USB remains king of PC and peripheral interfaces

MARCH 21--The Universal Serial Bus (USB) will continue its reign as the most successful interface in the history of PCs, with USB 2.0 completely penetrating the PC market over the next two to three years and PC peripherals and consumer electronics following closely behind, according to In-Stat/MDR (www.instat.com). The high-tech market-research firm reports that, as availability of bandwidth becomes increasingly important, USB 2.0 (capable of 40 times the speed of USB 1.1) is poised to successfully succeed the first generation USB standard, experiencing a 220% compound annual growth rate from 2001 to 2006.

"USB has definitely conquered the PC and peripherals markets since its introduction in 1996," says Brian O'Rourke, a senior analyst with In-Stat/MDR. "Today, USB connections can be found in a range of devices, from PC cameras to scanners, printers, digital camcorders, and digital modems." PCs will adopt the new 2.0 standard quickly and those enabled with USB 2.0 host controllers will be seen on the market in large numbers in the first half of 2002. PCs with USB 2.0 integrated into the core logic chip set will come to market in the second half of 2002. Those devices which require higher speeds, such as external hard drives and external optical drives, should also adopt the new standard quickly, with significant numbers of these devices coming to market in 2002.