
Total Nightmare: USB-C and Thunderbolt 3 - sfoskett
http://blog.fosketts.net/2016/10/29/total-nightmare-usb-c-thunderbolt-3/
======
jws
We will survive this. We survived having RJ45 jacks (which I just learned are
not really RJ45 jacks, but 8P8C connectors) in walls. Is it a phone, a token
ring, or an Ethernet? Cat 3, Cat 5, Cat 6? Did the installer unwrap the pairs
too far? Are there crossed pairs? Does it have two pair or four (in days of
old it was common to make single Cat 5 wire serve two devices since they only
used two pairs)? Does it have a DC voltage supplied between some of the pairs?
What voltage, what current capacity, which polarity, which pairs? What speed
is the ethernet switch port? Maybe it is a VGA extender or an HDMI extender.
Maybe it is a serial console. I had an office where one RJ45 went to an FM
antenna above the steel roof, you _really_ are not supposed to do that. (I
have installed or used all of these conditions except for token ring.)

USB has already had this problem for 16 years. When they went from USB 1.0 at
11mbps to USB 2.0 at 480mpbs they had to change the shielding. The only
visible change on the connectors was a tiny + sign in the three branched USB
tree molded on the end of the cable, which was apparently so useless to users
that no one bothered to put them on. At least, my quick rummage of cables
didn't find any. There is alleged to be a color code. The plastic inside the
connector is white for 1.x, black or white for 2.0, blue for 3.0, and yellow
or red for sleep/charge. My quick rummage of cables suggests this is not
necessarily known to cable manufacturers. I think the ports on devices are
more rigorous about this, at least, I think all my USB 3 ports are blue.

~~~
novaleaf
we survived wired home networks because they are expensive, and a superior IO
solution (wifi) caught up quickly.

Re usb-c: good luck not using the (only) io port on your device.

~~~
StillBored
Superior if your a laptop user sitting on the back deck. I run backups/bluray
movies/etc between my NAS and assorted devices. I will assure you that my
desktop PC's, which are connected via 10GbaseT have ~30x faster access to said
NAS than the small business class AC WIFI AP's I use. The latency, throughput
and most importantly the reliability of a decent wired network is still far
superior to wifi, and I have a far cleaner/stronger wifi system than the vast
majority of wifi networks I've seen. Even so, I still run wires to my home
theater devices because I don't have to worry about dropouts in the middle of
streaming a bluray, or more importantly the random driver/etc bugs that seem
far more frequent on wifi than boring old ethernet. Plus, with the advent of
reasonable speed internet accesses (thanks google!) the WiFi is frequently the
bottleneck. One room away and that AC 1200 router is only actually delivering
200Mbits, or for that matter the 20 closest neighbors APs/wireless
phones/airport radar/etc are messing up the spectrum.

~~~
novaleaf
I think people are forgetting that most people (in the usa or globally) don't
have the disposable income to (re)wire a house with ethernet. From a
"humanity" perspective I stand by my point.

Now for the average HN reader, sure I'm wrong. Enjoy your first world problems
:)

~~~
andwur
It cost me $250 ($100 of which was 300m of Cat6) and a very tedious,
insulation filled, Sunday to wire my house up with 1Gbit ports in every room.

Comparing that to the price of the current batch of AC WiFi access points
(that look like stealth bombers) I don't think it's too unreasonable.

~~~
jl6
You are not counting the cost of your expertise in networking and DIY. Most
people don't get that for free.

------
Animats
The spec [1] is a long read, but interesting. Misc. stuff that's not well
known:

\- The 24 pin connector does not have symmetrical connections. The interface
IC senses which way it is plugged in.

\- It's still a master/slave system, but either side can be the USB master or
the power master. Those need not be the same.

\- Who powers whom is an interesting issue. It's up to the OS to decide.
There's special support for the dead-battery case - what happens when you plug
something with a dead battery into something else? Can you charge your phone
from your laptop? Laptop from phone? Tablet from laptop? Phone from phone?
It's complicated.

\- There's something called the "billboard device", which is the interface
IC's mechanism for sending error messages when both ends are not in agreement
about modes. The devices at each end are supposed to display this information.
Hopefully they do. At least the designers thought about this.

\- Hubs are more restrictive. They don't pass through much more than USB mode
and power. They don't pass any of the more exotic modes, like HDMI, since
those are not multipoint protocols. It is supposed to be possible to pass
power upstream through a hub, though.

\- Anything with a female USB-C connector has to talk USB-C. It is prohibited
to have cables with a female USB-C on one end and some other USB connector on
the the other. Male USB-C to other USB is permitted, and will provide
backwards compatibility.

\- There are extensions defined for "proprietary charging methods" to allow
higher current levels. (I wonder who wanted that?)

\- There's a mode called "Debug Accessory Mode". This is totally different
than normal operation and requires a special cable as a security measure. (In
a regular cable, pins A5 and B5 are connected together and there's only one
wire in the cable for them. Debug Test devices use a cable where pins A5 and
B5 have their own wires and there's a voltage difference between them.) Debug
Accessory Mode, once entered, is vendor-specific. It may include JTAG low-
level hardware access. Look for exploits based on this. If you find an public
charger with an attached USB-C cable, worry. Always use your own cable.

[1] [http://www.usb.org/developers/docs/](http://www.usb.org/developers/docs/)

~~~
yurymik
\- Who powers whom is an interesting issue. <...> It's complicated.

Yeah... I have a battery bank from Anker with two plugs: USB-A and USB-C. If I
connect my Nexus 6p with USB-C/USB-C cable, everything is good, phone gets
power. But if the only cable I have at the moment is USB-A/USB-C, then phone
starts to charge the battery bank.

~~~
Hondor
That has to be a spec violation of at least one part of the system. How can a
USB-A port possibly ever receive power? Does it actually charge the battery or
does the phone just think it's delivering power - perhaps because of a non-
compliant cable?

~~~
colejohnson66
That's a problem I've seen with cheap Chinese powered USB hubs. You plug them
into the wall and your Raspberry Pi and all of a sudden your Pi turns on (even
though its power is unplugged) but doesn't boot.

~~~
Animats
That may be a Raspberry Pi problem. The Pi's non-power USB ports are "On the
go" ports, and potentially bi-directional. But they don't have the proper
power circuitry and protection on the power side. The Pi's power USB port
doesn't do power negotiation, so if connected to a power source that demands
negotiation, it may only get the default per-negotiation 100mA, which isn't
enough.

(I've been designing a board that gets power from USB, and had to read up on
all this. The USB power system is complex but well designed, and if all the
devices comply with the standards, immune to user mis-plugging. The problem is
that doing it right usually requires an extra IC at each USB port just to
manage power.[1] A lot of low-end devices don't do all this right.)

[1]
[http://www.linear.com/product/LTC4085](http://www.linear.com/product/LTC4085)

------
dognotdog
Personally, I am rather sad to see the Magsafe connector go, and having to
sacrifice IO for charging while mobile seems like quite the headscratcher.

It's somewhat funny that not only will you have to carry dongles for
everything for a few years time, but also make sure you carry the right USB-C
cables, as your friend's might not work. Yay we have superlight laptops, but
need to carry a backpack full of spaghettied cables.

