Is the firewire port on the audigy breakout box powered?

[Paulson]

I've got the audigy platinum which comes with the internal drive bay type box that has all my nifty connections and a firewire port... is it a powered one though?

I've read that the audigy cards aren't powered, but I was wondering if the breakout box was, because it actually charges up my ipod...

???

 

[Paulson]

Nobody knows this?

hmmmm

 

[TGHI]

I am assuming it is - all USB ports are powered - so why wouldn't firewire? My best suggestion: try it and find out, it won't kill anything.

 

[buleyb]

is it 6pin?

 

[AIWGuru]

It is 6 pin but it is not fully powered. .5a only.

 

[Monoman]

Originally posted by: AIWGuru
It is 6 pin but it is not fully powered. 5a only.

cool, whats the rating on a fully powered firewire port. (I am thinking of doing a external firewire/usb powered external HDD project) I havn't looked up any specific numbers yet but it's on the back burner anyway

 

[Eug]

It is 6 pin but it is not fully powered. 5a only.

5a?

cool, whats the rating on a fully powered firewire port. (I am thinking of doing a external firewire/usb powered external HDD project)

Fully powered I believe is 12V x 1.25 amps = 15 Watts.

Thus, the only external HDD you can run is a laptop drive. They're usually around 2.5 W or something.

 

[Monoman]

actually, it's 4.7 on spinup on the 80gb drive I was lookign at. Now I must check and see whats the required wattage on the 160gb drive I am contemplating. I am going to try and combin power from 2 firewire ports and see of thats enough. Infact, I may try to use 2 usb and 1 firewire port.

Thanks Eug

 

[AIWGuru]

Originally posted by: Monoman

Originally posted by: AIWGuru
It is 6 pin but it is not fully powered. 5a only.

cool, whats the rating on a fully powered firewire port. (I am thinking of doing a external firewire/usb powered external HDD project) I havn't looked up any specific numbers yet but it's on the back burner anyway

No, that's the rating on a fully powered USB port.
THis is an unpowered firewire port. There are warnings about it all over the manual. Take a look.

 

[Eug]

Originally posted by: AIWGuru

Originally posted by: Monoman

Originally posted by: AIWGuru
It is 6 pin but it is not fully powered. 5a only.

cool, whats the rating on a fully powered firewire port. (I am thinking of doing a external firewire/usb powered external HDD project) I havn't looked up any specific numbers yet but it's on the back burner anyway

No, that's the rating on a fully powered USB port.
THis is an unpowered firewire port. There are warnings about it all over the manual. Take a look.

AFAIK, USB is usually rated for 0.5 A per port (continuous), not 5 A. ie. 2.5 Watts.

Indeed, some laptops have problems powering some older laptop drives off of USB 2.0 ports, whereas with powered Firewire it's not a problem.

 

[AIWGuru]

Originally posted by: Eug

Originally posted by: AIWGuru

Originally posted by: Monoman

Originally posted by: AIWGuru
It is 6 pin but it is not fully powered. 5a only.

cool, whats the rating on a fully powered firewire port. (I am thinking of doing a external firewire/usb powered external HDD project) I havn't looked up any specific numbers yet but it's on the back burner anyway

No, that's the rating on a fully powered USB port.
THis is an unpowered firewire port. There are warnings about it all over the manual. Take a look.

AFAIK, USB is usually rated for 0.5 A per port, not 5 A.

Yes. That's what I meant, .5a
That's the rating in the specs.
The manual is also filled with warnings about it being an unpowered port. Both on the card and in the breakout box.
Not. Powered.

 

[Paulson]

well how come it still charges my ipod? (and no I'm not imagining things, I've had the ipod down to empty and it charges it back up)

???

 

[Pariah]

The .5A rating is most likely for the port on the card itself. All "full" powered firewire addin cards have an auxiliary floppy drive power connector since PCI slots aren't really designed to deliver that level of current. With no additional power connector and a sound card to power through the PCI slot, it's not surprising the port can't supply enough power. The Live Drive does have the power connector and almost definitely supplies closer to the firewire spec'd power.

 

[MDE]

6 pin FireWire= powered, 4 pin mini FireWire = unpowered (I think).

 

[AIWGuru]

Originally posted by: MDE
6 pin FireWire= powered, 4 pin mini FireWire = unpowered (I think).

Not always.
I'm just going by what the specs and the manual says.
Re: the ipod, it doesn't provide NO power, it provides the same ammount as a USB (or USB 2.0 if you prefer) port which is still more than what's needed for a trickel charge.
Instead of calling it unpowered, it may be best to call it "underpowered."

 

[gsellis]

With AIWGuru on this. Just because it has 6 pins, does not mean you have power or power for what you want to do. If you are planning on running an external drive, don't. Use the power source that should have come with that drive. Your life will be happier because of it.

Think about it. If the drive is powered, a cable pull (they aren't locked) won't be as dramatic.

Edit - But hey, if you are just charging your iPod and it is working. Ok then.

Edit 2 - Oh, does the iPod have a smart charger? The Li-Ion batteries do not like to be overcharged, so I assume it does. You don't want to kill it too soon, but rumour is that it will only last about a year.