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Example of an External Dock and GPU Over Thunderbolt Technology
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Yes, I do love the VGA and HDMI ports on my iMac. I totally agree about Sony (although what's their new PSP device using? At best their own memory stick but probably some new random crap that no one else uses...) but I don't really think Apple has learned its lesson. As much as I like the idea of Thunderbolt it feels a bit silly that my iMac supports such a technology that barely anyone supports and shrugs off the more standard ports found on most PCs. I did actually use VGA and HDMI connections on my PC so its a bit lame that at best I'll need an adapter which is just adding to the costs.
It's not underpowered in any way, you must be confusing it with the MacBook Air.
With the CPU and screen resolution of the Sony Z series basically you are toting around the functionality of a typical 15" laptop except in a 2.5lb, 13" package. That's nothing to sniff at. And damn sure it costs money - quality costs - its not targeted at the mass market. Why not give Sony their credit for what theyve done and leave it at that. I dont know why people feel the need to be so ungracious. That's all I'm saying.
That's a psychology thing. Group identification, homogene group structure, attractiveness of the group 'mac users', group cohesion et cetera.
I think sony did a nice job. But I don't like the design. And it's not MacBook. I want a stylish shiny MacBook. If it was one, I would definitely buy it. But as I like my computers/smart phones/smart stuff to be compatible with each other, I will wait and save some money for the upcoming Air or maybe MBPro.
A super dvd drive + 6970m would be an incredible compliment to a MBA...if they could facilitate proper cooling for the external enclosure.
Do you have any idea what a "bell curve" is? Formats do not instantly take over. And despite your rosy memory, DVD did not annihilate VHS instantly (within 4 years as you claim). Player sales peaked in 2003 which was year 7. The last big VHS releases came in 2006, which was year 9 of DVD.
Further, at least according to thedigitalbits.com, Blu-Ray player home penetration and software sales have surpassed those of DVD at the same point in their lifetimes.
Further still, Blu-Ray's numbers continue to show growth (and in a bad economy, on top of it) so it's hardly failed by any means.
Legal downloads/streaming are a tiny part of the market -- less than 10%. So even if Blu-Ray "only" reaches 1/3 of sales on high profile releases, as it currently does, it still puts downloads to shame.
Netflix has recently begun cutting down the quality of its streaming to save bandwidth, and announced they were too aggressive in their hopes for streaming and are putting investment back into physical media. Seems they jumped the gun -- while streaming may be the future, it isn't the now, at least not as much as they (and you) hoped.
In a similar vein, CD sales still outpace digital downloads. And CDs went on sale in 1982, 29 years ago. OMG teh downloadz are fail.
Don't get me wrong, I'm no luddite and I stream/download plenty. But for music I insist on lossless (which mainstream download sites don't provide) and for movies I want high quality 1080p and lossless surround -- and that means Blu-Ray.
My ISP is Comcast which has a 250 GB per month bandwidth cap. Between that and the net neutrality fight where ISPs want to throttle and limit certain types of traffic, this download utopia you dream of isn't going to happen at least not without huge compromises in quality, like Apple's craptastic 720p offerings. And those of us with expensive home theaters aren't going to step backwards to poorly compressed 720p and dolby pro logic.
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Hi guys,
I'm here to tell you what we're discovering about this "Light Peak" that Sony used in Z21.
As you know, Sony used the former Light Peak Technology that is made of optical fiber instead of active copper cable. In addition it seems that the technology used by Sony differs from the former Light Peak and it's more like the actual Silicon Photonics Link by Intel. This technology use basically hybrid lasers, modulators,a muxer, an optical fiber, a demuxer and photo detectors. Each "subchannel" can go at 12,5 Gb/s and the former base project was made of 4 sub channel to obtain a 50 Gb/s.
http://techresearch.intel.com/spaw2/uploads/files/Intel_SiliconPhotonics50gLink_FINAL.pdf
We think that in reality that's the same technology that Sony used:
http://weekly.ascii.jp/elem/000/000/048/48360/110706gian_vaio003_1000x.jpg
With this technology, the demuxing of data would be made by photodetectors connected electrically to their own pins set. If the flux data is from a single peripheric and type, there's no need for additional demuxing and so no additional TB controller (eagle ridge or light ridge) avoiding Apple licenses.
