Using the same inline signal boosting principle as our
USB booster cables, this IEEE-1394 extension cable has a built in repeater
box on the female end to clean and amplify the received signal. The electronic
hardware is powered by the bus and transparent to the devices.
We tested these units thoroughly in-house, specifically testing throughput between
two computers on a 1394 network. With only one of these active boosters in the run,
we were able to break 50 feet at full speed. With two of them, we were over 100 feet
of firewire with no loss. Of course, these are designed to extend only another
5 meters after the booster, and individual results may vary.
These new cables are now in stock and ready to ship. For more information, see
the active FireWire booster cable product page.
The IEEE-1394 (also known as Firewire or i.Link) is a high-bandwidth plug-and-play
interface that is commonly used in data-heavy situations like digital video,
intranet, and external storage. While the 400 Mbps spec of Firewire is less than
USB 2.0's 480 Mbps, real-world applications consistently prove Firewire to be
far superior.