~~~
ryanmonroe
>having to sacrifice IO for charging while mobile

You're not sacrificing anything. The old MBP had two usb ports and the new one
has 3 available while charging. The only thing that has changed is now you can
use the charging port for IO when not charging. Framing this as a "sacrifice"
doesn't make any sense.

>make sure you carry the right USB-C cables, as your friend's might not work

With the old Magsafe chargers, and for laptop chargers in general, it's the
same deal. If you want to charge your laptop, you have to bring your charger.
The fact that the charger is USB-C doesn't make the situation worse.

~~~
tnones
But the old MBP had two thunderbolts and an HDMI connector, on top of the two
USB. You could plug in 3 displays, charge it and still have room for a mouse
and a keyboard. Now it's always a trade-off, so on top of DVI/HDMI/DP dongles,
you'll have to carry a USB hub.

~~~
colanderman
Where could you possibly go where (a) there are three monitors, a mouse, and
keyboard waiting for you, and (b) none of those devices have a built-in USB
hub, and you did not think to keep a USB hub there?

Either you're mobile and need the USB ports, or stationary and there's a hub
there. What use case am I missing?

~~~
connor4312
> Where could you possibly go where (a) there are three monitors, a mouse, and
> keyboard waiting for you, and (b) none of those devices have a built-in USB
> hub

That describes my workplace. (But with two rather than three monitors.)
Standard monitors that operate over HDMI/DVI/etc don't have USB hubs without a
separate USB connection, most keyboards are the same way.

> Either you're mobile and need the USB ports, or stationary and there's a hub
> there. What use case am I missing?

Sure, you can work around the lack of IO by buying a hub, but the point was
that previously you would not have needed yet another dongle.

~~~
colanderman
So buy the USB-C hub/dock/whatever and _leave it at work_. No need to carry it
around with you. This isn't really any different than the case of a
traditional laptop with a dock, except instead of some weird giant proprietary
connector, you have a small standardized connector.

~~~
merb
> USB-C hub/dock/whatever

There aren't that many good one's. What I would need would be one which
handle's at least, 4-6 USB, two HDMI, Ethernet and charging would be a bonus.

~~~
lmm
Can I tempt you over to the Microsoft side? The Surface Dock has exactly those
connections - I leave everything connected to the dock as my "workstation",
and carry my Surface Book travelling when need be.

~~~
douche
If you're being tempted over to the Microsoft side, you might as well just buy
a Dell or HP or Thinkpad or whatever, and get Mac-level specs at half the
price, and usually a good collection of today's standard ports.

~~~
lmm
It's hard to match the Surface Book on specs, at least if you care about the
size and weight and resolution and touchscreen. I went shopping 6 months ago
with requirements of: thin and light (13" or smaller), available in the UK,
NVidia graphics, 12gb or more of RAM, reasonable processor, and touchscreen; I
wasn't expecting to walk out with Microsoft hardware but the Surface Book was
the only laptop I saw that (more-or-less - it's 13.5") matched up to that.

------
etblg
I liked when we just had USB2 and all you had to do was try to plug it in
once, flip it over, try to plug it in again, flip it over once more, now it
plugs in, and now you're reasonably sure it'll work.

And now the near-future seems to be full of dongles, shame.

~~~
colanderman
You forgot the step where you realize it's in an Ethernet jack.

~~~
lisper
At least if you tried to plug a USB cable into an ethernet jack it would be
immediately obvious that it wouldn't work. In today's world the wrong cable
will plug in to the wrong port just fine, and you can be scratching your head
for a long time trying to figure out why it's not working. And, if you are
particularly unlucky, while you are puzzling it out your device can fry.

[UPDATE] Well, I stand corrected. It is actually possible to stuff a USB A
connector into an ethernet socket. (You learn something new every day.) But
come on, folks, telling the difference between a USB socket and an ethernet
socket is really not that hard. You don't even have to look, you can do it by
feel. But all these different USB-C/Thunderbolt ports are physically
identical. They are literally and by design impossible to distinguish.

~~~
0xcde4c3db
> At least if you tried to plug a USB cable into an ethernet jack it would be
> immediately obvious that it wouldn't work.

Not necessarily. Ethernet jacks are often wide enough that a USB-A plug can be
partially inserted, and it's pretty common to stack the two types of ports. If
one isn't looking directly at the connector (common when dealing with the back
side of a tower or docking station), it's a surprisingly easy mistake to make.

~~~
vacri
That's a problem that can be solved instantly with a visual inspection. Not
necessarily the same for a protocol mismatch.

------
smilekzs
It is not easy to see, but we ARE on a converging path, instead of the other
way around. Current high-speed off-board point-to-point data links (SATA,
USB3, DisplayPort, PCIe, etc.) have converged onto some sort of 8b/10b
differential signaling. We used to have totally separate OSI stacks, but now
we are seeing potential to leverage the same physical layer (i.e. USB Type-C).
Sure, we would have to carry different protocols, but I am optimistic ---
eventually ASIC makers roll out adaptive chips (just like the cross-wire RJ45
@jws mentioned was solved by Auto MDI-X) that are smart enough to negotiate
the correct protocol (MAC layer upwards) between the two sides.

~~~
djsumdog
I dunno... I've been meaning to write a post about multi-protocols on the same
connector for a while.

Thunderbolt can run across DisplayPort and now both can run over USB-C. M.2
NGFF sockets can run mSATA, PCIe SSDs (either in AHCI or NVME), but not every
M.2 or mini-PCIe Wi-Fi card will work in every laptop because of blacklisting
(wtf?) even though they both attach to the exact same PCIe bus. Some M.2
sockets are only mSATA and can't take pcie/nvme drives. I'm pretty sure any
M.2 drive can attach to the mSATA controller via an mPCIe adapter, but I'm
willing to be there are some board that don't support that.

Why the hell are we doing multiple protocols on the same wire? It's beyond
confusing. I thought with USB3.1, at least there'd be a universal cable, and I
didn't realize until reading this article that the cables themselves are
different per protocol!

I agree with what the writer is getting at. This is really confusing and it
all feels like weird questionable design decisions.

~~~
smilekzs
> the cables themselves are different per protocol

I feel this is a transient rather than inherent problem of running different
stacks over the same physical layer. If the physical layer can "miss pairs"
then I agree we lose the whole point.

One way is to have some sort of official certificate system enforced by
USB.org and adopted by major manufacturers. Basically "guaranteed to support a
few pre-defined subsets of protocols".

~~~
weinzierl
> If the physical layer can "miss pairs" then I agree we lose the whole point.

It's not about missing pairs, Thunderbolt 3 cables are active in the sense
that they contain electronics. That's why a Thunderbolt USB-C cable has much
larger plugs than a regular USB-C cable.

