USB

• A high-speed (USB 2.0) rate of 480 Mbit/s (~57 MB/s) was introduced in 2001. All hi-speed devices are capable of falling back to full-bandwidth operation if necessary; i.e., they are backward compatible with USB 1.1. Connectors are identical for USB 2.0 and USB 1.x.
• A SuperSpeed (USB 3.0) rate of 4.8 Gbit/s (~572 MB/s). The written USB 3.0 specification was released by Intel and partners in August 2008. The first USB 3 controller chips were sampled by NEC May 2009 and products using the 3.0 specification arrived beginning in January 2010. USB 3.0 connectors are generally backwards compatible, but include new wiring and full duplex operation.