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Intel: Optical Thunderbolt cables arriving this year
Intel's Dave Salvator has been talking about Thunderbolt's future, promising that optical versions of the high-speed interconnect will arrive this year. The copper version currently available is cheaper and can carry 10 watts of power, but it can only be run a maximum distance of six meters. While the fiber version loses the ability to power devices, it's reportedly far faster and capable of running to the "tens of meters." Dave Mr. Salvator wouldn't commit to a release date, or how much more we'll be expected to pay for the cables, but given that we're also expecting to see PCI-Express 3.0 bolted on to the standard soon, we'll start saving today.
Optical cables for Thunderbolt coming in 2012
The cabling for Apple and Intel's next-generation peripheral interconnect will be getting an upgrade this year, says IDG. Thunderbolt optical cables will be shipping in 2012, according to Intel; current cabling for TB is all copper-based. The PCI-based Thunderbolt technology has always included optical cabling in its roadmap, but the costs of fiber versus copper and the development lead time meant that the initial implementation didn't include the optical option. Mac Thunderbolt ports and peripherals, fortunately, should be compatible with both types of cabling; swapping out one for the other should be straightforward for the most part. The only catch with optical TB cabling is that bus-powered devices (like Elgato's new Thunderbolt SSD drive) will probably require a power injector or standalone power supply. The optical cable's extended run length (multiple times the six-meter copper TB cable limit) means that power can't be dependably run through it. Thunderbolt peripherals have been thin on the ground since the first TB-equipped Mac models were announced early in 2011, but more and more are starting to arrive now. Sonnet's ExpressCard adapter allows for multiple interface options for TB machines, including FireWire 800 and eSATA.
Refresh Roundup: week of March 5th, 2012
Your smartphone and / or tablet is just begging for an update. From time to time, these mobile devices are blessed with maintenance refreshes, bug fixes, custom ROMs and anything in between, and so many of them are floating around that it's easy for a sizable chunk to get lost in the mix. To make sure they don't escape without notice, we've gathered every possible update, hack, and other miscellaneous tomfoolery we could find during the last week and crammed them into one convenient roundup. If you find something available for your device, please give us a shout at tips at engadget dawt com and let us know. Enjoy!
Elgato's Thunderbolt SSD delivers fast portable storage at premium prices
Update: Added BareFeats performance testing information. If there's one word I'd pick to describe Elgato's newest Mac peripheral, the Thunderbolt SSD external drive, it would have to be "minimalist." With this product, the company has delivered storage so simple that it's almost featureless. The Germany-based accessory maker (best known for the EyeTV line of tuners and video capture gear) jumps into the slowly-growing Thunderbolt market with these two drive models, identical save for capacity: the 120GB unit retails for $429.95 and the 240GB unit for $699.95. Unboxed, the drive is a compact gray metal oblong -- no lights, not much adornment, and just the single Thunderbolt port dead center on the back. It feels quite solid and is about as heavy as a LaCie rugged compact FireWire drive. Plug it in, and it mounts on any Thunderbolt-equipped Mac; it's thoughtfully preformatted as HFS+, since precious few Windows users would have any use for it. Note that the drive also requires, but does not ship with, a Thunderbolt peripheral cable -- so add that $40 to your net pricing. In use, it's fanlessly silent, although it does grow warm over time. You gain all the benefits of SSD storage, including no-moving-parts reliability and full resistance to magnetic field interference. Given the premium price (not as steep as LaCie's TB external SSD, but that includes a passthrough Thunderbolt port that the Elgato drive lacks), what are you getting for the money? Standalone storage for your Mac that beats USB drives on speed; it also blazes past external FireWire 800 drives, for machines that have that interface option. Update: BareFeats also performed tests on the Elgato drive with several different performance tools (AJA System Test, QuickBench & others) and saw dramatically better sequential write performance than I did; however, when they tested with the BlackMagic utility, they saw the same performance I reported. It is possible that the BlackMagic utility is doing something with write testing that is not optimized. BareFeats also noted that the Elgato unit is using a 3G SSD internally; when they replaced it with a 6G SSD storage module they saw a corresponding bump in speed. Elgato cites an optimal data transfer rate of 270 MB/second for data reads in its testing. When I fired up Blackmagic's speed test utility, I didn't get quite that fast a show, but it was definitely respectable: 222 MB/s on reads, 112.7 MB/s on writes. Compare that to an external FW 800 1TB drive, which leveled off at about 80MB/s on both writes and reads. My MacBook Pro's internal SSD (an OWC Mercury Pro 6G), connected directly to the SATA bus, topped out at 281/163 read/write. Of course, none of these speeds measure up to the fastest rated SSDs out there. One can't expect to do too much data sharing with the Thunderbolt drive, at least not until most of your fellow travelers also have TB-enabled machines. If you're looking for additional storage for your MacBook Pro or MacBook Air, it's fast and sleek; you're paying for speed and simplicity, but slower USB or FireWire storage can be had in much higher capacities for a fraction of the cost, which would be more appropriate for Time Machine backups or archival storage. For now, the Elgato drive is a premium option that's great if you have the cash -- but it might be overkill for most casual users.