~~~
smilekzs
Having never used Thunderbolt myself, I feel this "cable chip" is an
intentionally retarded design that violates the end-to-end principle. Is there
anything technical that prevents it from being absorbed into interface
controller chips inside devices?

~~~
weinzierl
I'm not a Thunderbolt expert, but I think the reason is twofold.

Thunderbolt was originally designed as an optical link and optical connectors
are highly problematic. Misalign the fiber just a tiny bit and you have
considerable losses. So they went with a hybrid design where the converter is
in the plugs and the connector is electrical. Later it was changed to all
electrical but the design where the connection between the two plugs and the
plugs and the devices are two separate things was retained.

The second reason is that this design still makes sense. With traditional
designs the driver in the end device is always a compromise. For example the
Ethernet driver has to be able to drive lines up to 100m long, but how many
Ethernet lines are really that long? For Thunderbolt they dis-coupled the
physical characteristics of the line driver from the driver in the end device.
They basically move all the problems of the physical connection (line length,
EMV and so on) form the end device to the cable.

------
0x0
And then there's this: [http://www.macrumors.com/2016/10/28/macbook-pro-
tb3-reduced-...](http://www.macrumors.com/2016/10/28/macbook-pro-tb3-reduced-
pci-express-bandwidth/)

"MacBook Pro (13-inch, Late 2016, Four Thunderbolt 3 Ports) The two right-hand
ports deliver Thunderbolt 3 functionality, but have reduced PCI Express
bandwidth."

~~~
blumentopf
Yes, because the PCIe root complex in the CPU can only connect one other
device besides the southbridge, and that's used for the Thunderbolt controller
on the left handside. The second Thunderbolt controller is connected to the
southbridge (as are all the other PCIe peripherals), so it doesn't have the
same number of PCIe lanes available as the one directly connected to the root
complex.

Apple could have solved this by connecting a PCIe switch to the root complex
and attaching both Thunderbolt controllers below it, but that would have
consumed additional energy. Alternatively they could have used a beefier CPU
with more PCIe root ports on the CPU, but I guess those available would have
been too energy hungry. Which kind of means this is Intel's fault for not
providing a low-energy chip with enough PCIe root ports on the CPU.

I'm wondering what the situation is like on the 15" version with discrete
graphics. This would require 3 root ports directly on the CPU to drive both
Thunderbolt controllers and the GPU with full speed, I assume that's indeed
the case since it's not mentioned in the document.

Another thing not mentioned in the document is that energy consumption will be
suboptimal if one device is attached on both sides of the machine because it
prevents one of the Thunderbolt controllers from powering down. One should
connect both devices on one side to improve battery life.

Edit: On Skylake the PCH is apparently optional, the functionality is mostly
integrated into the CPU, so the limitation is really the number of lanes
provided by the CPU, and this wasn't sufficient to connect both Thunderbolt
controllers with 4x. The CPUs used in the 13" model all have 12 lanes, the
ones in the 15" model have 16 lanes. So for the top-of-the-line model this
could be 4x for each of the Thunderbolt controllers, 4x for the GPU, 2x for
the SSD, 1x for Wifi, 1x for HD Audio?

~~~
revelation
Full Thunderbolt 3 for all four ports on the 15"?

I mean, I'm not sure how you can get 40 GBit/s with 4x PCIE 3.0 in the first
place, every quote I find says 32 GBit/s. Maybe there is that much overhead in
Thunderbolt.

But surely 4x40 Gbit/s would require 16 lanes at least. I don't think Intel
makes any consumer CPUs with more than 16.

~~~
erik
The 40 GBit/s is definitely confusing.

My understanding is that that's total bandwidth across all protocols. So the
mix of Displayport and PCIe 3.0 can't exceed 40 GBit/s. The 4x PCIe 3.0 on
it's own is 32 Gbit/s, as you mentioned.

Each controller provides two Thunderbolt ports, which share bandwidth. For the
15", 4x PCIe to the left side Thunderbolt controller, 4x PCIe to the right
side Thunderbolt controller, and 8x to the GPU would be a sensible
configuration. Though who knows if Apple took this approach.

------
ChuckMcM
And some vendors are apparently not having all ports do all things, so two
USB-C ports, one can charge at high power and one can't, but from the outside
they look identical, plugging into either can charge, but the low power one
will take forever.

While I'm a big fan of backward compatibility, I feel that at some point it is
better to start fresh rather than try to wedge another solution into the same
mechanical configuration. And while I get that people didn't appreciate
motherboards that went ISA->PCI->AGP->PCI_e, it saved people from the
frustration of plugging cards in that wouldn't work.

~~~
jaggederest
So one of the things I wonder here is, if I plug all 4 ports into chargers,
will it charge faster? I know the onboard battery is current limited, but I
wonder how it works in practice.

~~~
SiVal
Since there will be many occasions where power is being passed in on more than
one of the USB-C connectors, the new Macs are designed to take power from the
ONE charger that offers the highest power (capped at some limit) and reject
power from all others. So, plugging in all four will NOT charge faster than
plugging in just the one offering the highest power. This is a very explicit,
intentional design decision, not some hidden side effect of something else.

~~~
jaggederest
That also makes me wonder whether devices that both charge and provide power
get confused. Is there a hierarchy of charging beyond simple amperes provided?
Otherwise I could see plugging in a spec-max 100w portable battery and
draining it prior to pulling from the wall charger.

------
todd8
I once had a large plastic tub, full of SCSI cables, there were around 10
kinds of connectors, in both male and female configurations and about 10
different kinds of cables. Disk drives would have one kind of connector and
often computers would have a different style connector necessitating lots of A
to B connection issues. And the cables were expensive, often over $100. It was
an absolute mess.

It seems that the USB-C connector, finally, represents a small, robust, easy
to use connector that is capable of high data bandwidths.

It wouldn't make anything any better to have different connectors _and_
different cables for charging, mice, keyboards, disk drives, monitors, etc. I
just hope that I'll be able to get by with a handful of different lengths of
the highest end cables (e.g. the thunderbolt 3) and use them for everything.

~~~
jzl
Read the article. That's crux of the complaint -- that there _isn 't_ just one
type of cable for USB-C. Heck, the USB-C power cable that comes with the the
new MBPs can only do power and USB2 data. See for yourself:
[http://www.apple.com/shop/product/MLL82AM/A/usb-c-charge-
cab...](http://www.apple.com/shop/product/MLL82AM/A/usb-c-charge-
cable-2-m?fnode=8b)

~~~
todd8
Yes, maybe I wasn't clear. The USB-C connectors look like they will simplify
the end points so that's an improvement. We should need fewer cables.

I'm hoping that by buying the more capable cables (the Thunderbolt 3 versions)
that I will be able to use them on all of my devices, even the ones that don't
require Thunderbolt 3 like my 12" MB where I only use the USB-C connector for
charging, USB3, and sometimes an external monitor (not at Thunderbolt 3
speed).

~~~
jay_kyburz
Yeah but, I think the point is you will never be able to do this. There is no
"ultimate" USB C cable that can just do everything. You have to use the cable
that ships with your device, or risk, not only getting the correct
performance, but actually damaging your hardware.

