Well, it seems that the firewire does work on the 'firedrill' prototype card. I know of one instance of someone else getting it to work, but I wanted to find out for myself. While I don't have any firewire peripherals to test with, it says that it has a MacOS driver loaded for the firewire controller.
According to Accelerate Your Mac reports, the FireWire port is the only thing verified to work at this point. I have that card as well, and eventually I'll get around to trying it out under OS X drivers (which there are no reports for) to see if it'll work there.
BTW, the card also went under the codenames of "FireBlast" and "SXSW" (South-by-Southwest)
I tried it with a PPC Color Classic, using a 5500/6500 motherboard, and the firewire didn't work. (I have since verified that FW will work on this machine, using another FW PCI card.)
The xlr8yourmac web site seems to indicate that the FW ports on this prototype card have only been proven to work with an 8600 mobo -- there's some speculation that the 8600 ROM has some support for this card, or perhaps that all PCI Macs with DAV slots (7500, 7600, 8600) will work with it.
Matt
I'm running it on my Powerbase and it seems to run fine. Tattletech does shows that there is a firewire bus present. Don't have anything to actually try them out with.
I wonder if I hooked it up to a DAV port on an 8500. Someone has probably already tried this out, though.
Wow!!! :o
I thought I was the only one with a Powerbase... I had to search for 3 months to get one on Ebay. (I was too cheap to pay for a 63xx/64xx machine) got mine for USD $12. S/H was USD $35
How well did the card work?
Does it work at full speed?
Ya, its good to see another Powerbase owner.
Right now, I think only the firewire 'works' on it. As for as that, I don't have anything to truly test it with, but I've heard that it is 200Mbps.
Any Idea where I can get my hands on one of these? I have tried other firewire cards in my powerbase and have not been able to get them to work
I know this thread is ancient, but maybe someone will find this info useful or interesting: I got hold of one of these cards shortly before OWC sold out of them in '06. I have installed it in a case-hacked beige G3 motherboard. I noticed that the 50+ pin header on the card is identical to the pin header on the "wings" A/V personality card. In '07, I was lucky enough to find a rainbow-colored ribbon cable on ebay which matches these headers. The cable was reputedly NOS from some apple warehouse or something. I am certain that this cable was intended for this exact purpose. Anyway, I have tried both cards out under 9.2.2 with the cable connecting them, and the system recognizes both the firewire ports and the video in ports via the A/V setting in the control strip (IIRC). ASP also seems to be accurate and comfortable with the card. It has been many months since I ran this setup, and that machine is in storage right now. I didn't get a chance to test the card's functionality before putting it in storage, as I didn't own any firewire devices or BNC (video in) video hardware, but I plan on doing so soon. I can post/send pics of the cards and cable if anyone has a use for them. I will post again when I have a chance to test the card further. I hope someone finds this post worthwhile.
Double-posted. Sorry.
Very cool find! I just yesterday sold my only beige G3 (with a Wings card in it) - rats!
That said, I think the real test for this card is using it with an actual Firewire peripheral like a HD, to see if it actually works. Let us know if you get your rig out of storage to test it that way.
It's nice to see someone that actually managed to find a cable for the DAV port on these cards. This is the only thing that I've ever seen that actually had that port.
I remember trying a iBot firewire camera with it one time. I'm pretty sure it saw it connected but it didn't work. I think the iBot was Firewire 400 while this card was only 200.
Exceedingly worthwhile! Thanks for the information. Please do post whatever further information and pictures you might have.
If you have a multimeter and the patience, a pinout of the cable would be extremely helpful - unless it's just a straight through pin to pin match with no crossovers in the wiring, in which case there's no need.
Thanks once again!