On Sep 22, 2009, at 8:47 PM, MrMike6by9 wrote:
My first gen MBP has a free USB port on the right side and on the left. The port on the left is close to the mag safe power plug but only the port on the right can power my USB hard drive that I use for backups and my iTunes collection. I use the port on the left side to support my IPhone and my iTouch.
USB, being a PC technology picked up by Apple during its dark days, is technically a mess. One can have no reasonable expectation about what can and can't be successfully powered. I carry a portable drive with me that works fine with FireWire. To connect it using USB I have to carry an extra cable. First I have to plug in one cord into the drives power socket and plug that into one USB port. Then I plug in a second USB cord to carry data and supply additional power. The drive won't work unless it is getting power simultaneously from two separate USB connections. I see that as pretty shameful engineering.
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