Cables To Go’s FireWire cables are built well, and constructed for daily wear and tear. The company sells FireWire cables in a wide variety of types and lengths that are great for connecting a computer to external hard drives, disc burners, tape-based video cameras and more. However, the company's help and support options are somewhat limited. As a result, the FireWire interface cable from Cables To Go earns our TopTenREVIEWS Gold Award and lands in first place on our lineup.
Cables To Go sells a FireWire 800 cable – also known by its technical name, IEEE 1394b – that features 9-pin connectors; it can reach and maintain speeds of 800Mbps (megabits per second), or 98MBps (megabytes per second), which is the highlight of this type of cable. FireWire is one of the fastest connections available, with the exception of the new Thunderbolt technology from Intel and Apple, which is also available for Windows PCs.
Apple originally developed FireWire connectivity and sold it in its higher-end Power Macs in the late 1990s before adding the technology to most of its other devices, including the first iPod. FireWire can be found on most Apple computers and Windows PCs. Sony calls this connectivity option i.LINK.
These FireWire 800 cables are great for backing up the files on your computer or for transferring large files to an external hard drive with a FireWire port. Both consumer and professional video editors will benefit from the transfer speeds between their computers and external hard drives that these FireWire 800 cables are capable of maintaining. FireWire cables are the recommended method for putting footage onto a hard drive from either a camera or a computer.
The Cables To Go FireWire cables are also ideal for connecting to an external optical disc burner to quickly burn CDs or DVDs. External Blu-ray Disc burners connect via USB 2.0, however, not with FireWire.
The Cables To Go FireWire 800 cable features a gold-plated connector that won’t corrode. However, silver tends to be a better conductor than gold. This cable’s connector will last longer than similar models that don’t feature gold-plated connectors.
This FireWire cable is well constructed and is able to hold up nicely against wear and tear from daily use, but it's flexible enough to wrap up easily for travel or storage. These cables are also protected against potential sources of interference with triple shielding via a tinned copper braid and foil. Types of signal interference include radio frequencies (RF) and electromagnetic (EM) interference, both of which can slow down or stop the signal flow in a FireWire 800 cable.
Copper is an excellent conductor, which is why so many different types of wire and cables use copper in their construction, including FireWire cables. Copper helps keep the signal flow moving, which is part of the reason why FireWire is one of the fastest cables available and is consistent with its speed.
FireWire cables are mostly available in black, silver or dark gray, which can cause confusion if you have many similarly colored cables connected to your computer. These can include FireWire 800 and FireWire 400, USB, Ethernet and even HDMI cables. A great way to organize your cables is to use adhesive labels. We also recommend buying a short, 6-foot cable, unless you need something longer. This keeps clutter to a minimum. It’s also a good idea to wrap your cables. Otherwise, each cable looks like the others and you can’t tell the difference without checking the cables’ connectors.
While it still seems there will be future developments in FireWire technology to increase data-transfer speeds up to as much as 6.4Gbps (Gigabits per second), Intel’s new Thunderbolt technology, developed with Apple, was introduced in early 2011. It is already available on newer Apple computers and is starting to appear on Sony’s line of computers. Thunderbolt delivers constant transfer speeds of 10Gbps, and this I/O port can do double duty to connect both monitors and Thunderbolt hard drives or other peripheral devices.
With Thunderbolt technology beginning to show up on external hard drives and other devices, along with the disappearance of videotape and FireWire ports on video cameras, the future of FireWire is hazy. USB 2.0 and 3.0 are now more common and have many more uses than FireWire does. However, with the affordability of FireWire cards, cables and other accessories, and FireWire's fast, constant speed, it will be around for some time to come.
Cables To Go offers a wide selection of FireWire cable types. These cables are available in a number of lengths, including 3.2, 6.5, 8.8 and 14.75 feet. The cable types this company offers include FireWire 800 (9-pin), FireWire 400 (6-pin and 4-pin) and a mix of connector types, such as FireWire 800 to 400 (9-pin to 6-pin or 4-pin) and more. These mixed cable types feature male connectors and are called bilingual cables.
Cables To Go also sells a FireWire adapter (female to male), which is used to connect a FireWire 400 6-pin male cable to a 4-pin female I/O port. This is ideal if you only have a FireWire 400 6-pin-to-6-pin cable and you need to connect to a video camera, which usually has a single FireWire 400 4-pin female port. The adapter helps solve the problem, so you don’t need to buy an additional cable.
Cables To Go carries a 3-port FireWire 400 PCI card for desktop computers, as well as a special 2-port FireWire 400 PC controller card that you can use with a Windows or Apple laptop. The company also sells a 2-port FireWire 400 panel bracket. All of these cards and devices feature female I/O ports, and all are made for 6-pin connectors.
While there are several help and support options for many Cables To Go products, there aren’t many help options for or much information about FireWire cables specifically. The company’s website does feature a cable configurator, but it doesn’t have any solutions involving FireWire cables. Cables To Go's website also features a connector guide, glossary and knowledge base that discuss FireWire and other cable types and connector technologies, but all have limited information.
If you need technical support or have any other questions, you can contact Cables To Go by live chat, email or phone. You can also click on a link for returns in case you purchase a FireWire cable that doesn’t work properly.
We called Cables To Go with some questions regarding its FireWire cables, warranty and technical-support information. We were able to speak with both a sales representative and a tech-support agent fairly quickly, and they both answered all our questions.
Overall, the Cables To Go FireWire cables are built nicely and will bear up well during daily use, and the FireWire 800 cables are fast and perfect for backing up data quickly. These cables block out unwanted interference that can hinder your cable’s signal and data-transfer speed. This FireWire cable is excellent for connecting your computer to compatible external hard drives, tape-based video cameras, optical disc burners and more. The company’s help and support options are limited, but Cables To Go is definitely worth checking out when you’re in the market for FireWire cables.
