Laptop firewire conection DMK camera

[glowjet]

I am sure this may have been asked before, I have a Dell laptop which has the small 4 pin 1394 firewire ilink port, I need to connect to the 6pin in the DMK camera body, without breaking the bank, is there a reasonably priced way of achieving this, Imaging Source do a Y cable and separate power hub, but by the time you are finished it is quite expensive, I gather the problem is the power feed to the camera.

thanks for any input, John.

[Paxo]

There are lots of different combinations of cable ends available:

Wired--up FireWire Cable 6 Pin to 4 Pin 1.8m IEEE 1394 DV Lead - Black: Amazon.co.uk: Computers & Accessories

Steve

[Stephen]

Cardbus/PCMIA adaptor with 2x 6pin FW ports are about £15 on eBay?

[glowjet]

Thanks guys but finding a firewire cable 6pin to 4pin IEEE 1394 there is no problem, the DMK has a 6pin firewire input which provides power to the camera from computers with a 6pin firewire output, my Dell has only the small 4pin firewire output, someone must have come across this in the past, it is a question of providing a power source into the cable system, the basic 4 pin provides for camera signal/control, but not power. Imaging Source do one but it is only 2M and costs £35, and there will, no doubt, be other costs

involved.

John.

[Stephen]

As I said, PCMIA card with a 6 pin firewire port

[Merlin66]

I started with a 4 pin to 6 pin (plus external 12V power) for my DMK - worked well for a while then the small 4 pin socket on the laptop fell to bits!

I ended up with a PCMCIA card which has two 6 pin firewire connects and a small 12V DC socket. Again this worked 100% until I had to replace the aging ACER.

The newer DELL only takes the smaller Xpress type cards...but managed to find one and now that works 100%.

The 6pin -12V Y cable is expensive, but does work....my experience shows that the small 4pin socket is the weak link and if your laptop can take a PCMCIA or Xpress card - this is a much better way to go.

HTH

[glowjet]

Thanks guys, sorry my computer knowledge is a bit limited ( age you know ) but I am learning, penny has just dropped with regard to the PCMCIA card, my Dell is a couple of years old so I will drop along to PC World to see what they can provide, or for that matter we have Maplin nearby, so I will try there as well, once I know what will fit, I will have a look at eBay, I take the point about the small 4 pin socket being the weakest link.

John.