We have today a Lenovo ThinkPad 420s latop with FireWire connection. It worked fairly well until we rebooted the computer after an Windows 10 upgrade patch. Then we lost the connection between the laptop an our mixer and even with the new software "Universal Control v1.7.5.5 for Windows", the Device Manager would not update the driver for the FireWire card (it's an Ricoh chipset, and I now that you don't recomend this FireWire card). So we think that is no use to spend more hours to try to fix this issue anymore.
That's why we are thinking to buy a new laptop, but this time a MacBook Pro. The only problem (maybe not a problem at all, for all I know...?) is that this laptop only have USB C connection and no ThunderBolt or FireWire connections. Is there some posibility to buy a converter to hook up between the laptop and our mixer?