Lightpeak and Mac Pro

[milbournosphere]

Here's a question for you to ponder over morning coffee. If Lightpeak is introduced tomorrow when Apple refreshes their laptop line, what are the odds of a card being released for the Mac Pro that has Lightpeak ports on it? I wasn't around for the Firewire days, so I don't know how Apple handled the introduction of Firewire, the last big bus introduced by Apple. How did they handle the situation back then?

 

[eawmp1]

You can be sure that with the next refresh of the MacPro, the new ports will be on it. As for as existing machines, you'll have to have a third party come to the rescue, Apple will not likely provide a card.

 

[Chillviper]

Current Mac Pro can't even handle SATA @ 6, how would it handle the 10 of Thunderbolt?

 

[chrismacguy]

You can be sure that with the next refresh of the MacPro, the new ports will be on it. As for as existing machines, you'll have to have a third party come to the rescue, Apple will not likely provide a card.

I dont know about that - they have released cards with various connectors on for high-end machines in the past and still do - (Apple SCSI cards, Apple Fibre Channel cards (still avaliable as an after market upgrade to your Pro) and Apple Graphics-Card upgrades to name a few)

 

[goMac]

Current Mac Pro can't even handle SATA @ 6, how would it handle the 10 of Thunderbolt?

The PCI Express bus? Same way it handles high bandwidth GPUs.

Here's a question for you to ponder over morning coffee. If Lightpeak is introduced tomorrow when Apple refreshes their laptop line, what are the odds of a card being released for the Mac Pro that has Lightpeak ports on it? I wasn't around for the Firewire days, so I don't know how Apple handled the introduction of Firewire, the last big bus introduced by Apple. How did they handle the situation back then?

Firewire 400 came to the Power Macs first. However, Firewire 800 came to the Powerbooks first. Apple did not provide a FW 800 card for existing Power Macs (although third parties stepped in), and there was a slight delay until Power Macs got Firewire 800.

 

[dyn]

Current Mac Pro can't even handle SATA @ 6, how would it handle the 10 of Thunderbolt?

With the 10 from TB it can handly the sata-6, usb, firewire and displayport connection at the same time. It's in the last 4 words: "at the same time" aka simultaneously. It's not about just 1 port at a time. It's a universal protocol so you only need 1 chip in the future. That saves a lot of space since the only extra thing Apple needs to add is a connector.

 

[philipma1957]

I am thinking the iMac and MacMini could benefit the most from lightpeak. right now macbook pro has an expresscard slot that allows booting at about 120MB/s (at least the 17 inch model does)


http://eshop.macsales.com/item/Other World Computing/EXP34SATA2F1/


http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...re=western_digital_3tb-_-22-136-764-_-Product

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...112&cm_re=sans_digital-_-16-111-112-_-Product


you can have the above attachments at home and at work. carry the macbook pro back and forth and plug into the above. so you really don't need light peak for a 17 inch mBp. You can do the same with your mac pro. you only need 1 setup because you don't carry a macpro back and forth.

right now mac mini and iMac only allow fw800 so if you hook the sans digital up you get 75MB/s

If light peak allows booting with a 2 drive unit like the sans digital the mac mini will benefit a lot as would the iMac.

 

[VirtualRain]

This thread should be merged with the one started yesterday... https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/1100934/

 

[goMac]

With the 10 from TB it can handly the sata-6, usb, firewire and displayport connection at the same time. It's in the last 4 words: "at the same time" aka simultaneously. It's not about just 1 port at a time. It's a universal protocol so you only need 1 chip in the future. That saves a lot of space since the only extra thing Apple needs to add is a connector.

Mmmmm not Displayport. As noted, Displayport is 17.2 Gb/s.

 

[dyn]

That's a bit too easy. DisplayPort has several versions with only the current 1.2 version supporting up to 17.2Gbps. It seems thunderbolt is not using DP 1.2 but DP 1.1a: https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/1106091/ Considering the fact it is limited at 10Gbps this doesn't really come as a surprise.

 

[Bucko]

Current Mac Pro can't even handle SATA @ 6, how would it handle the 10 of Thunderbolt?

I have a 2.4 Ghz, 8 core, 2010
I bought an internal Seagate Barrucuda XT SATA 2 TB, 64MB cache, 6gb/s drive I called Apple and they said it would work but I go under the profiler and still says 3GB. So they lied to me? unless I am not seeing something?

 

[Cmd-the-World]

The Seagate drive would work at 3Gb/s as the Mac Pro's internal connectors supports only up to 3Gb/s. Apple did not lie if they said that the drive would work as Sata 6Gb/s is designed to be backward compatible AFAIK, but at the slower speed of 3Gb/s

Hope this helps

 

[Bucko]

They said that 6 should work with new Mac Pros. Nothing about backwards compatible. I specifically asked if my MAC could handle 6gb and they said yes.
So, if it doesn't, how can I make it? If there's a solution?

 

[DeeEss]

AFAIK, Thunderbolt won't work on current and previous Mac Pro's. It's physically impossible with the current architecture and isn't going to magically happen. TB requires graphics processing too and it's not something you can do with PCIe.

Having JUST bought one. I'm really pissed. Not only am I stuck with limited hardware but resale will be crippled because it isn't TB.

Thanks for nothing Apple.

