USB 2 (released in 2000) is the latest creation of the worldwide Serial Bus. USB 1.1 is still a usually accepted standard, but now, it is getting updated. USB 1.1 has a speed of 12mbps, compare to USB 2.0 which is rated with speed of up to 480mbps (60MB per second). There are a lot of devices that support USB than FireWire. All newer PC will have USB ports but only some will have FireWire. Macintosh PC usually include FireWire ports. You can identify whether your PC has Hi-Speed USB by opening and increase the Universal Serial Bus section. There should be an "Enhanced" USB host manager present.

FireWire is notionally a little slower than USB2 at 400mbps but FireWire plans use the full 400mbps speed (Peer-to-Peer) where with USB you are sharing the bandwidth involving the devices (Master-Slave). FireWire does perform better during sustained throughput. FireWire has been around for a long time though USB strategy seem to be more popular. Devices such as video cameras will have FireWire ports to allow you to move your video to your computer quickly. There is a newer FireWire 800 that boasts speed of 800mbps which is almost twice that of USB. When it comes to as long as power FireWire can provide much more power over the bus 30V as opposed to 5V for USB so several times there won’t be a need for an external power provide for the FireWire device.

Here are the skin of both USB 2.0 and FireWire

USB 2.0

• 1.5 Mbit/sec, 12Mbit/sec, 480Mbit/sec supported.
• USB controller is required to control the bus and data transfer.
• Cable can be up to 5 meters.
• Provides full compatibility with USB 1.1 devices.
• Power supply to external devices is 500 mA/5V (max)
• Up to 127 devices supported.

FireWire (IEEE1394)

• 100 Mbit/sec 200Mbit/sec 400Mbit/sec 800Mbit/sec supported.
• Works without control, devices communicate peer-to-peer.
• Cable can be up to 4.5 meters.
• Power supply to external devices is 1.25A/12V (max.).
• Up to 63 devices supported.