We guess there's no TB controller since... there's no one on laptop and power media dock (maybe we didn't see it, who knows).
Stated this, if they used the former technology, which goes @ 50 Gb/s per channel/fiber (and we have 2 fiber/channel)(using 2 lasers in one direction and 2 in the opposite, not 4 in one direction) we think that one fiber is for direct connection of GPU to PCI-E bus from CPU and the other one is for DP connection to laptop screen. We're waiting for someone to run AIDA 64 and see if the screen accept DP input. Otherwise, it would need LDVS muxer/demuxer. As for the GPU, we think that the PCI-E bus being directely connected, and not having any other peripheric connected, it's set @ 16X 2.0 (granting a maximum bandwidth of 128 Gb/s). Since fiber channel goes at 50/ Gb/s we believe that GPU goes at least @ 4X 2.0 (32 Gb/s) or maybe like a 6X (48 Gb/s since the maximum bandwidth possible would be limited by fiber channel).
A configuration @ 4X 2.0 would show a decrease of performance nearly 20% against a 16X 2.0. And that's what we see from benchmarks between Sony SA (6630M) and Sony Z21 (6650M). 6650M is 10% faster then 6630M; in some test seen in a japanese review, PMD goes 24.86 and if it's a real 4X bandwidth, we'd have a loss of 20% (avarage through some review in scaling performance)..so, if it would be @ 16X we would have 31.075. SA/6630M goes 28.32 and since 6650M it's 10% faster -> 6650M would have to get 31.152. Results are quite similar, so it may be a real 4X.
I remember you that the loss of performance, changing real PCI-E bus can decrease performance in respect to 16X 2.0 by:
1x 1.0 20%-80% loss
1x 2.0 15%-60% loss
2x 2.0 10%-45% loss
4x 2.0 5%-25% loss
8x 2.0 0%-15% loss
[ better results in synth benchmark /worse result in games]
Even very low-hand video cards show the same or little reduced but always remarkable performance loss. A 7300 GT showed loss till 75% ( remember that GDDR memory bandwidth it's different from PCI-E bandwidth)
As for the additional ports on PMD, VGA and HDMI are controlled directely by eGPU and USB 2.0 3.0 ethernet and ODD are likely to go to the metal circuit of Light Peak port (Light Peak port is both optical fiber/USB 3.0 compliant). If those flux data still go with optical fiber, there must be an additional demuxer as TB controller to separate data and direct it in the proper pins out.
It's all speculation, for sure. But it's very likely to be so. We're trying to develop an eGPU home made in collaboration with some companies. For both TB eGPU and Sony's LP eGPU. For thunderbolt eGPU the problem would be to find light ridge/eagle ridge controllers and replicate TB cable which is the only cable PCI-E 2.0 compliant at the moment. The 2 chips on it are sold only to Apple till the end of their exclusive (so it ends on the starting of 2012).
For Sony's LP we have 2 ways: copy in some way the cable ordering trasmitter and receiver and guess pins out set or modifying power media dock substituting BGA gpu and re-rooting channels.
As for TB technology, there are two controllers: Eagle Ridge and Light Ridge. Eagle Ridge is capable of 4 x 10 Gb/s bidirectional flux, able to achieve a total of 80 Gb/s (more then enough to achieve a 8X 2.0 PCI-E when connected to such a bus) while Eagle Ridge which is on MacBook Air is capable of 2 x 10 Gb/s bidirectional flux for an overall of 40 Gb/s, more then enough to reach a 4X 2.0 PCI-E bus flux. But in reality, there won't be any difference. Actual Thunderbolt cable are able to go @ 20 Gb/s overall thanks to active chips on it (that's why they cost a lot). They cannot go beyond this limit at the moment. And I can assure you that without those chips it's very DIFFICULT to achieve a PCI-E 2.0 compliant cable (we're trying to do that). So This generation of thunderbolt, will be like a 2x 2.0 PCI-E bus. (16 Gb/s). Expect to have a loss from 10% till 50% in worst cases.
