I'm never going to do well in this thread but what the heck!

Firewire is best input for video capture to a PC and the ONLY way I know of for successful transfer of higher quality video like miniDV but just my personal experience is that lower quality ananog video can be transferred and captured via a USB2 PC input. Capture setting in the US would be mpeg2 720X480 of if for PAL mpeg2 720X576 for highest quality standard definition mpeg.

Many manufacturers make video capture devices/adapters that will accept composite or camcorder usb output and transport it to the PC via a usb2 input port. Seem to work okay.

I have captured old analog video via usb as mpeg2 and via firewire as .avi and at the end of the editing, rendering and dvd conversion of it all to .vob I don't see any qualitative difference on my tv screen. Someone else may have sharper sight and disagree.

I have to confess that while I have done the above playing around I always connect my source output - composite or component or miniDV to a external dongle of a video capture card in an expansion slot of my PC so I do not regularly use a PC firewire. The video card always does an outstanding job of capture.

Summary is that manufacturers make capture devices that use usb2 input and successfully capture lower quality analog video. In general, firewire is the way to go and the only way to go for miniDV.
goodluck