I don't think it's a matter of difficulty. USB 3.0 is one of the selling points to Apple's 2012 Mac lineup.
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Third-Party Thunderbolt Docking Stations Remain Vaporware as Shipping Dates Pushed Back
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I don't think it's a matter of difficulty. USB 3.0 is one of the selling points to Apple's 2012 Mac lineup.
I guess you missed the memo about Apple emerging as one of Intel's largest rivals in the CPU space. Apple is not Dell, and the majority of their revenue does not come from commodity PC's such as Macs. Lately it has come primarily from the iPhone 5, which is powered by an Apple A6 SoC.
I would also say that the Apple adapters are pretty hard to argue with, in terms of price. But the point of the list was more that almost everything on it is "worthy in price" if you are a digital A/V pro, need to connect to a SAN, or need a direct attach RAID with better than 275 MB/s sequential performance. Thunderbolt is the interface for the people who make stuff for consumers, which is one of the reasons why I find it so aggravating that most consumers want to see it go away if it doesn't provide some obvious, immediately tangible benefit to them.
I've gotten into some long arguments about the lack of USB 3.0 in the 2011 Macs, and the bottom line is that people should blame Intel, not Apple. The only supplier who could have met Apple's needs for 3rd party controllers was Renesas (NEC), and they only started to produce viable chips in the necessary volume by July or August of that year. So it would have delayed the launch of the 2011 Macs by at least 6 months, and required Apple to write drivers and perform extensive validation for a controller that they would only be using for less than a year (especially if Intel had been more on-time with Ivy Bridge).
How many USB 3.0 ports based on 3rd party host controllers from that era are bootable? How many support UASP? How much power do they draw? How many of the OEM's that shipped them had to write their own drivers to enable OS support? There were significant engineering considerations for including USB 3.0 at that time, and just because other OEM's added a couple ports here and there across their product stack in order to make the spec sheets look good, Apple wasn't really in a position to do that. Of course this whole issue could be solved with a $29 adapter if Apple chose to produce one.
Repoman27
Excellent post. Apple wasn't the only one waiting for Ivy Bridge before moving to USB 3.0.
Did anyone really want what some PC makers did and put a big blue USB 3.0 only port on the side of notebook? That was not going to happen with Apple.
Excellent post. Apple wasn't the only one waiting for Ivy Bridge before moving to USB 3.0.
Did anyone really want what some PC makers did and put a big blue USB 3.0 only port on the side of notebook? That was not going to happen with Apple.
Ah yes. one problem...
What % of thunderbolt equipped comps sold have 2x thunderbolt ports?
Besides rmbps and outdated imacs... 0%
People who need externals generally don't have just one.
I just want one little big disk competitor (non-verticle).
LaCie eSATA Hub
The LaCie eSATA Hub has been shipping for a while now - I have one, and it's absolutely awesome.
If you have external enclosures that you've been using FW800 with, and they happen to have an eSATA port, you can now provide those enclosures with a significant speed increase, up to 3Gb/s per port. if you have two matched enclosures, you can stripe them and utilize the full 6Gb/s of thunderbolt - I do this with a pair of Mediasonic 4 disk enclosures (yes, I have an aggressive backup strategy to protect my data) and get amazing disk speeds with 8TB of storage. The Lacie hub has a TB port, so you can attach on additional accessories - I use the TB to Gigabit Ethernet dongle that Apple offers to give my MBP Retina ethernet access (because I have a Cinema Display, not a Thunderbolt Display), and you could attach another Lacie hub if you needed to bring more eSATA devices online.
I agree with the overall sentiment of the article and comments - TB adoption is a huge disappointment, including the fact that after all this time, nobody is offering reasonably priced BYO disk enclosure with TB. But I think Lacie was way smart creating this device, since it works with anything that has an eSATA port - not full TB speeds, but WAY faster than FW800 (3Gb/s versus 800Mb/s).
The LaCie eSATA Hub has been shipping for a while now - I have one, and it's absolutely awesome.
If you have external enclosures that you've been using FW800 with, and they happen to have an eSATA port, you can now provide those enclosures with a significant speed increase, up to 3Gb/s per port. if you have two matched enclosures, you can stripe them and utilize the full 6Gb/s of thunderbolt - I do this with a pair of Mediasonic 4 disk enclosures (yes, I have an aggressive backup strategy to protect my data) and get amazing disk speeds with 8TB of storage. The Lacie hub has a TB port, so you can attach on additional accessories - I use the TB to Gigabit Ethernet dongle that Apple offers to give my MBP Retina ethernet access (because I have a Cinema Display, not a Thunderbolt Display), and you could attach another Lacie hub if you needed to bring more eSATA devices online.
