Hewlett Packard Not Convinced of the Value of Thunderbolt

[dguisinger]

I think I like Sony's approach to Thunderbolt better.

I mean, why extra cables? if I can use one single cable type (USB3/TB compatible) throughout devices, that's the standard I would pick.

By going with mini DP, we basically have to add one more type of cable while using USB devices.

If USB-IF really worked out a deal with Sony to use USB3 ports as TB port... please Apple, just follow it. I don't want your TB to go the way FW800 has gone. I don't mind having a little adapter to adapt from current miniDP form to USB form...

Perhaps this was the reason why all the announced TB products are having non-firm release date?

Rather bad arguement, a TB cable would have different wiring than USB 3... in the case of Sony's implimentation, you would still need a different type of cable... now you'd be stuck with several cables that look similar but aren't and figuring out where the cable is for the right device.

Also, who wants to waste their only available TB port with a USB 1.1 device? I'd say leave Thunderbolt ports seperate from USB. They have different, non-competing uses.

 

[DocNYz]

I think Thunderbolt is more for professional users. Transferring high amounts of data. For the general public, I think USB 3.0 is better.

However, for people who are backing up files to their externals, I would want Thunderbolt. It takes me super long to back up my files with Time Machine with a USB drive.

HP: This is not kid's stuff.

Why would anything slower be better? It's twice as fast, period. For any type of user - transferring huge data files for professionals, putting music on your iOS device for anyone, time machine for normal users, etc. Fewer connections into your computer simplifies things as well. There is nothing better about USB 3 except that it's been out longer so there are more peripherals for it at the moment since apple was an early adopter of Tb.

 

[KnightWRX]

Engadget reporting Sony is going with a USB TB input. I'm confused.

Nice, fragmentation. This is sure going to help adoption.

 

[cube]

I'd say leave Thunderbolt ports seperate from USB..

And more importantly, leave Thunderbolt ports separate from DisplayPort. Who wants to waste DisplayPort ports with a Thunderbolt connection?

 

[DocNYz]

Just to remind you, Intel intents to implement USB3.0 in their next chipsets, which probably replace USB2.0 ports on Macs altogether like we saw with FW800 on PPC Macs. After this, it's not question of Thunderbold vs. USB3.0 anymore, rather a shakespearian "to implement Thunderbolt or to no implement Thunderbolt".

I guess HP just wants to stall the investment of $5 for the Thunderbolt chip and connector on every HP PC, plus AMD is not really convinced of it, either.

But in the end, what's not to like about the possibility have an external connector for PCIe x4? USB is just an immediate technology, as anyone archived an external PCI bus. Unifying external PCIe and display port is actually not such a bad idea, as all last-gen machines had were FW800, USB and display connectors.

Yeah this would make the most sense for sure and I hope is what happens. We're not talking about every computer having one port here people, even the MBA has a couple, we're talking about how unreasonable it is to complain about having the option of another and superior I/O interface in addition to existing ones. I like the term immediate to describe USB btw.

 

[the vj]

Of course!

Apple is the platform for video post production wich needs faster data transfer to the hard drive, Thunderbold is welcome.

On the PC side such requirements are not part of their day to day.

 

[DocNYz]

And more importantly, leave Thunderbolt ports separate from DisplayPort. Who wants to waste DisplayPort ports with a Thunderbolt connection?

That's what a daisy chain is for, you're not "wasting" or "using" or "losing" any ports, any other Tb device worth it's salt will have at least another Tb port on it so you can connect another display or drive or whatever to it, and continue like that, but only with one port on your comp taken up. Essentially you're just moving the port a couple feet on your desk.

 

[JayMBP]

Rather bad arguement, a TB cable would have different wiring than USB 3... in the case of Sony's implimentation, you would still need a different type of cable... now you'd be stuck with several cables that look similar but aren't and figuring out where the cable is for the right device.

Also, who wants to waste their only available TB port with a USB 1.1 device? I'd say leave Thunderbolt ports seperate from USB. They have different, non-competing uses.

Yes, but let's assume that now TB uses USB3 ports with slightly different pins, from a technical point, if they are both copper based, it's not very hard to come up with a cable that would cover both standards. And as some has mentioned, Intel is implementing usb3 in IB. If they can mix both of the ports up, that means one less different cable to buy and one less type of holes to be on the side of your next MBP.

One of the advantage that USB had to achieve popularity was the single cable design. The same cable can be used among thousands of different peripherals.

From Apple's current design with miniDP, to be on the road with USB device, say... iPhone5, we need to carry a miniDP/TB cable, and a USB3 cable should the USB device requires it.

From Sony's USB3 TB design, we only need one single USB3/TB cable. what's not to like about this?

 

[cube]

That's what a daisy chain is for, you're not "wasting" or "using" or "losing" any ports, any other Tb device worth it's salt will have at least another Tb port on it so you can connect another display or drive or whatever to it, and continue like that, but only with one port on your comp taken up. Essentially you're just moving the port a couple feet on your desk.

Yes. You're wasting a DisplayPort port because it cannot be used for DP 1.2 if it's thunderbolt.