Thunderbolt is everywhere, now let's make it faster with PCI-Express 3.0
Things are different on Planet Intel. Over there, Thunderbolt drives and peripherals are as cheap and abundant as artificial intelligences in a Culture novel, so the population's attention has already turned to what comes next. Some are prepared to wait for a promised 50Gbps optical interconnect by 2015, but an impatient few are trying to make Thunderbolt exploit the new PCI-Express 3.0 standard for more immediate thrills. PCWorld claims the latest form of PCI-Express found in Sandy Bridge E, Ivy Bridge and Xeon E5 chipsets could make 10Gbps Thunderbolt run "significantly faster", thanks to a 60 percent speed boost over PCIe 2.0. Maybe they're right, but back on this planet we're still 33 percent of the way through transferring The Best of Leo Sayer to our USB 2.0-equipped Xperia S.
LaCie 2big Thunderbolt series available now in 4TB and 6TB sizes
The aluminum-encased 2big has arrived, with its (up to) 311 MB/s transfer rates scorching the ground behind it. With hot-swappable disks and dual Thunderbolt ports for daisy chaining, the Portal-esque 2big is on sale now from LaCie's online store with a three-year warranty. Prices start from $649 for 4TB, moving up to $799 for 6TB. Those looking for the king-size 8TB model should hold onto their wallets for now-- it's listed on Lacie's product page, but apparently not available just yet.
HTC admits its bulky, quick-dying LTE phones kinda suck
After a long streak of skyrocketing earnings, HTC's climb towards the stars seems to have stalled. Q4 was not kind to the company and CFO Winston Yung thinks he knows the reason why. During the today's earnings call Yung admitted that HTC "dropped the ball" with its selection of LTE devices. He conceded that the bulky handsets simply failed on a design and spec level -- especially when it came to battery life -- and were not selling nearly as well as expected. Unsurprisingly, the company promises to turn its fortunes around with the next product cycle, which is rumored to kick off at MWC with the Ville.
Seagate GoFlex Thunderbolt Adapter now shipping, snag one for $100
Keeping its Q1 delivery promise, Seagate is now shipping its GoFlex Thunderbolt Adapter for portable drives of the same moniker. We got our mits on this bad boy back at CES, witnessing first-hand the much improved transfer speeds of Intel's tech over the standard USB 2.0 for the smaller external drives. You can snag yours now, via the source link for a whole Benjamin. If you're in need of a refresher before making the investment, hit the gallery below for another peek at our hands-on.