Here some links for what we're trying to do:
http://forum.notebookreview.com/gaming-software-graphics-cards/418851-diy-egpu-experiences.html [DIY ViDock thread - here there is a parallel project ti ViDock from Village Tronic to use home made boxes with eGpu. We're trying to develop things also for Thunderbolt and Sony's Light Peak -> http://forum.notebookreview.com/7575216-post4031.html
http://forum.notebookreview.com/sony/600942-vidock-4g-light-peak-z21-possible.html [here is a thread meant to push Village Tronic to develop something also for Sony Vaio Z21, they've already wrote an Open letter to Sony Community like the previous one for Mac community. If there's around someone who's interested in Z21.. -> https://www.facebook.com/topic.php?uid=89321949134&topic=17792#topic_top]
I'm here to tell you what we're discovering about this "Light Peak" that Sony used in Z21.
As you know, Sony used the former Light Peak Technology that is made of optical fiber instead of active copper cable. In addition it seems that the technology used by Sony differs from the former Light Peak and it's more like the actual Silicon Photonics Link by Intel. This technology use basically hybrid lasers, modulators,a muxer, an optical fiber, a demuxer and photo detectors. Each "subchannel" can go at 12,5 Gb/s and the former base project was made of 4 sub channel to obtain a 50 Gb/s.
http://techresearch.intel.com/spaw2/uploads/files/Intel_SiliconPhotonics50gLink_FINAL.pdf
We think that in reality that's the same technology that Sony used:
http://weekly.ascii.jp/elem/000/000/048/48360/110706gian_vaio003_1000x.jpg
With this technology, the demuxing of data would be made by photodetectors connected electrically to their own pins set. If the flux data is from a single peripheric and type, there's no need for additional demuxing and so no additional TB controller (eagle ridge or light ridge) avoiding Apple licenses.
We guess there's no TB controller since... there's no one on laptop and power media dock (maybe we didn't see it, who knows).
Stated this, if they used the former technology, which goes @ 50 Gb/s per channel/fiber (and we have 2 fiber/channel)(using 2 lasers in one direction and 2 in the opposite, not 4 in one direction) we think that one fiber is for direct connection of GPU to PCI-E bus from CPU and the other one is for DP connection to laptop screen. We're waiting for someone to run AIDA 64 and see if the screen accept DP input. Otherwise, it would need LDVS muxer/demuxer. As for the GPU, we think that the PCI-E bus being directely connected, and not having any other peripheric connected, it's set @ 16X 2.0 (granting a maximum bandwidth of 128 Gb/s). Since fiber channel goes at 50/ Gb/s we believe that GPU goes at least @ 4X 2.0 (32 Gb/s) or maybe like a 6X (48 Gb/s since the maximum bandwidth possible would be limited by fiber channel).
A configuration @ 4X 2.0 would show a decrease of performance nearly 20% against a 16X 2.0. And that's what we see from benchmarks between Sony SA (6630M) and Sony Z21 (6650M). 6650M is 10% faster then 6630M; in some test seen in a japanese review, PMD goes 24.86 and if it's a real 4X bandwidth, we'd have a loss of 20% (avarage through some review in scaling performance)..so, if it would be @ 16X we would have 31.075. SA/6630M goes 28.32 and since 6650M it's 10% faster -> 6650M would have to get 31.152. Results are quite similar, so it may be a real 4X.
