Asustek Computer on Thursday said that in a bid to make its products more future proof, it would install USB 3.0 controllers onto many types of devices that it sells, including mainboards, notebooks and netbook.

Modern digital cameras, HD camcorders, media players, digital video recorders, external storage devices and other data-storing products have to transfer tremendous amounts of information. As a result, maximum speed provided by USB 2.0 – up to 60MB/s without protocol overdraw – is not sufficient for today’s needs. Meanwhile, USB 3.0 provides up to ten times the speed of predecessor, hence, is more suitable for today’s needs.

Asus now offers USB 3.0 on a wide range of products beyond just motherboards. This includes current notebook offerings featuring the N-series along with recently announced updates to the Eee PC range of netbooks, all-in-one PCs and digital media players.

“We are the first in the world to introduce USB 3.0 through our notebooks, namely the multimedia N-series. We’re also the first to win USB-IF certification, achieved on our P6X58D premium motherboard. We believe that USB 3.0 has a pivotal role to play in delivering the ultimate experience to a new generation of multimedia-savvy users. With USB 3.0, everyone can enjoy fast data backup and ultra-speedy file sharing,” said Jerry Shen, chief executive officer of Asustek Computer.

Even though Asustek plans to broaden the lineup of USB 3.0-enabled devices, at present there are still not a lot of peripherals that support SuperSpeed USB. Still, in about a year from now a large share of various players, cameras and USB memory sticks will come with USB 3.0 interface and owners of USB 3.0 platforms will enjoy the advanced performance of the new standard.

So far approximately three million USB 3.0-enabled products have been shipped.

Tags: ASUS, USB