What's the best Firewire PCI card to get?

[carbonism]

I'm planning to get a new M-Audio firewire interface. My current system does not have a firewire port, so I need to buy a super fast PCI firewire expansion card. Can anyone recommend a good one? The one I'm favoring at the moment is the "LaCie 130820 FireWire 400 PCI Card Design by Sismo". Apparently it has a TI chip that is recommended for audio devices.

[bonestonne]

In terms of brand names, I definitely support the use of LaCie products, Siig, Belkin and Syba make good products as well.

TI is the preferred chipset. Something to keep in mind though, is that there are different revision chipsets. Unfortunately, there's no running list of which specific ones work best, or better than others.

Agere is also a "working" brand, I've used a Belkin 3 port FW card with an Agere FW chipset, and it worked very well, however I'm sure there are cases it wont, because computers just aren't that simple.

Some VIA chipsets work, some do not, so it's hard to say one is good, one is bad. Individual use has so many different experiences, so it's impossible to say yes to one, and no to others.

I would suggest that LaCie card, but if you find other cards in different price ranges (FW cards aren't cheap), I would say it's well worth checking other brands, to see if it's TI or not.

[delta6six]

yes any card with T I chipset----only TI

[bonestonne]

I would not say "only TI."

Yes, Texas Instruments was part of the original development of Firewire chipsets, but that does not mean that every other FW chipset is bad. There are other chipsets that work just as well for audio, however it is not clear cut, and a user needs to be careful, and test everything before expecting the card to work 100%.

[carbonism]

Thanks for the info bonestonne.

[blakegaston]

Whilst I agree that not every other chipset is bad, TI did help develop the standard, and in general they are often superior chipsets to their rivals, in almost all aspects. Not just when it comes to audio either. TI chipsets are the most desirable in video, audio, when it comes to external hard drive compatibility, etc.

I would get make sure whatever you get has a TI chipset. Its seems to be a pretty general consensus that stability, compatibility, etc are all a notch above VIA/Ricoh, etc. You can have problems with a TI chipset, you are just much less likely to do so.

My $0.02- Good luck.

[7pirates]

Hello i'm new to this forum, just signed up to comment on this thread.
I am also looking for a pci firewire card.
I am using it to conect a tl audio do-f from my fattrack console.
But I just came across a dual ti chipset pci card with 3 400 and one 800 firewire card.
It also states that it is for sound cards which sounds very good.
The only thing is it does look as high of a quilty card as the LaCie card in the way of build.
could some one give me some adivce on if it is a good buy.
Money is not part of my why I liked his one, I'd rather pay alot more for the right card seeing as they arn't going to be above £100 anyway.
here is the link to the card I found (maybe dual chips don't mean anything or it just means more ports not better porformance)
http://www.amazon.co.uk/PCI-FIREWIRE...=cm_cr_pr_pb_t

[7pirates]

plus i've just found this one, two ports is o.k for me so this doesn't mater.
http://www.partsdata.de/DUAL_firewir...CI-F4-890.html
If any one can direct me to anything better please let me know.
Money is no object on this one. ;-)

[joelg]

Both of those look ok. I would probably just get a FW800 card and use a 6pin to 9pin cable. Here's the Avid qualified firewire list for reference:http://avid.custkb.com/avid/app/self...p?DocId=352647

Joel

[Jared]

I would only recommend getting one of the cards that is qualified for Pro Tools is the article Joel links above. Those cards are tested with Pro Tools at full track counts; that's 192 tracks across 10 FireWire drives. When running a qualified Pro Tools system, that level of performance is guaranteed.