Gearslutz.com - View Single Post

Francis Vaughan · 10th July 2008, 09:04 AM

Firewire does seem to be somewhat marginalised - not for technical reasons - but commercial. History shows that Apple were perhaps too greedy for just a few moments too long, and by making it worth Intel's while to create a competitor they assured its marginalisation.

Firewire has a number of significant technical attributes that make it significantly superior to USB. Support of isochronous channels, peer to peer transfer, much more sensible protocols in general, and so on. These advantages make it better for audio in many ways, and allow it to perform better than USB in real terms. FW400 is noticeably faster than USB 2.0 (at 480Mb/s) due to the significantly greater overheads in USB.

Both are trying to run for the next generation. FW will go to 3.2Gb/s in the current roadmap. USB 3.0 is a bit of an unknown quantity still, it will be backward compatible, use more wires for the higher speed parts, and go to 4.8Gb/s, but also include some protocol changes. But would not appear to include any changes to the basic rationale of operation. So still no FW like performance guarantees or peer to peer operation.

Competitors for FW will be USB for commodity uses, and PCI Express for specialist high performance. The ability of PCIe to bring out a single lane (such as with an ExpressCard) means that some performance critical uses currently the province of FW may migrate. This clearly includes multichannel digital audio converters. Proprietary interfaces (like Apogee's Symphony) will probably be the first to move to PCIe, but FW could find serious competition here. However the inability to daisy chain easily may reduce the uptake.

FW can reticulate over CAT6 cable, and there is some suggestion you could run FW though a building on fixed wiring. Exactly why is another question.

So, the landscape will be USB 3.0, FW 3200, PCIe. Each with advantages and disadvantages. I don't see USB making any inroads into high quality audio, the protocol is basically unsuited, even with the higher speeds. Firewire retains the best fit for purpose here, until you need studio levels of interface - where PCIe will probably take over.

Microsoft has a rotten reputation with FW. Just look back to the SGI Windows workstations. MS promised to support them, and these were one of the first workstations with FW, but MS never did. SGI bet the company on these machines, and MS's lack of support nearly killed them. (As a reward MS hired the SGI CEO.)

10th July 2008, 09:04 AM	#8
Francis Vaughan Lives for gear Join Date: Jan 2008 Posts: 537	Firewire does seem to be somewhat marginalised - not for technical reasons - but commercial. History shows that Apple were perhaps too greedy for just a few moments too long, and by making it worth Intel's while to create a competitor they assured its marginalisation. Firewire has a number of significant technical attributes that make it significantly superior to USB. Support of isochronous channels, peer to peer transfer, much more sensible protocols in general, and so on. These advantages make it better for audio in many ways, and allow it to perform better than USB in real terms. FW400 is noticeably faster than USB 2.0 (at 480Mb/s) due to the significantly greater overheads in USB. Both are trying to run for the next generation. FW will go to 3.2Gb/s in the current roadmap. USB 3.0 is a bit of an unknown quantity still, it will be backward compatible, use more wires for the higher speed parts, and go to 4.8Gb/s, but also include some protocol changes. But would not appear to include any changes to the basic rationale of operation. So still no FW like performance guarantees or peer to peer operation. Competitors for FW will be USB for commodity uses, and PCI Express for specialist high performance. The ability of PCIe to bring out a single lane (such as with an ExpressCard) means that some performance critical uses currently the province of FW may migrate. This clearly includes multichannel digital audio converters. Proprietary interfaces (like Apogee's Symphony) will probably be the first to move to PCIe, but FW could find serious competition here. However the inability to daisy chain easily may reduce the uptake. FW can reticulate over CAT6 cable, and there is some suggestion you could run FW though a building on fixed wiring. Exactly why is another question. So, the landscape will be USB 3.0, FW 3200, PCIe. Each with advantages and disadvantages. I don't see USB making any inroads into high quality audio, the protocol is basically unsuited, even with the higher speeds. Firewire retains the best fit for purpose here, until you need studio levels of interface - where PCIe will probably take over. Microsoft has a rotten reputation with FW. Just look back to the SGI Windows workstations. MS promised to support them, and these were one of the first workstations with FW, but MS never did. SGI bet the company on these machines, and MS's lack of support nearly killed them. (As a reward MS hired the SGI CEO.) __________________ The night is coming, and its filled with dark surprise.