Edison’s revenge

[platinumsword]

The humble USB cable is part of an electrical revolution. It will make power supplies greener and cheaper

FIDDLY cables, incompatible plugs and sockets, and the many adaptors needed to fit them all together used to be the travellers’ bane. But the USB (Universal Serial Bus) has simplified their life. Most phones and other small gadgets can charge from a simple USB cable plugged into a computer or an adaptor. Some 10 billion of them are already in use. Hotel rooms, aircraft seats, cars and new buildings increasingly come with USB sockets as a standard electrical fitting.

Now a much bigger change is looming. From 2014, a USB cable will be able to provide power to bigger electronic devices. In the long term this could change the way homes and offices use electricity, cutting costs and improving efficiency.

Link: http://www.economist.com/news/international/21588104-humble-usb-cable-part-electrical-revolution-it-will-make-power-supplies

[olyteddy]

Why Nikola Tesla was the greatest geek who ever lived - The Oatmeal

[Kenshin]

Terms like “internet of things” and “bring your own devices” sound awkward and ugly.

The shift comes just in time for the “internet of things”—the idea that devices and gadgets can talk intelligently and automatically to each other online. That will mean many millions of new bits of equipment, all needing their own power supply and means of communication. The new USB standard provides both.

[ChristineBCW]

I remember the first mythical incantations about USB 1.0 - “T-connectors, so you’ll only need one cable from your computer to all devices.”

And for the inventor’s so-called “latest dream - to make the connector flippable” - du-uh - that’s called “round”. Like a stereo-plug with bands at certain intervals for different channels or signals.

Apparently, this is a massive quandry for an engineer.

[lee321987]

Are they suggesting we may one day get DC from our power companies?

[Aliraza153]

Unfortunately, I don’t have a USB3 SSD to test, but based on the flash drive test, the newer chipset appears to perform better with random 4K operations. By looking at the HDD result, the newer chipset also appears to perform a little better with sequential write performance.