Learn about wireless networks, Internet and general computer networking solutions

Wednesday, July 9, 2008

Universal Serial Bus (USB)

Short for Universal Serial Bus, USB is a standard that was introduced in 1995 by Intel, Compaq, Microsoft and several other IT computer companies. USB 1.x is an external bus standard that supports data transfer rates of 12 Mbps and is capable of supporting up to 127 peripheral devices. The image to the right is an example of a USB device, the SMC EZ Connect Wireless Bluetooth adapter adds Bluetooth connectivity for your computer.


Universal Serial Bus (USB) is a serial bus standard to interface devices. USB was designed to allow many peripherals to be connected using a single standardized interface socket and to improve the plug-and-play capabilities by allowing devices to be connected and disconnected without rebooting the computer (hot swapping). Other convenient features include providing power to low-consumption devices without the need for an external power supply and allowing many devices to be used without requiring manufacturer specific, individual device drivers to be installed.

USB is intended to help retire all legacy varieties of serial and parallel ports. USB can connect computer peripherals such as computer mouse, keyboards, PDAs, gamepads and joysticks, scanners, digital cameras, printers, personal media players, and flash drives. For many of those devices USB has become the standard connection method. USB was originally designed for personal computers, but it has become commonplace on other devices such as PDAs and video game consoles. As of 2008, there are about 2 billion USB devices in the world.

0 comments: