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Comment by traceroute66 | Hacker News Reader

> Also dropped support for FireWire drives, as I just found out the hard way.

Erm... it was dropped in macOS 26 back in 2025 ?

https://www.techspot.com/news/108394-usb-killer-dead-apple-d...

And even that was 13 or 14 years after Apple shipped their last computer with a Firewire port - long enough that those computers weren't even supported by macOS 26. Apple dropping support for a largely obsolete technology, which they hadn't used for well over a decade, should hardly come as a great shock.

It is actually shocking to no longer be able to access my data with literally no warning.

As in, not even a dialog saying "hey this drive isn't support anymore"... just... nothing.

What exactly is Apple gaining by dropping a (presumably) super stable driver??

Nice that you can dismiss this as "largely obsolete technology" tho.

I'd be annoyed. This stuff is usually not a big deal by itself but becomes death by a thousand cuts. Every OS update breaks something.

Apple's Thunderbolt FireWire 800 adapter daisy-chained with their TB2-to-TB3 adapter should work on any modern system with Thunderbolt and FireWire support, as it just presents as a bog-standard PCI FireWire card.

So worst-case, you should be able to access your old drives on a modern Mac by booting from a FireWire-compatible OS (Asahi or older macOS) on an external drive.

You used to be able to chain three adapters:

Thunderbolt 3 to Thunderbolt 2 Thunderbolt 2 to FireWire 800 FireWire 800 to FireWire 400

to plug a modern Mac into an iMac G4 in Target Disk Mode

Now you need to add another layer: virtualizing old macOS on a modern Mac

But you can still use the original 2005 iMac G5 remote with a new Apple TV

Is it specifically supported, or does it only "work" inasmuch as the Apple TV can be programmed to respond to most IR remotes?

It works out of the box, you don't need to make the Apple TV learn it

I had one plugged into the FW800 port of my Cinema Display.

Only really used it as a scratch drive for junk but it was still handy.

Yes, thanks for the correction. I skipped 26 but could no longer hold out :)

Ah yes 2025, the ancient times.

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