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Apple Now Selling Longer 3-Meter Thunderbolt 4 Pro Cable for Studio Display
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If someone's looking for a 3m cable, it means that they need 3m and not 2m, otherwise they'd just buy a 2m cable.
No wonder Thunderbolt still hasn’t really taken off or is even known besides hardcore professionals with those prices
Now Apple must make the iPhone chargers to work only when paired with a 3m cable for maximum profits to recoup from the USB-C EU debacle
https://www.apple.com/shop/product/MMEL2AM/A/thunderbolt-3-usb-c-to-thunderbolt-2-adapter
Works for Thunderbolt 2 to 3 or Thunderbolt 2 to 3. It won't work on USB-C ports the don't support Thunderbolt 3. If you are looking for a mini Display Port to USB-C adapter, you can use this one:
https://www.apple.com/shop/product/HN8B2ZM/A/mophie-usb-c-cable-with-mini-displayport-connector
Thunderbolt 2 doesn't natively support USB 3 like Thunderbolt 3 & 4 do.
It's not insane at all.
The difficulty of getting intact data down a cable increases exponentially with its length, not linearly. Meaning, the tolerances are tighter, more circuitry may be required, etc etc.
40Gbps down a 10ft cable that is as flexible as a consumer needs is not an easy task.
It would be useful to know if all that complexity shown in the tear-down of the cable is actually necessary, or just excesses used to justify higher prices. Could be a bit like cables in hi-fi audio that can cost thousands of dollars per foot. Despite being repeatedly and thoroughly proven as baloney, people still go out and buy these knowing full well that an unwound coat hanger transmits the signals just as well as their gilded cords....
Then why don't you buy a 1M and a 2M and just stick them together? Should just work, right? Much cheaper solution!
Slightly more seriously, in Physics Land, everything falls off at an inverse square rate. Which means a 3 meter wire-thing would have 4/9 (44%) of the magic mojo of a 2 meter wire-thing. Now imagine that the wire-thing is carrying extremely tiny signals bopping up and down at an ungodly high rate, and how much more challenging it would be to resolve such a signal that's only 44% as strong, unless it somehow got boosted.
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I have previously purchased a cable that cost a thousand dollars a foot, only to find out that a cable costing $500 a foot is just as good. And it contained a coat hanger. How to you people come up with this stuff?
If you have long covid, it should be 9 feet.During COVID, they taught us keeping a 6 foot distance was enough....
With analog signals, signal degradation just makes the signal slightly crappier; it may be beyond your big clumsy audio speakers, or human auditory system, to resolve the difference. With digital signals, signal degradation has no effect; until you hit a certain threshold, and then you get nothing at all on the other end.
Assuming you don't believe what I wrote (can't make out your intent), here is an article showing some of those cables. https://robbreport.com.au/homes/Nine-of-the-most-wildly-expensive-speaker-cables/
Nordost cables go for about $30K per meter.
And here is one article demonstrating how these cables are, of course, not worth it.
Now audio and video signals are very different, but the point remains, whether all that is necessary for good quality video.
Nordost cables go for about $30K per meter.
And here is one article demonstrating how these cables are, of course, not worth it.
Do Coat Hangers Sound As Good Monster Cables?
Can you tell the difference between music that passed through a pricey Monster stereo Cable, and a coat hanger? A reader forwarded us a post from the Audioholics Home Theater Forum and its author …
consumerist.com
The thing is, audio cables are a TOTALLY different situation than these high speed data cables. With hi-fi audio, you're only transmitting an analog signal down the wire and there's no scientific reason why it would possibly improve the sound quality to do anything beyond the basics of using a type of wire with a low resistance, and then putting some shielding/insulation around it. (Stranded wire vs solid and a thicker gauge is going to be beneficial, but that's been known for decades and doing that doesn't cost a huge sum of money.)
As they create these new cable standards for faster and faster data transmission, they're reaching a point where the cable itself has to be a part of the circuitry that makes it possible.
Actually, $30 for the extra 1.2 meters compared to the 1.8m from Apple. So that makes it around $70 for Apple quality and Apple tax compared to other brands. Perhaps one of the Youtube channels can do a comparative technical test.
I do see a future of having to possibly go to fiber optic, the only downside to that is the extreme fragileness of fiber cables, they already so thin and majority of the thickness already goes to "protection" and even that isn't enough. There will be a lot of wasted cables due to people being too forceful with the connectors and them getting bent and who knows what else, especially since with copper wire everyone is used to maneuvering their cables however they see fit because it basically doesn't matter.
In my previous job I worked with a lot of fiber cables and we had the quick release connectors and even with that I couldn't tell you how many people/techs would break them from being too forceful with the connector or not making sure the connector was lined up correct before pushing in and twisting to connect. We actually had 4 redundant connections for each fiber line because they would get broken so often so that we could just change which fiber line we were using while waiting for the broken one to get repaired or possibly the whole line getting replaced because there isn't enough slack to just cut the end off and make a new connector. Fortunately they are not incredibly difficult to repair, (with the right kit and know how) but it does require enough slack to do so.
I buy the Apple ones because other reputable brands aren't much cheaper. At least it's only $40 compared to $130 for the cheapest Apple TB4 cable and I can live with the shorter TB3 cable.