The U on iTunes - Terms
FireWire (IEEE 1394)
FireWire is Apple Inc.'s brand name
for the IEEE 1394 interface. Almost all modern digital camcorders have
included this connection since 1995. Many computers intended for home
or professional audio/video use have built-in FireWire ports including
all Apple, Dell (except the Inspiron 1501, Dimension 8300 series, and
Latitude 131L) and Sony laptop computers currently produced.
The system is commonly used for connection of data storage devices
and DV (digital video) cameras, but is also popular in industrial
systems for machine vision and professional audio systems. It is
used instead of the more common USB due to its faster effective speed,
higher power-distribution capabilities, and because it does not need
a computer host. Perhaps more importantly, FireWire makes full use of
all SCSI capabilities and, compared to USB 2.0 Hi-Speed, has higher
sustained data transfer rates, especially on Apple Mac OS X, with more
varied results on Windows presumably since USB2 is Intel's answer to
Firewire on Windows machines, a feature especially important for audio
and video editors.
FireWire is an easy way of transfering your file to the computer and to
the iTunes U website.
