This week, Avram Piltch discusses the future of USB, known as USB4 (or USB 4). While not everything is known about the new standard, such as the final marketing branding, we do know some. For example, we know that USB4 will be capable of up to 40Gbps transfer rates, equaling what Thunderbolt 3 supports currently. It will also support a smart switching capability when using both video and data over the same bus. Currently, each side gets 50% of the bandwidth, whether or not that is what is needed. In the new version, if video needs 20%, it will leave the other 80% of the bandwidth available for data transfer. This is similar to how Ethernet switches work today. For anyone using the port for external video cards, this will be an especially powerful upgrade.
