USB vs. S3200

USB 3.0 vs Firewire S3200

  • USB 3.0

    Votes: 15 71.4%
  • Firewire S3200

    Votes: 2 9.5%
  • Something else

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Osmosis/Don't give a fuck

    Votes: 4 19.0%

  • Total voters
    21

spacetrader

2[H]4U
Joined
Dec 12, 2008
Messages
2,681
i dont think there is any doubt that usb3.0 will be the new standard, but what about the new firewire- S3200? will it hold its own place or will usb completely, finally, kill firewire off?

edit i kinda screwed up the poll, i ment to make usb "will be the only type" and firewire "S3200 will have a place"
 
Pretty much all PC peripherals has a USB equivalent (Video cards, tv tuners, harddrives, wifi, network cards, cameras, etc.) and have never seen a firewall peripheral aside from video cameras.

No userbase, no market.
 
USB 3.0 because if I have a lot of ports, I want them to be backwards compatible with all my current USB equipment.
 
the firewire people don't think they're dead though. they believe they can take a much bigger share from usb then they did before. my opinion is similar to yours' though, usb is forever and we really dont need or want competition for connectivity.
 
Firewire is used a lot in the professional markets, like audio and video. You won't find USB-connected equipment in the professional audio market. This is mostly because USB has no guarantees on latency, whereas Firewire is lower latency and can be made to fit time-critical (real-time) applications due to its P2P design. USB is fine for cheap consumer products, but it has absolutely no place outside connecting printers, scanners, mass-storage devices, mice and similar. Even the military uses Firewire over USB in its systems.
 
USB 3.0 because if I have a lot of ports, I want them to be backwards compatible with all my current USB equipment.

Backwards compatibility with USB 3 is a kludge, though. The new connector is a hundred times more complex than the previous one, and the maximum cable length for USB 3 got reduced from 5 meters for USB 2 to 3 meters, and only if you're using the thicker, better shielded cables.

(e)SATA, Firewire and even USB 2 will make USB 3's life miserable.
 
Firewire is used a lot in the professional markets, like audio and video. You won't find USB-connected equipment in the professional audio market. This is mostly because USB has no guarantees on latency, whereas Firewire is lower latency and can be made to fit time-critical (real-time) applications due to its P2P design. USB is fine for cheap consumer products, but it has absolutely no place outside connecting printers, scanners, mass-storage devices, mice and similar. Even the military uses Firewire over USB in its systems.

this is usb3 were talking about here though. does it have the same issues as usb2?
 
Wow! Haven't read the article yet but i'm honestly more impressed with the drive. I don't think my DVD drive can move files that fast.
 
USB or SB3200 for WHAT? for a HDD, eSATA is the best. for thumb drives, USB is the only player (1 eSATA thumb drive thats compatible with all of 10 computers worldwide doesnt count). video editing? all the uni's/schools/ancient businesses still on Mac PowerPCs are hooked on FW for better or worse, but we all know video editing is just as efficient, or more so, on PCs now and with USB connections. i could still see the new FW prevailing here.

for general usage, there's no question USB will "win". FW is a niche format now designated almost entirely to certain video equipment (that is more and more supporting USB or both standards).

ive been a pretty big power user for 5+ years and ive never even touched a firewire cable before. im not bashing it, but if ive never had reason to use a FW device, there's little doubt that it's time has come and gone for mainstream usage.
 
I was wondering how USB could possible overwhelm firewire when the latter was supposedly better in every way. Then i found out it was originally developed for the mac. I remembered how onary apple is about licensing and keeping everything proprietary. Then Beta vs VHS came to mind.
 
for general usage, there's no question USB will "win". FW is a niche format now designated almost entirely to certain video equipment (that is more and more supporting USB or both standards).
All professional audio equipment (external) uses FW. All professional video equipment and lots of consumer video equipment uses FW. FW is a common option on HDD enclosures.

ive been a pretty big power user for 5+ years and ive never even touched a firewire cable before. im not bashing it, but if ive never had reason to use a FW device, there's little doubt that it's time has come and gone for mainstream usage.
I'd call the professional A/V market quite 'mainstream'. FW is the interface for situations where performance actually matters (throughput, latency, reliability). USB is for everything else. I doubt this will change.

I still doubt that USB 3 will overtake USB 2 that easily, though, with all the limitations of USB 3 compared to its predecessor (shorter cable lengths, more expensive and fragile cables/connectors). We'll see.
 
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