How much power does an SSD drive need? Remember we are talking near future and SSDs are here now.
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Light Peak Ready for Implementation on Copper, Not Yet on Fiber Optic
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How much power does an SSD drive need? Remember we are talking near future and SSDs are here now.
All forms of USB are limited to a few metres. USB 3.0 works best under 3 feet.
I remember a small office where someone had put their desk on one wall and their printer behind them on the opposite wall. Joining them required 16 feet of USB cable and the printer just never worked properly. Most print jobs left the computer never to be seen again. When the printer was moved to within 12 feet of the computer it was rock solid.
Some need a hundred watts or more, but a watt or two is typical for 2.5" SATA solid state media.
An OCZ Vertex 2 2.5" uses two watts in operation, 0.5 watts in standby. By comparison, a Seagate Momentus 7200 RPM drive uses 2.5 watts while seeking.
SSDs may be here, but they're still $$$$. The other day I saw a brand name 7200 rpm 2TB external HD for just $99. You can't get 128GB of internal SSD for that price.
Although originally introduced to serve the needs of pulling fiber in apartment buildings and other high-density units where conventional fiber is too inflexible, in 2009 Intel announced their intention to use it as the basis of a new computer interconnect system code-named Light Peak. ClearCurve's small size and high bandwidth capabilities offer great improvements over existing copper wiring in this role, and Intel is positioning Light Peak as a truly universal bus that can carry any existing traffic over a single cable.
Except that optical fiber is made of glass = sand, whereas copper is, well, copper. There is more sand than copper in the world, so eventually there is the potential for optical to be cheaper.
And high speed copper interconnects = precision engineering (look at the price of 1.85mm coax connectors) - at a certain point fiber wins out on price, what's expensive now is not the actual fiber, but the interconnects.
100Mbps 100-Base-T is pretty forgiving. 1000Base-Tx is less forgiving (PAM-5 modulation and some NEXT cancellation, IIRC). It's not "just an electrical signal".
Cat 5E and Cat 6 cables have a number of specifications of which impedance and XT are mainly effected by the degree of twisting.
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Oh boy... you really don't understand coaxial cables...
A coaxial cable has an inner and an outer conductor, for the signal and the return (every conducted signal, whether DC or AC (RF) requires a return path for the current). The same frequency flows along the inner and the outer, but with an opposite phase. Coaxial cable supports pure TEM (transverse electromagnetic) propagation, which means that all frequencies have the same phase velocity, i.e. the medium is non-dispersive.
As an aside, optical fiber is a waveguide and dispersive. Hence different frequencies travel at different speeds, giving group delay variation and other nasties...
Channels are groupings of frequencies, defined in the relevant standards (radio channels on the AM band have 10kHz (US) spacing, TV channels typically 6MHz spacing).
True but the prices are dropping fast. I sprung for an intel 160gb SSD recently and IMO the performance gains make it worth every penny.
Again, we're not talking twisting of the conductor pairs, we're talking about bending the cable.
You're too low level for what I was talking about. I was simply pointing out that bending a coaxial cable that's running something like let's say a 750 mhz signal that's carrying multiple 6 mhz channels is going to screw up your channel boundaries if you overbend and end up kinking the conductor. All coaxial cables have bending tolerances which are way lower than Cat cable.
Sorry that I just didn't think I needed to go deeper into signal transmission on coax to make that point and I'm especially sorry you never even addressed this point which was the basis for the entire conversation in the first place. Your post was totally useless and out of context.
You seem to be implying that TOSLINK is cheap plastic and not constructed of optical fiber that carries the signals.
TOSLINK may use inexpensive 1 mm plastic optical fiber, or it can use higher quality multistrand plastic optical fibers or even quartz glass optical fibers, depending on the desired bandwidth and application. TOSLINK cables are usually limited to 5 meters in length, with a technical maximum[1] of 10 meters, for reliable transmission without the use of a signal booster. However, it is very common for interfaces on newer consumer electronics (satellite receivers and PCs with optical outputs) to easily run over 30 meters on even low-cost ($0.75/m) TOSLINK cables.
-Wikipedia
If I bought a 12-foot cable for 50¢ and a 25-foot cable for $1.50, and if the quality of the sound is fine and I am satisfied with it, why would I need to buy some expensive, fragile cable at Best Buy or Radio Shack?
I would have said on average they are about average.
They get on technologies they like very quickly often well before the public is aware of them, sponsoring their development and/or launch in to the market place. I mean the company was founded on one such move (6502). Then there are some really obvious examples of tech they still standing back from.
