FireWire

FireWire

FireWire is a high-speed data transfer technology developed by Apple in the late 1980s and standardized as IEEE 1394. It was designed to provide fast, reliable connections for transferring large amounts of data between devices, making it especially popular for digital video cameras, external hard drives, and professional audio equipment during the late 1990s and early 2000s.

FireWire offered several advantages over other connection types of its time, such as USB 1.1. It supported much higher transfer speeds (initially 400 Mbps with FireWire 400, later 800 Mbps with FireWire 800) and allowed peer-to-peer communication, meaning devices could transfer data directly without going through a computer. This made it a favorite among video editors and creative professionals working with large multimedia files.

The technology also supported daisy-chaining, allowing multiple devices to be connected in series without the need for a hub.

However, FireWire eventually lost popularity due to the rise of USB 2.0 and later USB 3.0, which offered comparable or faster speeds at a lower cost. Today, FireWire ports are rarely found on modern devices, but they remain important for accessing data from older professional equipment.