4 ms·

Is there a licensing reason that one can't get a Thunderbolt switch to connect a few close computers, laptops, and a NAS and be able to have a network? Even if

Is there a licensing reason that one can't get a Thunderbolt switch to connect a few close computers, laptops, and a NAS and be able to have a network? Even if one's not going for the full 40Gbit, just at least let me move files around on an emulated 10Gbit network card as Thunderbolt supports. Does this just start to get too close to InfiniBand for Intel's liking? Thunderbolt cables and adapters are (relatively) cheap and I find it a pity not seeing it used for these kinds of cases.

walrus01 10y ago
Thunderbolt is basically an extension of the PCI bus, it's a very different thing than standards based Ethernet. The effort required to build a full network stack across it for computer-to-computer connectivity would be kind of useless, considering how cheap 10GbE optical is nowadays (I just paid $28/piece for 10GbE SFP+ 1310nm LX optics). edit: and what are you going to do, reinvent the wheel by creating a thunderbolt switch/hub? good luck getting a thing like that to capture economies of scale for manufacturing and more than 0.05% of market share compared to existing infiniband or ethernet based interconnects.
- jamesfmilne 10y ago
  I agree the transceivers and fibre are cheap nowadays, as are SFP+ DAC cables. The expense is the Thunderbolt to Ethernet adapters. You can link two Macs with Thunderbolt, but in my experience the performance is underwhelming compared to a good 10GbE card (no send/receive offload, etc). I'm beginning to hate Macs.
- thescriptkiddie 10y ago
  Thunderbolt is an encapsulation protocol. By default it carries displayport and PCIe, but it can also carry Ethernet frames. This is already implemented on OSX, just connect two macs together with a thunderbolt cable and you'll see a new interface appear with a link-local address. People have already used this for networking by using a mac with lots of thunderbolt ports as a router.

walrus01 10y ago

Thunderbolt is basically an extension of the PCI bus, it's a very different thing than standards based Ethernet. The effort required to build a full network stack across it for computer-to-computer connectivity would be kind of useless, considering how cheap 10GbE optical is nowadays (I just paid $28/piece for 10GbE SFP+ 1310nm LX optics). edit: and what are you going to do, reinvent the wheel by creating a thunderbolt switch/hub? good luck getting a thing like that to capture economies of scale for manufacturing and more than 0.05% of market share compared to existing infiniband or ethernet based interconnects.

jamesfmilne 10y ago
I agree the transceivers and fibre are cheap nowadays, as are SFP+ DAC cables. The expense is the Thunderbolt to Ethernet adapters. You can link two Macs with Thunderbolt, but in my experience the performance is underwhelming compared to a good 10GbE card (no send/receive offload, etc). I'm beginning to hate Macs.
thescriptkiddie 10y ago
Thunderbolt is an encapsulation protocol. By default it carries displayport and PCIe, but it can also carry Ethernet frames. This is already implemented on OSX, just connect two macs together with a thunderbolt cable and you'll see a new interface appear with a link-local address. People have already used this for networking by using a mac with lots of thunderbolt ports as a router.