------
Kliment
There's actually a semi-legit reason to make a usb2-only c-c cable: because it
can get away with not having the high-(super)speed differential pairs, it can
be thinner, lighter and cheaper than a full-function cable. Compare to charge-
only microusb cables - they are indistinguishable from real cables, but lack
critical functionality. If they were easily distinguishable, this would not be
nearly as much of a problem.

One really major (to me at least) concern with moving from USB to thunderbolt
is that thunderbolt is a PCIe connection, with the same security issues as
firewire (a device can basically access all your RAM, extract keys and
passwords, plant exploits etc). By bundling that into the same form factor as
the (by comparison) far safer USB and hdmi/displayport we're putting users at
risk.

~~~
rdmsr
Recent MacBook pros use the IOMMU for isolating PCI devices. With that, the
devices can't read arbitrary ram (if Apple configures it correctly).

------
gengkev
Back when we had different connectors for different things, we knew one thing:
if it fit, it worked. But the proliferation of incompatible connectors, driven
by the advancement of technology, meant that nothing fit! So we created one
connector to rule them all: USB-C. Now everything fits, but nothing works.

~~~
mycall
I say establish matched color coded ends for both the cables and rings around
the plug ports.

~~~
mattnewton
I think that's too subtle for many consumers and it has been hard for
manufacturers to stick to that, especially when selling cords in specific
shades of colors is good product differentiation.

~~~
lmm
It worked for PS/2 keyboards and mice. When Microsoft first introduced PC'97
everyone mocked it, saying that even if the computer had coloured ports you
never had a coloured keyboard and mouse or vice versa - but eventually after a
few years the standard became established enough. And that standard relied on
some truly nasty shades of purple and green.

------
jzl
Food for thought: will USB-C be the "last" standard connector? Speaking in
terms of the physical connector, not the data protocol. I'm sure it will
eventually prove not to be, but it's got a lot going for it and I suspect it
will last for a very long time. If USB-A was the dominant connector for nearly
20 years I think C could see a run of 50 years or more. RJ45 connectors are
around 40 years old and aren't going anywhere soon. I wonder what the
qualities would be of a connector to replace USB-C.

~~~
comex
Well, Lightning (which is older) is already significantly thinner than USB-C,
1.5mm rather than 2.6mm, though it has fewer pins. Looking at this visual
comparison, I'm a little concerned that USB-C will start being too thick if
the phone thinness war ever starts up again:

[http://josh-ua.co/blog/2015/3/15/usb-c-dimensions-size-compa...](http://josh-
ua.co/blog/2015/3/15/usb-c-dimensions-size-comparison-with-the-lightning-port-
and-usb-type-a)

Lightning also differs in not being hollow on the male side, which, aside from
reducing thickness, apparently has both advantages and disadvantages for
durability.

------
ilyagr
Why doesn't the USB consortium standardize (and, ideally, enforce) labeling of
ports and cables by capabilities? Kind of like washing instructions labels on
clothes, only printed on the cable.

The ports on a laptop wouldn't have to be physically labeled if the OS could
display a list of their capabilities in a user-friendly manner. Or, perhaps,
they should have the most important label (e.g. thunderbolt or not). Something
the committee would decide.

~~~
hk__2
How would a consortium force you to print stuff on the cables you
produce/sell?

~~~
ilyagr
By making it one of the conditions for licensing the specification and
permission to use the USB trademark to you.

------
jda0
USB3 ports and cables are (when spec compliant) easily distinguishable from
USB2 due to them being blue. Why was the same not done for USB-C (black for
USB3, red for Thunderbolt)?

~~~
usaphp
How is it going to help to a regular user? I doubt regular users even know
what those colors are for, adding more colors just brings more complexion

~~~
fudged71
At least you (or technical support) can look up the difference. If the cables
all look the same then you need to physically test the cables to know their
capabilities, which is a waste of time and resources.

------
Matthias247
Very interesting article.

Can here anybody maybe even explain a little bit more about the video
(Displayport) alternate mode? As far as I understand now both USB3 and
Thunderbolt support it, but they support it with a different Displayport
standard. How will that work if I plug in a future monitor with USB-C? Will
there first be some negotiation in which both devices clarify whether to use
USB oder Thunderbolt. And then another one in which the alternate mode is set?
Or is displayport directly available on some dedicated pins of the cable and
if yes, would it be the same for both cases? Or is displayport somehow
modulated/multiplexed on the remaining data stream, and in a different fashion
for USB3 than for Thunderbolt?

~~~
sfoskett
"Alternate Mode" means "using the same USB Type-C pins for other protocols".
That protocol can be HDMI or DisplayPort or Thunderbolt or even analog audio!

The USB consortium specifies using HDMI 1.4b and DisplayPort 1.3 (and MHL 3.0)
on the Type-C port. So non-Thunderbolt machines have these specs as a maximum.

Thunderbolt 3 can also pass video signals, and Intel specifies different
versions of the protocols: HDMI 2.0 and DisplayPort 1.2. Again, these are the
maximums.

So if you have a USB Type-C monitor (not Thunderbolt) or a native USB Type-C
to video cable, you're limited to HDMI 1.4b (1x4K at 30 Hz) but instead you
might be able to use DisplayPort 1.3 (1x 4K at 120 Hz). If your video card,
connector, cable, and display supports it, of course.

If you have a Thunderbolt-native monitor, you might be able to do 2x
DisplayPort 1.2 (4K at 75 Hz or 5K at 30 Hz) or 2x HDMI 2.0 (4K at 60 Hz and
much more). If your video card, cable, and the Thunderbolt controller support
it.

Essentially, you can pass video directly over the port (in USB Alternate Mode)
or over Thunderbolt. Then there are external video adapters that use USB or
Thunderbolt data. But that's not in scope of your question.

~~~
Matthias247
Thanks for the answer. Also to fragmede.

That means from USB-C I would either go to thunderbolt or directly to
displayport AM. But how would it go on from Thunderbolt mode to video
(displayport 1.2 version that intel specified)? Would Thunderbolt again
dedicate some pins for it or is the signal somehow multiplexed into a big
thunderbolt stream which carries everything?

~~~
kuschku
Thunderbolt multiplexes that in, yes.

Although, more accurately, it’s actually just a PCIe connection – you can even
connect a GPU via thunderbolt via USB-C

------
kartickv
Color-coding would have helped solve the cable mess, especially for users who
are not tech-savvy. Imagine if USB-C were green, Thunderbolt were blue,
Lightning was yellow, and DisplayPort red. If you have a rat's nest of cables
behind your desk, it becomes easier to tell what's what, which makes it more
manageable and less frustrating.

