassdude** » Thu Nov 03, 2005 5:29 pm

If it's USB2 and your pc does usb2 then don't bother with firewire. I believe usb2 is slighty faster than firewire.

Shayne White · Post by **Shayne White** » Thu Nov 03, 2005 5:53 pm

It isn't faster really -- 480mbps is burst, not sustained rate. FireWire is generally faster and uses less CPU. If you can easily get FireWire, use it.

ScofieldKid · Post by **ScofieldKid** » Thu Nov 03, 2005 6:09 pm

Since you already have a USB2 interface??? seems like you might as well test it... You can benchmark with HdTach from here: http://www.simplisoftware.com/Public/in ... est=HdTach

I would agree with Shayne though... given the choice, I pick firewire.

braincell · Post by **braincell** » Thu Nov 03, 2005 6:37 pm

Okay I'll run that test. I know I have USB 2 but not sure which ports are USB 2 or if I have the right drivers installed.

braincell · Post by **braincell** » Thu Nov 03, 2005 7:03 pm

According to HD Tach, my new drive is running at 31.9 MB/s and very steady. I tried all the USB ports and got the same results. The internal drive is 22.2 MB/s and very unsteady. Does this seem like USB 2 results or do I need to get the right driver? They predict SATA and SCSI to be way faster.

ScofieldKid · Post by **ScofieldKid** » Fri Nov 04, 2005 12:03 am

That all sounds correct. Internal laptop hard drives are usually tiny size 4200RPM drives. The 31MBPS is a very usable speed. If that works with your application, I'd try and run like that.

at0m · Post by **at0m** » Fri Nov 04, 2005 1:56 am

On 2005-11-03 19:03, braincell wrote:
According to HD Tach, my new drive is running at 31.9 MB/s and very steady. I tried all the USB ports and got the same results. The internal drive is 22.2 MB/s and very unsteady. Does this seem like USB 2 results or do I need to get the right driver? They predict SATA and SCSI to be way faster.

Now do the same, and compare CPU consumption...
Comparing USB2 to Firewire, you'll notice USB is slightly faster in theory (480mbps vs. 400mbps), but that's when the machine has nothing else to do. Let it run a sequencer (or rar or mp3 encoding, for the sake of benchmarking;) and notice which connection chokes.

I have such an external enclosure too, and only use the USB when the host has no firewire. The box has 2 1394 connections and I use it as LAN hub too - connecting laptop and desktop machine. Firewire has a much smarter chip: for example I can control my camera which hangs on the desktop's PCI 1394 card and comes to the laptop over the external enclosure, even when working in the desktop's BIOS.

In short, USB is nice if you want to store pictures, movies, mp3's IMHO, it's never been designed for multi-track audio.

Enjoy yer new harddrive, however you put it to use eh

braincell · Post by **braincell** » Fri Nov 04, 2005 3:26 am

Okay, I'll try it and maybe get the firewire.

spiderman · Post by **spiderman** » Fri Nov 04, 2005 4:24 am

forget USB2
i 've done a test with an external HD box with USB2 and firewire connection .
with samplitude I've tried to read a 24 tracks project which is on the external disk .
with USB2 connection it was full of lag and with firewire connection is was perfect !
I need no more !!

PIV 3.4 ghz
1Go DDR ram
P4P800
winXP

braincell · Post by **braincell** » Wed Nov 09, 2005 2:12 pm

This is great. It turns out I have firewire and didn't know it. It's the 4 pin type so I just ordered an adaptor cable. Thanks guys!

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: braincell on 2005-11-09 14:51 ]</font>