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Wireless USB hubs
HaggiZ writes "Here is alternative to the clutter of USB cables and keys sitting on your desk. Now Belkin has announced their own wire-free USB setup. It's a wireless USB hub, allowing your to plug devices into the hub and have your PC/laptop elsewhere and not need to worry about running cables along the livingroom or study to reach. Very handy for laptop users, I can imagine some very handy uses for so HTPCs as well. Shipping in spring for a shave under $130."
Well, yeah, it sounds great and will probably be great for lots of things.
However, performance will drop on these items, even the fastest wireless gaming mouses have a semi-noticable lag when you use them. This lag in other items could create problems, like obfuscated code going to printers, etc.
Also, a security issue if you live in close-quarters (apartments, office buildings) because people could sniff the "packets" between the hub and device. They could watch you on your webcam, when you have your webcam software off.
Well, it will probably be good, the cons are not too bad, I will actually probably buy one myself.
Windows? I haven't used that since 1999. Fix the Slashdot Problems
I have a PVR, the Humax 9200T. It allows me to record etc from digital tv/radio.
I can transfer those recordings from it to a pc via a USB connection, unfortunately whenever I want to transfer those it means connecting my laptop upto it. Because of the PVR's location in a cabinet it is a bit of hassle.
With a wireless usb adapter it essentially means I can transfer those recordings to my laptop/desktop pc with the minimum of hassle.
Not everything uses or supports bluetooth.
Wireless USB is a lot faster, according to specs it has 480 Mbit/s, whereas Bluetooth is only 721 kbit/s.
Sigs are bad for your health
Ooh, Slashdot short memory! Don't forget we're not buying Belkin after the fiasco with their routers redirecting occasional DNS requests to the Belkin website to show an advert.
Happened a little over a year ago and Slashdot was up in arms about it!
I don't know how useful this will be to me. Its not the wire, one, running to the usb hub, but the wires, four, running from the hub to the devices. Now if I could just plug in a wireless dongle to each device that would be cool.
Supporting World Peace Through Nuclear Pacification
700k/s is good enough for anyone.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
All we need now is wireless power! Heh.
For those who don't get it, the point of the hub is to provide a place where you can plug in your scanner, printer, and other external peripherals, providing them all with wireless functionality, without the scanner and printer actually having the wireless capability built in. Makes sense for those of us with lots of USB peripherals who also have a wireless laptop.
What's a little odd is that they aren't using bluetooth, but the article claims its 100x faster than bluetooth. Perhaps this opens up the idea of plugging in hard drives into a USB hub like this, either for backup, for extra workspace, or just a great way to store your extensive mp3/movie/pr0n collection.
"All great wisdom is contained in .signature files"
This might be more convenient than daisy-chaining USB hubs for that long run to the webcam in my bondage dungeon.
Because we figured out that stone is not the best wheel material.
rj
But like the grandparent post said, the real point is that most things aren't available in Bluetooth. You want to plug in your external hard drive by Bluetooth? You can't buy one that would let you do that. Is your digital camera designed to use Bluetooth to connect to your computer? Your drawing tablet? Your PDA? Your cell phone? Your printer? Your DVD-RW drive?
Some of these things may be available in Bluetooth, but if they were and if your computer supported Bluetooth you probably would be using it already. This is a solution for things that must be USB (or you don't want to fork out to buy the Bluetooth version), and I can see it being quite handy. It would be nice to have a little collection of USB stuff that I could plug into my laptop with one little adapter so I'm still cordless instead of the wire running over to the hub. And with a HTPC (as someone else mentioned) you could use this to plug USB stuff in by the couch where you are (game pads, memory sticks, etc) instead of having to reach behind your collection of AV equiptment where the PC is.
Comment forecast: Bits of genius surrounded by a sea of mediocrity.
It looks very handy, but why should the PC need yet another wireless interface?
Surely with a clever enough driver, you could tunnel USB traffic over 802.11 (or even over TCP/IP). Make a USB hub that provides the server for this tunnelling client, and you'd wouldn't need a dongle.
RIAA: Hey. WTF is this, you got 30 gigs of pirated mp3s! You're so sued!
Gollegeboy: Dude I swear one asshole sits in front of the building and beams his iPod contents to everyone with wireless USB!
I have seen attempts to do this before and even bought one (albeit it was just point-to-point and designed specifically for printers). I would not buy it until some independent testing was done it (Tom's hardware style). Basically my HP printer would work for a week or two and then it would just return with communication error until I power cycled everything. I remember a movement to make an official WUSB (wireless USB) protocol, but it did not seem to go anywhere. If Belkin finally made a version that actually works on most hardware without glitches, hurray to them. It is a very difficult task because of the way USB works.
Take a look at the USB specs, and the number of vendors deploying them. USB devices are 'trusted' where BT devices are 'paired'. BT in its first incarnation had an operation radius of 8m. With WiFi, the operational radius, given Defcon successes, might be nearly 200km (line of sight, no sun spots, nearby Schwarzchild radius, etc). So far, 8m vs 200km. Speed in payload is about 52x, USB 2.0 vs BT 1.1 spec.
BT is really designed as a paired communications medium (with dedicated voice channel) as a PAN setup utilizing OBEX (object exchange) and a few other interesting inter-device tricks. USB is a perhipheral connector and virtualizing the electrical part through wireless is a godsend. USB is more layer 1 & 2, where BT is a full stack.
---- Teach Peace. It's Cheaper Than War.