hard drives & backup...

[Marvin the android]

A most annoying situation I am having with my drives is requiring a bit of advice please.
I have a:
Mac Mini 2.5ghz
OS 10.8.3
LYNX Aurora 16 w/ LT-FW
Pro Tools 10.3.28
RAM 4gig
glyph GT050Q external drive
glyph Portagig 50 external drive (backup)

I bought the portagig 50 recently as a backup for the main glyph drive thinking how wonderful it would be to daisy chain them using their respective esata ports.. However i just found out u can only daisy chain these drives via their FW800 ports..AAARGGHHH!! annoying.

Now this is problematic because i need to use the only FW800 port on the mac mini for the Aurora. I have so far been running the GT050Q off the usb port with no issues.. (this is because i dont want to daisy chain the GT050Q & the Aurora as i've heard from Lynx it is not the best for the Auroras connectivity..

So, connecting the portagig to the GT050Q is impossible via FW800 because the GT050Q is not connected at its origin to the mac mini via FW800 thus making daisy chaining impossible.. yes, annoying..
ANy suggestions short of putting an esata port on the mac mini to hook the portagig up to it as well...?
I guess I can just unplug the aurora & plug in the portagig anytime i want to do a backup but it'd be nice to think i could use the bloody esata ports on these things for backup speed...

[brroberts]

I use a FW hub when I need portable use of ProTools HDX 11.01 with multiple FW drives no problem. It's called a Nitro AV FW800 8 port repeater/hub. I'm sure I just googled up a FW hub when I needed one and have been using it a few years now. Right now there are 4 drives attached to it, and PT is set to run on the MBP for a remote session here shortly. It's never been a problem. Occasionally FW gets finicky, but no more or less so with the hub than without it. So that's been my experience, it may not be true for others. I've also run MBoxes and Presonus SL 24's through it without problems for playback and recording. I think the hub cost about $130 when I bought it. It's not super cheap, but I had, and still have, lots of FW stuff, so it keeps it running until everything ends up USB or TBolt or whatever new shows up.