Firewire interface compatibility on Windows using a Thunderbolt adapter

[kaptainkeys]

I'm currently a Windows user and I will be likely upgrading my laptop in the near future.  While my current laptop doesn't have thunderbolt or firewire, limiting me to USB interfaces, I'm looking at getting a Windows laptop that has thunderbolt as my next computer.  One of the main studios that I work in (in my school) is running some older hardware: a 2013 27 inch iMac and a Tascam DM-4800 as the interface, using the firewire expansion card.  The Mac is connected to the Tascam using a thunderbolt 2 to firewire adapter giving us 24 mic pres and 32 channels in and out total.  I would love to be able to connect my computer directly to the Tascam, rather than have to record on the mac in the studio (it is quite lacking in terms of DSP power) and transfer the Pro Tools session to my own computer via a USB flash drive.  While I have no qualms with MacOS, I'm more comfortable on Windows and I would rather not pay Apple prices for a new computer, so I want to know if I can connect firewire interfaces to a windows computer via a thunderbolt to firewire adapter and expect it to work without too much issue.  Do any of you guys have experience with this?

[analogika]

The Thunderbolt-Firewire hardware side should be easily handled by an adapter. 

 

The question is whether drivers will support it. 

 

I'm only seeing drivers up to and including Windows 7, here: 

https://www.tascam.eu/en/downloads/archive/IF-FW%2FDM%2BMKII

[kaptainkeys]

Yeah that seems like it might be a bit of an issue.  Doesn't help either that the latest mac drivers are for el capitan either.  Thanks for the help.

[Anderton]

On 2/9/2023 at 4:35 PM, kaptainkeys said:

Yeah that seems like it might be a bit of an issue.  Doesn't help either that the latest mac drivers are for el capitan either.  Thanks for the help.

 

Windows drivers are iffy. I've always been surprised at how much Windows stuff I have that is backward-comaptible. I use Firewire and Thunderbolt devices with my Windows 10 machine. That's the good news.

 

The bad news is bonehead company decisions. For example, the Sonar's V-Studio can work with Windows 10, but Roland made the driver so that it recognized only Windows 7 (or maybe it was 8...whatever). Someone in the Sonar forums presented a hack to edit the driver to not care about the operating system, and it worked. Why did Roland not make that change, and offer it "as is" in their support section?

 

After upgrading Windows, my Matrox graphics card didn't work. The company said it was no longer compatible. In their support section, no driver was listed as being compatible. However...I downloaded a driver set for servers, and lo and behold, there was a driver in there that was compatible. It worked just fine. I think they just wanted me to buy a new graphics card.

 

People often complain about Apple having a monopoly over their world, but at least it's a known quantity, and the company doesn't claim otherwise because many customers see it as an advantage. What people forget is that regardless of how "open" Windows is, it's open only if the companies making products for it don't put up fences (and roll with whatever changes Microsoft throws at them).

 

The drivers for the IF-FW/DM MKII might work perfectly. They might not work at all. They might work only if you open the driver in a text editor and make changes. Who knows?