From owner-freebsd-current Tue Aug 5 19:56:04 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id TAA23133 for current-outgoing; Tue, 5 Aug 1997 19:56:04 -0700 (PDT) Received: from genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au (genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au [129.127.96.120]) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id TAA23111; Tue, 5 Aug 1997 19:55:58 -0700 (PDT) Received: (from msmith@localhost) by genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au (8.8.5/8.7.3) id MAA02704; Wed, 6 Aug 1997 12:22:50 +0930 (CST) From: Michael Smith Message-Id: <199708060252.MAA02704@genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au> Subject: Re: Status of USB, TX chipset, PIIX3, etc. In-Reply-To: from Atipa at "Aug 5, 97 08:25:14 pm" To: freebsd@atipa.com (Atipa) Date: Wed, 6 Aug 1997 12:22:50 +0930 (CST) Cc: msmith@atrad.adelaide.edu.au, sthaug@nethelp.no, hackers@FreeBSD.ORG, freebsd-current@FreeBSD.ORG X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4ME+ PL28 (25)] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-freebsd-current@FreeBSD.ORG X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk Atipa stands accused of saying: > > > It does, indeed, have lots of "potential". It's also an incredible > > PITA to understand at the protocol level, much less actually work with. 8( > > I was wondering about that... It just clicked who "Atipa" is; sorry I didn't get it before. If you have customers asking about USB, a couple of useful tactics : - Have a list of all the USB periphs you can source. Often this is small enough that they get turned off straight away. - Have a printed copy of the USB spec that you can wave at them. This works best if they're technically minded and read it, or you can smite them with it later. - Have some FireWire promo lit. instead and sell them on that. 8) > > I think that the lack of peripheral support is telling; particularly > > the custom silicon that is almost critical to producing a > > cost-effective peripheral just hasn't made it to market yet. At the > > moment, a peripheral vendor has to undertake development of peripheral > > firmware several orders of magnitude more complex than anything that > > has ever been seen before, or wait for the silicon. > > Good observations! That was the answer I was looking for. It's a sad one though; if the promised silicon had materialised when it was due, on cost, a USB peripheral would be absolutely trivial to manufacture, and we would be seeing a lot of USB hobby projects too. -- ]] Mike Smith, Software Engineer msmith@gsoft.com.au [[ ]] Genesis Software genesis@gsoft.com.au [[ ]] High-speed data acquisition and (GSM mobile) 0411-222-496 [[ ]] realtime instrument control. (ph) +61-8-8267-3493 [[ ]] Unix hardware collector. "Where are your PEZ?" The Tick [[