First Driver for USB 3.0
After a year-and-a-half's worth of work, Intel hacker Sarah Sharp announced that Linux will be the first operating system supporting USB 3.0.
Linux kernel "Geekess" Sarah Sharp announced in her blog of June 7 that the first groundbreaking driver for USB 3.0 devices are now available. The driver supports the Extensible Host Controller Interface (xHCI) for the new USB 3.0 standard.
Greg Kroah-Hartman already queued the patches for Kernel 2.6.31, "so Linux users should have official USB 3.0 support around September 2009. This means that Linux will be the first operating system with official USB 3.0 support" wrote Sharp, who was also active at Open Source Bridge in Portland, OR. The source code mostly under her name is on git.kernel.org.
Just recently NEC Electronics introduced the "world's first" USB 3.0 host controller. Sarah Sharp is looking forward to tests on NEC's device, of which the company "expects rapid adoption."
The basic specifications for USB 3.0 show it to have a transfer rate of 5.0 Gbps. The standard was announced in November 2008 by the USB Implementers Forum, Inc. (as we reported in December). Board of directors of the Forum are represented by companies such as NEC, HP, Microsoft and Intel (which has the current chairmanship). xHCI is a specification created by Intel.
Comments
comments powered by DisqusSubscribe to our Linux Newsletters
Find Linux and Open Source Jobs
Subscribe to our ADMIN Newsletters
Support Our Work
Linux Magazine content is made possible with support from readers like you. Please consider contributing when you’ve found an article to be beneficial.
News
-
Linux Kernel 6.17 Drops bcachefs
After a clash over some late fixes and disagreements between bcachefs's lead developer and Linus Torvalds, bachefs is out.
-
ONLYOFFICE v9 Embraces AI
Like nearly all office suites on the market (except LibreOffice), ONLYOFFICE has decided to go the AI route.
-
Two Local Privilege Escalation Flaws Discovered in Linux
Qualys researchers have discovered two local privilege escalation vulnerabilities that allow hackers to gain root privileges on major Linux distributions.
-
New TUXEDO InfinityBook Pro Powered by AMD Ryzen AI 300
The TUXEDO InfinityBook Pro 14 Gen10 offers serious power that is ready for your business, development, or entertainment needs.
-
Danish Ministry of Digital Affairs Transitions to Linux
Another major organization has decided to kick Microsoft Windows and Office to the curb in favor of Linux.
-
Linux Mint 20 Reaches EOL
With Linux Mint 20 at its end of life, the time has arrived to upgrade to Linux Mint 22.
-
TuxCare Announces Support for AlmaLinux 9.2
Thanks to TuxCare, AlmaLinux 9.2 (and soon version 9.6) now enjoys years of ongoing patching and compliance.
-
Go-Based Botnet Attacking IoT Devices
Using an SSH credential brute-force attack, the Go-based PumaBot is exploiting IoT devices everywhere.
-
Plasma 6.5 Promises Better Memory Optimization
With the stable Plasma 6.4 on the horizon, KDE has a few new tricks up its sleeve for Plasma 6.5.
-
KaOS 2025.05 Officially Qt5 Free
If you're a fan of independent Linux distributions, the team behind KaOS is proud to announce the latest iteration that includes kernel 6.14 and KDE's Plasma 6.3.5.
Impresed
Congratulations!