E Pens Mobile Notes Pro 2

TechRadar Verdict

USB three.0 is already starting to show signs of hope. As presently as SSDs get commonplace, USB iii.0 will exist too

Pros

+
USB 3.0 and SATA 6Gbps
+
Skilful transfer speeds
+
Core i7 support

Cons

-
Needs SSD drives for maximum performance

You may have noticed that Intel has a new 'Rock Stars' marketing campaign on the get. It features product engineers who have a major impact on our computing lives but are largely unheralded in wider society. To Intel, these people are rock stars.

The beginning instalment features Ajay Bhatt, co-inventor of the USB interface. And ane can understand why Intel chose to kick off with USB. Information technology's the ultimate invisible technology, incredibly useful and successful to the indicate of utter ubiquity. However, information technology does take its limitations.

Speeding upward life

Over the last year, ane such limitation has been bandwidth. With ever faster solid land drives appearing on a seemingly daily basis, it's becoming obvious that USB needs a refresh.

For instance, the gap between drive performance via USB and that of a dedicated storage I/O such as SATA is enormous. Fortunately, at that place'due south a solution in paw with the arrival of new standard USB 3.0.

The large news, of course, is increased information rates. USB 3.0 ups the ante to a quite astonishing 4.8Gbps. To put that figure into context, the USB 1.0 specification allowed for just 1.5Mbps. That grew to 12Mbps with USB i.1 and and so to 480Mbps with the arrival of 2.0.

Crucially, astern compatibility was maintained throughout. However, existent-world USB data rates tend to be rather less than the advertised maximum.

USB 2.0 peripherals, for instance, have a theoretical maximum of 60MB/s but rarely breach 35MB/s in practice. Even so, if USB iii.0 can evangelize 300MB/due south or more than, that will be enough to do justice to even the fastest SSDs for some hereafter.

Indeed, to understand just how big an impact USB 3.0 will take, consider this. Currently, backing upward a 1TB hard disk via USB consumes around 5 hours. With USB 3.0, it should be possible in effectually xxx minutes. That's the divergence between squeezing your backups in at the end of the day and the need for careful planning.

Our first taste of USB three.0 comes courtesy of Asus' 7P55D-E Pro, an updated version of its popular Intel P55 motherboard that'due south compatible with Core i5 and Core i7 processors in LGA 1,156 trim.

USB 3.0 support is achieved via NEC's 720200 – a defended controller that connects to the P55's PCH chip via PCI Express. The kicker is that the 7P55D-E Pro besides packs a SATA 6Gbps I/O interface.

Combined with USB 3.0, this gives you every chance of maximising bulldoze-todrive performance.

Fourth dimension to upgrade?

Exciting stuff, but equally ever, there are a few caveats. Importantly, performance will only exist as good as the drives you use. There's niggling signal in upgrading to USB 3.0 while retaining ancient hard disks.

Too remember that you'll need an finish-to-finish solution. In other words, both your PC and the plug-in peripheral in question must fully support USB 3.0. Currently, that tin exist difficult to achieve due to the scarcity of hardware.Information technology's very early days for the technology.

The last part of our exam parcel is an Asus USB drive enclosure that again combines an external USB three.0 interface with internal SATA 6Gbps I/O. It'southward an early technology sample rather than a fully finalised product, but in performance terms it's representative of what you tin expect.

All of which leaves the virtually important question of all. Does USB 3.0 deliver?

With a conventional magnetic disk installed, we measured sustained read and write rates of around 100MB/s. That'southward very much in line with the maximum performance of the hard drive itself and further underlines the importance of underlying disk or SSD functioning for USB three.0.

Handily, the 7P55D-E Pro board sports both USB iii.0 and legacy two.0 ports, allowing a direct comparison to exist made. With the same drive and enclosure connected via USB 2.0, the read/ write rates dropped to 30MB/s and 25MB/south respectively.

Even with a conventional magnetic hard bulldoze, therefore, USB 3.0 delivers over three times the throughput of USB 2.0. Drop a speedy SSD into the enclosure and functioning will only meliorate.

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