2 different size firewire ports????

Havent had a chance or the need to use it yet so this question is somewhat late...

I've built many pcs and a lot have had firewire ports either on the motherboard/ soundcard add on cards etc... the actual socket on all of these those has been the same size.....

My recently aquired laptop has firewire but the socket is a lot smaller????? why is this . are there different standards???

are there adpaters??

ANY info on this matter whould be appriciated.

thanks in advance

This could help:

http://www.ramelectronics.net/html/ieee1394_cables.html

Have you also seen the tiny USB connectors on things like Digital Cameras?

thanks.. and for anyone else :-

IEEE-1394 / Firewire / iLink / Lynx are all names describing various manufacturers name for cables belonging to the IEEE-1394 standard. IEEE-1394 is the new, extremely fast external serial bus standard that supports data transfer rates of up to 400 Mbps (400 million bits per second). It is used primarily for multimedia devices such as camcorders, computers, video cassete recorders (VCR's) and Digital audio recording workstations.
There are three types of cables used for 1394. The 6 conductor type has two seperately shielded twisted pairs for data and two power wires in an overall shielded cable with 6-pin connectors on either side. The 4 wire cable uses two seperately shielded data cables without power wires in an overall shielded cable with 4-pin connectors on either end. The third type of cable uses either type of actual cable, with a 6-pin connector on one side, and a 4-pin connector on the other side of the cable. Standard 1394/ilink/firewire cables use 28 AWG wire and are limited to 4.5 meters maximum cable length. Using 24 AWG wire cables can reach a length of up to 10 meters, but these cables usually are only available as a custom cable. Optical fiber cables can extend this maximum length still further to 700 meters. Speeds available are 98.304, 196.608 and 393.216Mbits/s, and soon with 1394B, up to 3.2Gbits/s. There are basically two different connectors used for IEEE-1394. There is the six position connector and the 4 position connector, which are sometimes called 6-pin and 4-pin respectively. To determine the proper cable, all that you need to know are what connector your camera (or other device) has, and what connector your computer, cable or other device has. The 4-pin connector is more common on digital video camcorders and other small external devices because of it's small size, while the 6-pin connector is more common on PC's, CDRW's, external hard drives, and Digital audio workstations due to it's durability and support for external power for 1394 peripherals. Please look at the connector pictures below. If the pictures are not clear, you can measure your connectors. The 6-pin 1394 cable connector is about 7/16"x1/4" while the 4-pin 1394 cable connector is about 1/4"x 1/8". The shapes are quite different as well. The 6-pin "firewire" cable connector is about a half inch long, by 3/16 wide rectangle with one of the small sides rounded, while the 4-pin "i.link" cable connector is a small 1/4 inch by 1/8 inch rectangle, with one of the longer sides "pushed in" or indented. Many new products are starting to support the 1394 standard, including the iMac, G3, G4, "Video editing" enabled PC's, various DV camcorders, CDRW's, external hard drives, and digital audio recording systems. Most PC's will still require a firewire/ilink add-on card for the PCI bus to support the standard, although some newer computers have them installed.
Do you want to learn more? Learn more about IEEE-1394 at the PC webopedia, or try the 1394 trade association for technical details.
New News!
The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers Standards Association (IEEE-SA) has approved IEEE Standard 1394b. Gigabit signaling, extended signaling distances (cable lengths) , a broader range of connection media, from CAT5 utp to glass and plastic optical fiber are some of the new changes. See the article in "Cabling Installation and Maintenance"

My new ASUS 7V8X motherbaords complete with an IEEE 1394 bracket containing two different firewire connectors according to the manual one is for devices needing internal power and the second not requiring it.