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General discussion

firewire problems. please help.

Aug 16, 2005 11:01AM PDT

i have plugged 2 bus powered laptop drives (cased in a mobile enclosure) in to my titanium g4 powerbook (dual boot) and both times smoke has come out of the enclosure. the first time my hard drive was blown and i had to replace it. the second time using the same type of enclosure smoke came out again but the drive was able to be reformatted and i have been told it is still working. i now have a different mobile enclosure but am hesitant to plug it in to my powerebook in case it happens again.

someone told me there was an issue with the firewire ports on older powerbooks and powemacs sending too much voltage and that this may be causing the problem. does anyone else know of any such problems as i will send it back to mac (under apple care) but want to know as much info as possible as they have denied certain problems to me in the past when i have experienced them myself. thanks in advance.

Discussion is locked

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It can be simple as that.
Aug 16, 2005 11:37AM PDT

You've learned the lesson. Now try a powered enclosure.

Or better yet, one that you don't build yourself.

Bob

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I have to agree
Aug 16, 2005 12:07PM PDT

Always use a powered enclosure whether for Firewire or USB.
If you are lucky, Apple will fix it

P

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firewire problems. please help.
Aug 16, 2005 1:21PM PDT

are you saying that bus powered hard drives are not actually able to be bus powered? that seems preety odd to me. i spoke to hitachi who i bought the laptop drive from and they couldn't see why it would be a problem as long as the voltage from the computer was not too powerful for the drive (5 volts). the drive worked fine when powered from another mac but blew both times when i booted up with it plugged in to my titanium powerbook.

as for powered drives, i already have 4 7200 speed lacie drives but they are not bus powered and i needed a bus powered for specific portable working tasks. when i purchased the extra 2.5" drive most bus powered firewire drives (in an enclosure already) were all only 5400 speed drives. i need a 7200 speed drive which is why i bought and enclosure. i've since seen a drive by OWC that is bus powered 7200 speed in an enclosure and seems well regarded by a number of reviews i have read (2 of which are below) but i'd already bought the internal drive and would still like to fit the drive into an enclosure.

http://arstechnica.com/reviews/hardware/mercury.ars

4 stars in macworld
http://www.macworld.com/2005/05/reviews/fwharddrivesportable/index.php

anyhow, i was hoping you could answer my question but obviously not. if anyone else out there knows about macs i just wondered if there were any known issues with powerbook/powermac firewire ports on some of their older computers. i'd just like to know if my mac is sending out more voltage that some devices accept. i've also heard of pro tools digi oo2 mixers (

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Firewire problems
Aug 16, 2005 9:57PM PDT

I can't find anything regarding the voltage problem on older PB's but have found numerous reports of drives failing and FW ports ceasing to work. In the majority of cases the problem was due to a faulty FireWire cable and not to anything that the drive or PB was doing.
Certainly Bus powered drives are a viable proposition, but powered drives are more the norm. Strange that there is not some form of power cutoff in the drive unit to prevent excess voltage.
Under AppleCare, Apple will take a look at the problem for you. As a possible work around, you could purchase a FireWire PC card and run from that. Assuming that the PC card would supply the necessary 5V, down the cable, to power the drive.
Were you using the same cable each time you toasted a drive?

P