WEBVTT - USB vs FireWire 0:00:00.320 --> 0:00:02.880 Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve camera. 0:00:03.240 --> 0:00:08.960 It's ready. Are you get in touch with technology with 0:00:09.119 --> 0:00:17.960 tech Stuff from how stuff works dot com. Greetings, loyal 0:00:18.079 --> 0:00:20.960 tech stuff fans, and welcome to the podcast. My name 0:00:21.040 --> 0:00:23.480 is Chris Polette. I'm an editor at how stuff works 0:00:23.480 --> 0:00:25.840 dot com, and sitting next to me, as usual, is 0:00:25.960 --> 0:00:32.080 senior writer Jonathan Strickland. Hoi hoi. Okay, it's interesting way 0:00:32.120 --> 0:00:35.120 to start off our podcasts this afternoon. Right, Well, there's 0:00:35.120 --> 0:00:37.720 another interesting way we could start off our podcast. Okay, 0:00:37.760 --> 0:00:45.840 that would be with listener made Yeah. I feel ambushed. Yeah, 0:00:45.880 --> 0:00:48.680 well you know you walked right into that one. So 0:00:49.200 --> 0:00:53.360 here's a listener mail from Leanna, and Leanna says, I 0:00:53.400 --> 0:00:56.800 was wondering what's USB two point oh all about? Will 0:00:56.840 --> 0:00:59.360 all my peripherals for my laptop stop working if I 0:00:59.360 --> 0:01:02.160 don't install a USB two point oh hub. It'd be 0:01:02.200 --> 0:01:05.840 cool to hear a podcast on this, Thanks Leanna. Hopefully 0:01:05.880 --> 0:01:08.000 we didn't get to this too late. USB two point 0:01:08.000 --> 0:01:11.640 i has been around for a while, Yeah, quite some time. 0:01:11.920 --> 0:01:15.520 Chances are you're actually using USB two point oh peripherals 0:01:15.600 --> 0:01:19.520 right now. In fact, um, I would be very surprised 0:01:19.560 --> 0:01:22.200 to hear that you were using USB one point one. Uh, 0:01:22.280 --> 0:01:24.000 two point oh has been the standard for a while, 0:01:24.040 --> 0:01:27.320 and three point oh. The three point oh um specifications 0:01:27.319 --> 0:01:30.559 were released last year. We can expect to see USB 0:01:30.680 --> 0:01:34.440 three point oh devices probably sometime in two thousand ten. 0:01:34.480 --> 0:01:38.520 I would say, yeah, I've seen as early as this year, 0:01:38.720 --> 0:01:41.319 but uh, it's gonna take him a while to get 0:01:41.360 --> 0:01:45.320 it in rolled out into the in the individual Yeah, 0:01:45.319 --> 0:01:48.760 things like things like digital cameras and and B three 0:01:48.760 --> 0:01:50.360 players and all that kind of stuff. It'll it's gonna 0:01:50.400 --> 0:01:52.480 take a little while. But you asked, what's the deal 0:01:52.520 --> 0:01:54.040 about it? And do you need a hub and all 0:01:54.080 --> 0:01:56.800 these kind of questions. We're gonna tackle that. So USB 0:01:57.040 --> 0:02:00.920 it's really a method of transferring data back and forth 0:02:00.960 --> 0:02:07.360 between different devices using a cable, a USB cable, yep um. USB. 0:02:08.040 --> 0:02:10.840 Going back to uh the very beginning, USB is actually 0:02:10.840 --> 0:02:12.880 sort of an old technology now. I mean one point 0:02:12.880 --> 0:02:16.960 oh was launched in November, and the first really the 0:02:16.960 --> 0:02:18.960 one that that really took off was one point one, 0:02:19.040 --> 0:02:23.840 which came out in September, which, uh, ironically was the 0:02:23.880 --> 0:02:26.600 same month that they launched the Bondai Blue iMac. The 0:02:26.720 --> 0:02:29.240 very very first iMac, which was the first computer that 0:02:29.360 --> 0:02:33.959 used only USB and no other technologies. Right, so you 0:02:34.040 --> 0:02:36.800 might wonder, Okay, so what's the big deal with USB? USB? 0:02:36.919 --> 0:02:40.040 First of all, it stands for Universal Serial Bus, and 0:02:40.240 --> 0:02:43.120 a USB is just a way of connecting a device 0:02:43.160 --> 0:02:46.400 to something like a computer. Um, actually it is a computer. 0:02:46.440 --> 0:02:49.679 I mean computer acts as the host for for USB devices. 