[CharlesS]

Intel apparently just announced a new connection standard called Light Peak:

YouTube - Light Peak to Connect Consumer Devices at Record Speed

Starts at 10 gigabits. 10... gigabits. They plan to scale it up from there, and eventually get it to 100 gigabits.

Uses optical cables, allows for cabling of arbitrary length (the video shows a spool 5 km long).

Can be used for everything, including peripherals, external storage, networking, displays, and pretty much anything else. Runs multiple protocols over the same wire to enable this. This could replace USB, FireWire, eSATA, DisplayPort, Ethernet, and pretty much any other port currently used on a Mac. If Apple used this across their line, every single Mac would have a full set of connectivity options, even the MacBook Air.

Intel plans to start shipping this as early as next year.

And, AI rumors that Apple specifically contributed to this, and thus will be an early adopter, in order to push acceptance of the technology in the same way that they did with USB a decade ago.

Holy. Crap.

[Big Mac]

Firewire Forever.

[CharlesS]

Hey, I like FireWire as much as the next guy, but if this thing's for real and does everything they say, it will blow the doors off everything we've currently got, including FW.

[AKcrab]

Originally Posted by CharlesS 

Apple specifically contributed to this, and thus will be an early adopter, in order to push acceptance of the technology in the same way that they did with USB a decade ago.

USB was introduced in 1996. (According to wiki)

If mactracker is correct, it looks like the first Mac with USB was the first iMac in 1998. The first "pro" model to get USB was the PowerMac G3 in 1999.

I don't think I would call that "early adoption".

That said, I think Light Peak looks quite promising!

[OldManMac]

Originally Posted by AKcrab 

USB was introduced in 1996. (According to wiki)

If mactracker is correct, it looks like the first Mac with USB was the first iMac in 1998. The first "pro" model to get USB was the PowerMac G3 in 1999.

I don't think I would call that "early adoption".

That said, I think Light Peak looks quite promising!

The first Mac to sport USB was indeed the iMac, but it was out a year or so earler on some Windows boxes, although there wasn't much that could be connected to it until the iMac forced manufacturers to adapt their devices. Even that took a while, as many of them no doubt waited to see how popular the iMac would become, so they wouldn't have to redesign their devices unnecessarily.

[CharlesS]

Originally Posted by AKcrab 

USB was introduced in 1996. (According to wiki)

The specification for the standard came out in 1996. And FireWire's spec came out in 1995. I'd prefer to go by actual implementations, and Apple had one of the first.

[HenryMelton]

High data rate is nice, but I'm concerned about power. It seems they'll be adding a couple of copper wires to provide power to external devices and that's critical. How much power? How many 'bus-powered' drives/printers/etc can I hang off a light peak cable? Not much need for a new cable standard if I have to clutter the place up with more wall warts.

[turtle777]

Originally Posted by CharlesS 

This could replace USB, FireWire, eSATA, DisplayPort, Ethernet, and pretty much any other port currently used on a Mac.

Not quite.

Since it can only transmit data and not power, you can only use it for self-powered devices.

It would suck if you needed batteries for keyboards and mice, let alone data sticks.

Aarg. Henry beat me to it by one minute.

-t

[reader50]

SATA3 is 6 gigabit. FW3200 is 3.2 gigabit. USB 3.0 is 4.8 gigabit. Displayport rates at 8.64 gigabit. What I'm pointing out is 10 gigabit per second is very nice, but it's not as big a jump over existing standards as one might think.

Unifying the connection standards would be nice though. So long as the DRM is optional.

[Chuckit]

Is USB 3.0 rated at 4.8 Gb in the same sense that USB is "480 Mb"?

[Spheric Harlot]

Yes: Universal Serial Bus - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

A new major feature is the SuperSpeed bus, which provides a fourth transfer mode at 4.8 Gbit/s. The raw throughput is 4 Gbit/s, and the specification considers it reasonable to achieve 3.2 Gbit/s or more after protocol overhead.

Note: "reasonable", not "reliable".

