on 10/13/01 5:39 PM, Mark Benson at [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: > I saw in my local electronics vendor's catalogue (CPC UK for all you > Brits) that they have FireWire external cases for IDE drives. They > are standard 5.25" cases with tha appropriate guts to use IDE devices > from them. > It SAYS in the catalogue, I almost quote, "Can be used > with HDD, CD, CDR, CDRW DVD (Windows 98/Me/2000) (If Mac user can > only fit HDD!). Is there any substance in this? Can they relly say > for surre the CD/DVD drives don't work.
All firewire drives that currently exist are ATA drives in a case with a firewire to ATA bridge chips in them. It may work very well... But it may not. What they are doing is covering their asses in case it doesn't. Ie, they =know= the chip in the enclosure will be recognized by apple's software, but they can't guarantee whatever CD/DVD drive you decide to put in will be. Ie, it could be that it would work with your cd drive... But if you tried it with another the macos or toast wouldn't recognize it... So they aren't selling it as compatible so they don't have to deal with support/returns if it turns out not to be. It depends on what firmware they are using, and what bridge chip. So, it could mean: A) The firmware and bridge have been tested to be able to tell the macOS it is a hard drive, but that there are some compatibility problems with some drives, or they just didn't want to test their myriad of optical drives out there and are covering their asses. :) B) Somethingin the firmware or bridge chip they are using lets it be recognized as a hard drive, but there are actual problems in using optical drives with macs. C) They are just going by what the supplier from whom they buy their stock Is telling them... Which could still be one of the above. > CPC aren't a small company > and I'm sure they go to lengths to check their stuff but it strikes > me they know next to nothing about Macs as some USB stuff in their > catalogue that is specced to work on a Mac (MS Mice for example) are > often only labled as PC compatible. This happens a lot. Mostly because it is really annoying to have to support multiple platforms from an inventory and also tech support role if macs aren't a large part of their business (or over 7-10%). It may be that microsoft itself wasn't handing it over to them as a mac-compatible device... I have a microsoft intellimouse explorer, and yes it is mac compatible but no drivers came in the box, you had to go and download them to get it to work. -- Michael Bryan Bell http://homepage.mac.com/michael_bell/ -- G-List is sponsored by <http://lowendmac.com/> and... Small Dog Electronics http://www.smalldog.com | Refurbished Drives | -- We have Apple Refurbished Monitors in stock! | & CDRWs on Sale! | Support Low End Mac <http://lowendmac.com/lists/support.html> G-List list info: <http://lowendmac.com/lists/g-list.shtml> Send list messages to: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To unsubscribe, email: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> For digest mode, email: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subscription questions: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Archive: <http://www.mail-archive.com/g-list%40mail.maclaunch.com/> Using a Macintosh? Get free email and more at Applelinks! <http://www.applelinks.com>