It seems pretty clear that Apple has had an influence on Lightpeaks development within Intel, probably not from the kick off. So It would be a good bet Apple will back Lightpeak and wait for it over say USB3.
Any word as yet what the final connectors are going to look like?
In many ways it's looks like Lightpeak was Intels take on USB3 before it got to committee. All the demo's to date have used standard USB and it seems like extra speed could have been added without the Frankenplugs of the official standard. Plus it looks like Lightpeak drops the whole A-B plug nonsense.
Wondering if Apple and the other OEM's who've been privy to this might have been pushing for micro-USB as the standard port?
I have to agree, it's hilariously ironic that "Light Peak" doesn't actually use light (yet.)
I have to agree, it's hilariously ironic that "Light Peak" doesn't actually use light (yet.)
Almost as ironic as a "Pro" laptop that doesn't have Blu-ray, eSATA, Expresscard, built-in 3G radio, ....
will linkin park also be able to deliver 45 watts of POWER?
and a whopping 2 usb ports!
Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_2_1 like Mac OS X; nl-nl) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.2 Mobile/8C148a Safari/6533.18.5)
I want to read an article about THE usage of it in the MacBook pro's
Any suggestions?
I want to read an article about THE usage of it in the MacBook pro's
Any suggestions?
Will we be able to "upgrade" our current HDs to Light Peak?
What I mean is, will we be able to buy a mini type b connector to a Light Peak connector, that takes advantage of the full speed of Light Peak and plug it into our current hard drive. (Obviously, it'll be throttled by the speed of the HD)? OR, will we have to buy a brand new HD, which has a Light Peak to Light Peak b? connector?
What I mean is, will we be able to buy a mini type b connector to a Light Peak connector, that takes advantage of the full speed of Light Peak and plug it into our current hard drive. (Obviously, it'll be throttled by the speed of the HD)? OR, will we have to buy a brand new HD, which has a Light Peak to Light Peak b? connector?
Everything that certain about the usage on Apple systems can be found by reading /dev/null.
It's a quick read.
No. You'll need to buy a Light Peak cable, and a (probably not cheap) dongle to convert Light Peak to USB/FW/eSATA or whatever.
I agree. I think one of the early implementations of LP will be a legacy hub that connects to the LP port on the computer, using LP between the hub and the system. The hub will have USB/FW/etc ports on it, so that you would just plug your existing HDs into the hub. One could then plug a traditional USB hub into the legacy USB port on the LP hub to multiple it.
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General thoughts, not in response to comments above....
Depending on implementations ('cause we are all just speculating here), the legacy hub could still be a big improvement on the current situation. One hub should be able to handle USB1 to USB3, and FW, etc, and allow each device to run at it's own max speed. I say "should" in the sense of "It would be really stupid if LP worked like USB and made the whole chain work at the speed of the slowest device."
I would love to be able to park my external HDs (mix of FW and USB) and scanner and printer all in one "Peripheral" spot, all connected to one hub, instead of the current set up where I have some things closer (due to cable length limits) and some things farther (the printer) and out of my rather small office space.
Heck. With a fully implemented LP, I could park my MP in the closet in the room next door, and run the LP cable to my desk, where all of my peripherals are. Keeps the computer safer from dust and spills (coffee breaks at the desk) and cats. Makes it easier to climate control the office and the computer.... Just makes it tidier in general.
I'm hoping that when this MP is ready to be replaced, LP will be mature enough that it'll be a viable option. Almost 3 years old, so I figure I've got at least a couple of years to go......
You mean like we on the Windows side have been doing with docking stations and port replicators for the last decade or two?
At the end of the work day, I push the "undock" button on my dock at work (connected to the office power brick, two monitors, GbE, mouse, keyboard, USB drives, ...). In less than 10 seconds, the light under the undock button changes from blinking yellow to steady green. I push the physical disconnect button, and put my laptop in my bag.
When I'm home, I click the laptop into the dock at home (connected to the home power brick, one monitor, GbE, no USB drives, no keyboard, and a mouse). Wake it, and everything pops up (windows that were on the 2nd monitor show up on the new single monitor).
Next day, when I go back to the office, I push the "undock" button and stuff the laptop into my bag.
In the office, I click the laptop into the dock and wake it. All my peripherals come back, and windows return to their original monitors.
I hope some group at Apple is working to make docking on Apple OSX work as well as it does on Windows.