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Wait for USB 3.0?
- Thread starter louis0nfire
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zw-gator
macrumors 6502a
It will come out in 2010 I think. Probably hit desktops first and then laptops maybe a few months later.
Not sure if I'm sold on it yet. I mean, USB 3.0 will reach speeds of 600+ MB/s, but i doubt your HD can even take advantage of that.
Hell, even the 60 MB/s limit of USB 2.0 would be tough to reach for most laptop HD's,
Furthermore, it'll be a while before companies start shipping USB 3.0 capable products. Anyone know if they'll be backwards compatible?
Not sure if I'm sold on it yet. I mean, USB 3.0 will reach speeds of 600+ MB/s, but i doubt your HD can even take advantage of that.
Hell, even the 60 MB/s limit of USB 2.0 would be tough to reach for most laptop HD's,
Furthermore, it'll be a while before companies start shipping USB 3.0 capable products. Anyone know if they'll be backwards compatible?
The real-world limit of USB 2.0 is 30-35mb/s because of all the protocol overhead. My stock 200gb 5400RPM drive is just below that for reads and writes (so I don't mind having it in a USB enclosure), but my 720RPM 320gb drive will read at easily double that speed. It is internal right now, but a USB enclosure would really cripple it.
Dont wait usb 3.0 wont come out until next year and apple never like putting things we dont need 🙄
Lol by the time usb 3.0 becomes the standard, you will probably no longer need an optical drive... I'd say 2012-13...
jsw
Moderator emeritus
You must either not back up a lot of stuff or have a lot of time on your hands. 😉 eSATA is good. FW800 is decent. USB 2.0 is slow for external disk use, IMHO.
Plus, USB 3.0 would make iPhone/iPod backups and syncs less painful as well. But yeah, I wouldn't hold my breath.
Anuba
macrumors 68040
I'd say about 6 months away. I think Apple will refresh the laptops again in January or thereabouts, and that they'll introduce both quad processors and USB 3.0. Not that you'll find a lot of USB 3 peripherals for it, that's gonna be another few months...
I'll be happy with it as long as it is gonna be backwards compatible like they said for a lot of my USB 2.0 devices--and if possible USB 3.0 on a PCI card capable of working on my G4 would be really cool too
USB3 is backwards compatible with USB2. Basically the outside of the connector is the same as a regular USB2 connector, but deeper in there are extra pins for USB3. USB3 cables have longer connectors to reach the deeper pins, but if you connect an old USB2 cable, all it will see is a regular USB2 port.