Western Digital shows off a Thunderbolt hard drive at Macworld | iWorld 2012
Hard drive storage company Western Digital was in attendance at Macworld | iWorld 2012 last week showing off its MyBook Thunderbolt Duo setup. The unit is a two-drive box that can hook up to your Mac through the Thunderbolt port, and it's Western Digital's first entry into the protocol. As you might imagine, using Thunderbolt means the transfers are much faster. Western Digital's rep said that while a transfer of 6 terabytes (the drive will likely debut in 4 or 6 TB models) would normally take up to 6 days to completely write over, the Thunderbolt drives can do it in six hours. That's big news for backup fans, who are very much awaiting WD's new models. The drive we saw was only a prototype model, and official pricing or release information hasn't yet been announced, unfortunately. But the units on display at the show had two built-in Thunderbolt ports, which actually allowed them to be daisy-chained off of the iMac on display. That means that users can either run the drives in Raid 0 or Raid 1 configuration, either using the two drives as one storage unit, or allowing one drive to back up the other. Additional units can then be added on to the setup -- the display at WD's both had three such units all hooked together, allowing for 18 TB of storage total, or any number of splits across those drives for backups. It was all very impressive, though again, WD hasn't yet announced plans for release. We should see these drives hitting the market later on this year, however, so we'll stay tuned for that.
Western Digital MyBook Thunderbolt Duo eyes-on at Macworld 2012 (video)
Here at Macworld 2012, Western Digital demoed a preview of their essentially finished, yet not final, MyBook Thunderbolt Duo. Scheduled to ship in Q1 for an "aggressive price," the unit plays host to two 3.5-inch drives, which'll come stuffed from the factory in either 4TB (2x 2TB) or 6TB (2x 3TB) configurations. On the outside, you're looking at the MyBook aesthetic you either love or loathe, but around back you'll find all connectivity has been gutted, save for power and two Thunderbolt ports. The latter means that up to six can be daisy-chained off one interconnect, which when setup in RAID 0 equates to rather speedy transfers, like 700MB/sec reads and 500MB/sec writes in the four-unit demonstration configuration we toyed with. And it's future proof too, as there's a door up-top which enables plebes to swap drives should the need arise. We'll keep an ear out for pricing, but until that day arrives, peep them in the gallery below, or in video form after the break.
Western Digital announces My Book Thunderbolt Duo drive
It's the first day of Macworld | iWorld 2012 and the new Mac products are beginning to roll out. Western Digital is back with a hot, new Thunderbolt drive, the My Book Thunderbolt Duo. The external hard drive uses the 10 Gbps Thunderbolt port, and supports two 3.5-inch hard drives in a RAID 0 striped array. It'll send data at a speedy 2 Gbps (250 MBps) which will let you send a full HD movie to the drive in 30 seconds. This is fast, but not as fast as it could be because hard drive technology has not kept up with the speed of the ports. Despite this speed discrepancy, the My Book Thunderbolt Duo still beats any USB 2.0 drive on the market. It'd be a perfect drive for video professionals who regularly transfer large files. The My Book Thunderbolt Duo will be available in 4 TB and 6 TB capacities. The availability date and pricing are not yet known. Check back with us all week as our team at Macworld | iWorld is providing complete coverage of all the goodies on the expo floor. [Via Electronista] Show full PR text WD® PREVIEWS ITS REVOLUTIONARY THUNDERBOLT™ DUAL-DRIVE STORAGE SYSTEM DELIVERING ULTRA-FAST DATA TRANSFER RATES AT MACWORLD/IWORLD IRVINE, Calif. - Jan. 26, 2012 - (Macworld/iWorld Booth #401) - Western Digital® (NYSE: WDC), the world's leader in external storage solutions, will demonstrate the ultra-fast data transfer rates of its upcoming My Book® Thunderbolt Duo dual-drive storage system at the Macworld/iWorld show (booth #401). Thunderbolt technology will dramatically improve workflow speed and efficiencies for enthusiasts and professionals dealing with large digital files such as video, audio and still photos. Thunderbolt technology is capable of producing up to 10 gigabits per second1 of throughput on each of two channels in both directions. Users can experience very fast read/write speeds especially during applications such as video editing, 3D rendering, and other intense graphics projects. To put Thunderbolt's speed into perspective, HD media creators will be able to transfer a standard size full-length HD movie in less than 30 seconds, or backup an entire year of continuous music (approx. 