The actual useful bandwidth for media use will probably be on par or lower than with FW3200.

[ghporter]

If they make it so it can use existing optical interconnect cables, such as those that work with home stereo systems, that'll be great! Having a simple interconnect that runs WAY faster than either USB or FireWire do in a practical sense, and that could conceivably be used to connect everything together would be exceptionally handy.

Powering peripherals would indeed be an issue in this sort of setup, but probably only a small one.

[Cold Warrior]

Like Henry said maybe they'll add some wiring to offer power.

This could be an exciting connectivity capability if implemented and executed well.

I wonder if it could trunk if a Mac and a device had multiple LP ports.

[ajprice]

If they can make it compatible with optical audio cables, what is the 'transfer speed' of an optical audio connection, compared to this Light Peak?

[mduell]

Power questions aside, I'm not that excited about it.

The bandwidth isn't that much higher than existing copper standards; enough to give you DP and GigE in a single cable (with dongles), but not enough to cover a handful of SATA ports (as a replacement or compliment for port multipliers) or DP+USB3. And although the run length is longer than most, I just don't see that many common applications where it solves problems.

Intel's backing will help, but Apple has a long history of ports that fail to see widespread adoption (ADB, NuBus, ADC, MDP, and even to some extent Firewire). It's going to be dongles everywhere.

And then there's the devices where it doesn't make sense for power/cost reasons. Light Peak in my mouse? Keyboard? External optical drive? So we'll still need USB ports for those.

I look forward to the details on how they're going to solve some of the above issues, but I remain pessimistic. No doubt Apple will use it on a device or two and add a port to some Macs, but replacing USB, FW, SATA, HDMI, and DP? Not so much.

Originally Posted by ajprice 

If they can make it compatible with optical audio cables, what is the 'transfer speed' of an optical audio connection, compared to this Light Peak?

TOSLINK is 125Mbps over 10m. Optical cables that can deal with consumer abuse have pretty limited capability.

[tooki]

Originally Posted by ajprice 

If they can make it compatible with optical audio cables, what is the 'transfer speed' of an optical audio connection, compared to this Light Peak?

Optical audio, in the consumer world, is actually a combination of two standards: S/PDIF (the signal format, which can go over optical or copper), and TOSLINK, the optical standard.

In any event, according to the wiki article above, the current implementation is 125Mbps. But I can't imagine any possible way to reconcile the S/PDIF signaling with Light Peak, because S/PDIF is an extremely simple, naïve format that would have no way to identify itself among other competing protocols, and that's even assuming they were optically compatible, which is exceedingly unlikely.

[CharlesS]

Originally Posted by mduell 

The bandwidth isn't that much higher than existing copper standards; enough to give you DP and GigE in a single cable (with dongles), but not enough to cover a handful of SATA ports (as a replacement or compliment for port multipliers) or DP+USB3.

Ah, but you're missing something big. It may not be faster than all those ports combined, but it is faster than each of those ports individually, and able to take over each port's job. What this means is that Apple can release a machine with no USB ports, no FireWire ports, no Ethernet port, etc., but just a whole bunch of Light Peak ports. Currently, there are lots of people that have Ethernet ports they don't use, and other people that rely on it daily. There are some people that never touch the FireWire port (or even know what it is), and others who wish there were two FireWire busses. There are people who never use external monitors on their laptop, and people that only use one USB device. There are others that need tons of USB ports, and don't have much use for anything else. Apple's conscious of the way some ports have been lying unused on many people's machines, which is why they've been experimenting with removing things that they perceive few users to need lately, but they've been getting outcries each time. With this new standard, everyone could use each port for whatever they wanted, and there wouldn't be any wasted, unused ports collecting dust. Don't need an external monitor? Now you can use the port that would have been dedicated to that to connect a bunch of devices you'd normally use USB or FireWire for. And even the ports that you use for the same purposes that you use them for today can do double-duty, if your primary use for them doesn't completely use all the bandwidth.

If Apple adopts this, there'll be no more artificial limitations on what specific Mac models can do based on their port complement. This will eliminate one of my major gripes about Apple hardware.