0:02:50.680 --> 0:02:53.040 And the reason why USB is such a big deal 0:02:53.840 --> 0:02:57.400 is before USB, you had lots of proprietary or very 0:02:57.520 --> 0:03:00.760 specialized kinds of cables and plugs you had to use 0:03:00.840 --> 0:03:03.440 for different kinds of devices if you wanted to hook 0:03:03.480 --> 0:03:07.639 them up to your computer, like parallel cereal scuzzy. Yeah. Yeah. 0:03:07.680 --> 0:03:09.800 You had all these different different things like if you 0:03:09.840 --> 0:03:11.880 had a printer, then you were going to use a 0:03:12.480 --> 0:03:15.920 parallel printer port, which were you know, these pretty wide 0:03:16.360 --> 0:03:21.560 uh cables. Monitors had their own kind of connectors, modems 0:03:21.600 --> 0:03:24.240 had their own kind of connectors um. And then you 0:03:24.280 --> 0:03:27.000 had other devices like special joysticks or whatever where you 0:03:27.000 --> 0:03:30.360 would have to buy a specific kind of card that 0:03:30.400 --> 0:03:33.680 you would have to install inside your computer. UM and 0:03:34.200 --> 0:03:36.920 the at one end of the card was essentially a 0:03:37.000 --> 0:03:40.680 port and you would plug the device into that port 0:03:41.160 --> 0:03:44.440 and pretty much. Usually those ports were only good for 0:03:44.680 --> 0:03:47.720 very specific devices. You couldn't you know, you couldn't multitask 0:03:47.760 --> 0:03:50.480 with one of these things. So it ended up where 0:03:50.480 --> 0:03:53.040 you had all these different proprietary plugs and all these 0:03:53.080 --> 0:03:57.240 different proprietary ports, and it wasn't easy to switch out gadgets. 0:03:57.320 --> 0:03:59.640 Um if you decided that you wanted to upgrade, you 0:03:59.720 --> 0:04:02.680 might have to buy a whole bunch of new new 0:04:02.720 --> 0:04:06.400 hardware in order to upgrade. It just wasn't very convenient. Now, 0:04:06.560 --> 0:04:11.360 the Universal Serial Bus is much more convenient because it's 0:04:11.360 --> 0:04:14.400 a cable that if you create a device that uses this, 0:04:14.480 --> 0:04:16.720 then you know you can plug it into the same 0:04:17.040 --> 0:04:20.560 port as you would any other USB device. So you 0:04:20.600 --> 0:04:23.320 could use let's say you've got a USB keyboard and 0:04:23.360 --> 0:04:26.640 a USB mouse, and you also have a USB microphone, 0:04:26.720 --> 0:04:30.200 and you have a USB uh MP three player. All 0:04:30.240 --> 0:04:32.560 of those devices could plug into the exact same port 0:04:32.720 --> 0:04:35.560 as your as any of the others to your computer, 0:04:35.680 --> 0:04:37.880 unlike the old devices, which each had to have their 0:04:37.880 --> 0:04:43.080 own that's right, and um USB has another serious, serious 0:04:43.080 --> 0:04:47.040 advantage over those older technologies, which is it's hot swappable. 0:04:47.560 --> 0:04:49.520 And what that means is if you have a printer 0:04:49.920 --> 0:04:51.960 and uh, you want to plug it into your computer 0:04:52.000 --> 0:04:53.880 and turn it on. You can plug it into your 0:04:53.880 --> 0:04:56.800 computer and turn it on. UM, I'll give you an example. 0:04:57.040 --> 0:05:00.320 I had most of you long time list. There's no 0:05:00.400 --> 0:05:03.760 that I used to be a Commodore Amiga owner. Jonathan's 0:05:03.839 --> 0:05:05.920 rolling his eyes. But what I used to use if 0:05:05.920 --> 0:05:08.160 I wanted to plug something in was called Scuzzy, which 0:05:08.279 --> 0:05:12.919 was an older technology, very fast. But UM, let me 0:05:12.920 --> 0:05:14.440 explain what I'd have to do. To say, if I 0:05:14.480 --> 0:05:17.760 wanted to to hook up a printer or um an 0:05:17.760 --> 0:05:21.479 external DVD burner. Of course I didn't have those when 0:05:21.560 --> 0:05:23.640 I used my Amiga, but if I wanted to do 0:05:23.680 --> 0:05:25.839 that using the old interface, I'd have to turn my 0:05:25.880 --> 0:05:30.200 computer off and turn the peripheral off, plug it in, 0:05:30.680 --> 0:05:32.880 and make sure that there was a terminator plugged into 0:05:32.880 --> 0:05:36.280 the external port on the Scuzzy device, and then turn 0:05:36.360 --> 