USB 3.1 or 3.0

crosstalk

USB 3.1 or 3.0

This item, WD My Book 6TB USB 3.1 (Gen 1 Type-A) 3.5" Desktop External Hard Drive - Black:

https://www.microcenter.com/product/468871/wd-my-book-6tb-usb-31-(gen-1-type-a)-35-desktop-external-hard-drive-black

At the top of the page and in the specs section shows USB 3.1, the documents available to download all show USB 3.0. Which one is correct and why the difference?

TSKevinG

Good afternoon @crosstalk

thank you for contacting micro center. So i would go with the documentation that came with the device on this as it could be that Western digital may have upgraded it later for the Better usb. when i look online at the drives now on their site they show usb 3.2 so most likely they are upgrading them as the new version of usb are released

https://www.westerndigital.com/products/external-drives/wd-my-book-usb-3-0-hdd#WDBBGB0040HBK-NESN

PowerSpec_MikeW

@crosstalk

USB 3.0 specs are confusing, since it's been retroactively renamed twice to 3.1 Gen 1 then 3.2 Gen 1. These are standard changes and legacy 3.0 ports were renamed to the new standard. WD's site says USB 3.2 Gen 1 as of now. Spec is 5Gbit on Gen 1, 10Gbit on Gen 2. Divide 5 Gbit by 8(8 bits in a byte), you'll get 625MB/s. Speeds on a 3.5 5400 RPM are going to cap out around 160MB/s.

crosstalk

Thanks TSMikeW, that was really insightful. So essentially the speed of the port in this case makes no difference, whether it's Gen 1 or 2, since the drive will never be able to take advantage of that speed due to the write time limits, on this particular drive anyway.

PowerSpec_MikeW

@crosstalk

That's correct. USB 3.0 speeds will far exceed an HDD. A SATA SSD could come cap it out. The faster drive is in the 550MB/s area. SATA 3.0 controllers are 6Gb/s or 750MB/s theoretical max.