The Keyspan FireWire Card provides a simple and affordable way to add high speed FireWire (IEEE 1394) to your older Mac or PC CardBus equipped Laptop. FireWire is now built into all new PowerBooks.

FireWire is used to connect to DV camcorders, hard drives, CD burners, scanners and other devices.

The card is packaged with a FireWire cable and includes two valuable software applications. For Windows users VideoWave III SE from MGI Software, is included. VideoWave III SE features SmartDV technology for faster rendering of DV content.

Each Keyspan FireWire Card also includes a copy of QuickTime Pro (for Windows and for Mac OS). QuickTime is the most popular format for streaming videos on the internet. QuickTime Pro also provides useful file translation and compression tools.

The card has a MSRP of $99, but is available from some resellers for as low as $78.25.

My experiences with the card have been very good so far. I tried it with a QPS QueFire FireWire CD Burner, as well as a FireWire equipped Sony Camcorder. I spent several days with the Sony Camcorder filming my car on the highway, and taking pictures of my girlfriend, and then used iMovie to import them through the FireWire card.

Although 6 pin FireWire devices can draw power from the FireWire bus, some FireWire devices still have external power supplies. This is good, because the bus powered Que M2 FireWire hard drive I tested with these adapters would not power up when plugged into the PC card, so I was forced to use the external brick. This is a shame because it would be convenient to take the drive on the road with the PowerBook where AC outlets are not available.

The card is simple to use, it's almost like it's part of your Mac. No drivers are required to use it with Mac OS 9, and later, so you just plug it in, and plug in the device you want to use, and it works. I also tested it with Mac OS X, and again it works flawlessly without any drivers.

This Keyspan FireWire card is a truly outstanding product, and I would recommend it to anyone who needs to connect FireWire devices to an older PowerBook.

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