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Forums - PC - What will USB 3.0 mean for gaming...

heruamon on 14 January 2009
bardicverse said:

The problem with USB 3.0 is that there is a new Firewire spec RIGHT around the corner that is even faster than USB 3.0. So before it exists, USB 3.0 is already obsolete.

 

edit - nm. apparently the 3.0 throughput is still higher,  or at least has the potential for such. Most USB doesnt reach its max throughput. FW 3200 will allow for 3.2 ghz even on older FW hardware.

Huh???  USB is far more widely supported, and do you have some links to the expected firewire specs?

 



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TheGuardianFID on 14 January 2009
heruamon said:
Finnbar said:
NO moveing parts! I often wondered why movies ans such already didnt do this? just cuz it was to slow to transfer the data? or discs are just really really cheap in compaison?

 

Part of it is cost, as disc are much older tech than flash memory, but part of it is also people sticking with what they have already got!  Disc work just fine, currently, so why go mess with a good thing...unless you have something much better to lower cost.  Cheaper packaging is such a cost driver, and as noteed in this article flash prices are tumbling fast:

http://arstechnica.com/journals/apple.ars/2008/11/05/dropping-flash-memory-prices-may-help-apple-bottom-line

I'm waiting for apple to stop shafting people and see them launch a 64gb ipod touch, to replace my 160gb ipod, so as more and more devices rely on flash, the prices will tumble, so that by 2010, 32gb of flash will be dirt cheap, and that would be sufficient to hold most games.  also...if your game needs more space, you just put it on a bigger drive, no added equipment cost.  no moving parts, less energy, less heat, etc etc...flash is the way to go.

Very interesting, there are some great posibilities, the speed of 3.0 sounds awesome!!!

 



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NJ5 on 14 January 2009

I wouldn't mind a console with downloadable titles, possibly downloaded to a USB drive.

However, shipping games on USB drives is not gonna happen. That's way too expensive and it will likely stil be that way when the next generation starts.



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shams on 14 January 2009

USB medium is too expensive for games. Carts (DS) are much, much cheaper - as the data is ROM, not writable.

Its definitely making hard disks and disc based devices obsolete though - I love my 16Gig USB II key - only $40AU (about 6 months ago). Yes, thats 3 'raw' DVD discs - or about 20 movies.

Give me a reliable 1TB USB3.0 key... and I'll be done for good!



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Spankey on 14 January 2009

That is fast!
But isn't that max theoretical 5gbs throughput faster than most most current drives can physically write? huge bottlenecks appear...


http://www.interfacebus.com/PC_HardDrive_Throughput.html

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NJ5 on 14 January 2009
shams said:
USB medium is too expensive for games. Carts (DS) are much, much cheaper - as the data is ROM, not writable.

Its definitely making hard disks and disc based devices obsolete though - I love my 16Gig USB II key - only $40AU (about 6 months ago). Yes, thats 3 'raw' DVD discs - or about 20 movies.

Give me a reliable 1TB USB3.0 key... and I'll be done for good!

Even for the DS kind of format, an important consideration is size. What's the biggest DS game size? It's fine for portables since they don't require a lot of data (lower resolution assets), but for console games it doesn't look appropriate.

 



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drpunk on 14 January 2009

Lots of cross information going on here.

Like, all we're really talking about is data throughput. As in I've got a big buffer of info here, I need to get it in that big bugger over there, how long's it gonna take?

What medium that data is on is irrelevant to this discussion really.



NJ5 on 14 January 2009
drpunk said:
Lots of cross information going on here.

Like, all we're really talking about is data throughput. As in I've got a big buffer of info here, I need to get it in that big bugger over there, how long's it gonna take?

What medium that data is on is irrelevant to this discussion really.


Latency is also important, and it's the biggest problem with optical media (seek times).

 



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Spankey on 14 January 2009
drpunk said:
Lots of cross information going on here.

Like, all we're really talking about is data throughput. As in I've got a big buffer of info here, I need to get it in that big bugger over there, how long's it gonna take?

What medium that data is on is irrelevant to this discussion really.

 

I think it is relevant though.

If you have a standard magnetic platter SATAII drive (throughput 300mbs) connected to another SATAII drive over a USB3 (throughput 5gbs) bus, whats the point of all that throughput if it can't be used?

Even if the drives were USB3 native, the platters and heads couldn't possibly keep up, could they?

stringing multiple devices together is where it will shine imo, not on device-device transfers at least for the near future



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vlad321 on 14 January 2009

I've been sayinig this for months now. Flash is the next REAL distribution medium, not DVD 1.5, ....errrr Blu-Ray. I'm predicting that by 2015 we'll be using SSD Hard Drives and people will be able to use the full capability of the 4.8 gig data transfer speed. The only reason it will be 2015 is because the drives are still too expensive to replace the old tech, but just give it time.



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