IanG. Yes, it is an expensive mystery for me. I'm using one firewire card for
the camcorder, and the other card for a Maxell ieee external hard drive. I'm doing this only because I read somewhere that doing this was a good idea. At least that's how I interpreted what I read..."piggybacking", the article said , could cause problems. Also, I was in the midst of having a lack of communication between my camcorder and PC when I read this. So I installed another card giving each device it's own card and I got back the ieee communication...even if only by coincidence. I removed the default (I-Link)card from my Sony R-545DS and I think I'll take it out again. The firewire connection on it is sloppy/loose. I have a 3rd card here I'm going to replace it with, (I think it came with a Pinnacle DV editing package). It appears to have
an impressive array of components on the circuit board, but more important, I recall that it was heavier and sturdy with two ports in the back, and one internal port. Then I think a "monster' ieee cable will be in order. Not much I can do except trial and error. There's no way I'm going to plug the Canon GL-2 into this computer again, untill I am confident with some sort of changes having been made. I might even just get a 2-way anaolg-to-digital converter. Maybe the Bescor ADVC-110. This situation really stinks,...esp. after 3-4 years of it. I checked the outdoor house ground and made sure my PC station is well grounded. I guess so far the feedback on this dilemma seems to be saying "bad connection", "bad cable". If there was a BMW cable to beat all cables and a super-high-performance lifetime IEEE card (The Firewire Cardinator) I'd order them right now. Thanks for your input.

Maybe the issue here is a question about ground-connections and similiar things, as you suggest yourself - i.e. myself I used to damage my printers, displays and other equipment before I got an electrician to do the following: 1)Made sure, that the power supply in our house had a good ground connection 2)changed all wall-outlets to the type with ground connection 3)changed the power plugs of my equipment, that did not have proper groundconnection to a type with (have seen several with 3 legs, but the groundleg was not connected!) 4) helped me to check that ALL my PC equipment was connected to ONE power phase only - after this operation the spook with burnt inputs etc. stopped at once.
Beside all this, it is a good idea to avoid carpets etc. that give high-voltage static electricity in the areas where one works with any connection/disconnection of peripheral equipment - especially on frosty days where the static voltage from simple movements can rise to many kilovolts and zap any circuit boards.

There are failure modes that can be catastropic to equipment connected to firewire ports. A friend with whom I collaborate on projects and I found this out the hard way, having two external drives and one Canon camera "zapped" by a faulty firewire port on a very new computer. At first, it was not obvious that it was his computer, because these were new devices and were connected to a couple of different computers in different configurations before the failures occurred.

After connecting the dots, I did a search on the net and found a couple of places where this is documented. Seems to be a larger problem with Macs, but the same thing does happen in the PC world, also.

Here's a link for anyone interested in learning more about this.

ritsmer. This is an old house and my wife, before I came along, had some upgrades installed in plumbing and electric incl. converting outlets to 3-prong w/ ground. Still, I feel there's a ground or static thing happening here. I went into another chat forum called "camcorders.com" and found other individuals experiencing my problem. One conclusion was the 4-pin to 6-pin cable issue. The thought being that camcorders are equiped with the 4-pin IEEE interface , as they do not need to draw power fron the PC, where some items depend on a cable with both ends as a 6-pin plug. If the 6-pin plug has two additional pins that are hot, then maybe it's likely that "slipping-and-sliding' while connecting could send a charge(created at the 6-pin plug) up the cord to the camera. My Sony vaio PC came with a 4-pin I-link input at the front of the tower for the camera. When I bought my 1st digital cam. I ordered a 4-pin to 4-pin cable. My 'popping ieee' issue only began once I installed an additional ieee card and started using the 4-pin to 6-pin cable that came with the (Pinnacle) card. Alot of food for thought here. The camcorders.com site is very educational. I'm still considering using analog-to-digital converter once my GL-2 gets back. Thanks for your input. Checking the house ground has been on my mind - might have to have that done.

cbrillow. I checked and printed the "ieee blow-out" info. on that Mac link. I found it to be very helpfull, thank you. The idea of using a 'hub' backs up my thoughts of buying an analog-to-digital converter with the same idea..."the converter would be less expensive to replace"...(and my $690.00 repaired ieee on the GL-2 could keep it's dust cover on). Without going too far off the track, in looking at and pricing analog to digital converters, I see quite a range in price, though the more expensive two-way coverters have quality correction that seems hard to resist. So, my thoughts on this are.."if I'm going to start using an AV-to-DV converter as a fuse,... I'll skip any bells/whistles in the interest of preserving function and lower replacement costs. Thanks for the feedback.

I don't understand why an A/D converter would be preferable to a hub. Hubs are cheaper and everything's digital - what am I missing?

Ian G.

IanG. I am not familiar with the hub. Is it basically an extension cord for ieee?
Does it have a fuse or a reset of some sort in case of a short? That might be just the ticket! Perhaps you have a link that you could share describing the 'hub' if you, after reading below, still think I could benefit from it? I use one ieee card for my external hard drive, and the other(PC default Sony card) for my camcorder. Doing so at the time of an immediate ieee communication issue got me back to my editing (though it was most likely a lucky co-incidence).This "2-carding", I believe, developed from my misreading an article suggesting that "daisy chaining" on one Firewire port was not a good idea. I took it to mean "more than one device per card". None-the-less, I had the slot to spare. As for why I plan to purchase an AV/DV converter... aside from my two digital cameras, I have an old Panasonic AG-456 and other analog sources that I would like to play around with in editing. With the converter I would acquire a few new freedoms in that area. The main point to all this being that so far, I feel that the AV-DV adapter solution is my safest option for never again damaging another camcorder ieee interface...since I will instead be using the analog connections on my camcorders. But is a 'hub' would take any static shock damage, or whatever is happening here, I'd sure like to know more. Thank you for your input, your interest, and your time.

A hub's basicaly just a device for allowing you to connect multiple devices to a single port on your PC without daisy-chaining. Whether it's any safer than connecting those devices to multiple ports on a single card I honestly don't know! The main selling point seems to be that you can plug things in without interrupting the other devices, which might imply some level of protection - I've seen a couple of ads mentioning over voltage protection, so that sounds hopeful!

I found a couple of articles which might be helpful:-
http://www.pcbuyersguide.com/hardware/storage/firewire_failures.html
http://www.a-no-ne.com/music/mh/fried_fw/

Good luck!

Ian G.

IanG. I have'nt yet purchased an AVDC converter. My camcorder was delivered to me today from Canon service. It's great to have it back!. I'll be sure to invest some time online checking out the possibility of a hub as a solution to the ieee blowouts. Especially since you think you may have seen a mention of voltage protection. The 3rd and last time the ieee interface on my Sony Digital-8 blew, is when I decided to skip a third $269.00 Sony service repair and instead put the money into the GL-2. A converter might be just the ticket for putting my Sony dig.-8 back to work, and I'd like to film and edit using a Panasonic AG-456 I bought last summer on ebay, maybe even add a vcr to this work area (if I can find room). But I won't spend a dime untill I do some homework on IEEE Hubs. I'll ad a new topic on "Solution to ieee blowouts" when I get set up in a week or two.Thanks again for your input. Everyone has been great in this forum.