how much is affordable? I have read caldigit is releasing a 199 one with less ports, but enough for normal folks
search google and get some good pictures from show
http://www.thunderbolt4mac.com/caldigit-thunderbolt-station.htm
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Sonnet Announces Thunderbolt Dock With Internal Drive Bay and Blu-Ray Drive
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how much is affordable? I have read caldigit is releasing a 199 one with less ports, but enough for normal folks
search google and get some good pictures from show
http://www.thunderbolt4mac.com/caldigit-thunderbolt-station.htm
That was pretty much the problem that Apple always has. They don't say about anything. What were the audience supposed to expect? Every other manufacturer had usb3 already in their products and then Apple gives tb, but not usb3 and does not tell, that tb is not meant to replace usb3 and Apple will implement usb3 in the next models. All Apple said that they introduce new fastest interconnection. Not even for what it was for.
Since the system is already affected by hiccups, I don't see any reason to try protect users from these hiccups. What could be done, is educating users how to deal with issues. Well, some companies can't do that, since then they would admit that their products aren't magical miracles or otherwise fully perfect.
Biggest flaw with TB-daisychaining is, that the one device that is usually never moved (display) has to be at the end of chain. You loose picture from display every time you need to connect or disconnect something.
Putting tb controller out of the computer is a good idea. Every tb device is like this. If pci is extended to external box and then divided to 2 tb controllers, I'd see there now additional "computer" or "host".
Sadly there's no instructions for using tb to comply this fat tree topology. Users will see hiccups when devices' added bandwidth exceeds last link's bandwidth. Nothing new or revolutionary in daisy-chaining with tb.
Nevertheless it's pretty interesting that firewire was able to support isochronous transfers, daisy chaining AND hubs 2 decades ago. Where did that know-how disappeared?
I was suggesting "mechanical" switches, same kind of that you can buy for hdmi for $20. Just to help not needeing to pull and push the cables every time.
Can you also tell why fw-hubs are cheap, even with low latency and isochronous data transfer?
It costs a fair bit just to build a box with a thunderbolt controller, thunderbolt in/out/through etc. which is all relatively new technology (plus, theres the cost of a TB cable). After that, it should be just a case of adding bog-standard PCIe to firewire/ethernet/USB/SATA chips. Also, making lots of different versions of a device to suit different people's need is expensive and a stock control nightmare. So it makes sense to throw in as much as possible.
They need a SATA controller for the Blu-Ray - which probably provides 4 x SATA interfaces, so adding eSATA is relatively straightforward. If you need another HD, eSATA is the way to go - you'll get something like the speed of a Thunderbolt hard drive without the expense.
Some people will want Firewire (Macs only just got USB3 - before that, Firewire was the best way to attach external HDs).
You're missing two major points of these devices:
1. To minimise the number of cables you have to plug in to your laptop and have trailing across the desk.
2. To give a laptop or small-form-factor computer with a limited selection of interfaces something like the flexibility of a mini-tower PC (which often feature all of these interfaces).
Good points! The more Thunderbolt cables you use, the more you pay
I am seriously thinking about this sonnet docks or CalDigit's Thunderbolt station which is another great docking system. To do firewire, I can just use Apple's Thunderbolt-to-FireWire adapter downstream from Caldigit's dock.
That is true if you're using a DisplayPort monitor or adapter. A TB monitor can be placed anywhere on the chain.
As long as Apple does not make matte screen with 10-bit colors and adobeRGB gamut, TB monitors don't exist to me.
I am wondering how does sonnet do 4 USB3 ports where Belkin and Caldigit only provide 3 instead. Saw some big poster online but not that much information available yet.
Had the same question from this guy
http://www.thunderbolt4mac.com/sonnet/Echo-15-Thunderbolt-Dock/index.asp
Had the same question from this guy
http://www.thunderbolt4mac.com/sonnet/Echo-15-Thunderbolt-Dock/index.asp
Just get a Mac Pro
I love all these gizmos essentially replicating what you already have in the Mac Pro
http://tinyurl.com/dym45fj
I love all these gizmos essentially replicating what you already have in the Mac Pro
http://tinyurl.com/dym45fj
First is, thunderbolt is not an apple product, it's an intel standard and can be in a pc too you know.
