RSSU3 USB Devices Launch at DEMOfall
By Ed Oswald | Published September 19, 2005, 2:30 PM
Several device manufacturers on Monday unveiled the first USB drives based upon the U3 standard, a method that enables users to carry, store and launch applications directly from a USB flash drive without installation.
The U3 technology was first introduced at CES 2005 in January, supported by a host of software and hardware vendors. However, missing from the list is Microsoft, which has not committed to backing the standard.
In the United States, SanDisk, Kingston, Memorex and Verbatim will be launching smart drives for U3 and several popular applications are announcing software support for the standard.
Kate Purmal, CEO of U3, plans to demonstrate on Tuesday the technology's advantages at DEMOfall, to be held in Huntington Beach, California.
"Computing will never be the same after today's launch. This will mark the first available plug-and-play way for consumers to carry and access their personal workspace without having to lug a laptop around," Purmal said.
Software support includes AOL's Winamp, Cerulean Studios' Trillian, McAfee Antivirus and Skype among others. This support by high profile vendors is helping U3 to gain momentum and spur possible widespread adoption, according to Gartner Senior Analyst Joseph Unsworth.
"The next 18 months will be interesting to watch as new software developers come on board, broadening the landscape for new applications while attracting new consumers," Unsworth noted.
U3 drives will begin to ship from various vendors beginning on October 15 in sizes ranging from 256MB to 2GB. The U3 group also announced it had signed a deal with I-O DATA of Japan to begin producing drives for that market beginning early next year.
???wtf?
Am I reading this wrong? Seriously. I've been doing this since DOS.
I have roughly 30 programs on my 1GB cruzer right now that I can run on any ww2k+ machine.
Winamp is one of them.
So how is this U3 thing different?
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U3 allows the programs to run directly from the USB device without any dependency (well... hardly any) on the host system.
It's like carrying around your PC's hard-drive in an external harddrive enclosure. You can plug it in anywhere and have your own PC environment up instantly.
...or maybe that's what you were talking about to begin with lol.
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Still don't get it. What dependency...really, does WinAMP have? I have the program dir on my USB stick...runs fine on any PC I plug it into.
All the apps on that stick run natively from the stick when run on a 2k+ system. 80% or so will run in any 9x environment, USB support permitting.
I suppose I could grab one of our laptop HDDs, throw it in a USB cradle and set one of these thing sup in about 5 minutes.
Whallah! a 10GB USB edevice that will run on any syetem supporting USB 2.0.
I've got to be missing something. Unless they are now creating a documented spec for seperate "U3" compliant packages for these apps.
Kind of like creating a spec for ghosting a HDD to DVD...even though we've been doing it for years.
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Its sad what people consider innovation today. This is nothing more than a way to market something thats been doable for several years.
I already have Winamp, musikCube, AIM, McAfee, Trillian, Putty, Firefox, Navicat, Filezilla on my USB stick. They all run directly from the USB stick even where the software is not installed on the desktop.
PC_Tool I agree with you completly.
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My Friend has made a version of linux (non-gui) that can run from a reg. usb flash drive. This is nothing special.
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I believe the underlying goal here is a standard that will allow these applications to run with a standard on where files are stored, dealing with the registry, etc - key being storing ALL data on the USB drive. Right now for say web clients and the like, there is often data that is put in "documents and settings" as well as the registry - take for example bookmarks and temporary files. This apparently aims to eliminate that, greatly increasing security, etc.
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Yeah
What he said.
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I'm confused. I though U3 was a software standard; not a hardware standard. Either way, I'm excited to see more development of it. I can't wait til the day when I can load all my necessary files/programs on my USB drive and just transport my pc around in my pocket =D
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