0:05:39.120 them on. Now, with USB, you can go ahead, plug 0:05:39.120 --> 0:05:42.560 in your your you know, iPod, you can plug in whatever, 0:05:42.720 --> 0:05:45.880 your keyboard, mouse. You don't have to worry about whether 0:05:46.000 --> 0:05:48.000 or not it's gonna cause your computer to foul up, 0:05:48.080 --> 0:05:50.920 because it would using some of those older technologies. So 0:05:50.960 --> 0:05:54.800 this is very intuitive and and it's you know, you 0:05:54.800 --> 0:05:56.200 don't have to mess with it. You don't have to 0:05:56.200 --> 0:05:58.520 turn things off and worry about which one is in 0:05:58.600 --> 0:06:02.240 what order, and those there are problems that USB really 0:06:02.279 --> 0:06:05.120 made a difference in. It made it easier for manufacturers 0:06:05.120 --> 0:06:07.400 to come up with a single standard that they could 0:06:07.480 --> 0:06:11.640 use for PCs and MAX both. Right, Yeah, it was 0:06:11.680 --> 0:06:16.480 actually a wonderful development. Um. When you when you plug 0:06:16.560 --> 0:06:19.880 something into a USB board or when you turn on 0:06:19.880 --> 0:06:23.200 a computer and things are already plugged into those ports, uh, 0:06:23.240 --> 0:06:27.560 the computer goes through a process called enumeration, and in enumeration, 0:06:27.800 --> 0:06:30.839 it it checks all the different ports and it assigns 0:06:30.920 --> 0:06:34.479 an address to each device that is connected to the computer. 0:06:35.040 --> 0:06:36.880 And the same thing happens when you plug something in 0:06:37.000 --> 0:06:40.080 on the fly, and if the computer recognizes the device, 0:06:40.160 --> 0:06:42.920 it works right away. If it doesn't recognize the device, 0:06:42.960 --> 0:06:45.720 it might ask you for a driver, which you may 0:06:45.760 --> 0:06:48.080 have either on a disk or you may be able 0:06:48.080 --> 0:06:51.160 to download one off the web, and then you're ready 0:06:51.160 --> 0:06:53.919 to go. You can just plug it and play. That's 0:06:54.000 --> 0:06:58.240 the common turn of phrase, I guess for that. But uh, 0:06:59.000 --> 0:07:02.039 the other neat thing, as you can connect way more 0:07:02.160 --> 0:07:05.160 devices to your computer than you could if you had 0:07:05.200 --> 0:07:08.760 to depend on you know, individual plugs and ports, right, 0:07:09.320 --> 0:07:12.320 that's right. In fact, um, you can include up to 0:07:12.360 --> 0:07:18.680 a D twenty seven with USB. That's a lot of devices. Now, um, 0:07:18.720 --> 0:07:20.920 those of you who are listening probably caught the fact 0:07:20.960 --> 0:07:22.800 that I said printer for the Amiga and that would 0:07:22.800 --> 0:07:24.840 actually have been on the parallel port. So don't write 0:07:24.840 --> 0:07:27.040 in and tell me that. But say, um, say I 0:07:27.080 --> 0:07:29.840 did have a device I wanted to plug in via this, guys, 0:07:29.840 --> 0:07:32.760 report to Miamiga. See if you plug in a printer 0:07:33.480 --> 0:07:36.760 using USB on a modern computer PC or Mac, it's 0:07:36.800 --> 0:07:41.320 going to automatically assign, uh that a number from one 0:07:41.360 --> 0:07:45.760 to one seven, I guess um. On Miamiga, I would 0:07:45.760 --> 0:07:48.640 have had to have actually assigned a number on myself. 0:07:49.040 --> 0:07:51.040 So on the back of those devices there would be 0:07:51.040 --> 0:07:53.320 a little counter. It looks like those counters that you 0:07:53.440 --> 0:07:56.400 hand holding your hand when somebody's walking through the turnstiles 0:07:56.400 --> 0:07:58.480 and you're actually doing a manual count. So whenever a 0:07:58.480 --> 0:08:00.120 girl winks at me and I hit the little and 0:08:00.280 --> 0:08:04.840 that thing, yeah, that's the one. Uh. It's actually it's 0:08:04.840 --> 0:08:06.800 actually very much like that though. It has that that 0:08:06.920 --> 0:08:08.680 digit counter. So you plug it in and you have 0:08:08.720 --> 0:08:11.000 to assign it a number yourself from one to eight. 