I agree with the overall sentiment of the article and comments - TB adoption is a huge disappointment, including the fact that after all this time, nobody is offering reasonably priced BYO disk enclosure with TB. But I think Lacie was way smart creating this device, since it works with anything that has an eSATA port - not full TB speeds, but WAY faster than FW800 (3Gb/s versus 800Mb/s).
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should be "Gb/s" and "Mb/s"
B is traditionally for byte
b is tradtionally for bit
Otherwise, agree with your comment that the LaCie eSATA Hub is pretty handy way to get more life from existing eSATA peripherals.
I knew better - thanks for pointing that out - corrected.
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Here's another relatively new product - looks great, but again crazy expensive, to expensive for those without professional needs:
http://www.barefeats.com/hard156.html
You only delay something if you have problems. Very disappointing. I took the plunge and bought the Lacie eSata hub. I am glad because I would be mighty upset if I had waited for the september release and then they push it back. Look at the price too.
Not good Belkin. Not good.
Not good Belkin. Not good.
why no eSATA?
Biggest frustration with my wife's late-2011 MBP is with storage. Upgraded the 500GB HDD with a 256GB SSD to improve performance, especially with VMWare Fusion. Now need more capacity, and the most cost-effective options are USB2.0 and Firewire 800.
What's most frustrating is that the late-2011 MBP still shipped with an internal CD/DVD drive. We've probably inserted fewer than eight discs in there over the past year. Would have been awesome if Apple put in an extra internal 2.5" HDD bay instead of the CD/DVD. If they had, I imagine tons of users would be installing a 2nd disk for RAID, SDD upgrades, or for convenient Time Machine backups.
Apple could also be building an combo USB/eSATAp port into the MBP, which probably wouldn't cost them much since the logical controller is already there. eSATA may not as flexible as USB3.0, but I've never heard anyone trash-talk eSATA for being slow or buggy.
I suppose some geniuses at Apple really did think the market would be crowded with $149 Thunderbolt hubs by early 2012. At least they realized by mid-2012 that they were mistaken.
Biggest frustration with my wife's late-2011 MBP is with storage. Upgraded the 500GB HDD with a 256GB SSD to improve performance, especially with VMWare Fusion. Now need more capacity, and the most cost-effective options are USB2.0 and Firewire 800.
What's most frustrating is that the late-2011 MBP still shipped with an internal CD/DVD drive. We've probably inserted fewer than eight discs in there over the past year. Would have been awesome if Apple put in an extra internal 2.5" HDD bay instead of the CD/DVD. If they had, I imagine tons of users would be installing a 2nd disk for RAID, SDD upgrades, or for convenient Time Machine backups.
Apple could also be building an combo USB/eSATAp port into the MBP, which probably wouldn't cost them much since the logical controller is already there. eSATA may not as flexible as USB3.0, but I've never heard anyone trash-talk eSATA for being slow or buggy.
I suppose some geniuses at Apple really did think the market would be crowded with $149 Thunderbolt hubs by early 2012. At least they realized by mid-2012 that they were mistaken.
Belkin update
The Belkinistas have updated their webpage, now their Express Dock release has been pushed up from last month all the way until next year:
"First Quarter, 2013: Thunderbolt Express Dock will be here fast."
Losers. How many of you guys even believe them?
The Belkinistas have updated their webpage, now their Express Dock release has been pushed up from last month all the way until next year:
"First Quarter, 2013: Thunderbolt Express Dock will be here fast."
Losers. How many of you guys even believe them?
I'm aware of those devices, but the number of owners can probably be counted on a single hand. Also, many of those devices would have been equally functional using eSATA, USB 3.0, or FW800 in some cases.
Thunderbolt is a dead technology - USB 3.0 has made sure of that.
If you don't realize how silly this makes you sound you should just stop. Both are Intel technologies that serve different needs.
USB 3.0 is not an Intel technology - Thunderbolt is.
USB 3.0 will meet the requirements of the majority of consumers, Thunderbolt will be relegated to a niche market. Where's Firewire these days? Same thing as Thunderbolt vs. USB 3.0.
If you doubt or question what I say, you are the one who is silly and should stop.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_Serial_Bus
Designer -DEC, IBM, Intel, Microsoft, NEC and Nortel
Yes USB will indeed meet the needs of most consumers ..for those enthusiasts or professionals that USB 3.0 isn't meeting the needs on there is Thunderbolt. They are complementary.
Firewire is a poor comparison and here's why.
