What is fire wire

I would like to buy a hard drive to upgrade my mac from Tiger to Snow Leopard.  I would like to buy an external hard drive. My MacBook is a white 13 inch 2007. My very basic question is: does this mac have fire wire port?  On the left side of the computer there is a port I never use.  The icon is in the shape of a Y.  Is this the fire wire connection?  If not what does the icon above the fire wire connection look like.
Thank You

Yes, FireWire is the Y port you have.  The icon is this:
There are two flavors of FireWire so far: 400 and 800.  They have slightly different cables.  In this picture, the left one is FW 800; the right one is FW 400:
Pay attention to exactly what interface the drive has (USB vs. FW400 vs. FW800.  All will be compatible with your MacBook, but each will require a differnent kind of cable.  All cables are available from your retailer or from auction sites.

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    Message was edited by: Sunny's mommy

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    Message was edited by: Sunny's mommy

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