Anyone saying blu-ray is dead can't criticise thunderbolt. Both are having issues penetrating the market. Thunderbolt will superseed usb3 in time if they are licensed correctly to manufacturers.
This dock is way expensive though for the connectivity you are getting, it's ugly to boot. If you want to sell an apple accessory you should add some style you can probably charge more too.
I don't know about anyone else but iTunes on my connection streaming hd movies looks amazing and I never see compression artefacts have no loading times and get to take my tiny Apple TV anywhere I want like friends houses.
I don't actually think blueray with its old compression techniques actually looks that much better, for most it's no convenient to go to a store to buy one when you can click a few times and play it instantly.
I still go to the cinema and love the 4k screens and sound systems but I very very doubt 4k will be a consumer device anytime soon. 99% of TV broadcast is still sd or 720p or massively compressed 1080p, it looks like junk when you leave quality up to broadcasters!
TV screens are still way ahead of the content available from TV providers. YouTube is still over compressed.
Blueray will be around for a while by its sheer quality, only as a standard but iTunes proves you can do quality video that matches the screen online.
I really think thunderbolt is the future especially if they introduce a micro version for phones, thunderbolt to lighting would be amazing for speed though wireless 802.11ac will kill that I think.
Anyone saying blu-ray is dead can't criticise thunderbolt. Both are having issues penetrating the market. Thunderbolt will superseed usb3 in time if they are licensed correctly to manufacturers.
This dock is way expensive though for the connectivity you are getting, it's ugly to boot. If you want to sell an apple accessory you should add some style you can probably charge more too.
I don't know about anyone else but iTunes on my connection streaming hd movies looks amazing and I never see compression artefacts have no loading times and get to take my tiny Apple TV anywhere I want like friends houses.
I don't actually think blueray with its old compression techniques actually looks that much better, for most it's no convenient to go to a store to buy one when you can click a few times and play it instantly.
I still go to the cinema and love the 4k screens and sound systems but I very very doubt 4k will be a consumer device anytime soon. 99% of TV broadcast is still sd or 720p or massively compressed 1080p, it looks like junk when you leave quality up to broadcasters!
TV screens are still way ahead of the content available from TV providers. YouTube is still over compressed.
Blueray will be around for a while by its sheer quality, only as a standard but iTunes proves you can do quality video that matches the screen online.
I really think thunderbolt is the future especially if they introduce a micro version for phones, thunderbolt to lighting would be amazing for speed though wireless 802.11ac will kill that I think.
It would be a waste FOR ME. I wouldn't be able to justify paying that much for something that I'm only going to use half of the ports it offers. I would use the Blu Ray drive. A LOT. I'd use all the USB 3.0 ports (I have a late 2011 MacBook Pro, so it would give me access to a wider variety of accessories). But I never use firewire, and never use eSATA (I hadn't heard of eSATA until a few months ago).
I'm not saying they should make different versions, either, so I don't know where you're getting that from, and I'm not missing any points. I'm stating that it wouldn't be as useful a utility to me as it would be to someone else.
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Already looked at it and signed up to be notified when it's available in the UK.
Only if you were paying a large premium for the extra, unused ports. You seem to be assuming that half the ports = half the price.
So, you're paying $250 extra for the Sonnet with Blu Ray vs. the Caldigit.
For that you're getting:
- the Blu-Ray player (c.f. ~$100 for an external BD)
- ability to add an internal 2.5 or 3.5" SATA hard drive (bare drives will cost you less than a USB3 external drive, far less than a Thunderbolt external drive).
- 4 USB ports rather than 3.
- you free up 1 or 2 USB ports because you don't need external bluray or HD.
You lose:
- some portability (if that's important to you - pretty irrelevant if you want this as a desktop dock)
- HDMI (and I'd really wait for the reviews to see what the pros/cons of that are).
However, after the history of the Belkin dock, I'd wait for these things to actually be on sale before inferring too much about specs and prices.
Get a Seagate adapter. You don't need a Seagate drive. They have a 2.5" version for $99 and a 3.5" version for $150.