8,600 hours of music) in roughly 10 minutes. "Thunderbolt technology offers the speed needed for creative professionals and enthusiasts who produce, edit, or need quick access to large files, including HD video," said Jody Bradshaw, general manager of WD's consumer storage solutions. "During the demonstration, twin Thunderbolt ports show amazing flexibility while allowing daisy-chaining of up to six My Book Thunderbolt Duo systems or other high performance peripherals for an enhanced workflow process. The combination of storage, backup, and speed could make the My Book Thunderbolt Duo the only drive a creative pro would ever need." About WD WD, one of the storage industry's pioneers and long-time leaders, provides products and services for people and organizations that collect, manage, and use digital information. The company designs and produces reliable, high-performance hard drives and solid state drives that keep users' data accessible and secure from loss. Its advanced technologies are configured into applications for client and enterprise computing, embedded systems and consumer electronics, as well as its own consumer storage and home entertainment products. WD was founded in 1970. The company's storage products are marketed to leading OEMs, systems manufacturers, selected resellers, and retailers under the Western Digital and WD brand names. Visit the Investor section of the company's website (www.westerndigital.com) to access a variety of financial and investor information. 1 Stated transfer rate for Thunderbolt is based on published specifications from Apple. Actual transfer rates when used with My Book Thunderbolt Duo will differ significantly based on system configuration. Performance testing by WD resulted in an average actual transfer rate for Thunderbolt of >250 MB/s on 6 TB systems and >225 MB/s on 4 TB systems. Gigabits per second (Gb/s) = one billion bits per second; megabytes per second (MB/s) = one million bytes per second.
Belkin Thunderbolt Express Dock hands-on (video)
So, Belkin pulled a bit of a switcharoo on us with its Thunderbolt Express Dock. The device we saw back at IDF was very different from what made it out on the CES floor here in Vegas. But you know what? We're not mad because they managed to slim the dock down in the process. The outfit was also able to fit a single HDMI port into the peripheral while adding a nice cable channel to hide that unsightly Thunderbolt cable that connects the device to your PC of choice. If you'll recall, the dock also packs a trio of USB ports, Ethernet, 3.5mm audio, FireWire and an additional Thunderbolt port for all your connectivity needs. Head on past the break and we'll give you a quick tour.
ioSafe gives shocking demo of Thunderbolt Rugged Portable prototype (video)
Every year ioSafe has some absurd demo to show off just how tough its rugged hard drives are. They've already played with fire and peppered a portable model with buckshot. This year the company turned to an eight-foot tall Tesla coil and pointed its bolts of current at a prototype Thunderbolt model of its Rugged Portable -- which the company hopes to ship sometime in Q2. Unlike previous versions, this one packs dual SSDs in a RAID array for redundancy. After being blasted repeatedly with a million volts of electricity the drive still worked. Things got a bit hairy when the drive wasn't recognized at first, but CEO Robb Moore broke out the screwdrivers, cracked open the case and connected the SSD directly through a separate adapter. Turns out just the mainboard was fried, but the storage was still safe. A second Rugged Portable, one of last-year's models brought in by a member of the press, was also put to the voltage test and came through unscathed. Check out the video after the break. Edgar Alvarez contributed to this report.
