USB / FireWire PCI combo card for a Power Mac 6400 ?

ClassicHasClass

Tinkerer
Aug 30, 2022
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www.floodgap.com
ISTR (perhaps trag can elucidate) that there is some issue with cards with PCI-PCI bridges and the 6400/6500. That said, my TAM had a Sonnet combo USB-FW card in it and the TAM is basically a 6500, so I can recommend one of those.
 

joevt

Tinkerer
Mar 5, 2023
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ISTR (perhaps trag can elucidate) that there is some issue with cards with PCI-PCI bridges and the 6400/6500. That said, my TAM had a Sonnet combo USB-FW card in it and the TAM is basically a 6500, so I can recommend one of those.
There exits Sonnet specific nvramrc patches for Sonnet card PCI-PCI Bridge problems that you can download.
A nvramrc patch for general PCI-PCI bridges in Gazelle (6500, TAM) based Power Macs is discussed at #232
I don't know if Alchemy (6400) has the same problem. If it does then a similar patch could be created to handle that.
 

trag

Tinkerer
Oct 25, 2021
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I was away for a while. The 6400/6500 actually isn't my specialty. The above referenced thread is probably the best reference.

I did extensive testing of PCI-PCI Bridges in the Umax S900 clone and can talk about the problems and exceptions at length, but that's not very helpful to someone with a 6400 or 6500.
 

François

Tinkerer
Aug 9, 2022
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France
Bought a Sonnet Tango 2.0 : it was not cheap, but it was new! Nice purple card, works great!

Previously tried an Adaptec DuoConnect AUA-3020, but it was only half working (the FireWire half). And prior to that I had bought (real cheap) a Belkin F5U508, but with a VIA chipset there was no way it would work! (narrator: it didn’t work at all)

So, the Sonnet Tango 2.0 is the way to go for an hassle free USB & FireWire upgrade for the 6400!
 

S. Pupp

New Tinkerer
Apr 2, 2023
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The Sonnet Tango is the only Firewire/USB card I used that didn’t cause data corruption with Firewire hard drives. An early NEC chip based Orange Micro card for Mac was terrible in that regard, as was a generic card from CompUSA. PM8600.