Oh, and port multipliers aren't magic, either. Even with a port multiplier, you've still only got 3 Gbits of bandwidth to share among all the devices connected to a particular port, so I don't see how that's any better than this. At least with Light Peak you can share 10 Gbits among your devices instead of only 3.

And although the run length is longer than most, I just don't see that many common applications where it solves problems.

If this is to be used for networking, it'll be important to have long wires.

Intel's backing will help, but Apple has a long history of ports that fail to see widespread adoption (ADB, NuBus, ADC, MDP, and even to some extent Firewire). It's going to be dongles everywhere.

It's the other way around - Intel developed this with Apple's backing. The last time that happened was USB, which as I recall ended up working pretty well.

And then there's the devices where it doesn't make sense for power/cost reasons. Light Peak in my mouse? Keyboard? External optical drive? So we'll still need USB ports for those.

It makes just as much sense to connect those to Light Peak as it does to connect them to a USB 3.0 port.

[downinflames68]

Originally Posted by CharlesS 

Ah, but you're missing something big. It may not be faster than all those ports combined, but it is faster than each of those ports individually, and able to take over each port's job. What this means is that Apple can release a machine with no USB ports, no FireWire ports, no Ethernet port, etc., but just a whole bunch of Light Peak ports. Currently, there are lots of people that have Ethernet ports they don't use, and other people that rely on it daily. There are some people that never touch the FireWire port (or even know what it is), and others who wish there were two FireWire busses. There are people who never use external monitors on their laptop, and people that only use one USB device. There are others that need tons of USB ports, and don't have much use for anything else. Apple's conscious of the way some ports have been lying unused on many people's machines, which is why they've been experimenting with removing things that they perceive few users to need lately, but they've been getting outcries each time. With this new standard, everyone could use each port for whatever they wanted, and there wouldn't be any wasted, unused ports collecting dust. Don't need an external monitor? Now you can use the port that would have been dedicated to that to connect a bunch of devices you'd normally use USB or FireWire for. And even the ports that you use for the same purposes that you use them for today can do double-duty, if your primary use for them doesn't completely use all the bandwidth.

If Apple adopts this, there'll be no more artificial limitations on what specific Mac models can do based on their port complement. This will eliminate one of my major gripes about Apple hardware.

That is a very interesting concept.

My big gripe about Apple is they place the USB ports SO CLOSE TOGETHER on the new portables that if you are using a thumb drive, it blocks the adjacent port. How retarded is that?

[lexapro]

Holy early adoption, Batman!

[Big Mac]

Would Light Peak really be able to cater to every need now serviced by other specific ports?

[tooki]

Originally Posted by downinflames68 

My big gripe about Apple is they place the USB ports SO CLOSE TOGETHER on the new portables that if you are using a thumb drive, it blocks the adjacent port. How retarded is that?

Well, it's actually not Apple's fault -- Apple follows the USB standard, which actually has requirements on maximum connector size and minimum jack spacing. The problem is that some USB cable and device manufacturers believe they are above the rules, and make plugs that exceed the maximum allowed size and thus intrude on the adjacent jack's personal space.

[ghporter]

Originally Posted by mduell 

TOSLINK is 125Mbps over 10m. Optical cables that can deal with consumer abuse have pretty limited capability.

As long as the connector is as simple and easy to use as TOSLINK's, I don't care if the cable itself is different.

I've seen cables that had their minimum bend radius mechanically enforced by braided wire shielding, making the cable larger in diameter but a LOT more robust. TOSLINK cables are made to a "minimum mechanical requirement" rather than anything more, so a more expensive but more capable cable is possible and probably for not too much more money.

[CharlesS]

Originally Posted by Big Mac 

Would Light Peak really be able to cater to every need now serviced by other specific ports?

It sounds like that's the intent. And reportedly Apple's been the driving force behind this.