 

[macchiato2009]

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PCWorld reports that while Hewlett-Packard (HP) had considered using Thunderbolt in its newest desktop PCs, for now it's sticking with USB 3.0.According to Lauwaert, everone seems to be content with USB 3.0 so they don't see the value of including Thunderbolt in their desktop machines.

[url=http://cdn.macrumors.com/article-new/2011/05/thunderbolt.jpg]Image

[/url]
Thunderbolt is the high speed interconnect system that was introduced by Intel in February. Apple was the first customer to adopt the new connector with the launch of its early 2011 MacBook Pros. Apple has since released new iMacs also supporting Thunderbolt. Due to the newness of the connector, there is presently little 3rd party support, though Intel is said to be opening up Thunderbolt development this quarter.

HP is notable for being the largest U.S. computer manufacturer accounting for 26% of the market in the 1st quarter 2011.

Article Link: Hewlett Packard Not Convinced of the Value of Thunderbolt

LMAO

since when do we care about what HP thinks ?

this company is barely alive...

their products are crappy, not reliable and expensive

if they didn't have printers, they would not survive

they'd better innovate and keep their mouth shut

 

[MrWinters]

LMAO

since when do we care about what HP thinks ?

this company is barely alive...

their products are crappy, not reliable and expensive

if they didn't have printers, they would not survive

they'd better innovate and keep their mouth shut

Gee what an intelligent post!!! Oh, are they "Crappy" LOL, love it!!!

 

[MrWinters]

Sure they're relevant. As relevant as the #1 manufacturer of plastic, single-mold lawn-chairs.

There's a market for everything. HP is proof.

What's not relevant is anything you say. You appear be the resident "fanboy extreme" who will defend Apple till the end of time..

 

[MrWinters]

And HP's opinion is relevant, why? Not sure what they've contributed to the industry, besides being another PC maker clone, so their 'value proposition' is of little concern. The smartest think theyve ever done is to buy Palm. Thunderbolt is an amazing technology, I only hope it is supported by peripherals.

Couldn't agree more!!! They sell more computer than any other company in the world. Why would their opinion be relevant????

Pffffttt

 

[kockgunner]

I think they need demos in Apple stores

I'm really surprised they haven't done this if they want to push the standard.

Apple really needs to be setting up demos and telling people what Thunderbolt is. Put 2 computers beside each other (one with Thunderbolt and one without) and transfer a 50GB file from a camera to each of those 2 computers.

I think it will really inform consumers if they see one computer transferring the file in 10 minutes, and the other in 1 minute (I don't know the actual speed of Thunderbolt).

I have a feeling people who see the port logo on their computer box don't really know what it is and even if they knew, there's nothing that works with it now.

 

[ajvizzgamer101]

Is it a cost thing? Is HP worried they will be spending more then they have to? Or do they just not like the technology? Because Thunderbolt is way faster so, why they would not like the technology is baffling to me?

 

[OllyW]

I'm really surprised they haven't done this if they want to push the standard.

Apple really needs to be setting up demos and telling people what Thunderbolt is. Put 2 computers beside each other (one with Thunderbolt and one without) and transfer a 50GB file from a camera to each of those 2 computers.

I think it will really inform consumers if they see one computer transferring the file in 10 minutes, and the other in 1 minute (I don't know the actual speed of Thunderbolt).

I have a feeling people who see the port logo on their computer box don't really know what it is and even if they knew, there's nothing that works with it now.

They just need to wait for someone to make a Thunderbolt equipped camera.

 

[KnightWRX]

They just need to wait for someone to make a Thunderbolt equipped camera.

Not to mention this camera needs to be fast enough to actually saturate the Thunderbolt port. Not to mention it needs disks that will be able to write that fast. Not to mention...

Most likely a camera would be a bad example. A USB3 camera would be able to pull off the same transfer rates as a Thunderbolt camera. Let's face it, for most people, the bottleneck will be their hard drives anyhow. Not everyone can afford 2 SATA-III SSDs in RAID 0. It's not like platter based HDs can pull off the 6 Gbps that SATA-III offers or even the 3 Gbps that SATA-II offers, let alone saturating Thunderbolt of USB3.

Some people really need to understand bottlenecks.

 

[ericmooreart]

What kind of speeds do you get?

My IT department hasn't been able to get it to work with CISCO

 

[Bafflefish]

My 1994 G4DP still does everything I need it to do and then some.

A 1994 G4 dual-processor system? Wow, and here I was thinking that the first dual-processor G4 system (at 500 mhz) didn't debut until 2000 .

Next time you want to just "throw something out there", at least check to make sure it's chronologically consistent.

 

[baryon]

FW800 has worked mighty wonderfully for me for years. And it only takes 5 seconds to Google a 400 to 800 cable from actual vendors, not shady eBay dealers:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...roogle-_-Cables-_-Cables+Unlimited-_-12339059

Troll harder next time.