I remember you that the loss of performance, changing real PCI-E bus can decrease performance in respect to 16X 2.0 by:
1x 1.0 20%-80% loss
1x 2.0 15%-60% loss
2x 2.0 10%-45% loss
4x 2.0 5%-25% loss
8x 2.0 0%-15% loss
[ better results in synth benchmark /worse result in games]
Even very low-hand video cards show the same or little reduced but always remarkable performance loss. A 7300 GT showed loss till 75% ( remember that GDDR memory bandwidth it's different from PCI-E bandwidth)
As for the additional ports on PMD, VGA and HDMI are controlled directely by eGPU and USB 2.0 3.0 ethernet and ODD are likely to go to the metal circuit of Light Peak port (Light Peak port is both optical fiber/USB 3.0 compliant). If those flux data still go with optical fiber, there must be an additional demuxer as TB controller to separate data and direct it in the proper pins out.
It's all speculation, for sure. But it's very likely to be so. We're trying to develop an eGPU home made in collaboration with some companies. For both TB eGPU and Sony's LP eGPU. For thunderbolt eGPU the problem would be to find light ridge/eagle ridge controllers and replicate TB cable which is the only cable PCI-E 2.0 compliant at the moment. The 2 chips on it are sold only to Apple till the end of their exclusive (so it ends on the starting of 2012).
For Sony's LP we have 2 ways: copy in some way the cable ordering trasmitter and receiver and guess pins out set or modifying power media dock substituting BGA gpu and re-rooting channels.
As for TB technology, there are two controllers: Eagle Ridge and Light Ridge. Eagle Ridge is capable of 4 x 10 Gb/s bidirectional flux, able to achieve a total of 80 Gb/s (more then enough to achieve a 8X 2.0 PCI-E when connected to such a bus) while Eagle Ridge which is on MacBook Air is capable of 2 x 10 Gb/s bidirectional flux for an overall of 40 Gb/s, more then enough to reach a 4X 2.0 PCI-E bus flux. But in reality, there won't be any difference. Actual Thunderbolt cable are able to go @ 20 Gb/s overall thanks to active chips on it (that's why they cost a lot). They cannot go beyond this limit at the moment. And I can assure you that without those chips it's very DIFFICULT to achieve a PCI-E 2.0 compliant cable (we're trying to do that). So This generation of thunderbolt, will be like a 2x 2.0 PCI-E bus. (16 Gb/s). Expect to have a loss from 10% till 50% in worst cases.
Here some links for what we're trying to do:
http://forum.notebookreview.com/gaming-software-graphics-cards/418851-diy-egpu-experiences.html [DIY ViDock thread - here there is a parallel project ti ViDock from Village Tronic to use home made boxes with eGpu. We're trying to develop things also for Thunderbolt and Sony's Light Peak -> http://forum.notebookreview.com/7575216-post4031.html
http://forum.notebookreview.com/sony/600942-vidock-4g-light-peak-z21-possible.html [here is a thread meant to push Village Tronic to develop something also for Sony Vaio Z21, they've already wrote an Open letter to Sony Community like the previous one for Mac community. If there's around someone who's interested in Z21.. -> https://www.facebook.com/topic.php?uid=89321949134&topic=17792#topic_top]
Your post contains technical information, but for the lay person lacks comparative data. Are you saying Apple just got 'PWNED' by Sony, having a version of Light Peak that is over 10x faster and not hampered for video card use? Are you saying it will likely be vastly more expensive due to the use of coherent light rather than copper, requiring encoding/decoding of the light signal? Are you saying it will share a port with USB on its computers (kind of like how Apple's audio port often shares an optical/cable connection, but are sent to the appropriate device internally depending on the cable inserted?) Is this another BETA/VHS war brewing for the 'light peak' standard?
The point of Light Ridge is that you can have two ports from one controller (2x10Gb/s channels per port = 20Gb/s) which is what Apple is doing in 2011 iMacs.
