Thunderbolt 3/USB-C Adapters, Cables, and Hubs for New MacBook Pro

[rittchard]

I can't wait to see the reaction when Apple eliminates ALL the ports.

Don't laugh, with wireless charging and 60GHz Wigig already deploying, it could be sooner than you think

 

[KPOM]

With adapters, sure, it can be everything you like, but on it's own they are just holes in the chassis and that's my point. If you forget your precious adapters you are screwed.

Like the speed matters for anything but connecting displays.

My point is that there's nothing magical about USB-A or any of the other ports, either. Forget a cable and it's the same thing. It's just that the legacy cables are currently more readily available.

In any case the vast majority of people don't need every one of those ports, just some of them.

 

[Ankaa]

That's funny, given that we lose of lot of flexibility with this product. Honestly, I prefer if products adapt to my needs rather than forcing me to adapt.

Soooo...what about ALL the OTHER people who may have different needs?

Goosh, seriously

 

[Feenician]

So, let's do some math to figure out how much money it would cost to basically get the same I/O that we had in the outgoing MacBook Pro 15" model:

2 USB-A = $38
2 Thunderbolt = $98
MagSafe = $39
HDMI = $69
SD = $15

Total = $259 US, ontop of the already ridiculous pricing for the new 15" models.

This nickle-and-diming crap is the exact reason that my current mid-2014 fully-loaded MacBook Pro 15" is the last Mac I buy from Apple, and quite possibly the last device in general I buy from this scumbag company.

How much would it cost to get same i/o bandwidth and flexibility from the new 15" to the old 15"? Oh right, up couldn't no matter what you spend.

 

[littyboy]

Nothing says "Pro" like showing up to a job with a handful of adapters and dongles.

I used to work for a CCO of this company and he had a nice laptop. He kept saying that the one thing he hated the most was bringing all these adapters just to do presentations.

 

[sir1963nz]

Lol, look at all this crap. You pay out the ass for the Macbook, way more than it's worth, then on top of that you also get to buy all these dongles and adapters at their own inflated price! What a joke.

Then don't buy one.
There you go, life is good for you now.

If I buy a laptop it had better last me YEARS (my current is a mid 2011), sure I upped the RAM and put in an SSD, and it will probably do me another year or two.

MY guess is Apple is privy to a LOT of information about where technology is heading, you know the future. and they are building it for that future.

The Dongles are NOT just 2 plugs with a couple of wires in-between , they have their own electronics / controllers, so @20 is probably about right, especially as most people won't be needing or wanting them.

 

[ConnorMcJeebus]

Look folks... Timmy, Jony, Eddie, Angie... they all have already banked f*** you money. Jony barely works. Timmy has his political agenda, Eddie hangs with Drake, Taylor, et. al. Angie stays a mystery. Love reading all the comments about how you all think the MBP design should care about consumers' current needs.That ship has sailed on the seas of a vastly immense sea of cash and option values. When you have f*** you money, the value to shareholders for making consumers happy takes a distant seat to the thrill of adopting the poseur's take on "we can lead the industry". What the f*** do they care about getting fired should the board every actually care. Be thankful that the MBP is a hella good engineering design, and that it likely will retain its second-market sales value. Myself, I appraised the current MBP lineup, and bought the 2012 - the last truly expandable MBP. Since I am developer not a video fanatic, it is way more machine than I need (once I put 16 gig of RAM and a Samsung SSD in it). I asked the guy I bought it from to look for another pristine 2012. Eventually I will get a new MBP, but am happy Apple's quality of engineering makes the 2012 such a good option. Remember: F*** YOU money runs Apple now, so be careful and pick your opportunities to take advantage of their still-great parts/assembly engineering.

This pretty much sums it up. Steve Jobs' words in that Xerox video come to mind: the "genius"/innovative aspect of the company has begun to rot out and they have no feeling in their hearts about genuinely wanting to help the customer. They basically just want your money. They're the monopoly now, and so it seems the cycle will repeat itself.

All the people defending the forced adoption of a universal adopter (a.k.a. Apple's apologists) are assuming that Apple has a plan for the future, and that plan is to make things more simple and more neat. But, given the fact that they couldn't even make their flagship phones and laptops (released within months of each other) connect without the use of an adapter, I'm not so sure Apple has any unified plan for the future or that they care what your desk spaces look like. Maybe they just wanted one type of port only because it was cheaper for them to do that. Or maybe they didn't have enough room to add other types of ports AND make the MBPs thinner, so this was the compromise. Who knows.

Since Tim took over, it's just been year after year of putting out whatever will sell for the most money possible with no real end-goal in sight (seemingly). Look at the fragmentation within all the major product lines: iPads, iPhones, Macs, Apple Watch. People say the Android market is too fragmented but that's because so many different companies build Android products. On the other hand, Apple has fragmented their own damn product lines to the point where the common buyer wouldn't be able to say what the differences between a iPad mini 2/mini 4/Pro/Air/Air 2 or a Macbook Pro with touchbar, without touchbar, 13, 15, 2015, etc. etc. For every single product lineup, things have been fragmented. Most recently, you can get the Apple Watch Series 2 or 1, Apple Watch Nike, Apple Watch Hermes or Apple Watch Edition. After seeing this, how can the defenders believe that anyone at Apple gave any serious thought about simplifying the lives of the average user?

