back to article PCMCIA pitches USB 3.0-friendly ExpressCard update

The ExpressCard add-in standard for notebooks is to be updated to bring on board compatibility with USB 3.0, the PCMCIA organisation announced at CeBIT this week. ExpressCard 2.0 will double the data transfer rate between card and host to 5Gb/s - just above USB 3.0's target data speed, 4.7Gb/s. ExpressCard 2.0 will support USB …

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  1. André Marques
    Thumb Up

    Graphics card add-in?

    With this upgrade I could see the market for external graphics card add-ins opening up. It has the bandwidth and with that you could have the little 6-9 hour-on-battery-power laptop that you can take everywhere converted into a gaming machine when you get home and plug it in. Or a very fast 2nd harddrive on the move. I like it.

  2. jason
    Unhappy

    Where are all the first generation cards???

    Still waiting for something worthwhile to put in my PCIExpress version 1 slot! Same goes for all those PCI-E slots in my PC.

    PCI-E is a total flop as a 'all hardware' expansion to be honest. Should have just called it AGPMAX and limited it to graphics.

    Not very exciting.

  3. David Simpson
    Alert

    What expansion cards

    There are so few express cards around why bother with the slot at all ?

    My wifi broke and sadly its a mobo problem i can't afford to get fixed yet, so i thought I'll just get a new N express card from ebay, and yep you guessed it I COULDNT FIND ANY ! the only device available for express card seems to be 3G modems.

    Is someone talking to high a licensing fee ? why is noone supporting this format my laptop is 18 months old and you can no longer buy laptops with PCMCIA slots, do i want to buy a PCMCIA adaptor ? NO its gigantic the switch to wonderously fast pci-express is a total crock of crap.

  4. Mad Hacker
    Flame

    Also to support FireWire 3,200?

    So will they also support FireWire 3,200 which I believe will be out before USB 3.0?

    Flame icon for FireWire!

  5. Nexox Enigma

    Fujitsu makes a sane choice

    All I can say is thank the gods that Fujitsu went with a sane PC Card slot on the p8010. I'd hate for all that high end wifi hardware I've accumulated over the years to go to waste.

    Just about the only useful device I've seen in an express card slot is a tv tuner... Don't really need one of those in a laptop though. I really think that I'd go with a USB 3G connection, supposing I lived in an area with anything better than EDGE coverage.

    Then again, this sort of thing always happens when you switch standards. I suppose eventually it'll all come out alright.

  6. b166er

    External GPU

    If they do get round to this, I'm really hoping they also provide a way to pipe the video back into the laptops display.

  7. Rich
    Stop

    Trifle pointless

    If you've got 480Mbps on (smaller and less fragile) USB connectivity, why do you need a card slot? You could have an outbound graphics card on USB.

    If anything, laptop makers could provide SDIO card support, which has a much smaller form factor.

    Only downside of USB3 is that it doesn't have a decent amount of power, I don't think. 20A @ 5v would be much better.

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