Light Peak supplier says mass production to start early 2010
By Nilay Patel 
posted October 8th 2009 1:01PM
posted October 8th 2009 1:01PM
posted October 8th 2009 1:01PM
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im starting to hate the whole word play of PCs and Macs of course Light Peak will be made for All PCs and systems made by Apple Inc.
PC = Personal Computer that runs operating systems made by Microsoft/Linux/Unix And Apple Inc "Hackintosh"
Mac = a brand of Personal Computers that runs a OPERATING Systems made by Apple Inc.
Macs run windows too...
Windows 7 running great on my macbook! I don't even boot into os X anymore...
doesn't the usb cord have to be fibre optic as well.. I know 3.0 is faster but won't it still be the limiting factor for this technology.. as well as all the other components in the computer that arn't fibre optic.. ? I feel like it will speed up transfers but once it reaches a "wire" component the transfer rate will have no choice but to slow down.. maybe I'm wrong but this is my thinking
It's like the "idea" that gold plated audio cables are better. but the reality is that every component in the system must be gold plated in order for it to make a difference.
It only looks like a USB cable. That cable connected to the port is actual optical so there's no bottleneck in the wire.
That's a light peak cable, it just looks like a USB cable. If you cut it open you'd see copper for power and fiber for data.
As to you're feeling about copper and speed, basically the copper paths on the board are short enough that it won't really be a issue.
Thank's I didn't realize that was a special cable.
and that's a good point about how short the other wired components are.. I never really considered that.
So? Wouldn't it be nice for once not to have the limiting factor be the cable? Devices will eventually come up to speed, and perhaps something like this will allow or help push manufactures to bring those devices up to speed faster. I have a feeling the only reason people feel "concerned" over this technology is because Apple's name is associated with it. Even a few months ago if someone told you there would be a fiber optic cable technology developed to connect all your devices and was at least twice as fast as the upcoming USB 3 spec everyone would be urging them to bring it on. Maybe people should research it a little more instead of being so pessimistic or "concerned". This has far superior potential than USB and I hope everyone doesn't settle with USB only because it's familiar or they hate Apple so much that they want any of their endeavors to fail.
Great. So Apple is probably going to avoid USB 3, which is going to be used by the vast majority of products, and try to force LightPeak on us. It won't take off and we'll all be using more expensive adapters from Apple all while missing out on all the awesomeness of USB 3 because Apple won't support it.
PCs seem like less and less work all the time.
I know, how dare they push a faster, simpler interconnect spec. It should be thrown aside in favor of the slower, less useful USB3.
Go ahead, soldier on in your blind, anti-Apple rage hating all that they produce. With Intel onboard it'll probably supercede USB3 quickly, and completely on Apple hardware (which will likely have external USBLP hubs) out of the gate. Along with every other connector on the Apple.
I, on the other hand, will gladly minimize the number of different ports on the back of my PC in exchange for 10gbit connections to all of my devices. I love it when progress isn't bound to the whims of a single corporation.
Or heeeey here's an idea. Fiber optic USB 3.0. You know that thing that's already being produced that uses one type of connection to minimize needs for other connections. Yeah, that standardized connection that's been around for years and is used universally by many devices? That connection?
You fail for your blind Apple loving faith that this connection will replace others. We've seen this over and over many times before.
Jordan, don't be an idiot. Apple has pushed USB harder than anybody (remember the original iMac?), and they know there is no infrastructure in place for Light Peak right now, and that Mac users have millions of USB devices. Assuming Apple will completely skip USB 3 is just a stupid assumption.
Not really. Why would they add USB 3? All the devices you talk about are all USB 2. They could include USB 2, skip 3, and try and force light peak on us. Remember how much Apple also tried to force Firewire? Yeah that turned out well. Please, don't be an idiot. If Apple wants to skip USB 3, Apple will, and they will definitely try and force light peak.
Let's hope the actual connectors are circular - like an audio jack. This way, they can be plugged in any way around - without fumbling about. Being this is an optical technology, there should be less restrictions on the shape of the plugs and sockets. A more recent design concept for my employer's UNIFII proposal suggested this.
All said, this is a great venture and let's hope all technology vendors adopt it. No politics!
Here's the magic, USB 3.0 spec includes the space for fiber already. LP could basically be USB 3.5 or 4.0 depending how it's implemented.
You buy 1 LP cable it can work with a LP port or it could work as a USB 3.0 cable in a 3.0 port.
It will be cool if they develop wireless lightpeak.
*sputter*
Actually, it is available. It's called infrared.
Laser pointer.
And a book on morse code.
What's with all this scare about technology jumping way far ahead by the end of next year? I was going to get a MacBook Pro this winter, and now it's already outdated!
It sucks to be an early, mid, and post adopter of technology...
When you can buy devices that will actually use just a lightpeek connector and nothing else come back and cry about your poor macbook pro, at least 5-10 years away IF it succeeds, I can't see anything beating USB at this point and USB 3.0 already has an optical standard.
Most Intel demos use Macs because most of the staff use Macs, strangely enough they get them very cheap.........
USB is designed for data.
Firewire 400 and Firewire 800 is very popular in video and audio because it is faster (even Firewire 400) and consistently maintains the bandwidth pipeline.
USB often momentarily pauses the data stream. It makes no difference when you are just transferring files, but if you are streaming video or audio or have really big files to transfer it makes a huge difference.
Also Firewire doesn't rely on the processor, whilst USB does.
Here is the problem.. Intel keep coming up with these crasy spec... WUSB then USB3.0 then LP and then not supporting them as they should be.. can you imagin how much damage this is creating to the peripherals market and how much money R&D companies are spending on bad inverstments because these were trapped or even mislead by intel's ignorance...Yes Intel is the industry leader but they are not behaving like one.. maybe it is time for it to get out of they way..
I also believe both Apple and Intel are reaching a level where they will be liable infront of law for this damage.. VC money will be no longer provided to companies trying to follow Intel's spec and develop products and devices.. this will be damaging to intel on the long term.
Now the whole thing is political between Apple fighting the USB spec because of pride issues and Intel bending over because Apple and Intel are in the same bed now since Apple being a big customer for the Intel chipsets. Look at the damage Intel is making by giving birth to ORPHANS.
I am from optical fiber development back ground. One major issue is when it comes to LP I DON'T see the users cleaning the optical connectors because it is dirty causing dB attenuation to be too high OR the user having problem when plugging the LP plug to receptacle and get no signal because the diode and receiver are not perfectly alligned...
May be Apple can ship an optical power meter with every MAC system they sell so the user can troubleshoot a bad connection..lol
What about the billions of USB devices out there.. do they plug into light peak .. NO..
I bet you will see PC OEMs giving the finger soon to intel and focus more on AMD CPUs and chipsets for their motherboards.. the damage Intel is doing is unrecoverable.
The truth is Apple notebooks and desktops are NOW PCs but cooler looking ones and running a limitted capabilities OS.. Apple has nothing to be proud off anymore other than the nicer looking ID...
This is just a move from Apple to say that they still have some say in the computing industry spec but they don't really have any because the stupid management in Apple out sourced all the Hardware development of their computers and lost the expertiese..
The other truth is Apple now is nothing but a software company who put their logo on a cool looking PCs which they control only the cosmatic design of it.