Orange Micro Inc. on Wednesday announced its OrangeLink FireWire 800 for Notebooks, a FireWire 800 interface aimed at Cardbus-equipped portables like the PowerBook.
FireWire 800 was introduced in January with the release of the PowerBook 17-inch model. The external peripheral interface has twice the available bandwidth of its predecessor — up to 800 Mbps.
Right now the PowerBook 17-inch model is still the only laptop in Apple’s line to include FireWire 800 natively. And while adoption is still in its early stages, FireWire 800 is appealing for video professionals, designers working with detailed images and scans and anyone else looking to transfer large files quickly.
The OrangeLink FireWire 800 for Notebooks provides a solution — it plugs into the Cardbus expansion slot on the side of PowerBooks, and works with Mac OS X v10.2.4 or higher (a driver is included to work with PC laptops equipped with various flavors of Windows, as well).
The OrangeLink FireWire 800 for Notebooks card, which will retail for US$89 when it’s released at the end of September, features two 9-pin FireWire 800 ports. An external power supply is also available for purchase for users who need to provide full bus power to peripherals.