Advancing standards in USB technology

This may seem like a trivial feature but, like air conditioning in cars, once you’ve had it, you never want to be without it. Ask anyone who has experienced the joy of Apple’s vertically symmetrical Lightning connector, introduced with the iPhone 5. Little things mean a lot, especially when they remove big irritations. And the USB connector is even better, it produces a little audible click when it’s properly seated, something that’s missing from the Lightning connector.

Usblyzer.com gives a detailed history of the development of USB connectivity. It’s easy to forget USB technology was really the start of plug-and-play for computers and peripherals. Before its introduction, connecting anything to a PC involved a level of hardware and software expertise that generally resulted in a call to the company IT specialist.

An alliance of Compaq, DEC, IBM, Intel, Microsoft, NEC and Nortel was formed to develop the USB standard in 1995. USB connectivity then developed in three main ways: different form factors to suit different applications (think printers, digital cameras, etc.), higher speed data transfer, and higher current carrying capacity, primarily a consideration for battery charging.

The original USB spec boasted a low-speed transfer rate of 1.5Mbit/s and full-speed rate of 12Mbit/s. The USB 2.0 spec, released in 2000, saw the addition of a high-speed rate of 480Mbps, which effectively headed off a challenge by IEEE1394, Apple’s FireWire. USB 3.0, announced in 2008, saw a further 10-fold leap in data rates, which rose to 4.8Gbit/s.

While there’s no definitive answer to how many USB connections are out there today, this presentation from the 2008 USB Developers Conference suggested an installed base of 6bn units at that time, growing at over 2bn units per annum. That would mean some 16bn connections exist now. It makes USB the most successful interface in the history of computing with more than two connections for every person on the planet.

The key drivers of this success were the initial standardisation and consolidation, the ability to hot-swap without having to re-boot your PC each time you connected a new device, expandability (whereby, in theory, 127 different devices can be connected to a single USB port simultaneously), elimination of the need for a separate power connection in many instances, some degree of backwards compatibility as the standard has evolved, low cost, and ease of use.

The USB Type-C connector looks like a Micro USB one but it’s just a little bigger at 8.3 by 2.5mm. Its introduction is timely - the SupersSpeed USB 3.1, 10Gbp/s spec was announced in 2013. To put things into context, at 10Gbp/s, a 25GB HD movie can be transferred in around 35 seconds. With the old USB 1.0, the process would take 9.3 hours.

Products featuring the new USB 3.1 standard are now starting to emerge, with Apple first to launch with the new standard in March 2015 on its 12" MacBook Air model.

The USB technology story is a remarkable one. It demonstrates clearly the benefits of collaboration between companies in consumer electronics, particularly when the alliance extends to silicon chip manufacturers too. And it shows just how successful something as fundamental as a connectivity system can become when the foundation of its design is making life easier for users. The USB Type-C connector is going to be one more positive step in that direction, whichever way you look at it.

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