Matrox Launches DS1 Thunderbolt Docking Station for $249

lordofthereef said:

If I am not mistaken, Thunderbolt is still exclusive to Macs? THAT is the reason it is a total failure. There are so few people using them, relatively speaking, that there is not a potential to reach hundreds of millions of users you could target if this went to PC. It's good technology, but it is essentially proprietary.

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It just recently began showing up on PCs. It's Intel's standard to control, Apple just had a one-year exclusive deal to it.

SimonTheSoundMa said:

I'll give this a miss. Over priced and misses IO such as eSATA, Thunderbolt pass-thru, and Firewire.

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Thunderbolt pass-thru, yes, eSATA never worked on mac very well, waste of time IMO. Firewire, maybe. But then the price would be up, up, up.

bdkennedy1 said:

Thunderbolt serves solely as a revenue stream for Apple. No one really needed Firewire but as long as that port was on there, people were going to buy the accessories anyway.

"Thunderbolt sounds so cool I have to buy stuff to use it!"

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Huh? Apple is probably selling their own Thunderbolt adapters at around cost given all of the stuff inside them. The 27" Thunderbolt display is the same price as the previous 27" cinema display.

Apple makes no more money when you buy a Mac with Thunderbolt than they did before (actually they probably make less because of the cost of the Thunderbolt chips), and they don't make any money when you buy a non-Apple Thunderbolt accessory, like the one in this article.

Thunderbolt is not Apple's proprietary interface that they license out (like the 30-pin or Lightning connectors). It's a connection standard from Intel:

http://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/io/thunderbolt/thunderbolt-technology-developer.html

92jlee said:

What is the point in this product?

All macs (apart from air) have built in LAN, USB, display out and in/out audio.. Whats the point? If you need more USB plugs get one of those splitters/extentions etc..

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It's a DOCK. You know, you have a Large screen at home/office and other peripherals. But not another Mac. Plug in one port and you have everything connected. That is the point.

It sure would be nice if those submitting these articles and pictures would take 30 seconds and color correct their photos before submission. The product looks terrible in orange.

Apple fanboy said:

Would this device mean you could hook an Xbox up to your iMac and use the screen? Even if the answer is yes it looks overpriced for what it is.

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dracoshafi said:

can you connect a games console in the HDMI port and have a thunderbolt cable connecting to a 27" imac and get output on the imac on it?

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The specs only mention display out, so probably not. There are however some thunderbolt-based video capture boxes on the market.

I want to see *ALL* thunderbolt accessories and drives at the SAME EXACT PRICE as anything USB3. Absolutely no exceptions.

That's when I'll adopt.

Until then, might as well not exist.

No thunderbolt pass-through?

And the Belkin one is way too expensive.

You have got to hand it to Apple for now including two TB ports.

Actually, i'd pay around $175 for this. It's got it's uses, just not at that price.

Confuzzzed said:

Is it backward compatible with a floppy disc drive?

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Apple's plug-in floppy drive is USB, so yes, you can connect it. I don't know if Mountain Lion will recognize it. I'll plug my drive in and see if it works.

wikus said:

The technology behind thunderbolt is fine. Its Apple being stupid again, just like with Firewire and just like with all their other overpriced proprietary crap and how they executed the implementation of it.

2 years in, and I've still yet to see ONE SINGLE thunderbolt product on a store shelf.

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The only 'stupid' thing Apple might have done here is to implement TB at all. Or do you think Apple could just snip its fingers and half the price of all third-party TB devices and cables? What is it exactly that Apple should have done differently?

Xenomorph said:

It looks terrible, but I'd get it right now if my system supported Thunderbolt.

Every day I place my MacBook Pro on my desk at work and plug in the mouse, the monitor, Ethernet cable, other USB accessories, etc.

Wearing out an Ethernet port is serious business. They have to replace the entire motherboard for that.

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No you don't. The ethernet port is easily replaced on its own, well I can do it, don't know about yall !!!

TMay said:

TB was introduced in a product on Feb 24, 2011, which would be about 20 months. As a docking system on the 27 inch TB display, it has been very well received, and hardly a failure.

Haswell gives equal status to Thunderbolt and USB 3.0, and TB components for peripheral makers have or will get a die shrink to lower cost.

Once you factor in the roadmap for TB, more channels and optical up to 100m, and the existing advantages of low latency, isochronous channels, and Displayport compatibility it becomes obvious that TB will be the choice over USB 3.0 for video and audio professional, and any others that required high quality data streaming.

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That doesnt change the fact that thunderbolt is dead. No one is buying it, theres hardly any choice in devices and whatever there is to buy, its way overpriced.

