USB3 - worth the wait?

I have a Presonus Firestudio,  they made a very very stoopid mistake with the last but one driver upgrade (the one that gave Win7 support) but that's all fixed now and it works like a charm.

As with most FW interfaces it is best to use a TI chipset in your PC, but that is a FW problem and not Presonuseses fault.

Are there any USB3 audio interfaces yet?

USB interfaces work great as long as the drivers are good. Case in point... the V-Studio 700 system is USB and it runs very nicely.

No, you don't need a new computer to add USB 3 to your system. You can get a PCI-e interface card.

Scott

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Thanks for responses. Good to know its just a matter of plugging into a pci-e slot. That might just make it worth the wait. From what I read it should be much faster than FW (even 800). Just a matter of how quickly the manufacturers will move to support it. FWIW Karyn, I DON'T have a TI chipset on my FW card (I know that is heresy) but it actually works fine, absolutely rock solid, never crashes, no snaps, crackles or pops! I think I am maybe just lucky, and maybe I just don't stress it out that much, but surprisingly, I have never had a problem with it.

Karyn


I have a Presonus Firestudio,  they made a very very stoopid mistake with the last but one driver upgrade (the one that gave Win7 support) but that's all fixed now and it works like a charm.

As with most FW interfaces it is best to use a TI chipset in your PC, but that is a FW problem and not Presonuseses fault.

Are there any USB3 audio interfaces yet?

What is a TI chipset? What's the problem if you dont?

How/ where do I get this....TI chipset? How do I install it? Can it be installed on Windows 7 64bit? Do I have to disable any other chipset before I install it?

Don't judge me by my post count! All those posts were for asking questions as dumb as the ones in this post!

EDIT: My computer already has the Texas I chipset  :O

Ok...back to you

But Legion...I already said that I do have TI on my computer...

In another thread I asked if USB 3 will be forthcoming in audio interfaces as it's now showing up on new all the new MoBos. The word from "those who seem to know" was that it will make little if no difference to an audio interface.
I was told that data transfer speed is not an issue with an audio interface. If this information is wrong let the debate begin :/

USB (v1) was designed as a simple to use replacement for RS232 (serial) and printer (parallel) ports. It was possible to send audio data through USB but it took a lot of your CPU time as everything was controlled by the driver software.  Also, the slow data rate meant the number of audio channels was severly limited.

FW was specifically desgined to pass audio and video data in real time.  The hard work is done by the chipset and NOT by your CPU, thus freeing up your computer to do usefull work, like running Sonar. In increased data speed required to handle live video also meant a big increase in the number of audio channels that could be transfered.
Because the fw chipset is doing all of the data handling it becomes the limiting factor in performance. As with all pieces of hardware, some manufacturers are better than others and for audio transfer (read audio interfaces that we use) Texas Instruments produce the most reliable/efficient chipsets.

USB v2 is a faster version of USB v1.  The data transfer speed is roughly equivalent to FW and should in theory give similar performance.  HOWEVER, as with USB v1 the data handling and control is done by the software driver, and thus your CPU.  Any load on your CPU that takes time away from the audio driver process will leave you with missing data and thus, spikes, pops, clicks, etc...
A well written driver will give performance just as good as FW however.

The thing to note here is that both USB2 and FW are plenty fast enough to cope with all the audio we currently want to throw at them.  Then whatever the limit is, FW800 doubles it...

The limiting factor currently is not the speed of the connection, but the random limit built into the hardware/software by the manufacturers.

EG.  Presonus Firestudio range has a unified driver (same driver for all the hardware). It allows you to chain multiple devices, but to a limit of 52 inputs/outputs.  Why?  I can plug in multiple FW controler cards in my PC so bandwidth is not a problem, Why the restriction to 52 I/O channels?
I'm not saying I need/want more than that, but others do...


USB3 will not gain you anything over what we already have for audio.  Your external HHDs will work faster, but that's about it.


Sorry this turned into a bit of a rant...  I'm having a bad day.

I read this post. Most people use the computer they bought over a year, then obviously it's a great thing with usb third is stupid to say otherwise. Is now a stumbling block. USB 3 will be the norm in the future and would be good to have. I need a computer, so I buy what is available now, it's like all the should I wait for Apple's next update. The answer is always buy now, if you need it but wait.

I’ve heard that one reason USB 3 isn’t showing up on Intel products is because Intel are developing Light Peak. Supposedly up to 100 times faster from what I read a couple of weeks ago. They might have it available sometime in 2011. This would certainly leave USB 3 in the dust.