0:08:12.040 --> 0:08:17.400 So here again USB hundred twenty seven versus very you know, 0:08:17.480 --> 0:08:21.800 a manually assigned eight. So huge advantage. And I know 0:08:21.840 --> 0:08:24.360 what some of you are thinking. Some of you are thinking, 0:08:24.560 --> 0:08:28.320 how can I but Jonathan and Chris, my computer only 0:08:28.360 --> 0:08:31.920 has one or two USB ports? How could I possibly 0:08:31.960 --> 0:08:34.800 hook up as many as one and twenty seven devices? 0:08:35.480 --> 0:08:38.320 Well you couldn't directly, but if you used what we 0:08:38.400 --> 0:08:41.319 call hubs USB hubs, you could do that. In the 0:08:41.400 --> 0:08:44.680 hub essentially plugs into your computer and it divides that 0:08:44.960 --> 0:08:48.600 connection into further ports. Most of them are like four 0:08:48.720 --> 0:08:52.280 ports hubs, and but you can get eight or even more. 0:08:52.559 --> 0:08:56.520 You can find some that that divided into into larger numbers. 0:08:56.600 --> 0:09:00.320 And by hooking hubs to hubs, you then increase, you know, 0:09:00.400 --> 0:09:03.520 the number of ports that you can plug things into. Plus, 0:09:03.559 --> 0:09:08.079 some peripherals like keyboards sometimes have additional USB ports on them, 0:09:08.200 --> 0:09:10.640 or monitors if you're using a desktop computer, a lot 0:09:10.640 --> 0:09:13.800 of monitors now have additional USB ports plug into them, 0:09:13.800 --> 0:09:16.719 so you can use those. So yeah, just by by 0:09:16.840 --> 0:09:19.760 adding all these hubs you can you can connect tons 0:09:19.760 --> 0:09:22.520 and tons of devices to your computer. Uh. The other 0:09:22.600 --> 0:09:27.160 neat thing is that that that that devices can pull 0:09:27.200 --> 0:09:30.720 power from your computer. There are powered and unpowered devices. 0:09:31.000 --> 0:09:33.800 Uh the USB chord if you were to cut one open, 0:09:33.960 --> 0:09:37.719 don't do it, but if you were, you would find 0:09:37.760 --> 0:09:40.560 out that there are there was it. I think it's 0:09:40.600 --> 0:09:43.520 five wires in it or is it four? No, it's 0:09:43.559 --> 0:09:46.160 got it's got two wires for power and a twisted pair. 0:09:47.120 --> 0:09:50.319 It's more added five more for USB three. That's why 0:09:50.320 --> 0:09:53.320 I'm saying that's the thing um about that is that 0:09:53.400 --> 0:09:57.000 they had to change the wiring. Yeah. But USB two, 0:09:57.000 --> 0:09:59.800 which is the common standard right now, there are four 0:10:00.040 --> 0:10:02.760 wires within the cable. Uh so yeah, you've got you've 0:10:02.760 --> 0:10:06.600 got a pair that provides the transfer of data and 0:10:06.640 --> 0:10:08.840 then you have a pair that that's for the power. 0:10:08.880 --> 0:10:11.880 So you've got a power in the ground essentially. Um 0:10:11.960 --> 0:10:15.320 so the power right, and it's five volts. I know 0:10:15.400 --> 0:10:18.679 that five volts of power for USB two point oh 0:10:18.720 --> 0:10:21.559 and uh so yeah, you can you can actually power 0:10:21.559 --> 0:10:24.360 your devices. You can charge them through your computer. Um 0:10:24.400 --> 0:10:26.960 they're actually drawing power from your computer to the device. 0:10:27.520 --> 0:10:31.080 And uh and so you can get hubs that are 0:10:31.120 --> 0:10:33.760 powered as well. Um, where you would actually plug the 0:10:33.840 --> 0:10:36.120 hub in so that way you don't you know, overload 0:10:36.160 --> 0:10:39.800 your computer with a hundred twenty seven devices all trying 0:10:39.840 --> 0:10:43.160 to pull power from your poor little laptop or whatever 0:10:43.200 --> 0:10:45.640 you're using. Yeah, it depends on it depends on what 0:10:45.679 --> 0:10:48.680 you're doing. If you're plugging in a mouse, Um, it's 0:10:48.720 --> 0:10:51.280 going to draw a power from the computer. But if 0:10:51.280 --> 0:10:54.839 you're plugging in something more substantial, say a printer, that's 0:10:54.840 --> 0:10:57.439 not gonna be able to pull the power from the computer. 