Its dead.

bdkennedy1 said:

Thunderbolt serves solely as a revenue stream for Apple. No one really needed Firewire but as long as that port was on there, people were going to buy the accessories anyway.

"Thunderbolt sounds so cool I have to buy stuff to use it!"

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Really? You think Apple is getting rich selling $29 TB-to-FW and TB-to-Ethernet adaptors? Apple is not getting any license fees for TB.

And they don't need TB to sell Ethernet adaptors, they sold a USB2-to-Ethernet adaptor before TB and would be selling a USB3-to-TB adaptor now if there were no TB.

And how did Apple made money from FW? Apart from a short period at the beginning, Apple did not collect any licensing fees from FW devices. And Apple did not produce any FW externals themselves, all the money generated with the sale of FW devices went to third-parties.

(And only cheapskates saw no value in FW800 over USB 2.)

Confuzzzed said:

Is it backward compatible with a floppy disc drive?

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Why on earth are you still using a floppy disk ?

Any new dock without USB 3.0 is a non-starter. I wonder why they made the decision to put USB 2.0 ports on this thing?

Screen size limitation

The biggest issue is max screen resolution of 1920 x 1200. Seriously!? I can't use this with a 27 or 30" screen. This kills it for me. Why no thunderbolt pass through?

There are many valid criticisms of this product and one can only hope this will serve as a foundation for better products in the future. For me, the critical misses in this product outweigh its usefulness.

Misses:
--No TB passthrough
--No eSATA
--No FW800
--No Mini-DisplayPort
--Too few USB 3.0/2.0 ports
--A forced choice between HDMI and DVI
(I don't see the appeal in the HDMI model for owners of the 13" and 15" rMBPs because they already possess an HDMI port and many monitors support resolutions higher than what HDMI provides.)

Hits:
--GB Ethernet (rMBP lacks an ethernet port but even an Apple adapter is way cheaper and much more portable; even necessary for some)
--Separate Audio In/Out Jacks (many current Macs have a single audio in/out port)
--Aesthetics

I have no problem with the two ports on the front because some users may prefer to plug in TB directly to the front of the unit and run a USB 3.0 drive from the front (e.g., portable drive), if they carry it with them everywhere.

Unfortunately, this product seems to fail in too many areas. I don't want straight port replication; I want the ability to use ports that are lacking/missing from current Macs and which were provided on "classic" Macs and which are still being used by many companies that make peripherals.

SimonTheSoundMa said:

I'll give this a miss. Over priced and misses IO such as eSATA, Thunderbolt pass-thru, and Firewire.

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Others already mentioned it, but I'm going to rant anyway...what is the point of having a Thunderbolt "hub" if there isn't a pass-thru, or means of daisy chaining other Thunderbolt devices?

I'm seeing this on a bunch of products, even external hard drives? WTF? We didn't see this with the first generation of Firewire; I don't get why manufacturers are missing this? Are we all so used to (crappy) USB not being able to daisy-chain?

JHankwitz said:

Apple's plug-in floppy drive is USB, so yes, you can connect it. I don't know if Mountain Lion will recognize it. I'll plug my drive in and see if it works.

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Please be sure to share with us the findings of your experiment. More importantly also leave it as feedback to Apple's feedback portal.

http://www.apple.com/feedback/

Thunderbolt has become the definition of "...bag of hurt..."

Hoping for a Fast/Wide SCSI on a hub...

... since I have a SCSI-connected RAID unit attached to my old desktop machine. I had hoped this would offer a solution that would extend the life of that device, but it appears to be impossible.

Anyone know otherwise?

ed724 said:

Why on earth are you still using a floppy disk ?

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They are less rigid than other forms of physical media. Besides, how else could I play bomb jack? (Please someone do a sarcastic face for me as I don't think Tapatalk allows it)

I am waiting for the Belkin, this one is pretty weak.

ed724 said:

Thunderbolt pass-thru, yes, eSATA never worked on mac very well, waste of time IMO. Firewire, maybe. But then the price would be up, up, up.

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All my external drives are FW, never saw the reason to compromise on speed (and daisy-chaining) with USB 2. I am fine with a pass-through though as that is allows for inexpensive the TB-to-FW adaptor.

They should just can this product now.

Just stupid.

I'd rather buy a Thunderbolt LED and get better Peripheral connections:
Three powered USB 2.0 ports
FireWire 800 port
Gigabit Ethernet port
Thunderbolt port


It should have dual output Thunderbolt, Gigabit Ethernet, Audio In/Out, and at least 3 USB3.0 ports. Skip the HDMI and DVI.

Maybe Belkin will get it right.