Look, if something is only available off the internet and can't be found in electronics shops, then it's not practical, that's all I'm saying. The "backwards compatibility" of FW 800 wasn't perfect. You can't buy a FW 400 drive and plug it into your FW 800 port, straight away. You go to the shop and they tell you they've never heard of such a thing, so you have to resort to getting it online. So you have to wait at least 3 days to use your drive after you bought it, it's just annoying.

My university uses top of the line video cameras and they all have FireWire 400 ports. They also use the most professional Mamiya digital medium format still cameras, which also only have FW 400. My MacBook Pro only has a FW 800 port, and I could not use the cameras at all until I bought the special cable online. And trust me, I looked in every shop, including the Apple store, Maplin and some others as well, they all said that it doesn't even exist.

So one day I find myself at my university, after shooting lots of photos in the studio, and after the shoot it hits me "how the hell am I going to download all the images?". I'm not allowed to take the camera home as it is not mine, so I have to use the university's computers. But they only have the newest iMacs, with FW 800. There was NO WAY for me to download the pictures with standard cables. I can't quickly buy a cable online, that's absurd, I needed the photos instantly. How is that "backward compatible"?

 

[KnightWRX]

My IT department hasn't been able to get it to work with CISCO

What are you talking about ? Work what with Cisco ? Cisco what ? Thunderbolt is a host based technology. What are you trying to plug into a Cisco piece of equipement exactly ?

Are you trying to plug a MBP from its Thunderbolt port into a GBIC on a Cisco router/switch ? Is there even a Thunderbolt GBIC in existence ? Is there even support for IPoTB in OS X ? Is there even such a thing, since Thunderbolt is a PCI-E extender and you'd need a NIC to even convert the signal to 10000Base-SomethingorOther.

You're not making any sense here.

 

[cube]

Look, if something is only available off the internet and can't be found in electronics shops, then it's not practical, that's all I'm saying. The "backwards compatibility" of FW 800 wasn't perfect. You can't buy a FW 400 drive and plug it into your FW 800 port, straight away. You go to the shop and they tell you they've never heard of such a thing, so you have to resort to getting it online. So you have to wait at least 3 days to use your drive after you bought it, it's just annoying.

My university uses top of the line video cameras and they all have FireWire 400 ports. They also use the most professional Mamiya digital medium format still cameras, which also only have FW 400. My MacBook Pro only has a FW 800 port, and I could not use the cameras at all until I bought the special cable online. And trust me, I looked in every shop, including the Apple store, Maplin and some others as well, they all said that it doesn't even exist.

So one day I find myself at my university, after shooting lots of photos in the studio, and after the shoot it hits me "how the hell am I going to download all the images?". I'm not allowed to take the camera home as it is not mine, so I have to use the university's computers. But they only have the newest iMacs, with FW 800. There was NO WAY for me to download the pictures with standard cables. I can't quickly buy a cable online, that's absurd, I needed the photos instantly. How is that "backward compatible"?

FW800 is 100% backward compatible and is a safer connector. Apple did things right there. If you can't find cables at the shops, that's the PC vendors fault.

Thunderbolt is bad because it cripples DisplayPort. Apple did wrong there.

 

[ThisIsNotMe]

HP is missing the big picture.

HP could easily use ThudnerBolt to drive monitor sales.

Release a ThunderBolt monitor WITH USB3.

Then release all new computers with TunderBolt at the primary means of video out.

New consumers would have to get a new monitor and they would also get USB3.

Win/Win/Win

Anyways, if Intel was really behind it, it would make inclusion if ThunderBolt part of the chipset licensing deals.

 

[dguisinger]

Yes, but let's assume that now TB uses USB3 ports with slightly different pins, from a technical point, if they are both copper based, it's not very hard to come up with a cable that would cover both standards. And as some has mentioned, Intel is implementing usb3 in IB. If they can mix both of the ports up, that means one less different cable to buy and one less type of holes to be on the side of your next MBP.

One of the advantage that USB had to achieve popularity was the single cable design. The same cable can be used among thousands of different peripherals.

From Apple's current design with miniDP, to be on the road with USB device, say... iPhone5, we need to carry a miniDP/TB cable, and a USB3 cable should the USB device requires it.

From Sony's USB3 TB design, we only need one single USB3/TB cable. what's not to like about this?

I had already assumed they use different pins. You aren't going to want to wrap a 5Gbps set of cabling and two 10Gbps links in a single bundle of cable, from a signal integrity perspective it is suicide (I am an Electrical Engineer) so you won't get simultanious use of both.

Apple wasn't phasing out USB nor are they supporting TB on the iphone yet, so your point about different cables to talk to an iphone is not valid at this point.

 

[cube]

HP could easily use ThudnerBolt to drive monitor sales.

No. They can sell monitors with DisplayPort 1.2 daisy chaining. Then they can sell up to 6 monitors per graphics card.

Or what I would buy, a 30" 2560x1600 3D monitor which can only be supported by DisplayPort 1.2

Then I would also have to buy a PC because Macs cannot support that monitor until they put a proper DisplayPort connector.

As it is, I have been postponing buying a new monitor because there is not even one 3D that reaches 1920x1200. They are all stupid "Full HD".