USB 3.2 Is Finally Here

Megalith

Megalith

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The USB Implementers Forum has published their specifications for USB 3.2, finalizing the standard and making it official: features include two-lane operation using existing USB Type-C cables, continued use of existing SuperSpeed USB physical layer data rates and encoding techniques, and a minor update to hub specification to address increased performance and assure seamless transitions between single and two-lane operation. Thanks grtitan.

While new devices and chipsets will be needed to leverage USB 3.2, it is cool to know that existing USB-C cables will be compatible. Desktop users will be able to simply add a PCIe card to use this new standard, but existing laptop users are simply out of luck. Hopefully many new machines released in 2018 will have USB 3.2 by default.
 
Welcome!

Sorry, forgot to add the original post, https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=USB-3.2-Spec-Published
https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=USB-3.2-Spec-Published
From there:

"USB 3.2 again doubles the bandwidth to now allow up to 20 Gbps over a USB Type-C cable. This increased bandwidth comes from a two-lane operation mode as well as minor performance work on the hub specification. Existing USB Type-C 10 Gbps SuperSpeed Gen 2 certified cables should be able to support the USB 3.2 specification. The USB-C 3.1 Gen 1 cables meanwhile will be boosted from 5 Gbps to 10 Gbps with the multi-lane mode of USB 3.2."
 
20Gbps so around 2GB/s? That's insane and awesome! (I know b to B is /8 but /10 is usually more accurate in practice.)
 
Good gravy, bandwidth that USB-IF is implementing seems like it's going to surpass that of what SATA-IO is giving us.
 
How long until the video card can be moved outside the case without killing performance?
 
Dayaks said:
20Gbps so around 2GB/s? That's insane and awesome! (I know b to B is /8 but /10 is usually more accurate in practice.)
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In theory, practice is the same as theory, but in practice, it's not.
 
but it's 2 separate channels of 10gbps

not one fat pipe of 20gb

so no external gpu over usb anytime soon
 
Kdawg said:
but it's 2 separate channels of 10gbps

not one fat pipe of 20gb

so no external gpu over usb anytime soon
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It's the same trick Thunderbolt uses.

Thunderbolt 3 is 10Gbps x 4 channels. It just allows you to use the channels all at once, or split. It's not clear yet if USB 3.2 has this capability or not, but given it's much higher latency than Thunderbolt, I don't see this being used for external video cards.

All "serial" cable protocols are all multi-channel (DisplayPort has four), because getting beyond 10 Gbps in a single lane over an external copper cable can get vexing.

Even PCIe goes multi-channel, even though it's capable of much higher speeds due to being printed circuits.
 
Megalith said:
Hopefully many new machines released in 2018 will have USB 3.2 by default.
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That doesn't seem to "trip the trigger" of manufacturers. I would love to see it, but I'm sure it'll be a ways down the road.
 
I just find each generation more and more fussy. 3.1 has been a nightmare for me.
 
Pfft PC manufacturers arent even adopting the current standards at a reasonable rate.
 
In before the "USB is so complicated! Why do they keep revising it?" comments. :rolleyes:
 
Dan_D said:
YaY another standard we won't see devices for anytime soon!
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Yup, pretty much. Just like existing 3.1 type-c ports are hardly on any computers and these generally high end models. Existing standard didn't root in and next one is coming out, at least the physical connector is the same so there's hope for it.
 
USB 3.2?!?!?!?! Heck, I only just now started using USB 3.1 C, between a hard drive dock and my Lumia 950 phone. However, I do not bother with usb 2.0 ports on my computers anymore, no real need for that anymore.
 
zkostik said:
Yup, pretty much. Just like existing 3.1 type-c ports are hardly on any computers and these generally high end models. Existing standard didn't root in and next one is coming out, at least the physical connector is the same so there's hope for it.
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The ports are there and have been for some time. The issue is that there are hardly any devices that use it.
 
Crazy how usb c is so awesome but motherboards come with one connector
 
Still on USB 2.0 and I only have one thing that uses 3.0
 
Dan_D said:
YaY another standard we won't see devices for anytime soon!
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Good news is this bolsters current 3.1 devices too. Before all we got was extra voltage now we get both.

