USB 3.0 on the way

Stephen Withers
Monday, 21 September 2009 13:14

Your IT - Home IT

A chip company is set to demonstrate its USB 3.0 to SATA bridge chip this week, and a research firm is tipping adoption of the new standard beginning next year with rapid takeup.

USB 3.0 features the so-called SuperSpeed bus, with a nominal 4.8Gbps mode that means "it is realistic for 400 MBps or more to be delivered to an application", as the specification puts it.

SuperSpeed mode uses an additional two pairs of conductors, with connectors designed to allow interoperability with USB 2.0 devices and cables.

The first version of the specification was completed in November 2008. NEC demonstrated a test chip in January 2009 and announced the first USB 3.0 controller in May.

Now research firm In-Stat suggests that initial adoption of USB 3.0 will begin in 2010, with such rapid takeup that 70% of external hard drives will use the SuperSpeed interface by 2012.

Other devices likely to go USB in a hurry will probably include flash drives (In-Stat predicts the worldwide shipment of 200 million USB 3.0 flash drives in 2013), portable media players, LCD monitors, and digital still cameras. It would be surprising if digital video cameras weren't also on the list.

It is not clear from In-Stat's announcement whether the expected incorporation of USB 3.0 in monitors will be to provide a convenient desktop hub for SuperSpeed devices, or for an external video adaptor built into a monitor (eg, to drive a second independent screen from a notebook that lacks that capability).

What does In-Stat see as the potential obstacle to the broader adoption of SuperSpeed USB, and what about that USB 3.0 to SATA bridge chip? Please read on.