As for TB there's no need it's what Sony stated: a Thunderbolt cable goes @ 20 Gb/s overall, no matter what controller. So it can be like a 2x 2.0 PCI-E, not more. To see how PCI-E scaling goes, take a look here: http://forum.notebookreview.com/gam...e-out-how-make-diy-vidock-16.html#post5122549 here http://forum.notebookreview.com/gam...e-out-how-make-diy-vidock-23.html#post5154983 and here http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/AMD/HD_5870_PCI-Express_Scaling/24.html
I SAID that it's all SPECULATION... probably very near to reality, but speculation: everything makes sense since benchmark confirm it, but still we're waiting to run some test to see how eGPU in PMD is recognised (probably as a 4X 2.0 since the performance it has). So PROBABLY, if we're not wrong, this solution it's faster. But it's normal: next generation TB will switch to optical fiber, as we all know. Bandwidth is not 10X faster: it's likely 50 Gb/s against maximum against 20 Gb/s limited by copper cable. Still I say that 50 Gb/s it's not 128 Gb/s (16X 2.0 ) so it's not even enough to obtain maximum performance (but difference in performance between 16X and 4X ... it's less the 4X and 2X). I don't think it'll cost too much. Lasers are well known since 1960 and this design is very good for mass production. Thunderbolt it's cheaper for sure.. but if you take into account the expensive cable.. I think that they're equal in term of price. Yes, USB 3.0 and Light Peak are on the same port. This port has metal connection for USB 3.0 support and optical fiber connection for light peak. No, I don't think it's a war of standard ... I think Sony made it only to not pay TB licenses. And probably it will be the only one to use this technology with this port. Apple made a good choice to be the first to implement TB on DP in collaboration with Intel. I don't know for the future. It's known that next generation of TB will use this optical technology.. but who knows how they'll implement it.
Still I invite you to see previous links since we're trying to develop in collaboration with some companies, a home made TB and LP eGPU dock.
As you know, ViDock from Village Tronic with express card (TB is not developed yet) costs till 300$ for a 225W enclosure. With a home made setup we can reach for 300$ a good setup with a HD6850 for example.
But each channel is bidirectional, so you obtain 80 Gb/s of aggregate. Each port has two channel, 1 channel for PCI-Express and one channel for DP. To obtain 40 Gb/s in Pci-Express you would have have 2 ports and an enclosure capable of muxing and demuxing in the right way. Still, actual cable only have 2 channels and they cannot support higher bandwidth. A faster cable would have needed 4 channels, but it would have costed a lot more ( and to solve the problem, TB controller could have set to grant all four channel to achieve 40 Gb/s on PCI-E part)
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This is good news, now the race for external compatible GPU's will be released, so everyone can enjoy some powerful portable computing!
We made some new tests: as it seems GPU-Z and also AIDA 64 certificate PCI-E 2.0 16X (which is ATI video card maximum support) @ 2.0 4X. So this technology will go at least at 32 Gb/s till 50 Gb/s.
I wonder how next Thunderbolt generation will implement this without losing back-compatibility.
As for our Thunderbolt eGPU projects it seems that we'll have really to wait for Apple exclusive license to expire in 2012 (if we're not wrong XD).
I wonder how next Thunderbolt generation will implement this without losing back-compatibility.
As for our Thunderbolt eGPU projects it seems that we'll have really to wait for Apple exclusive license to expire in 2012 (if we're not wrong XD).
Lots of rambling on your part so I'm definitely having trouble following your post(s).
1) Apple has no exclusive license and Intel owns the Thunderbolt trademark
2) The USB group denied use of the USB connector for Thunderbolt/Light Peak, hence Apple put forward mini DP as the connector. I have no idea why Sony uses the USB connector.
3) At this point in time, there isn't any real advantage to an optical Thunderbolt connection over copper; there isn't a performance benefit except an increase in distance between devices.
4) This site claims that this was developed prior to Intel finalizing the standard with Apple;
http://thisismynext.com/2011/07/07/sony-light-peak-apple-thunderbolt-intel/
I'm betting that this Vaio is a one off, in which case all of the post by Crystal really doesn't mean much for the future.
