iMac will not recognize ext. HD w/Firewire 800

Clarification request: Do the drives work

In Reply to: iMac will not recognize ext. HD w/Firewire 800 by k-fish

Do the drives work without issue on another system? Two drives failing in the same way at more or less the same time is unlikely, but possible, especially if they're externals that tend to live near one another.

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iMac will not recognize ext. HD w/Firewire 800

by k-fish - 9/27/11 7:50 AM

In Reply to: Do the drives work by Jimmy Greystone

Hallo,
thank you for your reply.
Both drives have been working flawlessly on an Mac Book Pro. Today they worked fine on my iMac too.
I have no idea what ever happened to the FW 800 port.
I will try again.
regards,
Uli

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So if they both work

by Jimmy Greystone - 9/27/11 6:15 PM

In Reply to: iMac will not recognize ext. HD w/Firewire 800 by k-fish

So if they both work on another unit, that tends to point the finger pretty squarely at your iMac. And honestly, the Mid-2007 (there was no late 2007) iMacs were kind of a turd. The whole year 2007 just wasn't Apple's best quality wise. Nothing you're going to do about that now, but it sounds to me like the FW port is going out, and that means a new logic board, and that means it's probably more than you want to spend on the thing. You'd probably be looking at around $400-$500 for the part alone.

The cheap stopgap fix here is to get a FW800 to FW400 cable from Monoprice, and limp along like that until you're ready to replace your iMac with a new one or the FW400 port gives out. I forget if the Mid-07 had 2xFW400... Maybe only the 24" models. In any case, if you're willing to live with some reduced performance, you can probably limp along for at least another year or two.