---
title: X-Firewire FAQ's
description: The X-Firewire card is an option card that can be installed in supported Apogee converters. It turns the Apogee converter into an audio interface.
---

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# X-Firewire FAQ's

## The X-Firewire card is an option card that can be installed in supported Apogee converters. It turns the Apogee converter into an audio interface.

***\*Apple has discontinued the Firewire CoreAudio driver with macOS 13 Ventura.** This means audio products that connect via Firewire will not work on Ventura or higher macOS versions, and must remain on macOS 12 Monterey or earlier.*

Q: What devices can use the X-Firewire option card?

A: The X-Firewire option card can be installed in the AD-16x, DA-16x, Rosetta-800, or Rosetta-200.

*Note: Though mentioned in the Big Ben User's Guide, X-Firewire is not supported in that product.*

---

Q: What computer and operating systems can I connect to an X-Firewire equipped device?

A: You can connect an X-Firewire equipped device to any Mac computer from OSX version 10.3.9 to macOS 12**\***, or a PC computer running 32-bit versions of Windows XP SP1 & SP2 (SP3 and later versions of Windows are not supported).

---

Q: How do I update the firmware?

A: Installation instructions are included with the firmware download file on our website ([X-Firewire](https://knowledge.apogeedigital.com/x-firewire?hsLang=en)).

*NOTE: There are different firmware versions depending in which product the X-Firewire card is installed. Make sure you download the correct one from our website.*

*-Special Note for AD-16x & DA-16x: Since these units can operate in a Standard or Advanced routing mode ([Users Guide pg 8](https://www.apogeedigital.com/company/support.php#DA16X)), each mode requires a different firmware version. See \[[this KB article](https://knowledge.apogeedigital.com/x-firewire-firmware-notes-when-used-with-ad-16x-da-16x?hsLang=en)\] for more information on the Advanced Routing mode firmware.*

The update is performed through the standard firewire connection to the computer.

- - On a mac, the firmware can only be updated via OSX 10.6.7 or earlier. If you are running OSX 10.6.8 or higher you will not be able to run the firmware updater application.
    - On a PC, you must have Windows XP SP2-32bit or earlier (SP3, 64-bit, and later versions of Windows are not supported).

---

Q: Will there be new software at some point that works with the newest version of OSX and Windows?

A: The X-Firewire option cards are discontinued & there is no further Apogee software development for it. That said: although there are some graphical (GUI) anomalies Maestro 1.9.13 appears to still be functional on newer versions of OSX.

*NOTE: You can connect an X-Firewire equipped device to a mac computer and have it automatically work as an audio interface. This is because the X-Firewire card is class-compliant and uses an Apple-made Firewire CoreAudio Driver built into their OS, so it doesn’t require the installation of additional software or drivers.*

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