I'll stick with Intel's standard that Apple has adopted.
^
1) http://www.engadget.com/2011/02/24/intel-refutes-apple-exclusivity-for-thunderbolt-i-o-lacie-and-p/ I completly missed that news, sorry.
2) What is denied it's to CALL IT USB 3.0 since it has been modified. In fact Sony cannot call it USB 3.0. And there's no official support from USB group (that's what a Sony insider stated. As it seems, legal issues would come if Sony would call it USB 3.0 in specification, datasheets and so on.. odd things)
3) I don't agree. The biggest problem of Thunderbolt is its own "special" cable.. I say special cuz that's the only PCI-E 2.0 compliant cable on the market (and sony's one it's not on the market, at least, not alone). At the moment it can reach 10x2 Gb/s for PCI-E with one channel and 10x2 Gb/s for DP on the other lane (when we use a Thunderbolt device and not a DP device). So an external video card would have to use the channel for PCI-E. Since a there's a maximum of 20 Gb/s overall for PCI-E channel, the eGPU will work @ 2X 2.0 (16 Gb/s). I assure you (and you can see performance change in the last links in the first post of mine) that difference between 1X 1.0 and 2.0 or 1X 2.0 and 2X 2.0 or 2X 2.0 and 4X 2.0 are remarkable. Even between 4X and 8X we can see consistent difference in performance. There's always a gain in performance which is relevant till 64 Gb/s (which is over actual limit in Sony's implementation) and even till 16X with dual gpu video card.
4) Yeah, they decided to go on even if Intel and Apple decided to change route and go to copper wires. BUT remember that next Thunderbolt generation will use optical fiber, so they'll use this KIND of technology with some modification to be adapted to TB controller to maintain back-compatibility.
Yes, it will be probably a one shot product. But it means a lot for future, cuz it's simply the technology which will be used to achieve 100 Gb/s in Thunderbolt 2.0. Sony made auto-goal (as always XD) deciding to use a different port (with possible legal issues). It has been a suicide.
In any case, I'm here only to show you what Thunderbolt will be in future, nothing more. I'm not here to say that Sony is better. Yeah, it has implemented a very good technology that can achieve 50 Gb/s per channel, one year before what it'll be for Thunderbolt but they went wrong with the port, marketing and Apple's appeal power. I would preferred the same Thunderbolt port. In that way there wouldn't have been any compatibility problem.
1) http://www.engadget.com/2011/02/24/intel-refutes-apple-exclusivity-for-thunderbolt-i-o-lacie-and-p/ I completly missed that news, sorry.
2) What is denied it's to CALL IT USB 3.0 since it has been modified. In fact Sony cannot call it USB 3.0. And there's no official support from USB group (that's what a Sony insider stated. As it seems, legal issues would come if Sony would call it USB 3.0 in specification, datasheets and so on.. odd things)
3) I don't agree. The biggest problem of Thunderbolt is its own "special" cable.. I say special cuz that's the only PCI-E 2.0 compliant cable on the market (and sony's one it's not on the market, at least, not alone). At the moment it can reach 10x2 Gb/s for PCI-E with one channel and 10x2 Gb/s for DP on the other lane (when we use a Thunderbolt device and not a DP device). So an external video card would have to use the channel for PCI-E. Since a there's a maximum of 20 Gb/s overall for PCI-E channel, the eGPU will work @ 2X 2.0 (16 Gb/s). I assure you (and you can see performance change in the last links in the first post of mine) that difference between 1X 1.0 and 2.0 or 1X 2.0 and 2X 2.0 or 2X 2.0 and 4X 2.0 are remarkable. Even between 4X and 8X we can see consistent difference in performance. There's always a gain in performance which is relevant till 64 Gb/s (which is over actual limit in Sony's implementation) and even till 16X with dual gpu video card.
4) Yeah, they decided to go on even if Intel and Apple decided to change route and go to copper wires. BUT remember that next Thunderbolt generation will use optical fiber, so they'll use this KIND of technology with some modification to be adapted to TB controller to maintain back-compatibility.
