High-Speed Products Target IEEE 1394 Firewire Applications

April 3, 2000

Three new devices—a PCI card for desktops, a PCMCIA CardBus card, and a 20-Gbyte external drive—have been designed for the emerging high-speed IEEE 1394 Firewire interface. As part of Evergreen Technologies' fireLINE family of Firewire...

Roger Allan

"Evergreen's fireLINE product family will offer technology on two levels, and at extremely affordable prices," explains Mike Magee, president and CEO of Evergreen Technologies. "First, we're offering the 1394 connection—or port—for the many existing desktop and portable PCs without that port. Then, once consumers have the 1394 connection to take advantage of high-speed 1394 devices, Evergreen plans to offer a full line of high-performance 1394 devices, including external hard-disk drives, CD-RW drives (known as CD burners), and hard-disk Raid arrays."

Priced at $99 and $149 respectively, the PCI Card and the PCMCIA (CardBus) Card provide high-speed data communication between desktop and portable PCs, as well as up to 63 different computer peripherals and consumer electronic devices at a time. Devices that operate with the 1394 interface may include digital camcorders, CD-RWs, scanners, etc.

The fireLINE connector cards allow consumers to transfer dense data, such as graphics files, large database files, spreadsheets, audio, and digital video, to their PCs with unparalleled speed. Digital video editing is one natural application for 1394 connections.

Both of the fireLINE connector cards support Windows 98 and later operating systems. They also have hot-swapping and plug-and-play capabilities. The fireLINE PCI Card for desktops is equipped with one internal and three external IEEE 1394 connectors. It merely requires a standard available PCI slot in the desktop for installation. The PCMCIA Card for portables has two external IEEE 1394 connectors, and it only needs a type III-compliant PCMCIA slot and above (CardBus) for installation.

Evergreen Technologies Inc., 808 N.W. Buchanan Ave, Corvallis, OR 97330-6218; (541) 757-0934; www.evergreennow.com.

About the Author

Roger Allan

Roger Allan is an electronics journalism veteran, and served as Electronic Design's Executive Editor for 15 of those years. He has covered just about every technology beat from semiconductors, components, packaging and power devices, to communications, test and measurement, automotive electronics, robotics, medical electronics, military electronics, robotics, and industrial electronics. His specialties include MEMS and nanoelectronics technologies. He is a contributor to the McGraw Hill Annual Encyclopedia of Science and Technology. He is also a Life Senior Member of the IEEE and holds a BSEE from New York University's School of Engineering and Science. Roger has worked for major electronics magazines besides Electronic Design, including the IEEE Spectrum, Electronics, EDN, Electronic Products, and the British New Scientist. He also has working experience in the electronics industry as a design engineer in filters, power supplies and control systems.

After his retirement from Electronic Design Magazine, He has been extensively contributing articles for Penton’s Electronic Design, Power Electronics Technology, Energy Efficiency and Technology (EE&T) and Microwaves RF Magazine, covering all of the aforementioned electronics segments as well as energy efficiency, harvesting and related technologies. He has also contributed articles to other electronics technology magazines worldwide.

He is a “jack of all trades and a master in leading-edge technologies” like MEMS, nanolectronics, autonomous vehicles, artificial intelligence, military electronics, biometrics, implantable medical devices, and energy harvesting and related technologies.