1. It required new drivers. Thunderbolt is PCI-Express so little driver modifications are needed.
2. USB is a host -based protocol that leverages the CPU for I/O. Thunderbolt has better latency and doesn't have the same CPU utilization
3. USB requires a hub to add additional ports. Thunderbolt daisy chains.
There's little comparison
USB = Consumer
Thunderbolt = Enthusiast and Professional. Neither will kill the other.
Even if 0.5% of those who own Macs or PC's with Thunderbolt ports bought a single accessory, you'd need to have more than 125,000 fingers on a single hand to count them. So you might want to work on the accuracy of your statistics.
Arguing with you is a bit like arguing with Americans that love having fresh produce available at the local supermarket but can't stand Mexican immigrants. I get that you think there is no use for Thunderbolt, but if you like the things that other people are using Thunderbolt to create, like TV shows, movies, video games, or the products of advanced scientific or medical research, maybe it does indeed have some value for you.
I will agree that some of the Thunderbolt products that have made it to market thus far are of questionable benefit, but that certainly does not hold true for all of them. So maybe you shouldn't throw the baby out with the bathwater and make silly declarations like:
Semi-trailers are a dead technology - pickup trucks have made sure of that.
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TBH I think the hub is a more user friendly option. Particularly since not all TB devices have a second TB port.
The anemic response to Thunderbolt has been disheartening.
Thunderbolt should have been marketed as the LAST port you'll ever need.
It's too close to USB 3/eSata in its current state.
However, with improved integration and mass production, the price could have been driven down at a much faster rate than the "Enthusiast/Pro" designation has allowed.
Ok, maybe Thunderbolt would require a micro port (lightning, *sigh*)for phones/minor devices...
One port that can connect any AND ALL (up to 7) devices seamlessly, should have been enough to influence even the consumer electronic world.
No more hubs, no more adapters = more concise electronics.
Every other port should have been labelled "legacy" right out of the gate.
Now I fear it has been too long. People will be preoccupied about the next step (induction/wireless). Fear causes stagnation. Too many multi-port devices with only 1x thunderbolt, which immediately kills the ENTIRE point.
Adapters for life!
Daisy chains - the kiss of death
Actually, I think that what T-Bolt really needs is a good hub.
Daisy chaining is a terrible thing for storage, and most other things. It makes plug-and-play into a nightmare - since to remove the first disk in the daisy chain you have to offline *all* of the disks, remove the first disk, reconnect the chain, and then online the remaining disks.
And, of course, if the hub had GbE ports and USB 3.0 ports and eSATA ports you probably wouldn't buy any other T-Bolt devices.
Actually, I think that what T-Bolt really needs is a good hub.
Daisy chaining is a terrible thing for storage, and most other things. It makes plug-and-play into a nightmare - since to remove the first disk in the daisy chain you have to offline *all* of the disks, remove the first disk, reconnect the chain, and then online the remaining disks.
And, of course, if the hub had GbE ports and USB 3.0 ports and eSATA ports you probably wouldn't buy any other T-Bolt devices.
I've been waiting on that hub too.
I was just asserting my distaste in the use of old technology in brand new electronics that can benefit--however minimally (i.e. audio interface)--from the the new port.
Of course, at the projected price of these hubs, we might as well pay 30% more and get it in an incredible display.
I've run into that problem daisy chaining firewire too.
Additionally, Seagate didn't think they should have an off switch...so it's always powering up and down with every sleep/wake, eject to power down.
You shouldn't need to rip out the power or wiggly FW800 cable or punch a separate power strip.
I might go with something like this
But I can't blow $40 when i read elsewhere that the switches aren't intended for hard drives.
Daisy chaining is a pain.
However, if Thunderbolt could run (needing an extra split cable) as parallel circuits instead of series circuits...
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I don't think that's possible given the way the protocol itself works. Thunderbolt technically is PCIex and not like USB (plug & play). Apple has gone great lengths to make it feel/look like it's USB, but it's really an entirely different platform. It's usage really should be graphics chips and signal and any other PCIex-style cards (ethernet, etc).
I think drives should stick with USB3, since that is actually a plug&play interface.
Ideally, I want to see an external video card via TB or at least a splitter of the video signal (direct MD as well as the encoded TB signal) to two separate miniDP ports. I want two monitors, but not that happy about having dual-TB displays. They are expensive but give no real benefit since I want smaller monitors anyway.
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But, but...It hurts my inner Tim The Tool Man to know Raid drives (particularly of the mini multi SSD variety) are being insignificantly bottlenecked by USB 3
.