0:10:57.480 --> 0:10:59.320 It's going to need its own power. Now, in the 0:10:59.320 --> 0:11:01.680 case of a a printer, it's got its own power supply. 0:11:01.800 --> 0:11:03.960 You you plug it into the wall. But what say 0:11:04.000 --> 0:11:06.800 you have you know you're you're gonna work in garage, 0:11:06.840 --> 0:11:09.920 band or something else where you want to plug in 0:11:10.160 --> 0:11:15.640 a keyboard electronic music keyboard, not a typing keyboard. Um, 0:11:15.720 --> 0:11:18.640 you're gonna need another source of power. And if you 0:11:18.679 --> 0:11:20.600 have a powered hub that can that can help out 0:11:20.600 --> 0:11:25.960 with some of those sort of in between uh peripherals. Yeah, 0:11:26.280 --> 0:11:29.280 and um let's see what else can we talk about 0:11:29.360 --> 0:11:31.880 USB before we move on to FireWire and then USB 0:11:32.040 --> 0:11:34.360 three point Well, I was going to talk about how 0:11:35.160 --> 0:11:38.280 how far you can get away because USB cable can 0:11:38.320 --> 0:11:41.920 be about five meters from the source. Right, you can 0:11:41.960 --> 0:11:44.600 extend that a power to hub has that used too, 0:11:44.640 --> 0:11:47.400 because uh it can extend up to UM up to 0:11:47.440 --> 0:11:50.520 thirty meters away. Okay. And also we should point out, 0:11:50.559 --> 0:11:53.040 like we mentioned before, the computer acts as a host, 0:11:53.520 --> 0:11:58.000 so each device is ultimately connecting directly to the computer. UH. 0:11:58.040 --> 0:12:01.199 That's important for us to to note because even though 0:12:01.640 --> 0:12:05.000 the hub might provide a node or whatever you know, 0:12:05.160 --> 0:12:08.560 connect a further connection, but ultimately the device is interacting 0:12:08.559 --> 0:12:10.839 directly with the computer, not with other devices that are 0:12:10.880 --> 0:12:14.040 on your UM uh that are hooked up through the 0:12:14.120 --> 0:12:16.440 USB ports. That's important to note because when we talk 0:12:16.480 --> 0:12:20.360 about FireWire, things change, it's different. Um. But we should 0:12:20.360 --> 0:12:22.480 also talk about the speeds. That's true. I was going 0:12:22.520 --> 0:12:24.560 to say, this is the part at which we actually 0:12:24.559 --> 0:12:27.920 address the guts of the question. Right. So USB one 0:12:28.000 --> 0:12:31.520 point one when that came out, the speed of data 0:12:31.520 --> 0:12:34.719 transfer was around twelve megabits per second. Right, it's got 0:12:34.720 --> 0:12:37.880 two modes one point five and twelve megabits per second, 0:12:39.000 --> 0:12:42.920 pretty fast. But USB two point oh was four hundred 0:12:43.040 --> 0:12:46.079 eighty megabits per second, which is even faster, much faster 0:12:46.559 --> 0:12:50.480 now between USB one point one in USB two point 0:12:50.480 --> 0:12:53.480 oh that's when we saw the introduction of FireWire. That's true, 0:12:53.600 --> 0:12:56.400 Can I mention one more thing? Go ahead? Okay, So 0:12:56.480 --> 0:12:58.360 the other the other part of of this, and it 0:12:58.440 --> 0:13:00.880 sort of ties back into the hubs. I've got a 0:13:01.080 --> 0:13:03.720 USB one point one hub that I got from my 0:13:03.800 --> 0:13:06.240 very first iMac, and I have a brand new iMac 0:13:06.280 --> 0:13:08.920 that I got last fall. Well, now I don't have 0:13:09.000 --> 0:13:11.600 to replace that hub. But when I plug that hub 0:13:11.640 --> 0:13:14.440 into my computer and then I try to plug something 0:13:14.480 --> 0:13:18.360 else that has USB two as the standard, my computer 0:13:18.440 --> 0:13:21.880 immediately goes, hey, you know, since this is a one 0:13:21.920 --> 0:13:25.640 point one hub, I can't send for eighty megabits per 0:13:25.679 --> 0:13:27.959 second down this line. Are you sure you really want 0:13:28.000 --> 0:13:30.280 to do that? See, it works fine, It will transfer 0:13:30.360 --> 0:13:33.240 data fine, just at the speeds of one point one 0:13:33.280 --> 0:13:35.520 as opposed to point out exactly so, if you were 0:13:35.520 --> 0:13:37.520 going to try to plug in your iPod and sink 0:13:37.559 --> 0:13:40.520 it with your computer, it's not going to be able 0:13:40.520 --> 0:13:44.800 to transfer songs, movies, etcetera. Nearly as fast if you're 0:13:44.880 --> 0:13:48.199 throttling it by putting it through a one point one hub. 0:13:48.720 --> 0:13:52.000 But that's that's basically the difference. It doesn't render it inoperable, 0:13:52.000 --> 0:13:56.040 It just slows it right, it's it's backward compatible. So 0:13:56.200 --> 0:13:59.400 USB two point oh will work with USB one point 0:13:59.480 --> 0:14:03.600 one UM devices or cables, whatever, whichever one you're looking at. 0:14:03.640 --> 0:14:05.920 So if you've got a device that has that only 0:14:05.920 --> 0:14:08.400 works on USB one point one and you plug it 0:14:08.440 --> 0:14:10.800 into a port that's USB two point oh, you should 0:14:10.800 --> 0:14:12.760 still be okay, You're just gonna be going at that 0:14:12.880 --> 0:14:16.120 lower speed. Um. You know, for for it to go 0:14:16.160 --> 0:14:18.960 at the higher speed, everything needs to be ready, you know, 0:14:19.120 --> 0:14:23.720 capable of performing at the highest of the standards. So technically, 0:14:23.800 --> 0:14:25.800 right now, we could say that's USB three point oh, 0:14:25.920 --> 0:14:28.040 although you aren't going to find a lot of devices 0:14:28.040 --> 0:14:30.640 and or computers that can do that right now. But 0:14:30.760 --> 0:14:34.160 if you did have a USB three point oh capable 0:14:34.200 --> 0:14:39.120 computer chord and device, then you could transfer at the 0:14:39.160 --> 0:14:42.320 top speed. And you wanted to talk to talk about FireWire, 0:14:42.360 --> 0:14:44.720 which was actually in development around the same time as 0:14:44.840 --> 0:14:49.320 USB and supposed to be a solution to the same problem. Right, 0:14:49.560 --> 0:14:52.960 So we're talking. You know, there's certain devices that tend 0:14:53.000 --> 0:14:56.440 to create very large files that you may want to 0:14:56.440 --> 0:15:00.000 transfer to a computer at some point, and the obvious 0:15:00.000 --> 0:15:05.480 example of that is a camera, like exactly, so you're 0:15:05.520 --> 0:15:09.200 taking these pictures or you're taking video and this. These 0:15:09.200 --> 0:15:11.480 tend to generate very large file sizes and it could 0:15:11.480 --> 0:15:14.560 take a very long time to transfer if you're you know, 0:15:14.600 --> 0:15:17.960 if you have to do it through normal cables. So 0:15:18.440 --> 0:15:21.240 FireWire was one of those solutions. And UM, I believe 0:15:21.280 --> 0:15:23.920 Apple was behind the development of that, wasn't it. That's true, 0:15:23.960 --> 0:15:26.840 But they weren't alone. They had other people in there 0:15:26.840 --> 0:15:30.400 with him, including IBM. There you go. Um So, from 0:15:30.440 --> 0:15:32.680 from what I read anyway, so USB one point one 0:15:32.720 --> 0:15:36.080 comes out, that's one of the possible solutions to this problem. 0:15:36.200 --> 0:15:40.680 FireWire comes out shortly thereafter. FireWire had much faster speed 0:15:40.880 --> 0:15:43.160 than um us BE one point one, so we're looking 0:15:43.160 --> 0:15:45.120 at twelve megabits per second at the top speed for 0:15:45.200 --> 0:15:48.120 one point one. FireWire four hundred which was the first 0:15:48.120 --> 0:15:50.040 one to come out, and that was four hundred megabits 0:15:50.040 --> 0:15:54.400 per second. Wow, how aptly named? Yes, how do you 0:15:54.560 --> 0:15:58.760 what do you know? FireWire four hundred, um and FireWire 0:15:59.320 --> 0:16:02.240 shared a lot of other similarities with the USB. You 0:16:02.280 --> 0:16:05.080 could you could hook up many different devices to a computer, 0:16:05.320 --> 0:16:08.440 not as many as USB. USB was a D twenty seven, 0:16:08.720 --> 0:16:14.480 FireWire was sixty three. Another big difference is that unlike USB, 0:16:14.680 --> 0:16:17.520 where you had where each device was ultimately hooked to 0:16:17.680 --> 0:16:21.600 a computer, and FireWire you could hook to fireware devices 0:16:21.640 --> 0:16:24.680 to each other. And so it's the difference between a 0:16:24.880 --> 0:16:29.120 a host and client relationship and appear to peer relationship. 