Buried in the Barefeats latest core duo vs. G5 comparisons I just noticed this about USB2. FW is still faster but USB2 is getting fairly useable.
[barefeats.com]


SB 2.0 is FASTER on the iMac Intel Core Duo than on the Quad-Core G5 Power Mac! One of our readers was pondering whether the speed of USB 2.0 might be improved on the Intel based Mac. So we ran some QuickBench tests using a Maxtor DiamondMax 10 and Wiebetech SuperDriveDock+ (USB2 + FW800). Here's what we observed:
Quad-Core built-in USB2 = 11MB/s READ, 11MB/s WRITE
Quad-Core with Aaxeon USB2 card = 15MB/s READ, 11MB/s WRITE
iMac Intel Core Duo 2.0 built-in USB2 = 18MB/s READ, 14MB/s WRITE
(of course, FireWire is faster)
iMac Intel Core Duo 2.0 built-in FW400 = 39MB/s READ, 28MB/s WRITE
Quad-Core built-in FW800 = 58MB/s READ, 50MB/s WRITE

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I kind of wish they had given us the specs of firewire 400 on the quad core as well.

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