Also easier to guide non-tech-savvy family and friends on the phone: "See the
red cable? Is one end plugged into the monitor?" "Yes" "Good, now plug the
other end into the laptop."

is a better conversation than:

"There are a dozen cables here, all alike!"

~~~
lathiat
I'm sure that would be great for everyone except Apple. Even blue ports
(probably the least offensive color) are too ugly for Apple hardware :)

------
ufmace
I think I can answer at least one of the questions, on why make 2.0 only C
cables.

When I got my Nexus 5X, I bought some assorted A to C cables to go with it. I
noticed that the 3.0-capable cables are awfully thick and heavy, and not so
convenient to carry around with a mobile device. I bought some 2.0-only A to C
cables that are much thinner, lighter, and more flexible, and use those
instead. Considering that I will basically never need the extra 3.0 speed for
connection to my phone, I'll take the cheaper, lighter, more flexible cable
every time.

------
phamilton
Is the long term dongle free? C to C everywhere? My TV could have USB-C
instead of HDMI ports. I could use the same cable I use for charging my phone
to hook my laptop up to the TV.

This solves the cable problem (every cable should support the full spec) but
it doesn't quite solve the support question. Just because I have a cable that
works between my phone and TV doesn't mean it will actually do anything.

~~~
kevincox
I hope so. It also solves the hub or dock problem in one go. I just get back
to my desk, plug in one USB-C cable and I now have all of my devices plugged
in.

~~~
hereonbusiness
There are Thunderbolt (2) hubs that allow you to do just that even now, bit
pricey though.

Also I don't think USB-C is the deciding factor here, it'll still have to use
Tunderbolt to provide the hub functionality.

------
tw04
>The core issue with USB-C is confusion: Not every USB-C cable, port, device,
and power supply will be compatible

Not every USB-A port, device, cable, and power supply are compatible. I'm not
sure I understand what his point is. That people who refuse to do research are
going to occasionally run into incompatibility problems? Like they have since
the dawn of the computing age? And?

~~~
gaius
The consequence of this incompatibility is damage to the host device; that's
what's new. Never an issue with RS232!

~~~
rictic
As far as I'm aware it is only out-of-spec cables that can cause damage. If
everything is in spec then the worst case is just reduced performance or the
connection not working. I'd add that – IMO – if an out of spec cable causes
damage, then the cable manufacturer should be held responsible.

I'm sure that an out of spec USB 2 cable can cause damage as well.

~~~
lh7777
Right -- it's cables that do not comply with the USB-C spec that can cause
damage. It's not as if plugging a Thunderbolt 3 device into a laptop that
doesn't support Thunderbolt will damage the laptop. It just won't work.

~~~
notatoad
and trying to argue that out-of-spec cables causing damage to your computer is
a deficiency in the spec makes about as much sense as saying the etherkiller
demonstrates a problem with the RJ45 spec.

([http://etherkiller.org/](http://etherkiller.org/))

------
tbatchelli
A meta comment. There are many other threads lamenting that this is not a
"Pro" machine, but all this cable discussion is not foreign to audio, video
and IT professionals and prosumers. If you want to get the max of your pro
computer's IO you will need to learn your cable specs and protocols.

It does look that the future will require some rebuilding of our cabling. I
have a thunderbolt hub that connects to my screen, my external thunderbolt
drive, and a plethora of USB devices. I only use a single Thunderbolt port on
my laptop. I like this Future. With these bandwidths I can see us connecting
more interesting devices to our laptops

------
__david__
This strikes me as being the same situation as hdmi cabling. Anyone who has
bought a 1080p tv then a 3D tv then a 4K tv then an hdr tv knows that not all
hdmi cables are made equally. This is not great, but it's very far from a
nightmare.

~~~
nicholassmith
I was going to post this very same thing, the upside is it'll be easier with
USB-C because it'll appear in far more devices over time than HDMI.

------
corndoge
Is it possible to make one Type-C cable that supports every possible protocol
that can go over Type-C and works as long as the devices are compatible? I.e.,
if the two devices can talk over Type-C, then the cable will work?

~~~
ianburrell
Type C cables only come in two types: USB 2.0 and 3.0/3.1. USB 2.0 cables have
fewer wires and only support USB 2.0 data and power. USB 3.1 cables have all
the wires (and are expensive) and support higher speeds and alternate modes.

Finally, Thunderbolt 3 requires active cables for longer lengths and higher
speeds. It can only do 40 Gbps with 0.5m passive cable, and 20 Gbps with 2m
passive cable. Anything longer requires active Thunderbolt 3 cables.

------
calinet6
One interesting thing is that when the port is the same for everything, the
port itself (the shape, size, look and whether it matches the other thing
you're looking at) ceases to be a useful interface for connecting things
together physically. Instead we need other indicators, labels, and on-screen
error messages to tell us those things, which is a much more indirect and less
clear way of understanding connectivity.

Did anyone ever stop to ask if we really wanted everything to go through one
port, even if everything wasn't really inter-compatible? I think we had it
pretty right before, with a mix of ports, some of which were exclusive to a
purpose (like HDMI, power, audio), some of which were generic (like USB,
FireWire, Thunderbolt). Now we've removed clarity for what exactly?
Aesthetics? "Simplicity?" The technological advancement of a single standard?
There could be good reasons, but we should be aware of the usability tradeoff.

------
sesutton
The USB 3.1 gen1 and gen2 thing still really boggles my mind. It's almost as
if the USB-IF was trying to confuse people. Who retroactively renames a
standard?

~~~
pitaj
They should have just named things this way:

USB 3.1 gen1 => USB 3.1, USB 3.1 gen2 => USB 3.2

I don't know why they would do differently.

~~~
Tempest1981
Agreed, 3 levels of versioning is too much for most users. Even 2 levels isn't
ideal when dealing with a novice user.

    
    
      - Good: Thunderbolt 1, 2, 3
      - Good: USB, USB-2, USB-3
      - OK: DisplayPort 1.2, 1.3
      - OK: HDMI 1.2, 1.3a, 1.4, 2.0
      - Bad: USB Hi-Speed, SuperSpeed, SuperSpeed+
      - Bad: USB-3.1 gen 1, USB-3.1 gen 2, ...
      - Bad: LEV, ULEV, SULEV, PZEV, AT-PZEV

------
icinnamon
I'm a bit confused. The ports on the computers themselves can have different
protocols- that makes sense. But the cables themselves can _also_ support
different protocols? Maybe I'm just naive, but can someone explain how a
"dumb" cable supports different specs?

~~~
cheiVia0
Specifically, different cables support different bitrates and Wattages. This
is due to the number and thickness of the wires in the cable.

I think Monoprices's labeling of a 5Gbps or 10Gbps USB-C to USB-C is false,
however. There is nothing about the USB 3.1 Gen2 (10Gbps) spec that requires
anything more than a regular USB3 cable. I think the "5Gbps" version is just
an older product description from when 5Gbps was the fastest USB available.

~~~
sfoskett
Plus, as noted by lee_s2, the higher-cost/higher-protocol cables are "active"
with chips in them.

------
billylo
USB standard bodies can borrow a page from the Ethernet port and signal
standards. 10-mbps to Gbps evolution does not have to be painful for users.

