Universal Serial Bus – USB characteristics and versions

The Universal Serial Bus (USB) is a method that allows to connect electronic peripheral devices to a computer. It is a fast serial bus and used in Personal Computers.

Characteristics of USB :

1. It is an external bus structure that supports data transfer rates of 12 Mbps.
2. A single USB port connects up to 127 peripheral devices.
3. USB supports hot plugging or insertion (ability to connect a device without turning the PC off) and Plug and Play (PnP).

USB versions :

1. USB 1X : released in 1996, standard data rates of 1.5 Mbps, need high speed throughput and much less bandwidth.
2. USB 2X: released in 2002, standard data rates of 480 Mbps, 40 times faster than USB 1X, need high speed throughput and much increased bandwidth.
3. USB 3x: released in 2013, standard data rate 5Gbps, 10 times faster than USB 2X.