[joeboyle]

Hi All,
Just purchased a Canon ZR 60 minidv camcorder for my son. I will need a firewire cable but can't seem to confim which one. Does anyone know if I need the six pin to four pin cable?
Thanks,
jb

[Daft&Dewey-eyed]

Every MiniDV camera of which I'm aware uses only a 4 pin FireWire plug. This can easily be verified by looking at the plug on your camera.
A 4 pin to 6 pin cable is standard for hooking a Mac to a DV camera, and you may have gotten such a cable with your Mac, since Apple has been including them with most FireWire Macs since FireWire became a standard feature.
The extra 2 pins in a 6 pin FireWire connection are used for transmitting power. MiniDV cameras have limited space and are not interested in receiving power from the computer, so they only use the 4 pin configuration.

[d00d]

In reply to:

---

A 4 pin to 6 pin cable is standard for hooking a Mac to a DV camera, and you may have gotten such a cable with your Mac, since Apple has been including them with most FireWire Macs since FireWire became a standard feature.

---

I'm not sure this is true. My Powerbook G3 didn't come with one (it has firewire built-in), my brother's flat panel iMac didn't come with one, my Powermac MDD didn't come with one, and neither did my girlfriend's eMac. I haven't encountered a Mac that came with one.

[rockinphotog]

I have an Apple branded 4-6pin FW cable that must have come with my 500MHz DP G4 since it looks kind of old, and there is no other reason why I would have it.

[Daft&Dewey-eyed]

Every new desktop Mac I've installed since the iMac DV up to a 2 Ghz G5 has had a 4 to 6 pin FireWire cable included in the box. However, I have seen only a very small portion of the computers Apple has shipped in the past five years, so can speak only to my experience. Hence the qualifying word "may".

[d00d]

Yes, I understand your use of "may" but I also wanted to communicate the idea that maybe most Macs don't come with one, so he shouldn't be surprised if he doesn't discover one.