My wild speculation: Apple will release something to go in the low-end MacBook space - a netbook, a tablet, or something similar - that will exclusively use Light Peak ports, similar to how the low-cost (for the time) iMac in 1998 was their first legacy-free USB machine. This new machine will make a huge splash on the market, provide a testbed for the new technology, and embarrass the heck out of the other netbook makers (VGA for video output? Pffff).

[OreoCookie]

Originally Posted by reader50 

SATA3 is 6 gigabit. FW3200 is 3.2 gigabit. USB 3.0 is 4.8 gigabit. Displayport rates at 8.64 gigabit. What I'm pointing out is 10 gigabit per second is very nice, but it's not as big a jump over existing standards as one might think.

Unifying the connection standards would be nice though. So long as the DRM is optional.

The point is not raw throughput, the point is size (it's an optical fiber cable whose connector can be much, much smaller) and that it's a jack of all trades. I'd be very thrilled if there were a one-connector-does-it-all.

[mduell]

Originally Posted by CharlesS 

Ah, but you're missing something big. It may not be faster than all those ports combined, but it is faster than each of those ports individually, and able to take over each port's job. What this means is that Apple can release a machine with no USB ports, no FireWire ports, no Ethernet port, etc., but just a whole bunch of Light Peak ports. Currently, there are lots of people that have Ethernet ports they don't use, and other people that rely on it daily. There are some people that never touch the FireWire port (or even know what it is), and others who wish there were two FireWire busses. There are people who never use external monitors on their laptop, and people that only use one USB device. There are others that need tons of USB ports, and don't have much use for anything else. Apple's conscious of the way some ports have been lying unused on many people's machines, which is why they've been experimenting with removing things that they perceive few users to need lately, but they've been getting outcries each time. With this new standard, everyone could use each port for whatever they wanted, and there wouldn't be any wasted, unused ports collecting dust. Don't need an external monitor? Now you can use the port that would have been dedicated to that to connect a bunch of devices you'd normally use USB or FireWire for. And even the ports that you use for the same purposes that you use them for today can do double-duty, if your primary use for them doesn't completely use all the bandwidth.

Dongles, dongles everywhere. My own personal hell.

Originally Posted by CharlesS 

If Apple adopts this, there'll be no more artificial limitations on what specific Mac models can do based on their port complement. This will eliminate one of my major gripes about Apple hardware.

Apple will find a way. This is the company that still ships keyboards with non-standard, non-interoperable USB extension cables with their keyboards.

Originally Posted by CharlesS 

Oh, and port multipliers aren't magic, either. Even with a port multiplier, you've still only got 3 Gbits of bandwidth to share among all the devices connected to a particular port, so I don't see how that's any better than this. At least with Light Peak you can share 10 Gbits among your devices instead of only 3.

I'm well aware of how port multipliers work. But I can't replace four 6Gbps (by the time Light Peak comes to market in any significant way) SATA cables with one Light Peak cable. Maybe I save one cable, big deal.

Originally Posted by CharlesS 

If this is to be used for networking, it'll be important to have long wires.

So now Light Peak is going to be routable and two orders of magnitude cheaper than 10GBASE-SR?

Originally Posted by CharlesS 

It's the other way around - Intel developed this with Apple's backing. The last time that happened was USB, which as I recall ended up working pretty well.

Revisionist history much?

Originally Posted by CharlesS 

It makes just as much sense to connect those to Light Peak as it does to connect them to a USB 3.0 port.

Except the part where I can plug my USB1/2 keyboard/mouse into a USB3 port without dongles/adapters.

Originally Posted by OreoCookie 

The point is not raw throughput, the point is size (it's an optical fiber cable whose connector can be much, much smaller) and that it's a jack of all trades.

Link to connector size specs? I missed it.

[Chuckit]

Yes, that's why USB is going to fail — if I can't plug it into my PS/2 port without a dongle or adapter, it's useless. Apple would be foolish to ship a computer that only let you use USB.

[CharlesS]

Originally Posted by mduell 

Dongles, dongles everywhere. My own personal hell.

For the transitional period. Before too long, all your peripherals will come with Light Peak connectors on them, and then no more dongles.

