Firewire 400 is slower than USB 2.0??

[PewPewBangBang]

this is strange..........im using a portable external hard drive, its the Iomega eGO mac edition (haha eGO)
anyways, the firewire 400 on it is really really slow for some reason, the USB 2.0 connection is even faster.

I tested this because i was wondering why file transfers of around 1-2gb (BRRIP movies) were taking as long as 30-60 minutes

then just recently i tried transfering a file 1.7gb to it, was taking around 40 mins. I then just went, wat the heck and changed the connection to USB 2.0 and it took merely 1-2 minutes =O!!!!!

any reasons?? i tried updating my firewire driver on my mobo but it says its up to date, my mobo is an Asus P5K pro if anyone wants to know, tried searching google for some firewire drivers but couldn't find any.

very strange phenomenon

P.S - the firewire 800 on it is very fast as expected when being used with my Macbook Pro (unibody)

 

[GBear]

Supposedly, USB is not a constant transfer rate. It fluctuates and can spike at transfer rates higher than Firewire. Firewire is a consistent transfer rate. eSATA is just weird. Supposedly it can transfer almost as fast as an internal HDD but from experience, it doesn't. It actually locked up my computer. Since my case and motherboard does not have an eSATA port, I had to plug it straight into the SATA port. It seemed to work fine. That's what my friend did with his eSATA external. But whenever I transfer files onto the external, it seems to lock up all the time.

 

[reflex99]

Are you using the firewire port on the front of your case? If so there is your problem. Front pannel connectors are notorious for their slowness/not-working-at-all-ness. Try using the FW port on your mobo.

If usb isn't unbearable i would just use that.

 

[iOprah]

Firewire is faster over time (meaning it will be a shorter transfer time) however USB will spike at high and low transfer rates. I use Firewire 800 (or 9 pin firewire) for all my harddrives and for my video cameras and its faster than USB, so is firewire 600. I have never used firewire 400 (at least on the computer side) so I would not be able tell you about it.

 

[Passerby]

the speeds aren't directly comparable because they work in different ways.

usb2 send information in ones direction at a time in bursts which can be faster for small amount of information.

firewire 400/800 sends information in a constant stream and can sends data up and down the pipe at once. over a longer period of time firewire will win out for transferring data.

the difference is mainly there uses usb2 is more of a consumer type of interface well as firewire is used more in the video and audio industry and is more suited to reading or recording large amount of audio and video to the drive at once.

for most projects i work with if i attach my drive via usb i will start to get clicks and pops in my audio and pro-tools will complain about not getting data fast enough. vs using firewire where i can usually with a good 7,200 rpm drive or better where i can recored and read about 32tracks of audio at 24bit 96khz at once.

and you are also comparing the old firewire spec the the new usb spec

 

[PewPewBangBang]

thanks for replies everyone......yes i've been using the front firewire 400 port, i will try the back one when i have time, as of now i guess ill just stick to USB 2.0 on my desktop and firewire 800 on my macbook pro