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Your statement about the 3 times speed being only theoretical, but quicker is quicker. I have a fewHDD enclosures all with either USB 2.0, Firewire, SATA or eSATA, and without a doubt the USB and Firewire are close, but the eSATA knocks them in the dirt. Not sure why you are making some claim the hard drive can only read/write so fast.

Whatever the interface of the hard drive, you are still left with that drive's maximum capability to read and write. Refreshing my memory of reviews, the same manufacturer's eSATA version only wrote about 20% faster than their Firewire *400* version. Looking at a newer Tom's Hardware review, I see that the eSATA had a write burst slightly faster than the Firewire 800, but the average and slowest writing was pretty bad in comparison. And the read was far slower than the Firewire 800 drives.

Not looking too good for eSATA. It looks like both the eSATA and Firewire 800 standards are capable of more bandwidth than most single drives can use anyway. IOW, no advantage for eSATA with one drive, and some disadvantages.

As far as a port multiplier I am sure you are meaning an eSATA controller card. I have one with 4 ports and for now that's all I will need.

Good. And when I get a Firewire scanner I'll just plug it to the back of the Firewire hard drive. Same with more hard drives, a printer, etc. And I didn't have to put a card in a computer, or get mad because my onboard eSATA is complete crap (as it is in many boards).

Hey how about specifics in that test where eSATA was only 20% faster than Firewire 400? This sounds like something you can't back up, and there might be some insignificant stat where it might only be 20% faster.

Heck I read a review from a Mac site that confirmed eSATA trumped Firewire 800 handily, but the idiot used different drives on all 4 different interfaces, which doesn't make for a valid comparison.

I read a few users comments and most seem to sheepishly acknowledge but they all seem like yourself in that they don't want to admit there is something superior to Firewire. Part of their reulctance, is Mac don't come native with eSATA and they like to point out the con it doesn't power the device like USB or Firewire does.

The last thing and probably the big reason is the paradoxical reason they don't like the move towards eSATA is the price. I think the review was a year old but (and I havent priced it myself, just going by some Mac users review) but they mentioned it cost close to $200 for the eSATA port added on to the airport? express interface or whatever that is. The paradoxical thing is Mac users don't have a problem getting ripped off paying more for most every other piece of software/peripheral over a PC counterpart, but for eSATA they can't budge.

ps. BTW I know the eSATA controller cards cost slightly less than that. How does $50 strike you? Hahahaha.