USB 3.0 & FireWire 3200 For the Mac
USB 3.0 hard drives have been popping up at CES this week and the question for Mac users is when will we get 3.0 support?
Intel has dragged their feet a little on releasing USB 3.0 chipsets and has stated that they will not support the standard until 2011. We may see PCI cards for Mac Pros before we see native support in iMacs and portables. With the standard in place and peripherals on the market, we should see OS X support (or 3rd party drivers) by the end of the year.
So what’s so great about USB 3.0?
USB 3.0 runs about 10 times faster than USB 2.0 or FireWire 800 (up to 4.8 Gbit/s but usually runs at 3.2Gbit/s.) It uses an new cable which can supply more power to devices (one of the former advantages of FireWire over USB) yet is still backwards compatible with USB 2.0 devices.
One of the reasons FireWire has been on the decline is that they completely changed the form factor of the port and cable when moving from FireWire 400 to 800. There are two new FireWire standards (FireWire 1600 & 3200) coming out that will use the same port and cables as FireWire 800. The new 3200 spec will run at 3.2Gbit/s and is designed to compete with USB 3.0.
Apple has always been a big proponent of FireWire (they helped develop the standard) and have kept the ports in their pro line. With USB 3.0 providing more power and speed, it’ll be interesting to see if Apple continues to support the standard or if everything will just mover over to USB. Time will tell.