~~~
jzl
Start getting involved with 10Gb Ethernet and it is no longer trivial. You've
got Cat 6, 6A, and 7, and all sorts of different length and shielding
considerations and often don't get anywhere close to 10Gb.

~~~
kccqzy
At least for most Ethernet cables I buy, the category is actually printed on
the cable itself. I don't see that happening on USB cables.

~~~
tmzt
It would be nice to see something like #lanes@XGhz + 1 .

------
fragmede
Generally the cable hasn't mattered in consumer devices - as long as the
device and cable are good and you plug it in to the right port, it'll work. A
cable's a cable, after all, right? Unfortunately, that's not true, hasn't been
true for a bit, and Apple's only partially to blame. DVI-A, anyone?

Some of Apple's dongles have a microcontroller inside in order to do the
signal conversion, so it's a wonder they're only $30. That lighting-to-3.5mm
jack that comes with the iPhone 7? Tiiiiny DAC -
[http://www.macrumors.com/2016/09/20/lightning-earpods-
teardo...](http://www.macrumors.com/2016/09/20/lightning-earpods-teardown-
confirms-dac/) (The other option being dumb signaling with the iPhone itself
doing the DAC and passing the signal, as USB-C allows with alternate mode).

Past Apple's dongle madness though, the bleeding edge of technology has always
had a few edges. Despite the connector at the end fitting, HDMI 1.0 cables
won't work where HDMI High Speed cables are necessary (though monster cables
are still a rip off). High-end 4k TVs need the proper cables or else it won't
work, just like a random cable with RJ-45s on the end won't necessarily
support gigabit connection speed (or even support ethernet, for that matter).

If Monoprice listing all the possible variations of USB-C cables seems
frustrating, and you're allergic to details, only buy the expensive Apple
cables and certified Apple accessories and you'll be fine, same as it's always
been.

If you need to venture outside their walled garden, yeah, there are some
details to know about that the article doesn't go into, but I'm quite excited
for what's become known as the USB-C connector to become the global consumer
connector standard. Once that's true, the fewer weird dongles we'll all need,
and you'll always be able to charge your phone-that-has-usb-c (we'll see if
the iPhone 8 picks up USB-C).

What the author glosses over in the article is actually an interesting part of
USB Type-C spec, which is Alternate Mode. This allows a device and host to
negotiate to speak something other than USB on the pins, be it video,
networking, or in Apple's case Thunderbolt 3.

Apple's definitely gone and made things confusing with Thunderbolt 3 - for
everyone else. Buying only Apple stuff is going to "just work" as long as you
keep buying their newest shiniest gadget, and, well, they're in the business
of selling gadgets.

~~~
sfoskett
I agree that it's exciting to have a durable/flippable cable that can be used
for all sorts of things. The issue is that the nomenclature is unclear, with
everyone just saying "USB-C" when that can mean all sorts of things.

I actually spent quite a lot of time talking about "Alternate Mode", I just
didn't call it that all the way through.

------
krylon
The proliferation of various ports and interfaces has been disturbing, even in
the PC arena where Thunderbolt is rather hypothetical.

Displays alone drive me insane these days. Twenty years ago, you had a VGA
connector, and that was it. Then came DVI, which allegedly worked better with
TFT panels. Then came HDMI, but there is also DisplayPort which appears to be
similar, yet different. I have not seen a display or beamer that will accept
DisplayPort input. Does such a thing even exist?

And laptops have, of course, the "mini" version of these, so there is mini-
DisplayPort (which looks suspiciously like ThunderBolt) and there is mini-HDMI
(which looks suspiciously like USB-C).

I am still telling myself this is a transition, and in five years everything
will be USB-C. Once we are there, that sounds like a nice future, but I am not
certain we'll get there in time. (Plus, a tea leaf got stuck my Galaxy Tab's
USB-C port while riding the train - it took me an hour to scrape and shake
everything out before that thing could be charged again. Something that never
happened to me with good old USB ports for some reason, even though they were
much larger.)

~~~
douche
Plus, we have all the old devices that still work just fine using the old
ports. I've been using some LCD monitors for five or six years that are VGA-
only, and they are still going strong, with no need or reason to replace them.

DisplayPort vs HDMI is one of the real bafflers. Graphics cards always seem to
have one HDMI out, and two or three DPs, yet I have never encountered a
monitor that have DP-in ports, just VGA or HDMI.

~~~
hocuspocus
Wow VGA... even 13-14 years ago my monitors were on DVI.

As for DP, you've never seen a 27 or 30" monitor? All high resolution (QHD,
UHD, 4K, 5K) or high refresh (120/144 Hz) or G-sync/FreeSync monitors use DP
as their main input source.

~~~
krylon
Okay, for higher resolutions that may be a thing. I have only seen one 27"
display, and it was "only" 1920x1080, with one VGA, one DVI and one HDMI
input. :-/

(Also, I have seen many PCs with builtin graphics that have no DVI output,
only VGA and HDMI (and sometimes DisplayPort).)

------
vladimir-y
Thunderbolt 3 is a great thing (really), though some time is needed for the
transition period.

------
revelation
That's just the start of it. So the new MBP has what, four USB-C ports.

Can I put power into all of them? What if I try to do 4xHDMI for all of them?
Surely I can't connect four external graphics cards over Thunderbolt 3? Can I
chain Thunderbolt devices?

The author also missed the "audio accessory mode". That's right, in some
unique star constellation, some of these USB-C pins can be repurposed for
pumping out analog audio! Supported? Who knows.

I think before long every USB-C accessory will have to come with some sort of
EEPROM that the host reads first to figure out 1) what is this you are
plugging in and 2) is this going to work. So that there is at least some user
feedback instead of "plain doesn't work" or "oopsie now the port is dead".

~~~
djrogers
The answers to all of the questions in your second paragraph are easily
available and in most cases the answer is yes (you can do 4x HDMI if they're
4K or less on the 15", 2k on the 13" \- video card limitation, not port
limitation).

[1] [http://www.apple.com/macbook-pro/specs/](http://www.apple.com/macbook-
pro/specs/)

~~~
revelation
It says two displays for both, so the answer is no. I'm not sure a user is
particularly interested in the video vs port distinction.

Also says nothing on the four external graphic cards, but frankly the answer
is probably going to be no as well.

That's the principal problem here: there is now a port for things that the
underlying hardware can't even offer.

------
ulfw
It is a pity that they didn't introduce a common color coding for USB-C
connector cables.

~~~
kevincox
How many color bands would you have to have one each end? The point of USB-C
is that it can support many, many protocols. Labeling that is legitimately
hard without a massive book.

~~~
ulfw
At least some basic coloring would be nice. Let's say (For the sake of
discussion) blue for USB-C (maybe a different shade for 5 ws 10GBits if you
want), a black one for a Thunderbolt 3 connection, a white one that only has
charging pins (hello Macbok Air cable). Still better than the mess we have
now.

------
bootload
There is a real evolutionary fight going on with connectors at the moment.

    
    
        > Apple's fastest growing product category.
    