 

[ts1973]

Still haven't seen or found a solution to hook up my 30" cinema display or Dell 3008 monitor. Both are dual link DVI. Any thoughts ?

 

[AppleFan1179]

Still haven't seen or found a solution to hook up my 30" cinema display or Dell 3008 monitor. Both are dual link DVI. Any thoughts ?

I think you know the answer. It sucks, but that doesn't make it the wrong answer.

 

[KPOM]

So, let's do some math to figure out how much money it would cost to basically get the same I/O that we had in the outgoing MacBook Pro 15" model:

2 USB-A = $38
2 Thunderbolt = $98
MagSafe = $39
HDMI = $69
SD = $15

Total = $259 US, ontop of the already ridiculous pricing for the new 15" models.

I need an adapter to plug in my brand new iPhone into my brand new MacBook.
I need an adapter to plug in my EarPods that came with my iPhone into my new MacBook.
I need an adapter in order to interact with any of many, many billions of devices out there that use USB-A.

This nickle-and-diming crap is the exact reason that my current mid-2014 fully-loaded MacBook Pro 15" is the last Mac I buy from Apple, and quite possibly the last device in general I buy from this scumbag company.

How many people really need ALL those ports? Plus it isn't as if Apple is the only choice. I have a $7 USB-C to USB-A bud that works as well as Apple's cable. Apple's Thunderbolt adapter is actually one of the cheaper ones, and Intel has basically said that the older TB 2 port is dead and all future TB products should use TB 3.

Apple's TB3 adapter is actually bi-directional, so you can use it to connect a TB 3 device to your older MacBook Pro that has only a TB2 port (obviously at the slower speeds). So Apple could have "forced" you to buy a new Mac, but instead they developed a versatile adapter.

Remember, when Apple released the iMac in 1998, they dropped EVERY legacy port they had ever used in their history, and there were only a handful of USB devices at all (about 5).

 

[Suckfest 9001]

How much would it cost to get same i/o bandwidth and flexibility from the new 15" to the old 15"? Oh right, up couldn't no matter what you spend.

I couldn't care less - having faster I/O is not good trade-off for a computer that's useless in the real world without a million dongles hanging from it.

 

[Duane Martin]

I am personally very happy about my new MacBook Pro having 4 x Thunderbolt 3 connectors as that is a crapload of peripherals it will support now and into the future. Dongles are a short term inconvenience.

Still looking for the perfect dock for my 2016 MacBook Pro, though. I want it to be TB3 so that the pass through is also TB3. I want the USB 3.1 to be Gen 2 which almost none of them are. I want 85w of power to charge my 15" properly. And I want solid construction. Bonus to the first company that includes a 10GBe ethernet, but I know that's a dream.

So, TB3 in and pass through; at least 3 (preferably 5) USB A connectors, some of which support USB 3.1 gen 2; ethernet (bonus for 10GBe); HDMI 2.0; Display Port 1.2 (bonus future proof 1.4); SD card reader (bonus mini SD as well); bonus for FW 800 and eSata though it is probably time I let these devices go (when is the last time I used my DV Cam deck or AJA IO?).

So far, no single device rings all of these bells. That said, I am confident that I will see this product some time in the near future and I am hoping CalDigit does it as I like their build quality. Their TB2 dock has been outstanding.

 

[Suckfest 9001]

How many people really need ALL those ports? Plus it isn't as if Apple is the only choice. I have a $7 USB-C to USB-A bud that works as well as Apple's cable. Apple's Thunderbolt adapter is actually one of the cheaper ones, and Intel has basically said that the older TB 2 port is dead and all future TB products should use TB 3.

Apple's TB3 adapter is actually bi-directional, so you can use it to connect a TB 3 device to your older MacBook Pro that has only a TB2 port (obviously at the slower speeds). So Apple could have "forced" you to buy a new Mac, but instead they developed a versatile adapter.

Remember, when Apple released the iMac in 1998, they dropped EVERY legacy port they had ever used in their history, and there were only a handful of USB devices at all (about 5).

I use all of them on a very regular basis.

Having to carry around adapters is not the solution. Not even including said adapters in the box is an additional kick in the nuts.

 

[sir1963nz]

So, let's do some math to figure out how much money it would cost to basically get the same I/O that we had in the outgoing MacBook Pro 15" model:

2 USB-A = $38
2 Thunderbolt = $98
MagSafe = $39
HDMI = $69
SD = $15

Total = $259 US, ontop of the already ridiculous pricing for the new 15" models.

I need an adapter to plug in my brand new iPhone into my brand new MacBook.
I need an adapter to plug in my EarPods that came with my iPhone into my new MacBook.
I need an adapter in order to interact with any of many, many billions of devices out there that use USB-A.

