Gadgetory

you know what really overcooks my pasta when groups of seemingly very smart people in positions of power in the tech world build this really cool technology then when it's finally time to bring it to market come up with naming schemes for it that make no sense the worst and yes that's right I am looking at you USB forum and for you guys specifically what really confuses me is that you went over to the dark side after a long history of making things actually pretty simple and straightforward so we started out with USB one then we got 1.1 which was a minor revision to one cool then we got USB 2.0 which was much faster then we got USB 3.0 which was much faster again so then it wasn't until around 2013 that things started getting a little weird you see the original USB 3.0 spec had a max theoretical speed of five gigabits per second so you would think that the next revision which doubled that speed to ten gigabit would be USB 4.0 right wrong instead what we got was USB 3.1 but honestly it was even okay with that I mean one is clearly a larger number than zero and I guess it wasn't a fundamental redesign of the spec or anything no no the issue is that at the same time they also renamed the original USB 3.0 spec as USB 3.1 gen2 new ten gigabit spec USB 3.1 gen2 I mean how do you just rename something after the fact dear are you shampoo do you think that makes it seem new and cool now now improved but it's the old one but you're also releasing a new one that is improved why and in fairness yeah it's been done before but still then making matters worse we've just gotten a they're doubling in speed to 20 gigabits per second why am i mad how the extra speeds a good thing right the reason is that the USB forum has given us an even worse nonsensical naming twist so bear with me here the original USB 3.0 five gigabit spec is now USB 3.2 gen one with the 10 gigabit version becoming USB 3.2 gen - which okay so by this moon logic then the 20 gigabit variation would be USB 3.2 Gen 3 right no because the USB 3.2 spec just involves adding more lanes to the connection so the 20 gigabit version is USB 3.2 Gen 2 by 2 with the by 2 indicating that there are two data lanes instead of just one the US beef so the USB forum whose marketing department clearly isn't much better at naming things than the engineers has then gone and recommended the names super speed super speed USB 10 gigabit per second and super speed USB 20 gigabit per second to differentiate the products on store shelves now to be fair to the USB forum the method behind their madness seems to be to have the naming scheme reflect how many lanes can be used in each revision and I do get that when they transitioned from USB 2.0 to 3.0 part of the rationale for a big number change was that there were physical differences with the connectors which is not the case for the various USB 3 revisions the problem though is that Jenn is generation it means time you can't just rename a generation a later generation that's not how it works my my great-grandpa doesn't become my dad later furthermore USB 3.0 was backwards compatible with USB 2 we know connectors anyway and more importantly app than all of this is that consumers don't care about things like the configuration of data lanes and exactly how the pins and the traces on their motherboard are laid out they just want to know if the gadget they're buying is gonna work with their gear and how fast it's going to be I mean PCI Express has this sort of thing figured out now to be clear there are some very complicated sub elements of the PCIe specification like like hot plug support that are optional on certain revisions and then required on others etc etc etc but from a consumer standpoint when there's a speed boost the version number goes up by one and that's basically it and even though the various revisions of PCI Express are all backwards and forwards compatible with each other the folks in charge haven't felt the need to mess around with silly rebranding to make the point that it all works together it's all called PCI Express it's all called USB Tata but alas this is the system we have so if you're going to be in the market for a USB gadget anytime soon I would recommend paying really close attention to this chart that we created for your convenience or better yet print it out and keep a copy in your wallet like I do so that you two can be the life of the party whenever the subject changes to something lame like this all right so that's it if you'll excuse me now I need to go have a word with Intel about how they decide on names for their processors as well be right back and the back ah no matter what your routine is our sponsor for today's episode Dollar Shave Club has everything you need to look feel and even smell your best they've got shower products they've got oral care products they've got hair products skin products bobwhite products and obviously shaving products and they deliver them straight to your door basically if you have a body they've got you covered and right now they've got a great offer where you can get their shave shower or oral starter set each for only five bucks the shave starter set comes with the executive razor and a three ounce tube of their dr. 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