Looking at replacing/augmenting a 24-track ADAT setup with an Alesis
HD24 in the very near future. I went through the online PDF manual but
it left me with a question; maybe someone here has some experience with
this setup that can enlighten me.

They go into lots of detail in the manual on transferring files over
ethernet, but note that the ethernet connection can be slower than
transferring over lightpipe; however they don't say much about
transferring via lightpipe other than diagrams showing how to connect it.

We've got an ADAT PCR card in the machine now, to interface with the
ADATs and dump tracks via ADAT Connect, but Connect only handles up to
eight tracks at a time. I notice from the manual that the HD24 also
apparently divides lightpipe I/O into three groups of eight.

Does this mean I'm still limited to transferring tracks eight tracks at
a time using the same old Connect software, if I elect to use optical
transfer? Is it still a realtime dump, as with tapes?

I know there's a firewire option available for the HD24, but that's a
relatively hefty extra cost, in addition to needing to add a firewire
card to the PC ($25 for a PCI firewire card, $300+ for the HD24 adapter,
pffft).

Ah, one other question: anyone know if Alesis plans to update drivers
for the PCR to something a little more modern than Windows 98? Or is
there any other option for syncing the ADATs/HD24 with something like
Logic or Cubase that'll work with a newer platform? Will the HD24 sync
to MMC via the MIDI ports, maybe?