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QUESTION: As an owner of an older Macintosh, I have been putting off the inevitable decision to buy a new model for as long as I can. But after seeing the new G4 Cube model from Apple, I've decided to take the plunge. I understand my need to abandon the old serial and ADB interfaces for Apple's newer USB and FireWire standards. And although I know there are converters available, I would like to know your thoughts about abandoning my older peripherals for new ones that come equipped to handle the newer standards. Also, what about my old SCSI external hard drive? Is there an adaptor for SCSI to FireWire?

ANSWER: One of the more commonly asked questions is the one asking when is it time to move to a newer computer. But just as important is the question that asks when is it time to upgrade all those items that connect to it. If you have had your computer for a long time, chances are you have a rather large investment in all those peripherals. And if some of them are hard drives, your investment in the time it took to create the data they contain can be just as, if not more important.

About two years ago Apple first abandoned their serial and ADB connections for USB and FireWire with the appearance of the first iMac. In that time, third party developers have come up with solutions that allow the connection of legacy devices to the new standards.

There are two issues to consider regarding the purchase of an adaptor or buying a new peripheral. The first is cost in that your older device probably cost a lot more than a comparable new one goes for today. The second is ability. It's more than likely that the newer device far outperforms your older model. For example, you probably paid $500 or more for a color flatbed scanner only a few years ago. That scanner's resolution, speed and color accuracy is inferior to current models costing about $150 or less. And that doesn't even consider the superior technology packed into the new scanner's included software. Plus factor in the time spent along with the frustration you'll experience trying to get the older model to work on the newer computer with it's latest operating system and I think you'll agree that it's best to make your plunge a complete one. It just seems like the older hardware and software will always come back to haunt you.

One other item to vanish on Apple's new G4 Cube that you might not be aware of is the Small Computer System Interface or SCSI. And since the Cube has no PCI slots (another item to vanish with the Cube), you can't buy one of the available cards that adds SCSI to Apple's other Mac models. Fortunately, Orange Micro has just introduced their Orange Converter that converts SCSI devices to FireWire and does so without the need for a PCI slot. The Orange Converter sports a 25 pin SCSI connector along with a 6 foot FireWire cable and power supply. The Orange Converter is limited to a single SCSI device so if you have more than one SCSI peripheral, Orange Micro suggests that after connecting the Orange Converter to the SCSI device, you can easily hot swap it to the FireWire port on the Mac. However, in light of my suggestion that you ditch the older peripherals, and that it's more than likely your aging external SCSI hard drive is in the mere megabyte capacity range , I see the Orange Converter as a perfect solution on how to offload all your data from the old SCSI hard drive to your G4 Cube's internal 20, 30 or 40 gigabyte hard drive.

The Orange Converter sells for $99 and works on Macintosh as well as PC computers.

Orange Micro, Inc.
www.orangemicro.com
(714) 779-2772