Usb 3.0

GeneO · 01 Feb 2011

whs said:

I don't understand the whole discussion. Whether you have USB1, 2, 3 , or 99, the channel (attachment) cannot transmit the data any faster than the disk feeds it. USB3 is a LOT faster than any spinning disk around. You have to check the specs of the disk to get the story. And also be sure you always talk in the same currency - Mb/sec versus MB/sec - that is appr. 1:10.

We aren't saying anything different. Hard Disk Drives speeds are the limit, not USB 3.0, SATA II or SATA III. The only technology that can exceed these protocols is higher-end Solid State Disk drives.

The OP should be seeing HDD transfer speeds from his USB 3.0 drive, depending on the capabilities of the other end of the transfer.

Mitaek · 01 Feb 2011

whs,

I stand corrected, my reference should be to Megabytes/second (MB/s).

Night Hawk · 01 Feb 2011

The ATA hardware limitations is what WHS is referring to there. The speed you see listed for 3.0 is the maximum you could see not the actual in use speed.

A Sata III drive for example in an external enclosure would be the preferred over any Sata II drive with that seeing the 6gb over 3gb capability but still not end up seeing more then what the usb bus supports. The transfer rate is rated twice as fast as Sata II.

The SSDs are obviously fastter but will still be limited by the bus if the speeds exceed that. But external drives are not sold with performance in mind but typically see the more energy saving model drives in use there. For WD that would be a Green Power model over a Caviar Blue or Black edition performance model.

whs · 01 Feb 2011

sygnus21 said:

whs said:

I don't understand the whole discussion. Whether you have USB1, 2, 3 , or 99, the channel (attachment) cannot transmit the data any faster than the disk feeds it. USB3 is a LOT faster than any spinning disk around. You have to check the specs of the disk to get the story. And also be sure you always talk in the same currency - Mb/sec versus MB/sec - that is appr. 1:10.

I believe they already have some USB 3.0 devices released. With that, the speeds should be faster than what the OP is getting. That's his point.

I think we're losing sight of his issue.

Again, the OP needs to check his drivers, and check the owner's manual for the board.

My two cents.

Sygnus, I do not dispute that. But the USB disks are no faster than any other disk. They just have a USB3 controller. If you put any old disk into a USB3 enclosure, you have the same effect - but that does not make the disk any faster.

And the transfer rate will vary very much depending whether it is streaming adjacent records or whether the records are dispersed all over the disk. In addition, there is a big difference depending on record size. So a lot of factors that do not neccessarily have anything to do with USB3.

GeneO · 01 Feb 2011

Night Hawk said:

The ATA hardware limitations is what WHS is referring to there. The speed you see listed for 3.0 is the maximum you could see not the actual in use speed.

A Sata III drive for example in an external enclosure would be the preferred over any Sata II drive with that seeing the 6gb over 3gb capability but still not end up seeing more then what the usb bus supports. The transfer rate is rated twice as fast as Sata II.

The SSDs are obviously fastter but will still be limited by the bus if the speeds exceed that. But external drives are not sold with performance in mind but typically see the more energy saving model drives in use there. For WD that would be a Green Power model over a Caviar Blue or Black edition performance model.

There is absolutely no reason to prefer a SATA III drive over a SATA II drive. Transfer rates for Hard Disk Drives will be the same for SATA II or SATA III interfaces. Either protocol can handle the rates of current and future Hard Disk drives, whether it is an external or internal enclosure.

Simply staed: HDD transfer rates are slower than either SATA II or SATA III. The only reason to prefer SATA III over SATA II is for SSD drives, which can outperform SATA II rates, unlike HDD which don't. In any case USB 3.0 will be the limiting factor in that case, so again - no reason to prefer SATA III over II for an external drive.

sygnus21 · 02 Feb 2011

whs said:

Sygnus, I do not dispute that. But the USB disks are no faster than any other disk. They just have a USB3 controller. If you put any old disk into a USB3 enclosure, you have the same effect - but that does not make the disk any faster.

And the transfer rate will vary very much depending whether it is streaming adjacent records or whether the records are dispersed all over the disk. In addition, there is a big difference depending on record size. So a lot of factors that do not neccessarily have anything to do with USB3.

I don't diagree with your points as well. The OP isn't going to see blazing speeds, but I'm thinking he should see something better than what he's getting. However there are other factors to consider, cables, setup, driver.

Now to be quite honest I don't even have any 3.0 devices to check my USB 3.0 speeds so I can't really say what to expect.

And a question I have would be: are there special cables required for USB 3.0? I don't know, to be honest I haven't researched even though my board supports 3.0. I know my HAF X case came with special cables for the USB 3.0 front headers, but....

Anyway you guys have some good points I just think we're getting too technical here as opposed to providing the OP an answer. Again, no he's not going to see balzing speeds, but is the speeds he's getting now to low? I think that's the issue.

I myself can't answer that.

