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USB 2.0 For Linux

Posted by Hemos on from the plug-and-play-away dept.

SilentTone writes: "PCWorld is reporting that USB 2.0 or high speed USB will be hitting Linux first half 2002. Intel is already providing space on its Pentium 4 motherboard for the USB 2.0 controller. With a transfer rate of 480Mbps (more than firewire's 400Mbps) it seems promising." Update: 09/04 23:02 PM GMT by H : So, somewhere between my preview and going live, I seem to have "lost" the link - if you find it, please post below. I'm looking - in the meantime, this is a good Linux and USB tutorial, and Blue Cat Linux is supporting USB 2.0. HA! Found it - story updated.

7 of 255 comments (clear)

  1. The problem with USB 2.0 by James+Ray+Kenney · · Score: 4, Interesting

    After reading the comments so far, I figured that there should be something on topic, SO...

    The one problem with USB 2.0 is that it needs a computer to function. That makes it useless for many consumer uses.
    Firewire does not need a computer in the loop. Each device is intelligent enough to talk to other devices in and of itself.

    While USB 2.0 does not market itself for those purposes, it does market itself for purposes that firewire has worked fine for, for the last few years. Purposes like video transfer, high-speed data connection, etc. Fire wire is cheep enough these days that interface boards are being bundled along with low-end video editing software.

    If more motherboards would provide it onboard, there would be NO need for USB 2.0, except in the few situations where a hub topology was really needed.

    James Ray Kenney

    --
    James Ray Kenney mailto:jrkenney@swbell.net
  2. more than firewire..? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

    aren't newer and fully backward-compatible firewire interfaces going to start showing up soon that run much faster than the original ones?

    does USB 2.0 have any advantages over firewire other than that you're paying licensing fees to Intel and not Apple? (and isn't it free to conform to the firewire spec as long as you call it "IEEE 1394" or whatever instead of "firewire"?) Is there any reason for this USB2 standard to exist other than ensuring that nothing that involves an Apple patent becomes industry standard?

  3. Re:once again by fobbman · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Mind you I'm unable to quote whatever article that Hemos is referring to as there is no link to the story and I've searched the PCWorld website and found nothing about Linux and USB 2.0, but just going off of the quote it says that Linux won't have support until the first half of 2002 while this story quotes that Microsoft already has beta drivers and final WinXP drivers will be available by either the end of this year or the first part of next.

    Sure there was no linked article, but at least read the freaking POST before you go trumpeting Linux beating M$.

  4. USB was designed by Intel to waste cpu power by lupine · · Score: 2, Interesting

    USB is a low cost I/O interface that relys on the cpu. Intel wanted a standard that was cheap and would promote cpu sales. As devices are added processing goes up and available cycles goes down. Other I/O interfaces like scsi utilize a seperate processor to allow the cpu to perform more important tasks.

    I like usb, its fairly fast and cheap but intel has its own reasons for pushing the standard.

    --
    We have the best government that money can buy.
  5. USB 2.0 problems by Auckerman · · Score: 4, Interesting
    1. Firewire is ALREADY ubquitious and plans to move it to your TV already in place.


    2. The moment you put a mouse (or anyother low speed device) on that USB 2.0 port you loose the 480MB/sec max throughput.


    3. Microsoft supports Firewire instead of USB 2


    4. Firewire is looking to move to 800MB/sec in the near future.

    --

    Burn Hollywood Burn
  6. Agreed by marcsiry · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I worked for a major toy company that was basically subsidized by Intel to put a USB port on every one of our products. Additionally, we were encouraged to bundle CPU intensive software in order to drive computer upgrades.

    We all knew that USB was a poor choice for anything but momentary inputs, but we were pumping video, sound, all sorts of crap through the lines, and watching the signals degrade and the software sputter to a halt. This was USB-1, of course, but IMO, regardless of the bandwidth, it's a poor choice for the sort of tasks FireWire is ideal for, precisely because it's CPU dependent.

    --
    Marc Siry || interactive media professional, motorcycle enthusiast ||
  7. USB 2.0 transfer rates by iso · · Score: 4, Interesting

    With a transfer rate of 480mbps (more than firewire's 400mbps) it seems promising

    Let me guess: you also buy processors based soley on the megahertz rating. If you seriously believe that the "480mb/s" rating of USB 2.0 (chosen only because it appears on paper to be faster than FireWire), then I have a bridge to sell you.

    USB was meant to be a replacement for serial ports; for low-speed devices that could tolerate high-latencies, like keyboards and mice. It was never meant for devices like digital camcoders; that's FireWire's specialty. USB 2.0 is a hack. A wide adoption of USB 2.0 over FireWire would be a very bad thing. Thankfully FireWire 2.0 will reach very close to real and sustainable speeds of 800mb/s, cleanly beating even the highly exaggerated speeds of USB 2.0.

    People that buy on "specs" really piss me off. Learn something about the underlying technology before you go making rampant generalizations.

    - j