I'm well aware of how port multipliers work. But I can't replace four 6Gbps (by the time Light Peak comes to market in any significant way) SATA cables with one Light Peak cable. Maybe I save one cable, big deal.

What Mac has four external SATA ports (or even one, for that matter)?

So now Light Peak is going to be routable and two orders of magnitude cheaper than 10GBASE-SR?

USB cables are already cheaper than Ethernet cables. It stands to reason that once Light Peak becomes what USB is now (as it certainly will, with Intel's backing), it will be cheaper as well.

Revisionist history much?

What part of that was revisionist history? Intel developing it? Apple supporting it? Or its subsequent ubiquity?

Except the part where I can plug my USB1/2 keyboard/mouse into a USB3 port without dongles/adapters.

Yes, the fact that I can't connect ADB or SCSI devices to a USB connection without an adapter is certainly a death knell for USB.

[Laminar]

Actually, I think Apple and Intel stole the idea from ort888. I also love how plenty of people popped into the thread and said matter-of-factly how and why this was impossible. Well done, internet geniuses.

[reader50]

Originally Posted by CharlesS 

It's the other way around - Intel developed this with Apple's backing. The last time that happened was USB, which as I recall ended up working pretty well.

Originally Posted by mduell 

Revisionist history much?

Originally Posted by CharlesS 

What part of that was revisionist history? Intel developing it? Apple supporting it? Or its subsequent ubiquity?

If memory serves, FireWire was expected to become universal. But Apple tried to impose a per-port licensing fee on Intel. Intel got ticked off and helped develop the USB 1.0 standard instead, to prove they didn't need to pay that fee.

Apple would presently drop the licensing fee, and eventually turned FireWire (including tradename and logo) over to a standards group. But not until after USB had gained critical marketplace momentum.

Unfortunately, the wikipedia pages are missing that bit of history, from both the firewire and usb articles. It would take some work to dig up the references.

[CharlesS]

The way I always understood it, USB and FireWire were meant to be complementary technologies at first. USB was supposed to be for connecting things like mice, keyboards, and other things that it wouldn't make sense to connect using FireWire. Macs with FireWire, and Apple's infamous licensing issues, came about after there already existed Macs using USB, and USB and FireWire's uses didn't overlap until USB 2.0 came out later on.

Anyway, if what you say is true, it would make absolutely zero sense for Apple to have included USB on the 1998 iMac and not FireWire.

[turtle777]

Originally Posted by Laminar 

Actually, I think Apple and Intel stole the idea from ort888. I also love how plenty of people popped into the thread and said matter-of-factly how and why this was impossible. Well done, internet geniuses.

Actually, there were some valid objections raised that are not (yet) answered by this new Intel proposal.

-t

[reader50]

Originally Posted by CharlesS 

Anyway, if what you say is true, it would make absolutely zero sense for Apple to have included USB on the 1998 iMac and not FireWire.

You're right. I think it was USB 2 (not 1.0) that Intel went off to develop after refusing to pay Apple's fees. It would be helpful if I recalled where that info was posted - it's been a few years.

[Don Pickett]

Originally Posted by Chuckit 

Is USB 3.0 rated at 4.8 Gb in the same sense that USB is "480 Mb"?

I'd expect so. I've never seen anything higher than ~17 MB/s sustained for USB2, so I'd expected to see USB3 top out at a max of 600 MB/s. Actually, I'd be surprised to see it get anywhere near that high.

[Don Pickett]

Originally Posted by reader50 

If memory serves, FireWire was expected to become universal. But Apple tried to impose a per-port licensing fee on Intel. Intel got ticked off and helped develop the USB 1.0 standard instead, to prove they didn't need to pay that fee.

Apple would presently drop the licensing fee, and eventually turned FireWire (including tradename and logo) over to a standards group. But not until after USB had gained critical marketplace momentum.

Unfortunately, the wikipedia pages are missing that bit of history, from both the firewire and usb articles. It would take some work to dig up the references.

Never mind.