Seagate crams Verizon 4G LTE into a battery-powered portable HDD; Thunderbolt GoFlex Adapter launches
So, here's the good news -- Seagate has managed to convince Verizon Wireless to stuff a 4G LTE module into a portable hard drive as part of its newly-launched Innovation Program. The bad news? Heaven only knows when it'll ship, and how much it'll cost. Ever since Google managed to squeeze Big Red for gratis data in Samsung's Chromebook line, we've longed for similar solutions in other products. Now, it seems as if Seagate's getting the message; the company just revealed a wild device here at CES that mimics the GoFlex Satellite in a myriad ways, but the prototype we were shown is obviously far thicker (fret not; it'll be slimmer when it ships). The primary difference, however, is the built-in WWAN. It's so early on that the thing doesn't even have a proper name, with Seagate dubbing it the "4G LTE Mobile Wireless Storage" for the purposes of the show. Reportedly, there's a battery within that'll keep it streaming for up to five hours, with 802.11b/g/n devices capable of being served. We're told that the product can tap into VZW's 4G LTE network to connect with a library of entertainment (vague enough for you?), and it's also capable of downloading music, movies and photos before streaming over WiFi to up to three devices. There's nary a word on potential capacities, but it'll supposedly handle "over 300 HD movies." Now, if only we knew how much it'll cost to keep it connected from month to month... Finally, the outfit is introducing its new GoFlex Thunderbolt Adapter and the GoFlex Desk Thunderbolt Adapter, which we first caught wind up at last year's IDF. The former will be available during the first quarter of this year, while the latter is expected to be available before the second half of 2012. Dante Cesa and Billy Steele contributed to this report.
OCZ goes SSD crazy at CES, leaves no port unplugged
OCZ came rolling into CES this year with a pile of SSDs in tow. Most are pretty firmly aimed at the enterprise market but, what's impressive, is how the company has made sure to cover practically every interface . If you're looking to fill up some PCIe slots, the Z-Drive R5 and are R4 CloudServ have you covered. The former is based on the Kilimanjaro platform, designed with help from Marvell, and can deliver a staggering 2.52 million IOPS and 7.2GB/s. The latter is an evolution of the existing R4 line, but with nearly double the performance in a card that can carry up to 16TB of solid state storage. If rack-mount servers are more your style, the SATA 3.0-packing Chiron delivers a respectable 560MB/s and 100,000 IOPS in a 3.5-inch package. The most exciting item, at least for consumers, is the Lightfoot -- an external, compact SSD ready to take over your under-utilized Thunderbolt port. Lightfoot will be available in 128GB, 256GB, 512GB and 1TB sizes, though, price and release dates are still very much up in the air. Check out the gallery below and complete PR (with a few more products) after the break.
Elgato, LaCie, and OCZ announce Thunderbolt storage options at CES 2012
As Richard said sharply a few weeks ago, there really hasn't been a rush to plenty when it comes to Thunderbolt storage options from third-party vendors. That's apparently about to change for the better, as a slew of top-tier manufacturers are announcing products at this week's CES extravaganza. The fine folks at LaCie (makers of the Thunderbolt Little Big Disk HD and SSD models) are planning some serious storage: a multi-drive unit that will support up to 8 TB, for one, and a standalone eSATA adapter for another. The cleverly named 2Big Thunderbolt drive and the eSATA unit will ship in the first quarter of 2012, or so it's said. When you think Elgato you probably don't think storage (more like TV capture or video compression), but the company has long experience with writing storage drivers for the Mac; their coders were behind the Mac support for the VST Firewire drive introduced in 1999. (Ah, the memories.) Now the German firm is adding Thunderbolt to the product line with the Elgato Thunderbolt SSD, a solid-state storage unit similar to the LaCie SSD Little Big Disk but $200 cheaper in the 240 GB capacity (USD$700 vs. $900, but as our commenter points out below, the LaCie unit is actually a RAID set of two SSDs for speed & includes another Thunderbolt port). Shipping in February, the Elgato drive will offer blazing fast external storage in both the high-capacity model and a 120 GB ($429.95) size. Moreover, the Elgato drive will be bus-powered, which means no additional power brick to manage. OCZ is also jumping into the Thunderbolt SSD fray with a full set of capacities from 128 GB up to a terabyte (!) model, with pricing and ship dates to be determined. OCZ's drives have a solid reputation for internal laptop use, so the external models should be worth a look. The vaporware beast of the bunch, the long-awaited Belkin Thunderbolt dock, now has a firmer ship date (September 2012) and a price of $299. That sounds steep, but the combination of USB ports, Firewire, HDMI, Gigabit Ethernet and audio-out should be quite compelling for MacBook Air owners looking to get more flexible. The Belkin dock first appeared in prototype form at the Intel Developer Forum in September 2011. [hat tip 9to5Mac]
