The rise and fall of FireWire—IEEE 1394, an interface standard boasting high-speed communications and isochronous real-time data transfer—is one of the most tragic tales in the history of computer technology. The standard was forged in the fires of collaboration. A joint effort from several competitors including Apple, IBM, and Sony, it was a triumph of design for the greater good. FireWire represented a unified standard across the whole industry, one serial bus to rule them all. Realized to the fullest, FireWire could replace SCSI and the unwieldy mess of ports and cables at the back of a desktop computer.
Yet FireWire's principal creator, Apple, nearly killed it before it could appear in a single device. And eventually the Cupertino company effectively did kill FireWire, just as it seemed poised to dominate the industry.
The story of how FireWire came to market and ultimately fell out of favor serves today as a fine reminder that no technology, however promising, well-engineered, or well-liked, is immune to inter- and intra-company politics or to our reluctance to step outside our comfort zone.
(Score: 3, Informative) by mojo chan on Friday June 23 2017, @07:35AM
That's now how USB sockets work. The metal shield that provides retention is designed to be stronger than the cable, so that the cable is the part that wears out. In fact, with decades of data we have found that it's the plastic part that holds the contacts which tends to wear out with repeated use, not the metal housing and tabs.
USB-C fixes all of that. Apple went with a simpler design but with the flaw that the contacts are used to guide the cable in when being inserted, wearing them. USB-C has the robust metal housing for guiding and retention.
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