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So how do you feel about TB3 taking USB-C form?

thadoggfather

thadoggfather

macrumors P6
Original poster
Oct 1, 2007
16,340
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Does this anger you and make you want to throw your 1st gen at a wall at full speed right now?

Because it... doesn't for me.

But I think it's logical to take this route over DisplayPort. Still, as someone mentioned on the main thread, I could see this being confusing to people with a port that is brand new to begin with, blending USB-C accessories with something that might have what they believe to be TB capabilities.

I dunno.

Good stuff though overall. If I really want 2nd gen or up, I'll just fork over.

I have such simple computing needs in general though that I might not be tempted.

Glad I went 2011 air over 2010 for i5 over c2d, TB over DP, and backlit keyboard.

TB I really enjoyed for USB 3 expandability when 2011 had only USB2 otherwise it breathed new life into my machine, but now that I have USB 3 with USB-C and my external portables are slow rpm anyways, I'm thinking whatever for right now. This could change as 4k+ displays become lower priced and mature at a point that doesn't make me feel guilty about splurging.

This all also makes me feel that the release timing of rMB was uncoincidental with Intel's public unveiling of USB-C TB3.
 
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Makes me think the next rMBP is going to look more like the rMB than I thought. Guaranteed now that the next revision of the rMBP is going to be TB3 and USB-C only.
 
I like it because it opens up the possibility that the second or third generation MacBook will have a Thunderbolt port, which should enable better hubs and better monitor capabilities.
 
A very good thing. This confirms that MBPs and (more importantly) lots of other machines will adopt USB-C, both for low-speed and high-speed devices. That will increase the speed at which companies will be launching USB-C peripherals and docks.

So the 2015 rMB is a "low-speed" USB-C device, which will be able to take advantage of all the non-TB devices to be launched. A decent hidable dock (with a long USB-C cable) is really important, capable of connecting DP or HDMI, some USB ports, ethernet, and an internal drive.

In future, machines will be able to use the higher speed devices yet to be released. That hardly makes the rMB obsolete. I can see large numbers of low-priced Windows machines coming out with one or two USB-C ports in the near future, and it becoming the usual way of doing things. That only helps us.
 
thadoggfather said:
Does this anger you and make you want to throw your 1st gen at a wall at full speed right now?

Because it... doesn't for me.
...
I have such simple computing needs in general though that I might not be tempted.
Click to expand...

Agree with this part. I decided to replace my 2011 13" MBA with a rMB rather than a newer Air or Pro, because i need nothing from a laptop other than browsing, MS office, Citrix Apps, and listening to music and looking at Photos. I can do a clean reinstall with every OS update because it literally takes me about 30 minutes to restore everything. All TB means to me is expensive accessories. I went for this 1st gen because it is a beautiful, rock solid chunk of aluminum that feels phenomenal and has an amazing display, and will not shed a tear when gen 2 comes out...
 
I haven't used a TB before even my former macs had it,
what mattered for most people was a DP function, which rMBs already have.

Even if 2nd gen has a dream functionality for some, we have 1~2 years of fun time before that.
 
good for people who care about TB or use the rMB as a main machine.
In my mixed PC/Mac environment I never had a use for TB, as de-facto TB is still pretty much a Mac thing. I don't think I'll have use for it in the future either, unless the PC world picks it up.
 
tillsbury said:
That will increase the speed at which companies will be launching USB-C peripherals and docks.
Click to expand...

Yes, and it should lower the cost of USB-C cables, and hopefully lower the cost of the female connector that companies have to use as they will now be produced in such bulk.
 
I feel great about it. When the MacBook came out with USB c came out I predicted that the Skylake rMBP would be thinner and have TB3 and USB-C ports. Looks like I was kind of right, except that it will be the same port. Brilliant.
 
The only concern I have is any potential it may cause for confusion. I can't quite see how this will play out yet. If there ends up being a fairly wide array of Thunderbolt accessories that are not compatible with a wide variety of devices, despite having a connector that is physically compatible, that seems like a problem to me. I guess this could have materialized with Thunderbolt over displayport, so maybe it's much ado about nothing. On the other hand, up to this point, Thunderbolt has never really taken off to have the kind of market penetration where that confusion could spread widely. People who bought Thunderbolt stuff knew what they were buying and for what purpose.
 
It will permit to have less ports : for exemple, a MBP today have 2 USB and 2 TB minidisplay ports, It will have 2 USB C with TB3 compatibility.

Ok it's not enough for people who use 4 ports at the same time (btw they have an hub for that ...), but for a lot, professionnals too, 2 ports are enough if it can be USB C or TB3.
 
It's great news. Although I don't think this will be enough to convince the PC camp to join the Thunderbolt bandwagon. It won't make TB devices any cheaper either.

As for the  camp. The hardware designs will be much simpler. End users will ultimately like it too. It will allow things to just work without the users (esp. simple folks like my parents for instance) having to understand what USB or TB is, let alone knowing which way the plug goes in.

