David Vasek wrote:
> What would be firewire good for?

Data transfer such as for full backups or cloning or audio/video.
Haven't tested it yet on OpenBSD, I still have USB-only / ethernet-base
storage for those systems.  Subjectively, I find FW to be much faster
than USB2 on my hardware using OS X and Ubuntu.

Notes from published comparisons below.  YMMV:

        "Although the USB 2.0 is speedier than the FireWire, the
        latter beats it when used in high-speed storage devices. "
 http://ixbtlabs.com/articles/usb20vsfirewire/


        "Read Test:
         5000 files (300 MB total) FireWire was 33% faster than USB 2.0
        160 files (650MB total) FireWire was 70% faster than USB 2.0
        Write Test:
         5000 files (300 MB total) FireWire was 16% faster than USB 2.0
         160 files (650MB total) FireWire was 48% faster than USB 2.0
 http://www.cwol.com/firewire/firewire-vs-usb.htm



        Tests   USB2    FW      % faster than USB 2.0
        Test 1 (read)   6.12    8.14    32.99
        Test 2 (read)   6.39    10.89   70.51
        Test 1 (write)  5.11    5.92    15.85
        Test 2 (write)  5.76    8.50    47.59
http://g4tv.com/techtvvault/features/39129/USB-20-Versus-FireWire_pg3.html


        "Our benchmarks show Firewire 800 is up to 46% faster
        than a drive connected to the more common Firewire 400,
        and about 29% faster than USB 2.0. "
 http://www.anandtech.com/mb/showdoc.aspx?i=2602&p=15

regards,
-Lars

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