The Thunderbolt technology, developed by Intel in collaboration with
Apple, has great potential but so far has been limited to Apple’s
computers. Soon, however, that will not be the case.
Digitimes is now reporting that Intel has notified its
partners that the company will fully release the technology in April
2012, with several first-tier PC manufacturers already planning
motherboards, notebook and desktop PCs to be released with Thunderbolt
next year.
This is good news for the adoption of the technology. With more players
coming in, we will see a higher number of devices that support this
technology and also a reduction in prices for them.
In case you don’t know, Thunderbolt is the fastest I/O port available
on consumer computers today, with a bandwidth of 10Gbps both ways,
simultaneously and can supply up to 10W of power. With so much
bandwidth and power being available through just one port, Thunderbolt
allows you to easily daisy chain multiple compatible devices.
Thunderbolt ports are capable of transferring data as well as high
definition audio and video, all through one port. Being based on PCI
Express, it is backward compatible with older interfaces such as USB
and FireWire.
The current cost of Thunderbolt devices is quite high, with a 1TB LaCie
Little Big Disk costing $499.95 and just the Thunderbolt cable itself
costing $49. Hopefully, these prices will go down considerably next
year.
