Apple News, Analysis and Podcasts

Cnet's Scott Stein comes up with five creative areas where he'd like to see Thunderbolt deployed. Scott has some creative – and some not so creative – ideas:

• External Storage
• Monitors
• Cameras
• External GPUs
• iPhones, iPads and iPods

Hmmmm... We take a quick look at each area to see what makes sense.

1. External Storage:

No brainer. This makes perfect sense, and we said as much here.

2. Monitors:

Again, another given. iMacs now have Thunderbolt, and like USB, being able to daisy-chain Thunderbolt via the monitor is a solution many monitor manufacturers are likely to have out by year's end.

3. Cameras:

Yup. Again, we said as much in yesterday's Thunderbolt article.

4. External GPUs:

Nope. Not sure what Scott's thinking here, but he is apparently considering netbooks or underpowered laptops that would for some reason ship with Thunderbolt. Other companies would then make external Thunderbolt GPU solutions for underpowered laptops... Why on earth would people buy lame PC's to connect to a more powerful GPU instead of just spending a bit more on a laptop with a powerful GPU built-in? Ah, the cheap-is as cheap-does PeeCee buyer, need I say more. I can't think of a more horrific use of Thunderbolt technology. The fact that Scott even thought this up scares me even more. Perhaps Intel can come up with a "Not Allowed in Lame Applications" policy. Oh sorry, this is Intel I'm talking about here...

5. iPhones, iPads and iPods:

Yes and no. Yes, in that it would be nice to see these devices sport Thunderbolt, but no, it isn't going to happen any time soon. As Scott points out, Thunderbolt is built upon the PCI-Express architecture. If you've ever seen the board behind that architecture don't count on it being miniaturized into a form that will fit in an iPhone, iPad or iPod touch for quite some time. The PCI-Express architecture requires a lot of guts, and it'll be hanging around the desktop and laptop world for a while before it makes it's way into portable devices. However, Thunderbolt gives incentive for PCI-Express to go super-small, and it may happen in the not-so-near future, so don't hold your breath.

6 Comments

1. John ~ May 7, 2011 14:49
   Sorry disagree with the GPU comment. MacBook Airs or the 13 inch MacBook pro that don't have space for anything except an integrated gpu are perfect examples of how an external GPU could be used. You get the compact size and better battery life on the road but more power when you get home.
2. Sean ~ May 26, 2011 04:13
   The External GPU idea is amazing, having a PC video card in a laptop...it trumps all the other ideas really.
3. Paul ~ June 16, 2011 00:57
   I think the external GPU idea is brilliant... You guys OBVIOUSLY didn't think of the 13" MacBook Pro when you wrote this. Great CPU, mediocre on-board graphics. If only it had some sort of EXTERNAL graphics solution... Maybe through THUNDERBOLT...
4. Kain ~ June 27, 2011 14:47
   Really do need a dislike button for facebook, gpu idea is amazing.
5. Tin ~ June 29, 2011 14:29
   As others have mentioned the idea of external GPU is very interesting for: laptop users - when doing on the go work you dont need the powerful GPU installed. In fact you dont WANT it as it will eat the battery faster. But when you get home and want to play a nice game ... yup - plug and play. iMac or other "slim" desktops. - while I love macs I am aware that they are not gaming rings mainly because of GPUs. Having an option of using external GPU to boost gaming on an iMac sounds great. Both laptops and "slim" desktops are hell to upgrade. Only things you CAN upgrade are ram and HDD (most of the time). While CPU upgrading would be nice for gaming upgrading a GPU is more important (or so I think). So an external GPU sounds very nice. Or am I cheap for thinking it would be better not to buy a new iMac / laptop every year? :D
6. Paawan ~ July 7, 2011 19:11
   Idea of external GPU is excellent but not truely practical as bandwidth used by midrange GPU is not available with thunderbolt(10gb/s) but light peak may help (100gb/s).....

Leave your reply