Intel Thunderbolt 3 adopts USB Type-C connector to "do it all"

[HEXUS]

Good for 2x 4K video, single-cable docks, 10GbE networking and external graphics.

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[shaithis]

I wonder if I'll ever see one..........

Thunderbolt seems to be the technology that delivers, yet hardly anyone uses.

[HavoCnMe]

I'm still waiting for optical to be the only connector we will ever need. 100GBit internet backbones but we can't get past TOSLINK for consumers?? Give me a break.

Generic Company meeting: "CEO: What kind of connector can we make next with one or two pins more and add double the bandwidth, any suggestions?" "Engineer: Sir, How about we create a optical interface that runs at 40Gbit and is compatible with current optical cables?" "CEO: We're looking for the next step solution not the complete solution for the future."

[Pleiades]

I'm sure Apple will adopt it, hopefully others might do so later, in which case the price will come down (but not that hopeful tbh)...

[CustardInc]

I'm still waiting for optical to be the only connector we will ever need. 100GBit internet backbones but we can't get past TOSLINK for consumers?? Give me a break.

Generic Company meeting: "CEO: What kind of connector can we make next with one or two pins more and add double the bandwidth, any suggestions?" "Engineer: Sir, How about we create a optical interface that runs at 40Gbit and is compatible with current optical cables?" "CEO: We're looking for the next step solution not the complete solution for the future."

Optical alone can't power anything, that may be the reason it hasn't replaced USB. As for data-only connections I have no idea.

[peterb]

I wonder if I'll ever see one..........

Thunderbolt seems to be the technology that delivers, yet hardly anyone uses.

Google Amazon for Thunderbolt devices and you'll find a load of Thunderbolt external drives. It is used in professional applications for backup and archive, and video applications. There are a couple of Thunderbolt Ultrium Tape drives around. It is probably more reliable thaN SAS interfaces, and cheaper than FDDI.

USB was a slow take up when Apple introduced on the first iMac (the - IMNSHO - the tacky looking translucent multi-coloured iMac) but as events have shown...

I'd expect Thunderbolt to follow a similar path.

[JGJones]

Indeed it is, but the move to use a USB-C port mean it would be very easy to roll out.

Just have it in the chipset (as Intel seem to be doing now) and if you don't purchase a Thunderbolt cable, it doesn't affect you, you can just use USB as usual. If you get a Thunderbolt cable, then you can get higher speed etc.

It'll take a while before this fully roll out - ie monitors supporting the ports/cables and video cards with them, motherboards with the actual ports etc etc.

I've got a mini-ITX so I couldn't even get a card if I wanted to as it's taken so my current PC isn't going to be able to use this. But future - say in 4 year's time, it should be fairly widespread by then.

[TheAnimus]

USB was a slow take up when Apple introduced on the first iMac (the - IMNSHO - the tacky looking translucent multi-coloured iMac) but as events have shown...

No way.

USB 1.0 first came out in 1995. It was awful, just awful. Buggy by design, the protocol was obtuse and difficult, a plug n play bus is hard after all.

But then USB 1.1 came out, fixing most of the major short comings. Interestingly the iMac which launched with a ground breaking design, which twatish people immediately went for, launched with only USB 1.1, and no legacy. This was useful in a way because it showed USB could actually work (It was very unreliable before, and now only just unreliable).

I don't think it's fair to suggest that a machine which had ~3% market share, was able to really stirr the market. USB was already trending that way, the big explosion happened after 95 release 2 which made it actually work OK on 90%+ of the computers that had ports.

It wasn't until much later that people started to adopt USB on mass, I know back in 2000 I found the latency noticeable compared to a PS2 interface for HIDs.

However, the distance from the first good version, to mass adoption with USB was around 3 years. Now that it's 4 years old, it's not really had much of a following outside Display Port use. In fact I don't know anyone who uses it for anything other than it's the only option on my Mac. The cost compared to FDDI isn't really that bad if you are doing some big large scale storage, as thunderbolt also doesn't play well with multihosts, so compared with SAS thunderbolt is more expensive. As a result it's still very niche, mostly because adoption has been so slow outside of the display world.

I'm not saying thunderbolt is doomed. But I think much in the same way that firewire was only ever a niche tool, this will follow the same fate. There are something that externally tapping into PCIe is the right option, but these things are few and far apart.

[LSG501]

Hmm... maybe I'm weird but I kind of like different sockets for different purposes.

All it takes is for more laptop manufacturers to go down the apple macbook route of just one socket and you can basically kill your laptop by 'breaking the socket', at least with the current multi socket approach you can still use your laptop as long as you don't break the power socket.

Also wasn't thunderbolt supposed to have been an optical connector at the beginning, yeah it can't supply power but it wouldn't have likely needed new sockets/cables every couple of years. How many different sockets has thunderbolt had so far, I can think of at least 4, compared with usb which is still basically the same socket as the beginning.

Thunderbolt also has an issue in my view in that outside of os-x it doesn't/didn't really work very well (if at all). I'll be honest in that I haven't kept up to date with it (no use for thunderbolt) but last time I checked hot plugging didn't work and most thunderbolt devices were not even supported in windows. Not sure if windows even has native support for it yet.

Sidenote: I kind of miss firewire, used to use that at uni to connect pc and laptop, it was faster than the 10/100 network cable or wifi at the time. It just worked like a network cable just faster

[DanceswithUnix]

I wonder if I'll ever see one..........

Thunderbolt seems to be the technology that delivers, yet hardly anyone uses.

Not really, Thunderbolt is the technology that promises. That isn't the same as delivers

If it allowed you to gang the lanes it provides, if it wasn't patent encumbered with a high license fee, then perhaps a lack of being rubbish from both a technical and business point of view would help.

If you want to use a single cable to charge your laptop whilst connecting to keyboard, mouse etc as well as a monitor using FreeSync then you want to ask companies what happened to DockPort.

http://semiaccurate.com/2013/05/24/a...t-on-a-device/

I am guessing from the lack of uptake on both these interfaces that there really isn't much demand. Perhaps once DisplayPort becomes widepsread...

[azrael-]

Now, if only they could make sure that there's a latch to hold these small connectors in place and that it is mandatory. I know the DisplayPort connector has that in its specs but sadly it isn't mandatory. FWIW, I've had several USB and HDMI connectors wriggle themselves out of their receptacle.

[DanceswithUnix]

Now, if only they could make sure that there's a latch to hold these small connectors in place and that it is mandatory. I know the DisplayPort connector has that in its specs but sadly it isn't mandatory. FWIW, I've had several USB and HDMI connectors wriggle themselves out of their receptacle.

OTOH I have seen expensive equipment accidentally dragged across table tops to their doom by screwed in VGA/RS232/whatever cables. I would rather they fall out when a user snags a cable.

[azrael-]

OTOH I have seen expensive equipment accidentally dragged across table tops to their doom by screwed in VGA/RS232/whatever cables. I would rather they fall out when a user snags a cable.

Agreed, but not on their own. I've had gravity act on HDMI connectors which were inserted into bottom-placed receptacles in the tv. That's just not fun.

[MercutioUK]

Finally though, a sensible solution. Use the USB C port but let the chipset route thunderbolt over it.

I'm one of those strange folks who want a laptop with an external GPU, raid and beefy networking in a box I can plug in at home.

Even having machine 10GBe networking would be... well, amazing to be honest (again, maybe I'm in a minority )