Belkin announces Thunderbolt Express Dock
Belkin has announced its Thunderbolt Express Dock, a small unit that will allow owners of Thunderbolt-capable Macs to plug multiple peripherals into their Macs via a single cable. As reported by AppleInsider, Belkin's Thunderbolt Express Dock includes the following built-in ports: Gigabit Ethernet 3 USB 2.0 ports 1 Firewire 800 port 1 HDMI 1 3.5 mm audio jack 2 Thunderbolt ports -- one upstream, one downstream The dock will allow all of your peripheral devices to plug into your Mac via a single Thunderbolt cable. That all sounds really great, but there are two big gotchas. First is availability; Belkin won't release the Thunderbolt Express Dock until September 2012, which means Apple's Thunderbolt Display remains the only practical Thunderbolt-enabled docking solution. The second and even more worrying gotcha is the price: at US$299, Belkin has priced the Thunderbolt Express Dock far beyond the reach of what the average consumer is likely to pay. This little accessory would sell like crazy if Belkin priced it more reasonably -- say $99 or even $129 -- but 300 bucks puts the Thunderbolt Express Dock way out of my price range, and probably out of range for most people who'd consider picking one up. Thunderbolt-compatible peripherals have been both thin on the ground and highly priced in the year since Apple debuted the new connector, which hasn't painted an especially reassuring picture for Thunderbolt's future. However, at CES 2012 a variety of non-Mac PCs were announced with Thunderbolt support, as well as external drives from major manufacturers. Hopefully when more Thunderbolt-equipped PCs are in the wild, peripheral makers will be encouraged to step up production and lower those eye-popping prices.
Belkin details Thunderbolt Express Dock at CES, shipping this Summer
We first caught a glimpse of Belkin's Thunderbolt Express Dock back at IDF. Here at CES, the company has offered more info on the high-speed peripheral -- including an expected Summer 2012 arrival window. The dock features all sorts of added connection potential: three USB 2.0, two Thunderbolt, one FireWire 800, one HDMI, an Ethernet and a 3.5mm audio jack. Lending a hand to your port-deprived MacBook Air or Ultrabook via Thunderbolt, the peripheral offers the expected bi-directional transfer rates up to 10Gbps while keeping with the Apple color scheme. Pricing details aren't expected until closer to the ship date, but for now, take a look at the design render and PR just past the break. Update: We've just been passed some official images for the Thunderbolt dock. Peep 'em in the gallery below.
Elgato's Thunderbolt SSD brings no noise, brings the pain(less) operation
Elgato's decided to go back to its FireWire-roots with two new high capacity Thunderbolt-totin' SSDs. The 5.2 x 3.3-inch drives have a transfer speed of 270MB/s, drawing power from the port and promising silent operation for when you need to access data during those quiet winter nights. It's available next month: the 120GB edition costing you $420, the 240GB edition topping out at a pricier $700 and we've got a (thunder)bolt load of more information for you after the break.
LaCie announces 2big and eSATA hub Thunderbolt options, adds to high-speed arsenal
Back in November, we took the pricey LaCie Big Disk Thunderbolt SSD for a spin. The outfit has just outed two more Thunderbolt storage solutions at CES: the 2big and eSATA hub Thunderbolt series. Boasting blazing transfer rates of up to 311 MB/sec, the Lacie 2big is housed in its signature solid-aluminum casing while featuring RAID security, hot-swappable disks, daisy chain compatibility and storage capacities of up to 8TB. Looking to make use of those eSATA drives you've got lying around? The eSATA Thunderbolt series connects the latest Mac to an external hub outfitted for two of the aforementioned drives. If two storage units won't suit your workload, the hub also packs a secondary Thunderbolt port that allows up to 12 eSATA drives (six docks) to be connected to your machine -- all while sporting 3 Gb/sec speeds. You'll have to wait until later in Q1 2012 to get your mitts on either of these, though, which gives you a bit of time to get your piggy bank in order. Update: Our pals over at Engadget Spanish snagged a hands-on.