0:16:29.800 --> 0:16:33.640 So whereas you you could think of M A A, 0:16:34.200 --> 0:16:36.800 let's think of a think about like a USB hub 0:16:36.880 --> 0:16:40.320 as a bunch of spokes that all ultimately end at 0:16:40.320 --> 0:16:43.080 the computer on one end and on a device on 0:16:43.120 --> 0:16:47.120 the other end. Okay, so FireWire you could actually daisy 0:16:47.240 --> 0:16:50.120 chain the devices. You could hook one device to another 0:16:50.560 --> 0:16:52.920 and then with a second cable, hook that device to 0:16:53.000 --> 0:16:56.240 a third device, and then hook that device to say 0:16:56.280 --> 0:16:59.240 a computer, and all of these could transfer data back 0:16:59.280 --> 0:17:02.520 and forth, so you didn't have to have a whole 0:17:02.560 --> 0:17:04.880 bunch of direct connections going to the computer. That's another 0:17:04.880 --> 0:17:08.720 one of the big differences. UM and uh there. The 0:17:08.840 --> 0:17:12.359 cable was also slightly different. UM. It had six wires 0:17:12.359 --> 0:17:16.440 in it instead of four the FireWire cable had. UM 0:17:16.640 --> 0:17:20.240 had two for power and two twisted pair sets for 0:17:20.320 --> 0:17:23.399 data transfers instead of just the single twisted pair set 0:17:23.520 --> 0:17:29.440 for the USB had UM. So this was Apple really 0:17:29.440 --> 0:17:32.040 pushed this. This and put it in a lot of 0:17:32.040 --> 0:17:35.399 their products for a really long time, and then until 0:17:35.480 --> 0:17:38.880 just recently they started to kind of back off of it. Well, 0:17:38.880 --> 0:17:41.359 they still have it available on on a lot of 0:17:41.359 --> 0:17:44.560 the high end computers, but they're sort of backing off. 0:17:45.359 --> 0:17:48.280 And although they did come out with a second version 0:17:48.320 --> 0:17:51.120 of that called um, you know, you're never gonna get 0:17:51.160 --> 0:17:54.800 this FireWire eight. Wait, let me guess how fast it went? 0:17:55.640 --> 0:17:59.160 Eight hundred megabits per second. I can't put anything past you, yea, 0:18:00.000 --> 0:18:02.840 So yes, you know it's it's it's very efficient. Um, 0:18:02.920 --> 0:18:05.080 slightly different, the connector is a little different, but it 0:18:05.160 --> 0:18:07.919 is it does work essentially the same way and you know, 0:18:08.480 --> 0:18:11.560 just faster. So yeah, let's sea if we're looking at 0:18:11.560 --> 0:18:14.680 the timeline. Then USB one point one comes out, FireWire 0:18:14.680 --> 0:18:17.560 four hunter comes out, blows away the speed for USB 0:18:17.680 --> 0:18:20.520 one point one. USB two point oh comes out. It's 0:18:20.560 --> 0:18:24.440 actually a little faster than FireWire. FireWire a hundred comes out, 0:18:24.520 --> 0:18:27.080 and it's almost twice as fast as USB two point oh. 0:18:27.280 --> 0:18:31.399 So for competition, yeah, but then again, at this point 0:18:31.400 --> 0:18:36.440 you're dealing with USB and FireWire versus serial parallel, Scuzzy 0:18:36.760 --> 0:18:40.040 A d B, you know, all those other ports so 0:18:40.119 --> 0:18:43.720 now we're just down to two connectors, which is much nicer. Yeah, 0:18:43.760 --> 0:18:46.920 and really when you look at most computers, you're really 0:18:46.960 --> 0:18:50.000 done to one connector pretty much now because USB has 0:18:50.200 --> 0:18:53.840 essentially one this this format battle UM all but one it. 0:18:53.920 --> 0:18:57.159 I mean, there's still people who who work in video 0:18:57.920 --> 0:19:01.280 UM that prefer FireWire because a lot of video cameras 0:19:01.320 --> 0:19:05.399 that that's that's the the format they use. Well, Sony 0:19:05.560 --> 0:19:07.679 was a big proponent of it, but of course Apple 0:19:07.760 --> 0:19:11.240 owned the FireWire names, so Sony used eyelink or I 0:19:11.400 --> 0:19:13.959 got link um, you know, and a lot of other 0:19:14.000 --> 