This tweet highlights the Apple problem right now [0] What is damaging to
users is the cost / availability of connectors. What was the last time this
connector nightmare played out? Token/Ethernet, Serial/DBX/USB? It pays to be
a bit conservative in hardware choice at this moment.

[0]
[https://twitter.com/dbreunig/status/792034409788518401](https://twitter.com/dbreunig/status/792034409788518401)

------
naner
The fact that certain devices cab be damaged by the wrong cable is
inexcusable.

~~~
ominous
This is like complaining "mv ~ /dev/null" does what it is meant to do.

I know

\- "Keep It Simple, Stupid"

is a thing, but so is

\- "UNIX was not designed to stop its users from doing stupid things, as that
would also stop them from doing clever things."

~~~
et2o
Disagree. This is an engineering failure. You have to look at reality; it's
often not easy to tell what kind of cable you are planning to use. Any command
line interaction is decidedly more involved than the typical user plugging in
a cable. This type of interaction should have been planned for and mitigated.

This also has nothing to do with UNIX.

~~~
ominous
It has to do with designing a system to be used by people. UNIX is a system
designed to be used by people.

\- "Any command line interaction is decidedly more involved than the typical
user plugging in a cable."

Right. "The typical user plugging a cable". I expect the user to become a
"typical user" after learning how to choose and use a cable, and getting
acquainted with his hardware and software. One is not born a typical user, as
you seem to imply (plugging a cable is not a complex task). It is. Everything
is complex. Using the command line is complex, and then you factor your
"typical uses" into aliases or scripts.

Or maybe you curl | bash scripts from the web, and then cry when they fail /
your box catches internet aids.

Or you use an ipad for all the computing you do, and expect things to just
work.

See: a typical everyday usecase: [https://github.com/alex/what-happens-
when](https://github.com/alex/what-happens-when)

Did the user write "oogle.com" instead of google, and got malware?
....Inexcusable, as you said? Should it just work?

I say: "why did the user write oogle.com? Did he want malware?"

Simple stuff.

------
russdill
The article is pretty good, but this amount of hyperbole is really
unforgivable: "If you’re not careful, you can neuter or even damage your
devices by using the wrong cable." First of all, the linked post says that C
to C cables _do not_ have this problem at all. The issue comes about in
relation to how older standards report allowable power draw via resistor
configuration. This is a problem that can only occur with USB A to USB C and
also USB A to USB B.

~~~
sfoskett
No you can damage your devices with C-to-C cables.
[https://plus.google.com/u/0/+BensonLeung/posts/HakwCMmd346](https://plus.google.com/u/0/+BensonLeung/posts/HakwCMmd346)

~~~
cpeterso

      Q: Do C to C cables have the same problem?
      No. C to C cables do not have the same problem because they are required to be straight pass through

------
makomk
I think this understates the number of ways you can connect a monitor over
USB-C if anything. Let's see, there's Alternate Mode DisplayPort, Alternate
Mode HDMI, Alternate Mode Thunderbolt's video support, Thunderbolt to an
external GPU, USB 3.0 graphics, possibly more, most or all of which can be
converted to HDMI with different compatibility and performance tradeoffs.

~~~
sfoskett
...and most of which won't work with a given display. SO you have to figure
out which of the dozen or so possibilities works with your monitor and
computer and buy the right cable to go between them.

------
crudbug
The politics behind standard committees is horrible. Just call the new
standard USB 4.0 which supports alternate mode, power delivery ...

~~~
joecool1029
4 is unlucky some places. They'd probably go to 5.0 next.

~~~
cpeterso
_Tetraphobia is the practice of avoiding instances of the number 4. It is a
superstition most common in East Asian nations. … The Chinese word for four
sounds quite similar to the word for death in many varieties of Chinese.
Similarly, the Sino-Japanese, Sino-Korean, and Sino-Vietnamese words for four
sound similar or identical to death in each language._

Wikipedia's "Examples of sensitivity to tetraphobia applied" section is
interesting:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tetraphobia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tetraphobia)

~~~
mcv
Sounds appropriate for this mess.

------
chewxy
I was in shenzhen a couple of days ago, and faced with the prospect of having
different types of USB-C cables, I bought one of each standard (thunderbolt,
USB3.0 and 3.1).

I now have a problem because I don't remember which colour is which. Is there
a way to find out without having to break the nicely braided cables?

~~~
sfoskett
You could try them with appropriate peripherals and see if they connect at max
throughput... But that's going to be very hard since there are pretty much no
Thunderbolt 3 peripherals out there.

------
transfire
And here I am wishing HD-BaseT would catch on, but I don't think the people
behind that (and USB-C) have any intention of actually making our lives easier
-- it's just to having something new to sell :(

[http://hdbaset.org/](http://hdbaset.org/)

------
nashashmi
This makes my brain hurt:

 _Thunderbolt 3 is really an “Alternate Mode” use of the Type-C port /cable,
just like HDMI. But in practice, Thunderbolt 3 is a super-set of USB 3.1 for
USB-C since no implementation of Thunderbolt 3 will be USB 2.0 only._

Anybody care to explain?

~~~
sfoskett
"Alternate Mode" means "use these same pins for something other than USB". So
Thunderbolt 3 uses the same connector but re-purposes the pins and wires to
carry 2 or 4 PCIe 3.0 lanes rather than USB. HDMI similarly repurposes these
pins to carry traditional HDMI signals.

Anyone implementing Thunderbolt 3 will also be implementing the full USB 3.1
stack in the same chipset. Intel, for example. It would be silly to implement
just Alternate Mode Thunderbolt and skip the USB 3.1. That's all I meant.

------
hkjayakumar
Here's a slightly unrelated question -

What happens if you plug in 4 power cords into the new MacBooks ?

~~~
geerlingguy
In Apple's documentation, it mentioned that if you plug in multiple power
sources, the MBP would choose only one at a time.

------
partycoder
Well, a similar situation exists with UTP cables, where cat5 offers 100 Mbps,
cat5e offers 1000 Mbps, and cat6 offers 10000 Mbps. They all look exactly the
same unless you go and read the label on the cable and are familiar with this.

~~~
jzl
It's even worse: getting consistent 10Gb on Cat 6 depends on cable length and
electrical interference. Cat 6A and 7 also start coming into play for long
cable runs and make the situation even more complicated.

~~~
partycoder
Yes, though cable crosstalk and interference is an issue with most cables.
There is STP (shielded rather than unshielded), which protects against
external interference.

------
shurcooL
Such mixed feelings about this. Really nice content, but misleading title. :(

I already knew all that, but I appreciate the write up for others who don't
already know all those details. I'm an enthusiast and obsessed with these
details of ports, protocols and cables. I predicted this a year ago [0] and
I'm very happy with this outcome. Yes, it's a transition period, which is
unpleasant every time, but we will be in a fantastic state in a few years.

[0]
[https://twitter.com/shurcool/status/607351368387469312](https://twitter.com/shurcool/status/607351368387469312)

------
jay_kyburz
What is so crazy about this is, if you can't risk just using any cable that
fits in a socket, becuase you could damage your hardware, end users would be
better off with a completely unique shape for every cable.

