hi.

this way you can start with USB2.0 now, then when Firewire becomes really common and/or Firewire PC Cards start being available you then upgrade the interface to Firewire, but keep the disk(s) and the data intact.

I don't know about the addonics system, but with all the external drives I used so far, Windows (ranging from 98 over ME to 2k and finally XP) all handled external harddrives that are connected using FireWire different than those connected via USB, effectively removing that data integrity. Linux on the other hand didn't have any trouble at all accessing a disc via FireWire that was formated via USB connection. Basically, Windows handles USB discs like floppies (no partitions) while FireWire discs are handled in the same way as SCSI or internal discs (with partitions). Linux could access both devices in both ways (USB with/without partitions as well as FireWire with/without partitions).

MacOS9 didn't have trouble to use them in consistently either, don't know about MacOS X though (never tried that).

cu,
sven