Good, because there's much more to deliver than an already bloated consumer video market.

As you can see by the chart at right, nearly every camera or video related device for FireWire has been or soon will be delivered by their respective manufacturers. That's fine, but where are all those cheap storage solutions we were told are around the corner?

As far as we've seen only VST has made good on the FireWire hard drive promise. But look at that sticker price. We're sure the prices on these types of storage devices will level down to near where speculators were wishfully thinking.

On the brighter side, there is a hopeful bit of news for audio. Newer Technology should be releasing FireStorm AV, FireStorm DV and FireWire2Go products.

Of particular interest is the FireStorm AV. The sub $200 unit proposes a breakout bar with a variety of I/O connections including S-Video and composite. Plug this puppy into your Yosemite's firewire port (or other IEEE-1394 equipped PowerMac) and you have an A/V Mac with outrageous bandwidth capabilities.

Now, someone needs to come up with the same idea, light on the video & heavy on the multitrack. Most of what pertains to the audio market for FireWire right now is inextricably tied to some kind of DV product. If they can push digital video through this pipe, it shouldn't be hard to make 8-channel audio happen.

Not a peep so far from the major audio hardware manufacturer's. Even still Apple Computer's FireWire page mentions the wonderful products announced by manufacturers:

"At Macworld/SF in January, 1999, third parties announced 20 new FireWire products, including cameras and scanners to hard drives and audio mixers.

In addition to cameras and DV equipment, the array of FireWire products includes digital VCRs, home entertainment systems, music synthesizers, scanners and disk drives."

Mixers & Synths?

Where?

When?

MacRocks.com will be in the throng of the NAMM Summer Session Press Corps -- rest assured among the buzz words we will be stressing to product reps is FireWire.

Check out our first report
on IEEE-1394

TOP OF PAGE

• 400Mbps bandwidth (30 times more than USB)
• Supports up to 63 devices using cable lengths up to 14 feet
• Hot-pluggable—you don’t have to turn off a scanner or CD drive to connect or disconnect it, and you don’t need to restart your computer
• FireWire cables are a snap to connect—you don’t need device IDs, jumpers, DIP switches, screws, latches or terminators
• It's standard equipment on the new G3 PowerMacs.

Version 2.0 FireWire software improves digital video capture and offers support for high-speed hard drives and printers with the SBP-2 protocol. If you use FireWire DV cameras or decks, you should download and install this software update.

IEEE-1394 Enabled Devices: