Steve Jobs: USB 3 Not Taking Off At This Time

[Speedy2]

What nonsense.
There are plenty of USB 3 hard drives on the market. And hard drives really NEED the faster interface.

He's just too stingy to put a dedicated USB 3.0 chip into his high-end, high-margin computers. Instead he wants to wait till he gets it for free from Intel. There's really no other reason.

Dear Steve, what is not taking off at this time, or at no time, is Firewire. Firewire is pretty much redundant now. Please ditch redundant technology and move forward. Best regards, your common sense.

 

[jayducharme]

He said the same thing about bluray, mac users wont see it until it becomes an industry standard.

The irony is that Apple often adopts new technologies, and after Apple does they become the new standard (3.5" floppies, the original USB, etc...). I'll bet that Apple and Intel are banking on Light Peak, whenever that gets straightened out.

 

[twoodcc]

for some reason i'm not surprised by this. but i sure they adopt it soon

 

[nicroma]

Hmm didnt realize it was backwards compatible.

Are the speed differences significant over 2.0?

Yes, very significant. Close to 10x faster.

 

[pr5owner]

Hmm didnt realize it was backwards compatible.

Are the speed differences significant over 2.0?

how does 10 times faster sound do you?

on USB 2 a DVD (9GB) will copy in approx 6 minutes (usb 2 only really transfer around 28-35MB/s)

on USB 3 that same DVD will copy in less than 1 minute, it will go faster if you have a solidstate drive. (Sandforce drives will copy that dvd less than 33 seconds)

 

[!¡ V ¡!]

If you have not figured it out yet, and intel are supporting LightPeak for a reason. Its scalable and flexible when considering the present options on the market (e.g. USB 3, eSATA, ExpressCard, etc).

Lets consider this for a moment, can either have a x1 or x2 USB3 ports and x1 eSATA port on a MBA, however this complicates matters for ideology in design. Too many ports, too much Mobo design issues, power consumption, aesthetics, etc.

Consider LightPeak, on a MBAir. x1 or x2 LightPeak ports with an optional hub to connect any USB2, eSATA, etc... for flexibility. Mobo design simplified, power requirements reduced and design minimal with simple and elegant user-friendly usability.

Option 1 might seem like a great idea and many PC manufactures are doing it presently, however it is not idiot proof and looks like a mess.

Option 2 is more along design moto for simple and elegant along with ease of use, plus it will cost intel a lot less to produce and power consumption is minimal, only requires what is plugged into it.

I agree with Steve-O on this one, I would prefer LightPeak over USB 3 inclusion, it makes for a cleaner looking Mac, maybe even thinner MBAir.

 

[pr5owner]

It does not matter. Steve Jobs said it's not taking off. That's all some people need to know.

lol yeah, his army of zombies will obey...

my brain is right here, thank you very much.

popular in the sense that the people who actually own the products, not the companies that sell them. there would be 100x more usb2.0 products then usb3.0, and i daresay there are more people who own firewire devices then usb3.0 (at THIS point in time). when demand is high enough, and there is evidence that usb3.0 actually WILL be the "winner" (over eSata (which apple have proper patents for), fw1600/fw3200 and LightPeak) then they will add support (once intel provides it).

if there was little demand for usb 3, the search results would look more like firewire. also, most people know what usb is, they will most likely continue using that format because thats all they know,

 

[deconstruct60]

are you all living under a rock? eSata has been out for YEARS, its bandwidth far exceeds that of any magnetic drive, this is obvious since esata and sata are pretty much the same thing, 1 is just on the outside. every mac is using sata channels and sata drives so dont say its not well established.

eSATA is not plug-n-play by standard. Yeah sure, there is optional support for plug-n-play. For USB and FW that is not optional. When some devices work and other don't that is fast track to getting kicked off Apple's list of standard ports. It is also a contributing reason why they are highly motivated to dump expresscard also (in addtion to low utilization rates).

If USB , FW, and Lightpeak are standardized to be plug-n-play then eSATA is likely a long term looser at Apple. ( how LP routes SATA , or anything else, and magically puts higher restrictions on than the underlying protocol on the connection will be an interesting trick. )

 

[!¡ V ¡!]

What nonsense.
There are plenty of USB 3 hard drives on the market. And hard drives really NEED the faster interface.

He's just too stingy to put a dedicated USB 3.0 chip into his high-end, high-margin computers. Instead he wants to wait till he gets it for free from Intel. There's really no other reason.

Dear Steve, what is not taking off at this time, or at no time, is Firewire. Firewire is pretty much redundant now. Please ditch redundant technology and move forward. Best regards, your common sense.

You can also use Network, ethernet driven or FW800 for ext HDD. The problem is not one being faster or the other regarding HDD. The problem is the magnetic HDD is the bottleneck. SSD is changing this, however USB 3 for the majority of ext applications is limited.