[CharlesS]

Originally Posted by reader50 

You're right. I think it was USB 2 (not 1.0) that Intel went off to develop after refusing to pay Apple's fees. It would be helpful if I recalled where that info was posted - it's been a few years.

FireWire: History, Insight, Perspective: The Dollar Deal that Almost Killed FireWire

[reader50]

Thank you for that link - it is frustrating to misconvey story details. Makes people think you've been drinking, or worse, that you have no idea what you're talking about.

At least I got about 50% of it right.

[tooki]

Assuming the story is actually true.

[Oneota]

Originally Posted by tooki 

Assuming the story is actually true.

I suspect there's a great deal of wrong-ness in that article. It's just my sneaking suspicion, though.

[ort888]

Originally Posted by Laminar 

Actually, I think Apple and Intel stole the idea from ort888. I also love how plenty of people popped into the thread and said matter-of-factly how and why this was impossible. Well done, internet geniuses.

Thank you. And people mocked me. We'll see who's laughing in 10 years.

[CharlesS]

Here's another link, written by a former technical lead on the FireWire project:

http://www.teener.com/firewire_FAQ/#A_short_history_of_licensing

[analogue SPRINKLES]

I do remember all the fuss with $1 per port fees with Firewire when it first came out. Apple later lowered the cost. Strangely enough Steve mentioned that Blu-Ray is "A world of hurt" because of licensing issues yet Apple did the same in the 90's with firewire.

At any rate I think this new light peak is an absolutely fantastic idea. Not sure if it is daisy-chainable but either way the thought of ONE small port where everything from my monitor, peripherals and ethernet connects is a wet dream and a half. I don't care who is behind it just come out with it soon and make it a standard!

[CharlesS]

Originally Posted by analogue SPRINKLES 

I do remember all the fuss with $1 per port fees with Firewire when it first came out. Apple later lowered the cost. Strangely enough Steve mentioned that Blu-Ray is "A world of hurt" because of licensing issues yet Apple did the same in the 90's with firewire.

Not strange at all. Steve & Co. have obviously learned from that experience, which is why they're being so careful to play nice with Intel this time around - this time, they're not going to piss people off and cause Light Peak to get FireWired.

[Chuckit]

Originally Posted by analogue SPRINKLES 

I do remember all the fuss with $1 per port fees with Firewire when it first came out. Apple later lowered the cost. Strangely enough Steve mentioned that Blu-Ray is "A world of hurt" because of licensing issues yet Apple did the same in the 90's with firewire.

$1 per port is not necessarily the same world of hurt he was talking about with Blu-ray.

[analogue SPRINKLES]

Originally Posted by Chuckit 

$1 per port is not necessarily the same world of hurt he was talking about with Blu-ray.

Ok well fill us in then. Obviously it is not the same but similar issue.

[CharlesS]

Well, the presumption at the time was that he meant the draconian HDCP copy protection that Blu-Ray requires, but then Apple ended up implementing that on the DisplayPort-equipped Macs anyway, so probably not.

[analogue SPRINKLES]

Originally Posted by CharlesS 

Well, the presumption at the time was that he meant the draconian HDCP copy protection that Blu-Ray requires, but then Apple ended up implementing that on the DisplayPort-equipped Macs anyway, so probably not.

Great. Love those definitive explanations with catchwords like "Presumption" and "probably".

Anywho....

[CharlesS]

Would you prefer that I use ESP to figure out definitively what Steve was thinking?

Or what exactly were you expecting?

[The Final Dakar]

A ten-page paper, single-spaced, works cited.

[Brien]

I think Light Peak looks pretty promising.

Originally Posted by tooki 

Well, it's actually not Apple's fault -- Apple follows the USB standard, which actually has requirements on maximum connector size and minimum jack spacing. The problem is that some USB cable and device manufacturers believe they are above the rules, and make plugs that exceed the maximum allowed size and thus intrude on the adjacent jack's personal space.

Yeah, like the first-gen iPod shuffle?

[Spheric Harlot]

*zing*