Share USB PID

There is a guy who registered a VID a while ago and is selling the right to use small blocks of VIDs I think it was

but I can't see it on his website now - may be worth contacting though. It was discussed on the piclist a while ago May also be worth asking the supplier of your USB chip as they may be prepared to allocate VIDs to you - I know FTDI are happy to do this for users of their chips.

Thanks Mike !!!

Just like beer, you don't "buy" a VID, you just rent a VID for a yearly fee. So beware! Make sure the parties involved in sharing the VID have an understanding (ie contract, if $$$ is at stake) for the yearly renewal fee of the VID. Once the VID has expired, the PIDs mean nothing.

I don't know what USB.org does when a VID expires. I can't see any way for them to deny the use of an expired VID other than through legal channels.

JJS

..or just make one up. 1 in 2^32 chance of clashing with another product, multiplied by a pretty big factor representing the chance of that product being installed in the same machine.

only the license to use the USB logo with a product requires a recurring fee. It is possible to just buy a VID, but the costs are the same as for a two year logo license which includes a VID. Once assigned a VID will not expire.

See:

Regards, Robin

Sorry JJS but you are not correct here.

You do buy the rights to a vendor ID. Once you have paid your $1500 it is yours for ever, they do not take it back.

The annual fee you refer to is the license to say that your product conforms to the USB standard and has been tested to be so. You also have to submit each product for testing to be able to claim this. Once you have done both these, license fee + testing, your product will be listed as being compliant to the USB spec. If you do not have both these things you are not permitted to advertise or use the USB compliance logo. However, your vendor ID is still valid and recognized.

As for the PID (product ID), it is manufacturer specific and should controlled by the owner of the used vendor ID. It is not controlled by the USB Implementers Forum.

PhilW

snip.

But I'm sure I read that you cannot re-distribute any of your allocated range to third parties. If this were the case, you could do a search for 'PID broker' to find inexpensive Vid/Pid allocations.

Also, if you can still download the Implementors List, you'll get an idea about how the current VIDs have been allocated by the Forum - to further minimise a collision with an assigned VID.