Then don't buy it. Why are you even here? To prove that it is useless? Because it isn't to them who need something like this.
Would be great to play my BluRay collection on my Mac.
I suppose those are some distinct advantages, although it would be great to be able to swap in your own Blu Ray drive into it.
It's the idea of not using a lot of the ports that gets me thinking that it might be a waste for me. I don't use eSATA or Firewire, as I said before, and while the internal hard drive is a nice feature, it isn't essential. Might be nice for Time Machine backups though.
It looks like I would be getting a better deal because I'd be using all the features it offers rather than just half of them, especially with a pretty big price difference. Its a bit of a steep price to pay to get just one extra usb 3.0 port, a SATA port and a Blu Ray drive I might not be able to swap out should it break, and a premium I can't afford at the moment. I have a usb BR drive already which works great and is very portable for when I go see my friends at their university, and I'm only earning minimum wage at the moment, so I don't know if I could justify it unless I was going to make use of every feature it offered.
But hey, you feel like being generous and buying it for me if and when it comes out, I'll welcome it with open arms and you with a nice homemade pizza.
And yeah...where the heck is the Belkin Dock? What happened to the whole taking pre-orders thing?
I'd hope that will be possible - it would be better if they offered it without an optical drive and let you fit your own or use the space for another HD. Not offering a blu-ray writer is odd, too.
Value vs. cost is a tricky one - I'd say the Sonnet offers at least equivalent value to the Caldigit, but you can't ignore the fact that it costs more.
Sure I did. Let me recap:
Thread is about a $400 dock designed to sit on a desk. You comment how you don't want to spend $400 on something so clunky, because all you need is a splitter for TB.
That's awesome that that's all you need, but it's really not at all what the thread was about. It's like me posting in a Mac Pro thread "there's no way I'm paying $3000 for a computer. All I want is a Mac Mini".
The product in the OP isn't remotely aimed at someone looking for a simple splitter, so why bother commenting at all? Of course people are going to respond "just don't buy it" because it was a dumb thing to post in the first place.
exactly, all I need is a splitter for TB, which strongly implies I'm not buying. Later in the thread, I explained why I'm not buying it. Therefore, your comment "Then don't buy it" followed by an explanation that simply repeats the reason I gave already about not buying it is completely unnecessary. Why even bother commenting when you're just repeating?
That's like saying "then don't watch the indie Steve Jobs movie" right after I explained I'm not going to watch the indie version because I rather see the studio version which seems intriguing.
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then you have failed with your comment. try again.
If they offered it without a Blu-Ray drive, or swappable ones, I might save for a little bit and think about purchasing. But then again, I'm not completely sure. I use my external BR drive when I go see my friends, and they don't have a player so it's all "Hey, can you plug in the laptop and play this???" (I managed to get Mac Blu Ray Player cheap as part of an app bundle, so its a great portable player).
The writer thing is odd too...if they offer a reader, why not a writer too?
If they dropped the price, or offered it at a reduced price without the BR drive, it might just sway me from the Caldigit dock should it actually come out. I could swap my usb hard drive enclosures for some eSATA ones, but then that's an additional cost too. At the moment with the projected price of the Caldigit, it seems like a fair deal. The Sonnet seems like a heavier investment, where the Caldigit appears to give quick and convenient expandability. Either way, they both look like great products.
Anyway, if I did want the other one in the future (and had a better job) I could get the best of both with daisychaining.
Me too. Actually at this point the pricing is minor to me. How soon we can get the products on hand and use it is more important. I have been waiting for 2 years and finally saw a nice one from sonnet or caldigit. I just signed up caldigit's waiting list. No preorder but waiting list
easier
Me too. Actually at this point the pricing is minor to me. How soon we can get the products on hand and use it is more important. I have been waiting for 2 years and finally saw a nice one from sonnet or caldigit. I just signed up caldigit's waiting list. No preorder but waiting list
Yeah
I waited ages for the Belkin dock, and it still hasn't materialised, so I'm praying these make their way into production soon!Sounds like you'd need only usb3 hub, if you don't need else than usb and already have bd-drive.