10 years after the arrival of Thunderbolt, this is still a fast alternative to USB

Intel Thunderbolt Technology turns 10 this year, having debuted on Apple's 2011 MacBook Pro and even that far from having achieved the success that the company expected, Thunderbolt it's apparently still reserved for a niche market today.

However, on the tenth anniversary of the technology, Intel is taking a new approach which should allow you to open Thunderbolt to a wider audience, as Intel has integrated Thunderbolt directly into its latest generation of mobile Core processors, dubbed Tiger Lake, thus eliminating the surcharge that PC manufacturers pay to obtain it.

For those unfamiliar with Thunderbolt, you should know that this is an ultra-fast connection type for PC, whose work began in 2007, based on Intel's Light Peak concept.

Apple would have first registered the Thunderbolt trademark, before passing it on to Intel. The technology was first used in the MacBook Pro in February 2011 through a port based on a mini DisplayPort that had two channels with a bandwidth of 10 Gb / s each, allowing up to six devices to be connected in chain.

Intel expected Thunderbolt to become a daily tool for computer users, but it was not.

To drive adoption of this technology, Intel has integrated Thunderbolt into his last Tiger Lake processors, which means computer manufacturers can get Thunderbolt without having to pay extra for separate controller chips. With Intel chips in widespread use, the Santa Clara firm says Thunderbolt technology will now have its heyday.

In fact, for most people, USB devices work, but "serious" users need optimal performance and reliability, something that USB would not provide.

And the usefulness of Thunderbolt would be more important than everAs more and more laptop manufacturers offer thinner computers with fewer ports. Depending on specifications, Thunderbolt ports provide fast and versatile connections to external storage devices, monitors, network adapters, and more, plus they can replace ports for HDMI, DisplayPort, Ethernet, and power.

For example, the new Thunderbolt 4 is expected, announced at CES 2020, allow that docking stations and multiport hubs offer three Thunderbolt ports instead of just one.

Intel relies on all of its features, as well as the innovations it envisions, to say that Thunderbolt will prevail over USB this decade.

"I expect that by 2022, Thunderbolt will be present in more than 50% of the PCs sold," said Jason Ziller, who heads Intel's connectivity products, adding that more than half of the laptops to be delivered next year They will "definitely" carry technology.

Because of this, analysts predict that Thunderbolt has the potential to spread more widely in 2022. This would especially be the case when the Alder Lake generation of chips, Tiger Lake's successor, are integrated into tower PCs that today do not use Thunderbolt-equipped processors. Thunderbolt is also part of Intel's "Evo" brand to promote high-end laptops that Intel considers powerful and responsive with good battery life. The combination of these two factors would help Thunderbolt to thrive in a world where USB dominates.

Also, it is important to note that Thunderbolt was once much faster than USB on data transfer, but USB is gradually updating. The new version of USB, USB 4, although rare in products so far, can match Thunderbolt's 40 Gb / s.

However, Thunderbolt is expected to be faster in future releases, which could give it a new speed advantage gross, reliability and other capabilities. If the maximum bandwidth of Thunderbolt 4 is 40 Gb / s, Intel engineers estimate that Thunderbolt 5 it could reach 80 Gb / s.

“Today our data bus bandwidth in Thunderbolt 4 is aligned with PCIe Gen 3 × 4 performance, and for some of our storage applications we see that the storage speed in this type of form factor has already doubled. "


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