Night Hawk · 02 Feb 2011

GeneO said:

Night Hawk said:

The ATA hardware limitations is what WHS is referring to there. The speed you see listed for 3.0 is the maximum you could see not the actual in use speed.

A Sata III drive for example in an external enclosure would be the preferred over any Sata II drive with that seeing the 6gb over 3gb capability but still not end up seeing more then what the usb bus supports. The transfer rate is rated twice as fast as Sata II.

The SSDs are obviously fastter but will still be limited by the bus if the speeds exceed that. But external drives are not sold with performance in mind but typically see the more energy saving model drives in use there. For WD that would be a Green Power model over a Caviar Blue or Black edition performance model.

There is absolutely no reason to prefer a SATA III drive over a SATA II drive. Transfer rates for Hard Disk Drives will be the same for SATA II or SATA III interfaces. Either protocol can handle the rates of current and future Hard Disk drives, whether it is an external or internal enclosure.

Simply staed: HDD transfer rates are slower than either SATA II or SATA III. The only reason to prefer SATA III over SATA II is for SSD drives, which can outperform SATA II rates, unlike HDD which don't. In any case USB 3.0 will be the limiting factor in that case, so again - no reason to prefer SATA III over II for an external drive.

Well I can tell you a little story on that one. When first putting this case together 7 went onto one of the Sata III drives until the memory was found incorrect forcing a new clean install on one of the Sata II drives instead. Note the Sata IIIs were plugged into the S3 ports.

What big difference was seen with 7 during the first install and later on the present host/boot drive? NONE!

What does that mean? The faster bus "allows at times" faster transfer/access times when all conditions are met. Ideal speed with ideal conditions met.

As for hard drives they are still limited by the ATA contraints of that standard. And of course one reason why people are looking a lot at SSDs being solid state over physical platters to surpass the physical limitations seen with the ATA 100/133 standard.

whs · 02 Feb 2011

Sygnus, The USB3 cable seems to be sturdier than the USB2 cable - at least the one I have. That would suggest a bigger diameter. My tests showed a 30% faster speed with /3 over /2 when making an image of 20GBs. And that was with a 5400 RPM HDD that I recovered from my laptop when I installed the SSD.

HDD transfer rates are slower than either SATA II or SATA III.

GeneO, this is not quite correct. Transfer rates of spinning disks go to 80MB/sec and even higher - that corresponds to appr. 800Mb/sec. The USB2 can only transfer 480 Mb/sec maximum. So in that case the disk can "deliver" faster (best case) than the USB2 attachment can transport.

Night Hawk, access time is a function of the disk (speed of the arm and rotation speed) - the attachment does not do anything for that.

GeneO · 02 Feb 2011

sygnus21 said:

whs said:

Sygnus, I do not dispute that. But the USB disks are no faster than any other disk. They just have a USB3 controller. If you put any old disk into a USB3 enclosure, you have the same effect - but that does not make the disk any faster.

And the transfer rate will vary very much depending whether it is streaming adjacent records or whether the records are dispersed all over the disk. In addition, there is a big difference depending on record size. So a lot of factors that do not neccessarily have anything to do with USB3.

I don't diagree with your points as well. The OP isn't going to see blazing speeds, but I'm thinking he should see something better than what he's getting. However there are other factors to consider, cables, setup, driver.

Now to be quite honest I don't even have any 3.0 devices to check my USB 3.0 speeds so I can't really say what to expect.

And a question I have would be: are there special cables required for USB 3.0? I don't know, to be honest I haven't researched even though my board supports 3.0. I know my HAF X case came with special cables for the USB 3.0 front headers, but....

Anyway you guys have some good points I just think we're getting too technical here as opposed to providing the OP an answer. Again, no he's not going to see balzing speeds, but is the speeds he's getting now to low? I think that's the issue.

I myself can't answer that.

The answer to the OP has to be technical, sorry this is a technical forum. Yes, the speed the OP is reporting is way less than USB 2.0 speeds let alone USB 3.0.

GeneO · 02 Feb 2011

whs said:

Sygnus, The USB3 cable seems to be sturdier than the USB2 cable - at least the one I have. That would suggest a bigger diameter. My tests showed a 30% faster speed with /3 over /2 when making an image of 20GBs. And that was with a 5400 RPM HDD that I recovered from my laptop when I installed the SSD.

HDD transfer rates are slower than either SATA II or SATA III.

GeneO, this is not quite correct. Transfer rates of spinning disks go to 80GB/sec and even higher - that corresponds to appr. 800Gb/sec. The USB2 can only transfer 480 Gb/sec maximum. So in that case the disk can "deliver" faster than the USB2 attachment can transport.

Night Hawk, access time is a function of the disk - the attachment does not do anything for that.

Why are you talking USB 2.0? This is a USB 3.0 interface, which should exceed 150 MB/s. HDD drives nowadays are in excess of 90 MB//s (I assume you meant 80 MB/s and not 80 GB/s like you typed). This is much less than USB 3.0 speed.