Hi

Can anyone perhaps shed any light as to why I have blown the firewire ports on both my Sony PD-150 and VX2000 cameras.
Using Pinnacle DV500 I have captured from the VX2000 (as I have done daily for the past year) as normal, edited a session on Premier (using XP) then went back later to capture again and was told by PC it did not detect the camera. Tests indicated the cameras firewire port had blown. Swithed to PD-150 for capturing and all was well for a few days when exactly the same thing happened. Tests indicated that the PD-150's firewire port had also now blown. I'm scared to capture using another borrowed camera for fear of it happening again. I read elsewhere on this forum today that it could be the firewire cable at fault. I will change this immediately. Could anyone else who has had this happen to them please post their experiences and hopefully remedies.

Many thanks

Regards

Paul

paul,

Chk your power supply, be sure that the ground should be in between +/_ 3 volts.


------------------------
debu,
Studio Brahmaputra
Assam

I would take the cameras to another computer and test them out.

After that if they are working then I would check your 1394 card, also check out your OS if you are on XP Pro this will give some cards a bad reading. This all happened to me that is why I am giving it up to you.

Thanks Debu and Sharon for your input and will definately keep that in mind. In the meantime I have purchased a brand new high quality 6 to 4 pin firewire cable. Unfortunately I have been forced to buy another small JVC mini DV camcorder just for capturing purposes and to transfer the edited project from the Premier timeline back out to Mini DV with. Once the edited project master is on Mini DV I make my multiple copies ( weddings, school plays etc ) I certainly hope my blown firewire port nightmares are over.
I am also taking further precautions in only plugging and unplugging the firewire cable when the PC is off. I have been told that a digital camera is a hot pluggable device in that it is unnecessary to power off when plugging and unplugging but am not so sure.

Rgds Paul

All devices that are connected to the computer need to be and must be turned off as a precaution.

Not necessarily, Sharon. Lots of hot-pluggable devices out there including USB, iLink or Firewire, and hot-pluggable drives (in the appropriate carrier) to name a few. These technologies are designed to accommodate hot-plugging and unplugging.

Yeah USB and iLink are OK yet there are times you do have to watch out for that FireWire. Your right drives that are made for hot swapping are made for that. So I started out trying to help only to confuse the average person into Technophobia or Urban Legends.

I do however hold out judgment on video cameras as they have yet to put the full technologies behind FireWire as for USB 1.0 and 2.0 there is really no chance to blow out your 1394 port.

Is this better Mike? :)

Ya'aint been wrong yet, Sharon. I don't really expect you to be. Figured you were taking the better safe than sorry approach.

Firewire is a bit scary. Stupid designs that require everything to be hooked up and powered up before one runs editing software.

The real scary part of firewire is the stupidly delicate 4-pin connectors. Although I haven't bent one in over 5 years of use, I know that time is lurking out there. Right up there with S-Video connectors.

Happy holidays everyone.

Yeah USB and iLink are OK yet there are times you do have to watch out for that FireWire.

FireWire and iLink are exactly the same thing. Sony didn't want to use Apple's name so they adopted their own.

Firewire is a bit scary. Stupid designs that require everything to be hooked up and powered up before one runs editing software.

There is noting scary about an industry standard. The design doesn't call for devices to be powered up or down. Poorly written drivers by manufactures may require non-standard procedures. The proper implementation of FireWire is true plug-n-play.

My only problem Mike is if I am using someone’s system lets say a G4 Dual 1 Gig and they also bring in a DSR11 and I connect it and let us say that I plug an play....ZAP the what if part is better part of reason.

Yeah! Jeff has a point as to the nutty drivers as that is what caused all the Macs trouble in Panther. However my insurance does not cover the errors of companies’ failures.

I go the safe and slow method for now I have seen to many gadgets blow...really.

I understand. And I never turn my back on a Mac firewire system. They are very picky about what is plugged into what, when and is it powered on before you start the software.

<<<-- Originally posted by Jeff Donald : FireWire and iLink are exactly the same thing. Sony didn't want to use Apple's name so they adopted their own.



There is noting scary about an industry standard. The design doesn't call for devices to be powered up or down. Poorly written drivers by manufactures may require non-standard procedures. The proper implementation of FireWire is true plug-n-play. -->>>

Ah, but it is not an industry standard and that is the problem. It is a standards committee standard. A far different thing indeed.

As long as I stick to pure Sony, I have no problems. They seem to fully adhere to the standard. Apple and Canon, OTOH, do not appear to do so.

