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First 3rd Party Mac USB 3.0 Interface Benchmarked

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Apr 12, 2001
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Barefeats has benchmarked the first 3rd party USB 3.0 interface for the Mac from CalDigit:
"Wait a minute. Apple hardware and software does not support USB 3.0." Yes but CalDigit has developed OS X drivers for their PCIe and ExpressCard USB 3.0 host adapters.
Click to expand...
The early benchmark shows significantly faster sustained write speeds over both FireWire and USB 2.0 on the given drive, though no eSATA interface was available for testing. CalDigit claims it is the first and only card that allows USB 3.0 connectivity for the Mac. Apple has been slow to adopt USB 3.0 technology which promises faster access speeds for external devices. We haven't tried the interface, so can't vouch for it, and some forum goers have had some bad experiences with first generation product from CalDigit.

Apple was originally rumored to include USB 3.0 as early as this year into their Mac Pro line. The last Mac Pro update, however, offered no new upgrades in either USB or FireWire interfaces.

Article Link: First 3rd Party Mac USB 3.0 Interface Benchmarked
 
Article Link
https://www.macrumors.com/2010/09/27/first-3rd-party-mac-usb-3-0-interface-benchmarked/
USB 3.0 is easily the replacement of USB 2.0...FW will not win (again). I've used a few USB 3.0 external drives and they fly. Not to mention they are only about $25-45 more expensive (for a 1TB drive) than their USB 2.0 counterparts.

Too bad Apple consumers will have to wait another 12 months (if not more) for Macs to ship with USB 3.0. A very high percentage of PCs already ship with it.

Now if only more manufacturers would stuff SSD units in all desktops and laptops, the I/O bottleneck would finally be reduced by a huge percentage.
 
bring it on

I use an external hard drive to boot - wonder if I could use this set up to improve performance?
 
I hope 2011 macs get USB 3.0. That is, if there are going to be any new 2011 macs. I'm beginning to think Apple doesn't really give a crap anymore about its computers.
 
FW 800 is old technology.

Compare USB 3.0 to FW1600 and FW3200.

It wouldn't stand a chance.

flopticalcube said:
This is why every Mac needs an expresscard slot.
Click to expand...

No. Mac's just need to update their FW implementation to FW3200 and FW800 that is backward compatible with FW400 on that second FW slot.

Make the second pair of slots one USB 3.0 slot and 2 USB 2.0 slots for the iMac and Mac Pros.

Move the MacBook series to have a FW3200/800 dual functioning slot with two USB Slots [1 USB 3.0 and 1 USB 2.0].
 
I've never even heard of them, is this a reputable peripheral maker? The "FW800 CalDigit" vs "FW800 Other" makes me wonder if this will stand up to 3rd party testing, or is just marketing hype.
 
well they arnt gana put it into any ipods/iphones/ipad either till they have sold a solid # of macs with it. soo just a comment on that too.
 
mdriftmeyer said:
Make the second pair of slots one USB 3.0 slot and 2 USB 2.0 slots for the iMac and Mac Pros.

Move the MacBook series to have a FW3200/800 dual functioning slot with two USB Slots [1 USB 3.0 and 1 USB 2.0].
Click to expand...

I thought USB 3.0 was backward compatible with USB 2.0? They can both be 3.0 slots.
 
These speeds are actually very surprising to me. I just recently tried a USB 3.0 drive on a PC recently and i only got firewire 800 speeds. I guess it could have been the actual speed of the drive in the enclosure, but I still don't think it's all that.

Firewire 1600 and 3200 should be promising, and USB 3.0 still relies on the CPU host. Firewire has it's own, so professionals should still keep it in mind.
 
ericinboston said:
Too bad Apple consumers will have to wait another 12 months (if not more) for Macs to ship with USB 3.0. A very high percentage of PCs already ship with it.
Click to expand...
Very high percentage? I don't buy that, considering most of the systems I can see on bestbuy.com lack USB 3.0 ports. Sure, a handful of motherboard makers are implementing it, but odds are it won't see mass deployment until Intel gets around to adding it to their core chipsets.

Yeah, it will be nice when it gets here, but the Mac side is not behind on this one. It's a slow start across the industry right now.

I will agree this will probably kill Firewire completely at this point. I don't see many vendors sticking to it for newer products in any field. USB 3 at least brings along the good parts of Firewire in the base spec, like device-initiated communications and a non broadcast based messaging setup.
 
Cool, but is there even anything that uses USB 3.0 yet? I have never heard of USB 3.0 other than speculation and the fact that it is obviously the successor of USB 2.0...

All of my devices use USB 2.0, I would not benefit from USB 3.0 unless I buy new devices, which won't happen for a couple of years at least!
 
Regarding the ExpressSlot, too bad that Apple CRIPPLED IT in the latest revision of the 17 inch MBP. Just another reason to stay with my 17 inch unibody before Apple fumbled the ball.

baryon said:
Cool, but is there even anything that uses USB 3.0 yet? I have never heard of USB 3.0 other than speculation and the fact that it is obviously the successor of USB 2.0...!
Click to expand...

Build the ports and they will come.
 
baryon said:
Cool, but is there even anything that uses USB 3.0 yet? I have never heard of USB 3.0 other than speculation and the fact that it is obviously the successor of USB 2.0...
Click to expand...

Bufallo has USB 3.0 enclosures since last year.

And you could saturate a USB 2.0 bus easily with a 3.5" disk or some 2.5" disks. Even easier with a raid config.
 
baryon said:
Cool, but is there even anything that uses USB 3.0 yet? I have never heard of USB 3.0 other than speculation and the fact that it is obviously the successor of USB 2.0...

All of my devices use USB 2.0, I would not benefit from USB 3.0 unless I buy new devices, which won't happen for a couple of years at least!
Click to expand...

There are quite a few USB 3.0 external hard disk drives, for example, WD have their USB 3.0 MyBook drives.
 
baryon said:
Cool, but is there even anything that uses USB 3.0 yet? I have never heard of USB 3.0 other than speculation and the fact that it is obviously the successor of USB 2.0...

All of my devices use USB 2.0, I would not benefit from USB 3.0 unless I buy new devices, which won't happen for a couple of years at least!
Click to expand...

Buffalo has some 3.0 external drives.
Cyberguys sells 3.0 expresscard adapters, cables and hard drive docks.
However, that's about the extent of what is currently available.
 
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