5 ms·

USB C != Thunderbolt 3 != Thunderbolt 3 < 1m, but all of them have the same port. Things like charging your phone can be done with USB C. Things like external

USB C != Thunderbolt 3 != Thunderbolt 3 < 1m, but all of them have the same port. Things like charging your phone can be done with USB C. Things like external hard drive are generally done with Thunderbolt Things like External GPU's have to be done with a Thunderbolt cable that is less than 1m All of that said, I am not 100% sure of all of that, because it is all so confusing.

crazygringo 8y ago
OK... is is just a Mac-only Thunderbolt issue then, which I guess you could kind of say is a problem with Apple and not with USB-C itself? If you ignore Thunderbolt, can you always rely on the latest USB-C cables Apple and Google sell working for everything? Or are there still issues?
- gumby 8y ago
  No, this has entirely to do with thunderbolt and USB spec. Dating back to the early days of Apple, they have been hyper conformant with the spec (e.g. no drivers needed to connect to conforming devices). They still are. I answered your question about which cables above.
- TheAceOfHearts 8y ago
  Apple isn't the only vendor using Thunderbolt 3. According to Wikipedia [0], the following vendors have all shipped devices with at least one port: Acer, Asus, Clevo, HP, Dell, Dell Alienware, Lenovo, MSI, Razer, and Sony. This affects everyone. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thunderbolt_(interface)#Thunderbolt_3 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thunderbolt_(interface)#Thunde...
jhasse 8y ago
> Things like external hard drive are generally done with Thunderbolt Why? External USB drives are much more common.
- gumby 8y ago
  Thunderbolt 3 is 40 Gb/s of PCIe + DP — basically exposes your bus out through a Type C connector. USB theoretically tops out, as of last year, at half tha, though in practice you won’t see anything faster than USB 3.0 (if you’re lucky) which tops out at 625 MB/s, before all the USB protocol overhead. TL;DR: USB drives are really really slow.
  - jhasse 8y ago
    625 MB/s is "really really slow"? I don't know any HDD which can deliver more than 100 MB/s. And for SSDs there's also USB 3.1 Gen 2.
  - dragonwriter 8y ago
    > though in practice you won’t see anything faster than USB 3.0 (if you’re lucky) which tops out at 625 MB/s 625 MB/s is 5Gb/s; the switch from bits to bytes seems to be a way to exaggerate the difference from Thunderbolt speeds quoted in GB/s; at any rate, USB 3.1 Gen 2 (equivalent to USB 3.2 Gen 2×1) 10 GB/s cables and device support isn't hard to find; I don't know that anyone had USB 3.2 hardware (controllers, or cables supporting the new 2×2, 20Gb/s, mode) yet.

crazygringo 8y ago

OK... is is just a Mac-only Thunderbolt issue then, which I guess you could kind of say is a problem with Apple and not with USB-C itself? If you ignore Thunderbolt, can you always rely on the latest USB-C cables Apple and Google sell working for everything? Or are there still issues?

gumby 8y ago
No, this has entirely to do with thunderbolt and USB spec. Dating back to the early days of Apple, they have been hyper conformant with the spec (e.g. no drivers needed to connect to conforming devices). They still are. I answered your question about which cables above.
TheAceOfHearts 8y ago
Apple isn't the only vendor using Thunderbolt 3. According to Wikipedia [0], the following vendors have all shipped devices with at least one port: Acer, Asus, Clevo, HP, Dell, Dell Alienware, Lenovo, MSI, Razer, and Sony. This affects everyone. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thunderbolt_(interface)#Thunderbolt_3 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thunderbolt_(interface)#Thunde...

jhasse 8y ago

> Things like external hard drive are generally done with Thunderbolt Why? External USB drives are much more common.

gumby 8y ago
Thunderbolt 3 is 40 Gb/s of PCIe + DP — basically exposes your bus out through a Type C connector. USB theoretically tops out, as of last year, at half tha, though in practice you won’t see anything faster than USB 3.0 (if you’re lucky) which tops out at 625 MB/s, before all the USB protocol overhead. TL;DR: USB drives are really really slow.
- jhasse 8y ago
  625 MB/s is "really really slow"? I don't know any HDD which can deliver more than 100 MB/s. And for SSDs there's also USB 3.1 Gen 2.
- dragonwriter 8y ago
  > though in practice you won’t see anything faster than USB 3.0 (if you’re lucky) which tops out at 625 MB/s 625 MB/s is 5Gb/s; the switch from bits to bytes seems to be a way to exaggerate the difference from Thunderbolt speeds quoted in GB/s; at any rate, USB 3.1 Gen 2 (equivalent to USB 3.2 Gen 2×1) 10 GB/s cables and device support isn't hard to find; I don't know that anyone had USB 3.2 hardware (controllers, or cables supporting the new 2×2, 20Gb/s, mode) yet.