Firewire drive noise appearing in audio output

Hi:
When I have a firewire drive plugged in, a lot of digital noise appears at the audio output jack. If I turn the drive off, I hear a whining-down noise in the audio output. I've tried two different drives, 3 different cables, same thing. Anyone have any ideas? It's a huge bummer; I bought my MacBook Pro to do music on...

Hey george,
i know this is not going to be any help, (i need some too!!!) but i have exactly the same problem. I first noticed it when using my ICY BOX external harddrive and thought it was just the noise from the external drive but the same thing happens when i attach my Motu traveler firewire soundcard to it. Its so annoying. the sound dissapears when i take out the mini jack from the output.
I am also having a problem of sound distortion over the output and recording input when i attach my Motu firewire unit
(this is seperate from the minijack problem i think as this happens when the minijack is plugged into the output AND when it is not).
This didnt happen to my powerbook 1.6 and never happens to my friends one either????
I am going to make a seperate thread about this problem now but if you could tell me if you have the same problem with your soundcard i would be grateful.
All the best and if you find out what the problem is please post your solutio up, vice versa.
Will.
MBP 1.8 Mac OS X (10.4.6)

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Message was edited by: slverice

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Firewire drive noise appearing in audio output

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