 

[pr5owner]

Lets consider this for a moment, can either have a x1 or x2 USB3 ports and x1 eSATA port on a MBA, however this complicates matters for ideology in design. Too many ports, too much Mobo design issues, power consumption, aesthetics, etc.

nope not really, eSATAp is both a USB and eSATA port, im sure they can adapt USB3 and eSATA the same way they are doing it now, so you just have 4 ports in total, 2 of them being USB3, 2 of them being eSATAp, all of them compatible with USB.

lots and lots of laptops do it this way now especially the HP elitebooks
their current setup is 1x USB 2 by itself, 1x eSATAp, 2x USB Superspeed ports

 

[Nishi100]

His facetious what?

I said

Hello everyone, I'm Steve Jobs, that's right it's me, chief executive of Apple ink. 1 Infinite Loop Cupertino, CA 95014. I know the address that's how you know it's me, Steve Jobs. And, I have some big news and I want the whole world to hear it: I love Blu ray, USB 3.0, the orientation lock and, most of all flash. And, by the way Bruce has something to do with Apple, in fact I went to McDonald with him for a double whopper.

 

[karlwig]

I know Intel is probably to blame for this one.

But generally speaking, I get the impression that Apple is not exactly at the front lines in implementing cutting-edge technology in their Macs these days. They should be, with the price premiums.

It's all about thinner and lighter, leaving stuff out. And when it's not, its about using up stock of old components.

Flame away -- I know there's exceptions, and I know there's good reasons for continue pushing old processors like Core 2 Duos because of better graphics in the 13" etc etc -- but this is the impression I'm getting, and Steve's reply here doesn't help.

His attitude should be, "We can't wait to use USB3 in all our Macs, and will do everything we can to push Intel to get the support ready ASAP".

Push for new technology, Apple.

 

[pr5owner]

eSATA is not plug-n-play by standard. Yeah sure, there is optional support for plug-n-play. For USB and FW that is not optional. When some devices work and other don't that is fast track to getting kicked off Apple's list of standard ports. It is also a contributing reason why they are highly motivated to dump expresscard also (in addtion to low utilization rates).

If USB , FW, and Lightpeak are standardized to be plug-n-play then eSATA is likely a long term looser at Apple. ( how LP routes SATA , or anything else, and magically puts higher restrictions on than the underlying protocol on the connection will be an interesting trick. )

uhh i had hotswappable sata drives back in 2003 when i built my first gaming rig. that rig today would have esata by simply adding an esata bracket and it would be plug and play.

Windows 7 supports AHCI out of the box just like it does IDE, AHCI drivers automatically make your sata devices hot swappable (plug and play)

 

[Nishi100]

USB 3.0 is good, Steve doesn't like it, we don't get it until he is forced to put it in macs.
Blu ray is good, Steve doesn't like it, we don't get it because people enjoy to download for hours, 720p piece of rubbish quality movies.
HDMI is good, Steve doesn't want PS3's or x box's near it, because the macs are the best way to game.
HDMI is doubly good, Steve doesn't like people with blu ray player watching REAL HD content because 720p is good enough - it works, like the MBA.
Steve doesn't like colour consistent screens.
Steve doesn't like FM radios.
Steve doesn't like inbuilt 3g in macs.
Steve doesn't like etc.

 

[!¡ V ¡!]

lol yeah, his army of zombies will obey...

I actually disagree with many things Steve-O stands behind. However this time I have to agree. I prefer LightPeak over USB3.

if there was little demand for usb 3, the search results would look more like firewire. also, most people know what usb is, they will most likely continue using that format because thats all they know,

Many consumers fall into the marketing scheme of things and think USB3.0 must be better compared to USB2.0 since its version 3. However many forget that the applications for USB3.0 is limited. If you have some ext device that uses SSD for storage (e.g. HDD, Camcorder, etc) you might benefit from the speed increase. If you are using an ext magnetic HDD, chances are you will see little to no benefit as the bottleneck factor is in play.

 

[inlovewithi]

Didn't Jobs say that Apple was always ahead with the latest and best technologies? (Something to that effect.) Then he was criticized for still using core 2 duos and last gen GPUs, but that doesn't stop the media from quoting jobs and making the people who don't know much about computers to think that Macs have the fastest and best hardware around. The Apple universe is fascinating.

 

[DoFoT9]

Bruce has evolved to the next step of koolaid drinking and brainwashing,

THANKS! YOUR INPUT IS VALUBLE!

face it, USB3.0 is not big enough for apple yet.

if there was little demand for usb 3, the search results would look more like firewire. also, most people know what usb is, they will most likely continue using that format because thats all they know,

going by that logic, most people know USB2.0 so they will opt for it over usb3.0

 

[-=XX=-Nephilim]

Bruce has evolved to the next step of koolaid drinking and brainwashing,

Looks like it...

I thought it is impossible to beat *LTD* in this but apparently it is quite easy...

Simply storm the forums waving the Jewish flag while claiming you are Apple employe and that's it

Strange world

Anyway - back to the topic - Lightpeak sounds great and if it is here and now with number of devices supporting it directly I probably wouldn't say a word...

But fact is that no one knows for sure when exactly are we going to get the Lightpeak while at the same time millions of people out there are enjoying 10x faster performances with USB 3.0 at half the price we are paying for 10x slower performance...

Kind of reminds me of HTML5 - yes, it is future and I am looking forward to it but how about FULL internet of TODAY on iPad... Perhaps Flash isn't taking of either

Meh...

Luckily I am still not due for an upgrade on my main machine so I can still sit tight for a year or so and see what happens on this front

 

[snberk103]

One very good reason Apple is not going to adopt USB 3. It's confusing. It means another cable type. It will cause consumers problems.

One end of the USB3 cable is unique, the other end looks like USB2. If I have a 2010 computer (Mac or PC) that has a USB2 port, I can still plug in a USB3 device. "OH NO! It doesn't move data as fast as it should !!"

So the customer calls Tech Support to complain. And tech support has the unenviable job of telling the customer that they're an idiot.

So now I need yet more cable, plus I need to know what type of USB port I have. This is un-Apple to the extreme. The whole point of USB in first place was reduce the cable and port clutter. USB3 adds to this problem.

Lightpeak may not be ready for primetime, but it is exactly what Apple wants. It could, in theory, create a computer with a single port. Every type of i/o device - in theory - can use a LP port. Video ports, external HDs, scanners, printers, etc.... in practice there will be a few more than just the single LP port (oh, who am I kidding.... Apple will sell something with just the single LP port, and nothing else, because they can... ) But most systems will have a couple of legacy ports with LP for a bit.

The fast majority of consumers don't need anything faster than USB2 in anycase. You may need it - but not the vast majority. And, like it or not, Apple does not build for you - they build their systems for larger customer segment.

So like or not, my money is on Apple introducing Lightpeak soon as they can, and leapfrogging over USB3. Or to put it another way. USB is a bagful of hurt.... too confusing for the consumer.

 

[pr5owner]

Push for new technology, Apple.

lol they dont push for anything new

their DDR3 ram speeds are as slow as DDR2 (1066 MHz, while the current bare minimum for almost all other computers are 1333MHz while most mid end computers will use 1600MHz)

no USB 3

no esata

no BD (dont give me that crap about streaming, currently 0.0003% of the population has a higher internet connection than 50mbit, which is what BD's bitrates are, a pos 1000kps bitrate or whatever the apple format is wont cut it as a viable substitute for 50mbit/s)

Core 2 duos? lol dont get me started on that

video cards? onboard with shared memory? jobs said that was "killer graphics" hahahaha, killer graphics is when you have over 900 cuda cores working in SLI, not 30 or something lame

not only nvidia but ATi, i dont see a single Mac anything with a 6000 series ATi card.

no 3D 120Hz LCDs? ok most people dont use 3D, but still, the 120Hz LCD makes anything motion related much smoother.

no Sandforce S12 or S15 SSD's?

no hybrid solid state disk drives?

where is the bluetooth 3.0 devices? both phones and netbooks have this, off the top of my head the samsung wave and samsung netbook with the N550 cpu in it both have BT3

HDMI? netbooks have this now

 

[deconstruct60]

Lets consider this for a moment, can either have a x1 or x2 USB3 ports and x1 eSATA port on a MBA, however this complicates matters for ideology in design. Too many ports, too much Mobo design issues, power consumption, aesthetics, etc.

First, 1 USB port doesn't work. That's why the new MBA's have 2.
Second, Apple is far more likely to nuke the mini display port with a LightPeak connector. so the design would more likley look like 2 USB ports. 1 LP one..... done. Unless they put celluar modem inside there is a going to be a common use case where there is a USB modem plugged in (not likely to be flipped to LP) and USB Flash drive ( again not likley to be flipped to LP).

What Apple would do is make it so that need proprietary dongle if want to connect to a non Apple monitor. Sound familiar? Otherwise LP would get you a two headed connector cable ( power and LP ) instead of three.

Consider LightPeak, on a MBAir. x1 or x2 LightPeak ports with an optional hub to connect any USB2, eSATA, etc...

optional hub is a fail. It didn't work for the 1 USB port MBA. It won't work for LP either. Extra dongles and stuff for extermely basic stuff like a lowly USB port is a joke. That's ridicolous. It is bad enough they do it for the video ports. But to spread that practice to every single port on the box is colossally arrogant. Few rational people want to have to carry around a bag of dongles just to be able to use devices with their computer.