 

[goMac]

It's physically impossible with the current architecture and isn't going to magically happen. TB requires graphics processing too and it's not something you can do with PCIe.

Possibly politically impossible? Yes. But not physically impossible. Whether or not graphics are required, this is a problem that can be dealt with. A PCIe card is perfectly capable of doing graphics processing.

 

[DeeEss]

Possibly politically impossible? Yes. But not physically impossible. Whether or not graphics are required, this is a problem that can be dealt with. A PCIe card is perfectly capable of doing graphics processing.

Well I sure hope you're right

From Grant @ OWC (he answers comments at the bottom of the page)
http://blog.macsales.com/9038-new-macbook-pro-2011-model-unboxing-and-first-looks


A"...Dong at CNet is a sharp guy….and he’s right….no way to add TB via PCIe to a MacPro as TB requires graphics processing too (that’s the one side of TB many overlooking….the display capability) and PCIe doesn’t interface with such. So, as good as we are with all sorts of firsts on the market, looks like currently we won’t be working on a Thunderbolt PCIe card anytime soon..."

Q"...So I take it the ATI 5870′s that have two minidisplay port inputs and 1 dual link DVI input…..those Mini DP ports cannot act as a TB input?..."

A"...unsure how we will ultimately address…but IMHO, likely wouldn’t be cost effective to retrofit existing enclosure than what it would cost you to buy new...."

 

[goMac]

Well I sure hope you're right

No reason a card can't do both graphics and TB....

The issue is using TB with an existing card. That's a problem if they demand TB have video.

 

[DeeEss]

No reason a card can't do both graphics and TB....

The issue is using TB with an existing card. That's a problem if they demand TB have video.

Well fingers crossed. I really hope so. It's an odd thing for a company like OWC to say though DYT?

 

[goMac]

Well fingers crossed. I really hope so. It's an odd thing for a company like OWC to say though DYT?

Not really. OWC doesn't make video cards, so making PCI-E cards for TB is not an option for them regardless.

 

[ActionableMango]

A"...Dong at CNet is a sharp guy….and he’s right….no way to add TB via PCIe to a MacPro as TB requires graphics processing too (that’s the one side of TB many overlooking….the display capability) and PCIe doesn’t interface with such. So, as good as we are with all sorts of firsts on the market, looks like currently we won’t be working on a Thunderbolt PCIe card anytime soon..."

I still don't understand why you can't have a non-video Thunderbolt PCIe card, or why you can't just throw an el-cheapo video chip on the same PCIe card.

 

[goMac]

I still don't understand why you can't have a non-video Thunderbolt PCIe card, or why you can't just throw an el-cheapo video chip on the same PCIe card.

There is no technical reason why you couldn't do either. It's all political.

 

[seek3r]

There is no technical reason why you couldn't do either. It's all political.

I'd be willing to bet that the next graphics cards on the next model Mac Pro have thunderbolt (like apple cards used to have ADC) and won't be supported on older MPs, but will work fine (just like the 5770 and the 5870)

 

[goMac]

I'd be willing to bet that the next graphics cards on the next model Mac Pro have thunderbolt (like apple cards used to have ADC) and won't be supported on older MPs, but will work fine (just like the 5770 and the 5870)

ADC is actually pretty simple to add, just requires adding a power line.... Thunderbolt is a little more intensive. You actually have to bridge PCI lanes onto the an added chip, and honestly, cards like the 5870 may not even have the PCI lanes to spare. Especially for three ports.

This isn't to say it's impossible to add, but it would require much much great co-ordination with companies like AMD, and so far AMD has been pretty anti TB.

Adding Thunderbolt to the Mac Pro GPUs also means no more MDP 1.2, which means no more high res displays. This is likely unacceptable for some pros.

So really, no one knows what the hell will happen.

 

[seek3r]

ADC is actually pretty simple to add, just requires adding a power line....

ADC also passed USB

Thunderbolt is a little more intensive. You actually have to bridge PCI lanes onto the an added chip, and honestly, cards like the 5870 may not even have the PCI lanes to spare. Especially for three ports.

It's likely the next MP will have PCI-e 3.0, which should give it the bandwidth needed

This isn't to say it's impossible to add, but it would require much much great co-ordination with companies like AMD, and so far AMD has been pretty anti TB.

I agree there, though with the way Apple see-saws it wouldnt surprise me to see an all-nvidia lineup next time around.

Adding Thunderbolt to the Mac Pro GPUs also means no more MDP 1.2, which means no more high res displays. This is likely unacceptable for some pros.

Unless it implements TB2 (or whatever they call it) that will include optical, and probably newer displayport version.

So really, no one knows what the hell will happen.

True dat, but we *are* on a rumors forum after all

 

[goMac]

ADC also passed USB

Yeah, I realized that... Did they add a USB controller to the card?

It's likely the next MP will have PCI-e 3.0, which should give it the bandwidth needed

Hopefully, although if you are trying to drive 3 ports that's a lot of bandwidth...

I agree there, though with the way Apple see-saws it wouldnt surprise me to see an all-nvidia lineup next time around.

Yeah, kind of curious to see what NVidia says.

Unless it implements TB2 (or whatever they call it) that will include optical, and probably newer displayport version.

According to Intel the copper connectors aren't going to change, it'll just convert to optical after it enters the cable.

True dat, but we *are* on a rumors forum after all

Macrumors: We're pretty much making it up.