This nickle-and-diming crap is the exact reason that my current mid-2014 fully-loaded MacBook Pro 15" is the last Mac I buy from Apple, and quite possibly the last device in general I buy from this scumbag company.

And here is how much money my wife would need to spend $0

And stop confusing yourself with the majority. Apple will KNOW how many people use each port, after all they have tens of thousands of staff in all sorts of areas (accounting, design, programming, etc etc etc) as well as a millions of users.

YOUR needs are not mine.

 

[KPOM]

I use all of them on a very regular basis.

Having to carry around adapters is not the solution. Not even including said adapters in the box is an additional kick in the nuts.

A hub is probably your best bet. Rarely has Apple included adapters in the box. To do so would be an acknowledgement that they aren't "ready" to move on.

 

[Suckfest 9001]

And here is how much money my wife would need to spend $0

And stop confusing yourself with the majority. Apple will KNOW how many people use each port, after all they have tens of thousands of staff in all sorts of areas (accounting, design, programming, etc etc etc) as well as a millions of users.

YOUR needs are not mine.

Did I say that my needs resemble that of other people? Or are you just having an emotional breakdown for no reason? I guarantee by the way that your "wife" would need to get an adapter at least to plug her iPhone into the MacBook.

I hate the term, but I'm what Apple would consider a "Pro" user, and for me, the new "Pro" is not "Pro" whatsoever.
[doublepost=1478039649][/doublepost]

A hub is probably your best bet. Rarely has Apple included adapters in the box.

Isn't that just financially convenient for them, then

To do so would be an acknowledgement that they aren't "ready" to move on.

Kind of like including the 3.5mm in their laptops despite the "courage" speech they gave, right?

 

[ceedge]

"It just works"

f**** everything about this.

 

[KPOM]

Did I say that my needs resemble that of other people? Or are you just having an emotional breakdown for no reason?

I hate the term, but I'm what Apple would consider a "Pro" user, and for me, the new "Pro" is not "Pro" whatsoever.

Sure it is. The TB3 ports have more bandwidth than any of the ports on your current "pro" Mac. If you want the latest and greatest Thunderbolt devices, or even the ability to plug in a device capable of USB 3.1 Gen 2, they are your only Mac choices.

 

[Digital Dude]

For the 15-inch MBP, I'm still banking on OWC to come out with an 85-87 watt USB-C hub. Heck, even the 60-watt hub for my 12-inch MacBook should work just fine until then. It is well made and worth the $150 my pay for it.

 

[KPOM]

Isn't that just financially convenient for them, then

Since it's an industry standard, you don't need to get the hub from them. Most of the products in the article aren't from Apple.

 

[Feenician]

useless in the real world without a million dongles hanging from it.

You must realize it's impossible to take this kind of hyperbole seriously or have any kind of grounded conversation about it. Come back to planet earth and we can talk.

I couldn't care less - having faster I/O

Oh well, Suckfest 9001 doesn't care about faster i/o so I guess no-one else should either

 

[Suckfest 9001]

Sure it is. The TB3 ports have more bandwidth than any of the ports on your current "pro" Mac. If you want the latest and greatest Thunderbolt devices, or even the ability to plug in a device capable of USB 3.1 Gen 2, they are your only Mac choices.

"Latest and greatest Thunderbolt devices"

Clearly you have no idea what you're talking about when it comes to actual professional environments which still depend on USB-A connections 100%...

 

[Duane Martin]

Like the speed matters for anything but connecting displays.

Or RAID drives. Or PCIe break-out boxes. Or docks supporting multiple standards and devices. Or next generation amazing stuff not imagined yet because there has not been an easy and inexpensive way to connect devices at 40Gb/s. But yeah, 5k monitors, too.

 

[KPOM]

Some perspective:

http://www.macworld.com/article/1135017/imacanniversary.html

4. It introduced USB to the masses

The iMac’s sole reliance on the USB interface meant that Mac users had to throw out all their old mice, keyboards, scanners, printers, and external drives. The computer’s lack of SCSI ports particularly scared Mac pundits, who long relied on SCSI for external storage. But at the same time, the iMac provided the first kick start USB needed to really get off the ground. Thanks to the iMac, many peripheral manufacturers launched their first-ever round of USB computer accessories—it was no coincidence that most of them shipped in transparent blue-green housing.
[\Quote]

This time around, Mac users don't need to throw out all their old devices. There are new cables or adapters for literally every legacy port that Apple dropped from the previous model.

 

[Suckfest 9001]

You must realize it's impossible to take this kind of hyperbole seriously or have any kind of grounded conversation about it. Come back to planet earth and we can talk.

You could just not reply, that'd also be great.

Oh well, Suckfest 9001 doesn't care about faster i/o so I guess no-one else should either

I never said others shouldn't care. Why do you people think I want this to be pushed on everyone? Stop being so insecure and start recognizing that other people outside of your little bubble have differing needs than you and have valid criticisms to make.