Lightpeak makes for a great I/O port docking connector ( except for power ) . When at a desk it is fine to a device to connect to stuff that stays behind. It would great to have a industry standard "dock" that all laptops could plug into. However, on the road while mobile..... few people want to drag around a docking port to get work done with the small devices they bring on the road with them. They should just plug in and work.

 

[CaoCao]

I know Intel is probably to blame for this one.

But generally speaking, I get the impression that Apple is not exactly at the front lines in implementing cutting-edge technology in their Macs these days. They should be, with the price premiums.

It's all about thinner and lighter, leaving stuff out. And when it's not, its about using up stock of old components.

Flame away -- I know there's exceptions, and I know there's good reasons for continue pushing old processors like Core 2 Duos because of better graphics in the 13" etc etc -- but this is the impression I'm getting, and Steve's reply here doesn't help.

His attitude should be, "We can't wait to use USB3 in all our Macs, and will do everything we can to push Intel to get the support ready ASAP".

Push for new technology, Apple.

Apple is the Genius of Light Peak, three times as fast as FW3200 and USB 3.0
Apple is going to make Light Peak Succeed because they teamed up with Intel and it will be on the controllers of every mainstream computer in two years

 

[!¡ V ¡!]

nope not really, eSATAp is both a USB and eSATA port, im sure they can adapt USB3 and eSATA the same way they are doing it now, so you just have 4 ports in total, 2 of them being USB3, 2 of them being eSATAp, all of them compatible with USB.

lots and lots of laptops do it this way now especially the HP elitebooks
their current setup is 1x USB 2 by itself, 1x eSATAp, 2x USB Superspeed ports

Thought you have a point, this will cause end-user confusion and does not want to confuse the end-user. It's trying to cater to them so they buy more hardware. A few years ago, when the store was opening in locations outside the U.S.A., customers would come in the store with they MacBooks (PowerBooks), iMac, etc and state that the computer was not working with the ext device they had. The reason was that these customers were damaging or breaking the ports on the Mac hardware by forcefully trying to make the plugs fit, even though the wrong end was incorrectly being plugged into the Mac.

Again many people would not have this problem, however there is a quite a margin of customers who makes this common mistake.

What you are recommending do similar to what HP has done does not fair well. It will simply cause more confusion and more costly repairs for and its customers. In the end those customers will be angered that did not make it simple and give a negative user rating. And loves all the positive feedback it can acquire.

 

[Fraaaa]

USB 3.0 is good, Steve doesn't like it, we don't get it until he is forced to put it in macs.
Blu ray is good, Steve doesn't like it, we don't get it because people enjoy to download for hours, 720p piece of rubbish quality movies.
HDMI is good, Steve doesn't want PS3's or x box's near it, because the macs are the best way to game.
HDMI is doubly good, Steve doesn't like people with blu ray player watching REAL HD content because 720p is good enough - it works, like the MBA.
Steve doesn't like colour consistent screens.
Steve doesn't like FM radios.
Steve doesn't like inbuilt 3g in macs.
Steve doesn't like etc.

I've seen whiners on MR, but damn! You beat them all!

PS: Became CEO of something and do whatever you want.
PS2: HDMI is supported through the DisplayPort.
PS3: 720p is light enough to be downloaded, yet doesn't suck.

 

[pr5owner]

I actually disagree with many things Steve-O stands behind. However this time I have to agree. I prefer LightPeak over USB3.

Many consumers fall into the marketing scheme of things and think USB3.0 must be better compared to USB2.0 since its version 3. However many forget that the applications for USB3.0 is limited. If you have some ext device that uses SSD for storage (e.g. HDD, Camcorder, etc) you might benefit from the speed increase. If you are using an ext magnetic HDD, chances are you will see little to no benefit as the bottleneck factor is in play.

160GB laptop 5400RPM drives copy at 80ish MB/s, 1TB magnetic drives copy at over 130MB/s, USB2 is limited to a theoretical 60ish MB/s, im sorry which was is faster?

having usb 3 does not hurt anything, you can still use usb 2 cables and devices on the exact same port,

One end of the USB3 cable is unique, the other end looks like USB2. If I have a 2010 computer (Mac or PC) that has a USB2 port, I can still plug in a USB3 device. "OH NO! It doesn't move data as fast as it should !!"

So the customer calls Tech Support to complain. And tech support has the unenviable job of telling the customer that they're an idiot. .

what makes you think that brilliant customer even knows how fast somethings copying, by the sounds of it he or she probably doesn't even know what computer they have.

also, what makes you think that light peak isnt even more confusing to the avg non technical customer? usb 2 devices are compatible with usb 3, it will work with older devices, no usb device will work with light peak.