FireWire in 2018
I think we all know the pain of having to deal with the lack of firewire on modern computers and especially Laptops. With PCs you're able to buy a PCIe-Firewire card and everything works fine but with Laptops it's another story - especially on Windows.
With Mac you were able to get away with a Thunderbolt2 connection and a Thunderbolt2-Firewire adapter, which is readily available and very affordable and it used to work fine with my somewhat aged Macbook Pro 2013 Retina.
Now with Thunderbolt3 it seems to be much more difficult, even with the Tunderbolt3-Thunderbolt2 adapter I hear that people are getting very mixed results, especially under Windows. There are also some Thunderbolt3 hubs around (notably one from OWC with FW800) but those don't seem to work with Windows and even though they require their own power adapter, I doubt that they can power a FW device and it's not really a mobile solution.
As I am going with Windows I think I may have found a solution, though it's no the most comfortable one:
A workstation laptop that has a ExpressCard port + a Firewire ExpressCard.
The downside is that it's very heavy (very) and very expensive (very!) and as far as I can see there's only one manufacturer who still produces current laptops with such a port- and I have not heard from anyone who uses his PhaseOne gear with such a combination/device.
How are you coping with the lack of FW and which solution did you find, that works best for photography on location?
With Mac you were able to get away with a Thunderbolt2 connection and a Thunderbolt2-Firewire adapter, which is readily available and very affordable and it used to work fine with my somewhat aged Macbook Pro 2013 Retina.
Now with Thunderbolt3 it seems to be much more difficult, even with the Tunderbolt3-Thunderbolt2 adapter I hear that people are getting very mixed results, especially under Windows. There are also some Thunderbolt3 hubs around (notably one from OWC with FW800) but those don't seem to work with Windows and even though they require their own power adapter, I doubt that they can power a FW device and it's not really a mobile solution.
As I am going with Windows I think I may have found a solution, though it's no the most comfortable one:
A workstation laptop that has a ExpressCard port + a Firewire ExpressCard.
The downside is that it's very heavy (very) and very expensive (very!) and as far as I can see there's only one manufacturer who still produces current laptops with such a port- and I have not heard from anyone who uses his PhaseOne gear with such a combination/device.
How are you coping with the lack of FW and which solution did you find, that works best for photography on location?
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There are also some Thunderbolt3 hubs around (notably one from OWC with FW800) but those don't seem to work with Windows
We did a quick test with a USB-C based Windows laptop and the OWC 3 dock with great results.
No problem, no additional drivers needed with Windows 10.
Backs tested was
* IQ3 series
* IQ1 series
* P+ series
* P series
* Leaf Credo.
I can at the same time confirm that the TB3 -> TB2 -> Firewire double adapter solution does not work on Mac.0 -
Really? As far as I've heard OWC at first sold the dock for Windows and Mac but later retracted that and said it's only for Mac because the drivers for Windows don't work and that's the last I've heard of them..
I assume this dock does not work without an additional power source, is that correct?
Did you also try the TB3->TB2->FW adapter chain on Windows laptops with Thunderbolt3-ports?0 -
I have no idea about Firewire and don't shoot PO backs, but...
ThinkPad X230 is the last X series to have an ExpressCard slot. Maxed out with i7, 16GB RAM and SSD; is still pretty decent and inexpensive. Works well for me.0 -
Well actually the current "P" series features an ExpressCard slot as well as the "L" series.
But the "P" line is extremely expensive and very heavy and the "L" series has a mediocre screen an no dedicated GPU.
So if the TB3 <> TB2 <> FW solution were to work, that would actually be preferable..
@Ulf - did you try the daisychain on Windows? What was the problem with it on a Mac?0 -
C-M-B wrote:
But the "P" line is extremely expensive and very heavy and the "L" series has a mediocre screen an no dedicated GPU.
Fully agree.0 -
So is everyone either using a Dock or USB or not using Firewire at all? 🤓
I'm a bit surprised that it's so silent here, especially considering that tethering is one of the most important aspects of digital medium format and FireWire is extremely comfortable to use!
Edit: @Ulf: were you trying to get power via the Thunderbolt3 <=> Thunderbolt2 <=> Firewire 800 adapter? Or were you just trying to get a connection?0 -
Sorry for 'spamming' a bit, but I have actually heard back from a few people on reddit, who use the TB3-TB2-FW800 combination successfully, at least on a Mac.
So I'm very curious to know why it didn't work for you, Ulf. Were you perhaps trying to connect it to a USB 3.1/USB-C port and not a real Thunderbolt3? After all the connector is the same but the way it works is very different.
Sure, it's not possible to get the back powered this way, the adapter still won't deliver more than 7W which isn't enough - but according to most people who tried it, they were able to get a good connection going.0 -
Well today a friend of mine tested his P65+ with a Thunderbot3 - Thunderbolt 2 - Firewire 800 adapter chain and it worked flawlessly.
Only thing he did was to set the back to battery power (of cource) and he removed the memory card.
Now that I know it works on OSX with the adapter dongle chain, I'll try it on Windows.
I find it highly annoying that PhaseOne doesn't seem to follow up on those connectivity options - not because of my old back, the the new ones that still have a FireWire port.0
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