0:19:17.680 people called it by its standard name, which the Institute 0:19:17.720 --> 0:19:22.720 of Electrical and Electronics Engineers actually they use I triple 0:19:22.760 --> 0:19:26.320 E says it on the website. But yeah, I E. 0:19:28.119 --> 0:19:31.280 If you see that, that's FireWire, so um Yeah, very 0:19:31.359 --> 0:19:36.640 very popular with UM with video camera enthusiasts. But yeah, 0:19:36.680 --> 0:19:39.399 I think I think things are moving towards USB only 0:19:39.640 --> 0:19:44.240 or even Bluetooth. Now. There's still there's still some development 0:19:44.240 --> 0:19:46.560 on the FireWire front. I know that there there's a 0:19:46.560 --> 0:19:50.600 push to to pull out another yet another new standard 0:19:50.640 --> 0:19:54.359 for FireWire, which I think would transferred data an excess 0:19:54.480 --> 0:19:57.720 of six gigabits per second. That's funny. You should mention 0:19:57.800 --> 0:20:02.960 six gigabits this. Other people are are doing that too. Yeah, yeah, like, Um, 0:20:03.080 --> 0:20:07.280 the E S A T A transfer standard. Um, it's 0:20:07.320 --> 0:20:10.359 it's less popular than the other two, but it is 0:20:10.440 --> 0:20:13.960 probably the the last of the holdouts, I guess. Of 0:20:14.040 --> 0:20:16.359 course S A T A is a popular standard for 0:20:16.640 --> 0:20:20.399 internally mounting components on a computer. Um, but there is 0:20:20.440 --> 0:20:22.439 an external connector and you see you do see that 0:20:22.520 --> 0:20:26.119 on some pecs in different places. Um, but that the 0:20:26.440 --> 0:20:29.080 current standard for UH for S A T A is 0:20:29.359 --> 0:20:34.040 six gigabit per second. But USB three is approaching that. Yeah, 0:20:34.080 --> 0:20:37.640 it's not quite it's not. It's in four point eight 0:20:37.640 --> 0:20:40.720 gigabits per second, which if you look at the USB 0:20:40.800 --> 0:20:43.359 two point oh, that's ten times faster. I was going 0:20:43.400 --> 0:20:47.200 to say that falls into the nothing to sneeze at category. Yes, yes, 0:20:47.240 --> 0:20:49.159 if you were to sneeze it that you should be 0:20:49.200 --> 0:20:52.640 reprimanded exactly, for it is nothing to sneeze at. Yes, 0:20:52.680 --> 0:20:56.040 the USB three point oh sometimes people call it USB superspeed, 0:20:57.080 --> 0:21:01.119 And um, they've added five line, as I was saying 0:21:01.119 --> 0:21:03.480 earlier when I was fumbling around thinking was it four? 0:21:03.640 --> 0:21:06.399 Was it five? But they're not all copper anymore. No, 0:21:06.920 --> 0:21:11.240 there's fiber optics, and uh yeah, we're looking at UM 0:21:11.240 --> 0:21:13.400 we're looking at the potential for devices to be able 0:21:13.440 --> 0:21:17.800 to move data very very quickly. UM. Still, it's still 0:21:17.800 --> 0:21:21.399 one of those device host arrangements. The thing I like 0:21:21.440 --> 0:21:24.080 about FireWire is the idea of being able to share 0:21:24.119 --> 0:21:27.359 information between two separate devices without even bringing a computer 0:21:27.440 --> 0:21:31.400 into the picture. UM. I really do like that that capability. 0:21:32.040 --> 0:21:34.520 I don't tend to use anything that has FireWire in it. 0:21:34.720 --> 0:21:37.119 I just happened to think that's a that's a neat 0:21:37.960 --> 0:21:40.880 ability to have, UM, as opposed to having to use 0:21:40.920 --> 0:21:45.200 a computer as the middleman for all of your data transfers. UM. 0:21:45.280 --> 0:21:48.840 But I do think that USB has become pretty much 0:21:48.880 --> 0:21:52.800 the de facto standard across the industry, and so USB 0:21:52.880 --> 0:21:54.760 three point has got a good chance of being the 0:21:55.119 --> 0:21:59.920 standard for high speed data transfers between devices and your computers. 0:22:00.040 --> 0:22:04.200 So I'm looking forward to our USB overlords. UM. I'm 0:22:04.200 --> 0:22:08.000 sure I'll be using plenty of devices that use that standard. 0:22:08.160 --> 0:22:10.000 So I'm gonna hit you with a question that you 0:22:10.080 --> 0:22:14.240