USb 2.0 or Firewire 800 FASTER?

I have a Quad G5 with 8 gigs RAM. I want to buy an external drive (LaCie) and notice the USB 2.0 is 100 cheaper than the triple inetrface. Is USB 2.0 slower or the same as Firewire 800?
It was my understanding USB 1.0 and Firewire 400 were the same transfer rate and USB 2.0 and Firewire 800 are the same rate?
However, I see specs stating that firewire 800 is much much much faster?
Thnaks everyone.

USB 2.0 has a data transmission rate of 480Mbps, while USB 1.1 transfers data at 12Mbps; real-world transmission rates for USB 2.0 will be slower than FireWire 400. FireWire 400 and 800 have a transmission rate equal to the number in the term. Basically, FireWire 800 is much faster then USB 2.0. See this page for more information.
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