Firewire bus: suddenly insufficient power?

[space-time]

Firewire bus: suddenly insufficient power?

I have a machine which uses 5 FireWire cameras, one is FW800 and 4 are FW400. They are connected to 2 separate boars inside a PC. The machine has been running fine for a year, and now I have trouble. The camera do not work properly and the vendor did some remote troubleshooting and claims there is not enough power for all cameras and he will send me a FireWire hub. I wonder if this can suddenly happen; how come there was enough power for all cameras until now and now there is this issue? An identical machine is still running fine (knock on wooden desk)

The issue is that it takes 2-3 days for the hub to get here, and I would rather order one from Amazon and have it here tomorrow morning or maybe pick up one at Staples during lunch. Each hour the machine is idle we lose $$$$ (yes, 4 digits) and now we run longer shifts and evening on a second machine to catch up. I

I am somewhat skeptical that the hub will solve the issue… if I managed to get a hub today or tomorrow and I can test it, and if I still have issues, I can escalate the problem and get the tech and software guys to come here and fix the damn machine.

Can anyone recommend a good powered hub? As discussed recently Amazon search engine sucks, it shows me USB hubs

http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?u...lias%3Daps&field-keywords=firewire+active+hub

[Gareth]

A good powered hub, sure, but it isn't cheap, $165. http://www.amazon.com/NitroAV-8-Port-Fir..._1?ie=UTF8&qid=1358265409&sr=8-1&keywords=nitroav

[JoeH]

Power supply in the PC going bad? Or did an auxiliary power connection in the PC get unplugged, the Firewire cards can't draw enough power from the PCI bus by itself to provide full rated power for most cards.

[cbelt3]

It's quite possible that you were at the limit of the setup at the start, and something is now drawing more power. When a circuit starts to draw more power, follow the classic tree:

Check connectors.
Check cables.
Clean contacts.
Isolate the problem camera if possible.

[space-time]

thanks, told them to order one and I'll install it tomorrow mirning when it comes

[Chakravartin]

Computer power supplies become less efficient over time as capacitors dry up.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capacitor#...nstability

A year is pushing it, but with that many devices drawing power, it could prematurely age the thing from heat.

[space-time]

Thanks Doc, that makes some sense now, although I hope they used a larger power supply than the minimum required to run the system.

The other machine is 2 year old and still runs fine. Maybe they used a larger power supply. The machines are identical as far as I am concerned, but the PeeCees are probably slightly different.