Universal Serial Bus

USBs, or Universal Serial Buses, are the standard protocol we use for connecting peripherals to our computer.

We use them to connect things like keyboards, mice, printers, external hard drives, and even to charge devices like phones and tablets.

USBs are a standard for the ports and protocols used to connect peripherals.

Why have a universal standard?

Before USBs, there were many different types of ports and connectors for different devices. You’d need to have loads of different cables and ports on your computer to connect all your devices, which was really inconvenient.

Not to mention, each device had its own specific protocol for communicating with the computer, so we needed an input controller or output controller for each type of device, which made the computer more complex and expensive to make.

With USBs, we have a single standard for both the physical connectors and the protocols used to connect peripherals. This means we can use the same USB ports and cables to connect a wide variety of devices, and the computer only needs one input controller and one output controller to handle all USB devices, which makes the computer simpler and cheaper to make.