Orange-Micro Reviews

Reasons that this card only deserves one star:
1) The manual is only a small piece of paper with Mac instrution on one side and PC instructions on the other side. I think [amount]price should at least buy a piece of 8.5x11 letter paper.
2) No 1-800 tech support. I have to call long distance for some stupid questions.
3) This firewire card for notebook is not powered. So if your firewire device needs power, then by their great tech support guy, you have to buy a [amount] Orange Micro power supply cable, exclusively from their own website. Why don't they tell me this before?
4) This card couldn't connect Apple iPod to Thinkpad T23.

Hi. I own a Dell Inspiron 4000. It is a great notebook with an awesome screen (1400/1000 resolution). I also have a Sony Mini DV Camcorder. Since Dell does not use firewire on their laptops I was looking for a fast, affordable quick quick way to transfer my video to the laptop. I bought the Orange Micro PC card from the Dell Web site (and saved $30!). As soon as it came in I turned on my laptop and plugged the card in. Expecting I would need drivers I opened the CD that came with it. To my surprise no drivers where needed. Then I plugged in my firewire cable to the PC card and the Digital Camera. Immediately a "new hardware found" box came up and Windows asked what program I wanted to open to use the camera. I clicked on Windows Movie Maker and hit record. I started playing the video and it immediately came up on the screen. I pressed record and now I can save 20 hrs of video on 2gb! Amazing! Way to go Orange Micro! I am very impressed.

My desktop computer came with two 1394 (Firewire) ports and I use them to download video from my Sony camcorder. I just pruchased a Compaq notebook that came with Windows XP home edition to edit video, digital pictures and burn CD's while traveling in Asia. I pluged the card in and Windows XP recoginzed it right away. I pluged my camcorder in to the Orange Micro OrangeLink Firewire 1394 PC Card and it worked just like it was pluged into my desktop. No problems. I would recommend this card to anyone who's notebook does not come with internal 1394 (Firewire) support. Basic information about my notebook: Compaq, AMD Duron 1.1 Ghz, 256 Mg Ram, 20 Gig HD, WinXp Home Ed.