Laptop with Thunderbolt

I have done a lot of googling and browsed a lot of notebook manufacturer websites, but I cannot find any laptops with thunderbolt ports apart from macbooks and that Vaio Z-series notebook. Are there currently any others? And if not, have any manufacturers released information about when thunderbolt laptops will be available?

 

Nothing else at the moment... I thought it was going to be a year after Apple, that anyone else could have it... Note that the Sony implementation is only good for one peripheral.

 

Yeah, I believe that Intel will include Thunderbolt stuff in their next chipset.

 

Lightpeak in generic terms. The technology for Thunderbolt is a development between Apple and Intel so there's no wonder you'd see it come out on the Mac first.

Nevertheless, most PC manufacturers have chosen to focus on USB 3.0 as the next high speed alternative since that's the most easily developed and familiar speed port upgrade. Lightpeak can work in tandem with USB 3.0

 

Only Apple MBP/MBA have Thunderbolt ports
Sony Z2 is the only PC notebook with a proprietory Lightpeak implementation
Most notebooks have USB 3.0, some have expresscard 2.0
PC-SIG recently released an external PCI specification which will compete with Thunderbolt and Lightpeak.

 

Wait, I thought Lightpeak was renamed to Thunderbolt.

 

The lightpeak, now thunderbolt, was developed in conjunction between Apple, Sony and Intel. Thus there is a exclusivity agreement between those 3, so that only notebooks by those OEMs are going to use thunderbolt in its first year

Dont confuse the market of thunderbolt with the one for USB3, the I/O throughput of thunderbolt is several times higher than USB3, the said port is made for professional use and expandability, not what USB is meant for.

It was renamed.

 

Lightpeak uses a optical link. Thunderbolt uses a copper link.

 

thunderbolt will use an optical cable

and sony implementation aint lightpeak

 

more important that a plug on a laptop is what periperals are available that will use the plug??

And are those peripherals in any way 'better' than something that uses USB 2 or USB 3?

 

thunderbolt is geared for professional use. The average user can use it for egpu purposes, aside that I dont see the need for it. USB3 and all that crap that comes with USB is more than enough

 

'professional use' isn't limited to Thunderchicken....

egpus can run just as well from USB 3, there are more than a few available now.

 

the bandwidth of the USB3 is less than pcie 1x 1.0, since the theoretical throughput of the USB 3 is 5gbps, and in reality is barely above half of it.

 

max theoretical bandwidth doesn't matter.

what matters is what you're doing with it.

take a 1080p display at 32 bits, do the math, and then look at the bits/sec you need to sustain 60 fps. It fits quite nicely into usb v3.

 

its slower than the pcie x1 that people are enduring severe penalties using a egpu.

in reality the USB 3 bandwidth is around a 3gbps. its simply not enough, the performance hit is quite high

 

I'm not confusing them. Rather, I was simply implying that Thunderbolt can be used to sustain USB 3.0. Therefore, the the two are not in competition. That is to say, they can be use in tandem since Thunderbolt's greatest limitation is it's lack of power.

 

thunderbolt lack of power?

 

I'm guessing Thunderbolt can't power something like a harddrive that USB 3 can.

 

Thunderbolt doco on the web tells us it provides up to 10W of power (3.3V@3A) to the attached peripherals. A HDD requires max < 8W during spinup so is more than enough to drive it without the need of additional AC adapters.

 

I read something interesting on notebookcheck, USB3 has a theoretical capability of giving power in the magnitude of 100W

New spec will allow for high-power USB 3.0 ports - Notebookcheck.net News

I hope it will come true. it will benefit greatly the adoption rate of USB3

 

Exactly. As lightning fast as fiber optic technology may be, it still needs the additional cooper cable to supply power to the device. That makes it a much less attractive improvement on it's own.

 

thunderbolt currently uses copper. when it integrates fiber its going to have a copper cable to send power.

 

Why is copper unattractive? Rather, why is the inclusion of copper in the ThunderBolt port unattractive?

Mr. Mysterious

 

Because Mr Mysterious, it negate the tauted advantage of fiber optic over cooper wire in the first place: the inherent limitation to data flow in cooper wire.

Because cooper wire is still used, the fiber optic advantage is a lot less than it was originally introduced to be. Since both are used, it also requires more space.

 

I don't get it....why not have the speed of fiber optics and the copper dedicated to only providing power? Why must data flow through copper?

Mr. Mysterious

 

That's the issue; and why few are rushing to implement it.

The advantage of the greater speed (more correctly bandwidth) isn't a major selling point since the cooper (which can do everything by itself) is still there. Since we haven't yet reached it's bandwidth limit, who really needs the extra complexity of Thunderbolt?

 

Hmm....good point. But is it really that big of a deal? I'd worry about it once we do hit the bandwidth limit.

And I'm talking about this in terms of the consumer's POV.

Mr. Mysterious

 

That's the issue. And why few are rushing to implement it.

The advantage of the greater speed (more correctly bandwidth) isn't a major selling point since the cooper (which can do everything by itself) is still there. Since we haven't yet reached it's bandwidth limit, who really needs the extra complexity of Thunderbolt?

 

Lol Krane, I think you double posted there

Mr. Mysterious

 

and thats why its still copper, future implementations will have a fiber and copper cable.

To use the full bandwidth of what copper can provide requires a miniaturization that we dont have it yet, the cables are also going to be more expensive.

I still dont see what added complexity is there.

 

I actually like coppper? Why? latency. Optical technology adds latency to demodulate and stuff. Which rules out things like external graphics cards and monitors for gaming.

 

I have high hopes for this lightpeak/thunderbolt technology, for from what I've read so far it allows daisy chaining more devices, meaning I can do more from a single machine.. but I'm a total illiterate to the copper vs optic latency. Can you please shed some light or kindly put me to the right direction to start researching?

 

Well I'm not an expert but latency would mean that when you move your mouse there would be a delay on an external screen.

As far as I know optical cannot offer the same latency as copper. So if I wanted to game on an external monitor using thunderbolt optical it would not work as well.

 

Can't you daisy chain like 255 USB devices? That's not enough?

Optical would at some point have to convert to copper anyhow right? Which may be part of the latency.

And I guess I'm ignorant about this whole lightpeak/thundercats thing. Signals move across copper at the speed of light same as optical right? So not sure what the advantage would be? Thinner optical cable and less power for same or more data maybe? I guess I can see size and power improvements, and size is questionable, but speed? Dunno. I'm probably missing something though. Kinda like my bullets in Bad Company 2!

 

I'm no expert on it either, but I know there are components of cooper that you're leaving out. For example, what happens when you pass a current through a copper wire?

After a certain point, it will begin to deteriorate and it is also much more prone to interference. With fiber optics those limits are much greater since light can travel a lot easier than the electricity in a cable.

There's only so much data you can move through a copper cable before you reach it's limit. In the case, of fiber optics, that limit can be ten times greater.

That's all I get from bits and pieces of articles I've read. The whole science is massive but I'm sure you can google much more detail.

It is for most normal people. However, there always the errant guy that wants to be able to transfer the entire Library of Congress in one second.

 

I call shenanigans! Do you have a source?

 

It will transmit the current. Everything we have right now in terms of notebooks is based on the current passing through something and the interruption of the signal will give the binary code.

Yes, thats why intel, apple and sony are trying to make thunderbolt based on fiber and copper.

Yes, thats one of the reasons that the thunderbolt cable is so expensive its an active cable, to minimize the variation that a copper cable gives.