<<<-- Originally posted by Mike Rehmus : <<<-- Originally posted by Jeff Donald :

As long as I stick to pure Sony, I have no problems. They seem to fully adhere to the standard. Apple and Canon, OTOH, do not appear to do so. -->>>

umm apple wrote the standard so they aren't the ones breaking the rules

Not necessarily, Sharon. Lots of hot-pluggable devices out there including USB, iLink or Firewire, and hot-pluggable drives (in the appropriate carrier) to name a few. These technologies are designed to accommodate hot-plugging and unplugging.

Quite a few people on forums like these report blowing out firewire drives (they are connected via 6pin-6pin FW cable). The solutions seem to be:
1- power everything down while switching devices
2- Use quality firewire cable.

I don't know what's wrong in Paul's case, but I would suspect that the 6pin-4pin firewire cable is feeding power on some of the pins. It definitely isn't supposed to do this. The 4-pin connector should not be carrying any power at all. There are various ways to test this out. This includes trying a new firewire card ($25ish off newegg.com), getting a voltmeter and measuring all the pins (the 6-pin end plugged into the computer, turned on), or using a friend's computer.

<<<-- Originally posted by Jon Kamps : <<<-- Originally posted by Mike Rehmus : <<<-- Originally posted by Jeff Donald :

As long as I stick to pure Sony, I have no problems. They seem to fully adhere to the standard. Apple and Canon, OTOH, do not appear to do so. -->>>

umm apple wrote the standard so they aren't the ones breaking the rules -->>>

Unfortunately, that isn't true in this case. They didn't write FCP, for example. They bought the company. And Apple didn't write the standard, the standards committee did. They adopted most if not all of Apple's design. But creating something that becomes a standard is no guarantee that it will be followed by anyone.

And I submit that today, Sony is the Standard Bearer in this area because of the large number of units they manufacture every year.

<<<-- Originally posted by Glenn Chan : Quite a few people on forums like these report blowing out firewire drives (they are connected via 6pin-6pin FW cable). The solutions seem to be:
1- power everything down while switching devices
2- Use quality firewire cable.

I don't know what's wrong in Paul's case, but I would suspect that the 6pin-4pin firewire cable is feeding power on some of the pins. It definitely isn't supposed to do this. The 4-pin connector should not be carrying any power at all. There are various ways to test this out. This includes trying a new firewire card ($25ish off newegg.com), getting a voltmeter and measuring all the pins (the 6-pin end plugged into the computer, turned on), or using a friend's computer. -->>>

What is sad is that the implementations of firewire that can be blown by a voltage generated in the computer. The technology exists to protect input circuits from 12 VDC.

So you’re saying that Sony is more of a standard than Apple?

WOW I would have bet the money on Apple, as it is I use more Apple than Sony so I cannot reasonably say that Sony better only knows the one side.

I think it comes down to who ships more connections and who is held to be the 'gold' standard. I'd bet on Sony I think.

Whether Apple or Sony knows firewire better isn't the point. It is the impementation. My experience with the Apple implementation has decidedly been worse than with the Sony versions.

Before you start thinking that I believe Apple's version to be bad, I don't know that to be true or false. But their package in its entirety, hardware and software isn't as friendly. And it may only be the software, not the hardware that causes the differences.

I believe that most of the problems that Apple has comes from the software side and they way they think that WE should know what's going on whenever they put out an update.

What is sad is that the implementations of firewire that can be blown by a voltage generated in the computer. The technology exists to protect input circuits from 12 VDC.

Older Macs don't have this protection, but newer Macs do if I remember correctly. On newer Macs you need to press a button in case you "blow out" your FW port. I don't know what happens on the firewire drive side.

Hi guys

We "may" have found the problem with all my blown firewire ports. Here in South Africa we use 220volts a/c power. Upon inspection we today found that the "live" and "neutral" of the 3 pin power plug had been swapped around on the extension cable we were using to power the PC. This resulted in a huge potential difference across the points when it should have had none. Although the power was fine to actually power the PC and peripherals, it "may" we think be our problem. Will keep you all posted and thanks for those who offered their 2c worth ..... esp. Debu who originally stated "check your power supply" .... thanks.

Except for Canon XL1's (not XL1s) our Mac lab at school handles all cameras and peripherals without a problem. No communication errors and no blown FireWire ports. The XL1 issue was caused by Canon not fully implementing the FireWire standard in the camera's firmware.

On the other hand it seems that early Sony Viao laptops would only communicate via iLink with Sony cameras. I'm told that this was some kind of software limitation that the early Sony's had. I don't know the exact cause but I have seen more than several students with this problem. The laptop doesn't recognize any camera except a Sony.