This is a giant leap backwards.

~~~
tmzt
Where does it say you would damage your hardware? Alt modes are negotiated
with a standardized protocol as is power transfer. The defaults should be
electrically compatible with all devices, though not necessarily functional.

~~~
jay_kyburz

        "If you’re not careful, you can neuter or even damage your devices by using the wrong cable. Seriously: Using the wrong cable can damage your machine! This should not be possible, but there it is."

~~~
Niksko
This refers to out of spec cables, not the incorrect type of cable. As long as
your cable is within spec, you wont have issues.

------
jonathanberger
The mistake this article makes is thinking that the typical person will
interact with many different USB-C ports and cables than his or her own. The
reality, is that people will get to know their own ports, buy their own cables
and devices, and things will work 99% of the time.

Only occasionally they'll need to use a friend or coworker's device or cable
and then there could be confusion. Although, even then, assuming the friend
also has one of the most popular computers/phones/cables, it'll probably still
work.

~~~
Angostura
Ah for a world where you never have to go and make a presentation in another
office.

------
Dylan16807
> Thunderbolt 3 requires a special cable

Apparently this isn't quite right. You can use normal passive USB 3 cables to
get 40Gbps at very short lengths and 20Gbps at medium lengths.

Unless they're too low quality.

------
bobsgame
It would be nice if calling things "Total Nightmare" did not become a trend.

I've seen more of this negative rhetoric lately and I suspect it's influenced
by Trump's speech patterns of describing everything as a "Total Disaster,
Sad!"

It's not a constructive way of speaking, and it's hurtful and discouraging to
whatever or whomever it is criticizing. That's likely why Trump does it.

How about changing the title to "USB-C adapter confusion: what can we do to
improve this?"

------
fredfoobar42
This just sounds like the same whining people did when the Mac went to USB
back in 1998. "You mean I need an ADAPTER for my SCSI device?!"

------
exabrial
Tim Cook is the Steve Balmer of Apple. Balmer lead Microsoft to near oblivion.
Really nice to see Microsoft change into a more open company... I'm getting
more and more impressed with things like the Linux subsystem.

I haven't bought a Mac or an iPhone in awhile because their hardware is
terrible compared to their competitors. Gimmicky features like 3d touch
(haven't used it once, intentionally), unnatural scrolling, and this touch bar
are things I'll probably use once or twice. Literally the only reason I stick
with OSX is because it's a commercially supported Unix system with a nice user
interface.

What I don't understand is the "pro" in the name. Doesn't a "pro"fessional
need to do things with their computer outside of a coffee shop; usable I/O,
gigabit ethernet, slots for interfacing with their other professional
equipment, etc. I can totally understand these features in a consumer edition
laptop. But there is no longer a reason to call these "pro" laptops.

The silver lining I guess is maybe Apple drives a new wave of people to
desktop Linux and we can finally get a nice, modern, desktop environment.
Either that or another project to get OSX running on [superior] non-Apple
hardware.

Anyway, just my opinions. I wonder if anyone has similar thoughts.

~~~
andybak
Rather off-topic don't you think?

~~~
Matachines
Pointless Mac vs PC debates are never off topic on internet forums :-)

------
LeanderK
Does anybody know how the protocol/mode gets negotiated? Its unbelievable what
capabilities such a small port has.

~~~
makomk
Well, that depends on the protocol being negotiated and the connectors and
devices on either end, of course. Having just one or two methods of protocol
negotiation would be too simple.

~~~
LeanderK
Well, i would expect that. But how is the detection done? i don't think USB
was designed with an alternate mode/thunderbolt in mind. I would expect some
tricky solution to play nice with legacy USB-devices, or not?

~~~
makomk
I think legacy USB 2 has dedicated pins and devices are expected to deal with
all of the old legacy signalling methods in addition to the new ones.

------
aq3cn
You know whenever there is a bad press about Apple product they start to black
list those reporting websites. Blacklisted company don't get any pre-released
news or products for reviews. I wonder how many websites have been
blacklisted.

------
karlb
So am I right in understanding that… (i) When my new MacBook Pro arrives, I
need to learn which is the Thunderbolt port. (ii) I can simplify matters by
always buying the top-spec leads. If so, how do I know which to buy?

~~~
taejavu
Answer for (i): They're all Thunderbolt.

~~~
kccqzy
But some might be slower than others. [https://support.apple.com/en-
us/HT207256](https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT207256)

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kartickv
Is the article correct in claiming that the CABLES are backward-compatible?

I have a Nexus 5x, which uses USB-C. I want to buy a cable to charge it and
connect it to my computer. Would a Thunderbolt 3 cable work?

~~~
lmm
Yes - thunderbolt 3 cables are required to support the full 100W of power. It
sounds like there are only really four types of USB-C cable, at least for the
time being - USB2, USB3 without power, USB3 with power and thunderbolt 3.

------
bootload
interesting read on the technical details of the ports b/w 13"/15" and port
placement: _" Thunderbolt 3 Ports on Right Side of 13-Inch MacBook Pro Have
Reduced PCI Express Bandwidth"_ ~
[http://www.macrumors.com/2016/10/28/macbook-pro-
tb3-reduced-...](http://www.macrumors.com/2016/10/28/macbook-pro-tb3-reduced-
pci-express-bandwidth/)

------
wyager
USB needs to go back to being "universal". The USB spec has been getting
progressively more complicated over the years; it's time to cut back.

~~~
eyelidlessness
Has it ever been "universal"?

~~~
wyager
Yes, hence the name. It's quite easy to implement a USB 1 controller, and
there was very little difference across implementations.

~~~
eyelidlessness
I'm reasonably certain there have always been differences in power delivery
and connectors.

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teilo
What a bunch of alarmist BS. Drop all the exclamation points. No one takes you
seriously if you end every damn sentence that way.

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nobrains
Table nightmare:

[http://i.imgur.com/52zh3Ki.jpg](http://i.imgur.com/52zh3Ki.jpg)

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cmurf
I think the nightmare is if we give up and go back to separate ports and
cables for various things.

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moogly
What happened to Thunderbolt 3 over USB 3.1 Alternate Mode?

~~~
sfoskett
It's in there.

------
ngoldbaum
Anyone have a mirror?

~~~
fernandotakai
google has one
[http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:8O__73q...](http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:8O__73qyoS0J:blog.fosketts.net/2016/10/29/total-
nightmare-usb-c-thunderbolt-3/+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=br&client=firefox-b)

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tunneln
I love

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beedogs
> Although it looks exactly the same as a regular USB-C cable, you need a
> special Thunderbolt 3 cable to use Thunderbolt 3 devices!

They're clearly putting a lot of lead in the water in Cupertino lately.

~~~
Tempest1981
Intel's headquarters are in Santa Clara.
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thunderbolt_(interface)](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thunderbolt_\(interface\))

------
riobard
Worse case scenario: USB-C is gonna ruin the entire PC/Mac industry due to
confusion and potential damage.

~~~
joeberon
huge overreaction