External HDD arrays will like this.
 
Tawnos said:
Like the first iteration of USB?
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The difference here is that early USB 1.0 didn't deliver enough bandwidth to do anything useful. It was also dealing with the slow death of the AT formfactor, which had no USB ports without an adapter being installed in one of the expansion slots.

So adoption of the slots was slow, especially on cheaper systems...EVEN ON MOTHERBOARDS THAT HAD SUPPORT.


USB 3.1 has already exceed the current bandwidth needs of high-end flash drives and smaller RAID hard drive devices, and those are corner cases. Most will simply connect a single hard drive or slow flash drive, both of which are well-served by 3.0.

It will never become a viable bus for more powerful SSDs without a complete redesign because it has an order-of-magnitude higher latency (~50us) than SATA (6us) or nVME (2us). This means it sucks balls for 4k accesses.
 
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What I'd like to see is usb c on video cards. It's the most upgraded item other than motherboards, would be useful for future video over usb c applications and insure a low latency connection for that use...
 
I don't have an need for anything this fast, I probably won't even need it by the time it comes but it's nice to have.
For me, the main thing is the number of USB ports on the back of my motherboard and the durability of the connector.
I'm wondering how durable type-C will be in comparison to type-A. If the number of ports won't be increased I would prefer type-A at the back of the computer.
 
JoseJones said:
So ... when will we see the new USB 3.2 support on motherboards? What chipset from Intel and AMD do you think will have it first?
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No idea. More than likely it's two or three chipsets away, but we could see motherboards with it sooner than that using third party add-in controllers from ASMedia or some other company.
 
Master_shake_ said:
i hope this gets more use than sata express or u.2
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U.2 gets used in the server market. It makes much more sense to use on the desktop than M.2, but consumer SSD makers favor it because they can build one drive for mobile and desktop applications. SATA Express was a non-starter because of M.2's popularity.
 
Dan_D said:
U.2 gets used in the server market. It makes much more sense to use on the desktop than M.2, but consumer SSD makers favor it because they can build one drive for mobile and desktop applications. SATA Express was a non-starter because of M.2's popularity.
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Which lead to much surprise when I bought a Lenovo T560 that advertised "NVMe" that was actually SATA Express. Ended up throwing an extra terabyte at my desktop after that frustration.
 
Will USB 3.2 need different drivers, or just USB 3.0 drivers?

Will this work in Windows 7?
 
defaultluser said:
The difference here is that early USB 1.0 didn't deliver enough bandwidth to do anything useful.
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That's not true. USB 1.0 brought us an interface that was hot swappable. This wasn't possible with the PS/2 ports of the time. It also laid the groundwork and standardization for future peripherals to connect with.
 
FlawleZ said:
That's not true. USB 1.0 brought us an interface that was hot swappable. This wasn't possible with the PS/2 ports of the time. It also laid the groundwork and standardization for future peripherals to connect with.
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I seem to recall hot-swapping PS/2 devices, although it was not officially supported :D

Could have broken the ports, but I was brave and daring when doing tech support.

And really, how often does a regular user swap their mice? That has come to be more useful with the influx of external drive following the introduction of USB 2.

USB 1 was a good connector, but it was really a rebel without a cause. The only devices I remember people buying were mice and keyboards.
 
defaultluser said:
I seem to recall hot-swapping PS/2 devices, although it was not officially supported :D

Could have broken the ports, but I was brave and daring when doing tech support.

And really, how often does a regular user swap their mice? That has come to be more useful with the influx of external drive following the introduction of USB 2.

USB 1 was a good connector, but it was really a rebel without a cause. The only devices I remember people buying were mice and keyboards.
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Scanners and printers started adopting USB back with 1.0, but it wasn't until 1.1 that it really took off.
 
silk186 said:
I don't have an need for anything this fast, I probably won't even need it by the time it comes but it's nice to have.
For me, the main thing is the number of USB ports on the back of my motherboard and the durability of the connector.
I'm wondering how durable type-C will be in comparison to type-A. If the number of ports won't be increased I would prefer type-A at the back of the computer.
Click to expand...
Unfortunately with type A disappearing from some ultrabooks like the macbook pro we may not have much choice.
 
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