Yes, it will be probably a one shot product. But it means a lot for future, cuz it's simply the technology which will be used to achieve 100 Gb/s in Thunderbolt 2.0. Sony made auto-goal (as always XD) deciding to use a different port (with possible legal issues). It has been a suicide.
In any case, I'm here only to show you what Thunderbolt will be in future, nothing more. I'm not here to say that Sony is better. Yeah, it has implemented a very good technology that can achieve 50 Gb/s per channel, one year before what it'll be for Thunderbolt but they went wrong with the port, marketing and Apple's appeal power. I would preferred the same Thunderbolt port. In that way there wouldn't have been any compatibility problem.
I don't know about you guys but I would definitely love an external GPU. The one in the 13 inch 2011 MBP is fine for all of my needs, however it does run damn hot; 95 C when I'm playing newer games.
I would love a stand with a dedicated graphics card in there for heavy games; what I wouldn't love would be the price they'd sell it at. At least 2-3 hundred.
I would love a stand with a dedicated graphics card in there for heavy games; what I wouldn't love would be the price they'd sell it at. At least 2-3 hundred.
^ plus e Video Card... for example an HD6850 is about 160$ .. and actual ViDock 4 it's around 280$ (probably with TB module will cost a little bit more)..
Oh wow; I mean, I knew they cost a lot but I didn't think of the actual numbers.
Yea it's going to be around 500 bucks. I'd love one, but I probably wouldn't get it. I'd only need it to play games and I don't even do that that often.
Things are finally shaping up in this department 
http://www.anandtech.com/show/5352/msis-gus-ii-external-gpu-via-thunderbolt
http://www.anandtech.com/show/5352/msis-gus-ii-external-gpu-via-thunderbolt
Things are finally shaping up in this department
http://www.anandtech.com/show/5352/msis-gus-ii-external-gpu-via-thunderbolt
Not much, IMO. MSI gave no release schedule so we are still stuck with the same "sometime in the future". Also, that box is limited to 75W GPUs.
Yes, the article says it's powered by the TB port, which I find very hard to believe. The macbooks power supply needs to power the computer itself as well, so I guess the power adapter wouldn't be able to deliver THAT much juice to the external case.
That, and there is clearly a power cable on the back of the box visible in the pictures
EDIT: Come to thing of it, that is most likely the VGA / HDMI connector to the monitor. Using only the power the MacBook can provide seems like a huge design flaw, imo. Sure, adding a PSU would make it more bulky, but people using a solution like this will probably use it as a stationary docking station and don't care about a separate PSU for the box. Hope there will be one.
It more than likely comes with its own AC adapter hidden off somewhere. 150W limits you to the current GTX 550 Ti/HD 6850 lines. You are looking at 225W for anything impressive.Yes, the article says it's powered by the TB port, which I find very hard to believe. The macbooks power supply needs to power the computer itself as well, so I guess the power adapter wouldn't be able to deliver THAT much juice to the external case.
That, and there is clearly a power cable on the back of the box visible in the pictures
EDIT: Come to thing of it, that is most likely the VGA / HDMI connector to the monitor. Using only the power the MacBook can provide seems like a huge design flaw, imo. Sure, adding a PSU would make it more bulky, but people using a solution like this will probably use it as a stationary docking station and don't care about a separate PSU for the box. Hope there will be one.
There are no PCIe power connectors, hence I said 75W (which is what the slot should provide, unless that has changed with PCIe 3.0).
Yes, the article says it's powered by the TB port, which I find very hard to believe. The macbooks power supply needs to power the computer itself as well, so I guess the power adapter wouldn't be able to deliver THAT much juice to the external case.
That, and there is clearly a power cable on the back of the box visible in the pictures
Can't be TB powered as it's limited to 10W.
Conflict, it is slot powered but MSI also mentions a 150W cap on the info card right next to the product...