Surely the  marketing team will seize on this too. I can already picture Jony Ive in his calm British accent introducing the new Macs as having "ports that are truly universal" (or something similar to that):p.

I don't feel bad my new rMB will miss out on this. I don't own any TB devices, and if I really need to perform tasks that require the full 40Gbit/sec bandwidth, I never would have bought rMB anyway (and neither should you).
 
bcaslis said:
Makes me think the next rMBP is going to look more like the rMB than I thought. Guaranteed now that the next revision of the rMBP is going to be TB3 and USB-C only.
Click to expand...

Guaranteed that the next "pro" edition of Macbook won't have regular USB ports?? I think you are on another planet... :)
 
sangalang said:
It's great news. Although I don't think this will be enough to convince the PC camp to join the Thunderbolt bandwagon. It won't make TB devices any cheaper either.

I don't feel bad my new rMB will miss out on this. I don't own any TB devices, and if I really need to perform tasks that require the full 40Gbit/sec bandwidth, I never would have bought rMB anyway (and neither should you).
Click to expand...

I agree... I never used TB in my whole life. I use a MB air today and the only thing I would need on it is 1 USB, 1 charger input and a HDMI out.
 
deleder said:
Guaranteed that the next "pro" edition of Macbook won't have regular USB ports?? I think you are on another planet... :)
Click to expand...

I seriously think the same. Apple will choose for you that you only need USB C and TB3 ports, otherwise you can buy adapters. They can let 1 regular USB port for the first rev ok .. but that's all, they will move it.
 
I personally like this change. It means that I now have extra usb ports that can also be thunderbolt ports when I need the extra throughput. This is of course assuming that Apple doesn't decide that they can now have less ports on their computers. I don't want a nrMBP with 1 USB-C port :confused:

Now they just need to add mag-safe to USB-C and we'll be good to go.
 
Pandarama said:
I seriously think the same. Apple will choose for you that you only need USB C and TB3 ports, otherwise you can buy adapters. They can let 1 regular USB port for the first rev ok .. but that's all, they will move it.
Click to expand...

1 regular versus 0 is a big difference. No chance in hell they will launch a new rMBP without 1x regular USB ports within a timeframe of 1 year.
Of course they would like to move on. And they will. But the new rMBP won't be out of regular USB ports. It will be interesting to see what happens to the generation after the next one. It could be without regular USB ports...
 
deleder said:
1 regular versus 0 is a big difference. No chance in hell they will launch a new rMBP without 1x regular USB ports within a timeframe of 1 year.
Of course they would like to move on. And they will. But the new rMBP won't be out of regular USB ports. It will be interesting to see what happens to the generation after the next one. It could be without regular USB ports...
Click to expand...
I'm betting they will drop it next year. Better to do a massive upgrade at once rather than slowing down and having to transition into a post Type A world.
 
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TechGod said:
I'm betting they will drop it next year. Better to do a massive upgrade at once rather than slowing down and having to transition into a post Type A world.
Click to expand...
deleder said:
1 regular versus 0 is a big difference. No chance in hell they will launch a new rMBP without 1x regular USB ports within a timeframe of 1 year.
Of course they would like to move on. And they will. But the new rMBP won't be out of regular USB ports. It will be interesting to see what happens to the generation after the next one. It could be without regular USB ports...
Click to expand...
That's what people said about Firewire, Disk drive, Flash, etc... If there is a stepping stone it will be probably be in the broadwell refresh. Apple likes to make abrupt changes to push other people along. i.e. if they keep releasing devices with the old style of USB port, there is no incentive for USB makers to change to USB-C.

I suspect from the nMB that Apples end-game is computers without ports. Ironically in a few years we will probably find out that WiFi is carcinogenic or something.
 
Apple likes to make change. By leaving CDrom from the Macbook Air they showed that. But Macbook air was not meant for professional users.

Okay, they got rid of Firewire. How many used that port? Some video editors, okay. That may be right. But how many normal people used firewire on a daily basis? One can't compare ditching regular USB in a few months from now to ditching a port that not the majority used.
 
deleder said:
Guaranteed that the next "pro" edition of Macbook won't have regular USB ports?? I think you are on another planet... :)
Click to expand...

I'll take that bet. :D

Since when has Apple cared about legacy? With TB3 and USB-C using the same connector and TB3 also supporting all USB-C functionality, I can see the next Pro machine having 2 or 3 TB3 ports. Period. We will have to wait and see but you should stock up on adaptors now. :p
 
I think it's beyond idiocy that they didn't include a USB 3 port. Absolutely unacceptable. Ridiculous, insulting and infuriating.

I should have mine tomorrow :)
 
ShadovvMoon said:
One could argue that the new macbook is targeted at normal people, yet it doesn't have a regular USB port
Click to expand...

It is not aimed at professional users that use it as their main machine.
I wasn't shocked that they moved straight to USB-C on the rMB. What baffled me was that it only had one port, not two.
 
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