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Read the next few sentences! The whole point is that Thunderbolt will let you plug your smartphone into a keyboard (to write that paper), or a projector, video

Read the next few sentences! The whole point is that Thunderbolt will let you plug your smartphone into a keyboard (to write that paper), or a projector, video camera (FireWire), or an external RAID array (eSATA/PCIe) for that matter. As soon as the Thunderbolt/Light Peak socket gets a little thinner, anyway :)

glhaynes 15y ago
But is that really what people want? I don't want my phone being tied up being a CPU. I want to be able to pick it up (without unhooking any wires) at any time and make a phone call, walk around, etc. Or check Twitter on it while I'm working on my big screen. Just because it'll have enough processing power/storage capacity to be my "computer" doesn't mean I'd want it to - I still want both form factors.
- mrsebastian 15y ago
  Yes, multiple form factors will exist. As you say in your other comment, there are different use cases -- you don't want to read a book on a display the size of a wristwatch, for example :) I mean, it's impossible to say what we'll be doing in a few years, let alone 10 or 20, but if we still spend a lot of time moving around and interacting with the physical universe then I think smartphones will beat out tablets. You might have a tablet at home or at the office, but I suspect it will just be a dumb display. Admittedly you wouldn't want to use a Thunderbolt cable in that case -- you'd want a wireless solution of some kind. There are wireless solutions that support extension of the PCIe bus, though, like the upcoming WiGig thing: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wireless_Gigabit_Alliance http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wireless_Gigabit_Alliance
  - glhaynes 15y ago
    Definitely agree it's impossible to say. :) Why do you think the tablet would become a dumb display? It's hard for me to imagine there being much cost savings there - you could remove some smarts but you'd have to replace them with almost-equivalent-costing smarts because you still have to handle networking, presentation of remotely-generated video and audio, receiving and transmitting user inputs, etc. Guess you could save a bit on flash storage, too. But compared to the extra latency, added dependence, etc, it doesn't seem a win to me at all.
    - mrsebastian 15y ago
      Hrm, good question. I guess I just don't see us using 10 discrete computers to interact with the cloud. I don't see us having a TV computer, a tablet computer, a smartphone, a desktop, an office machine -- I see us having one computer (with a secure link to the cloud) that then interfaces with our surroundings. I agree, the cost difference wouldn't be that significant between a normal tablet and a dumb tablet, but I don't think it will come down to costs. It will come down to security, flexibility, customizability...
      - glhaynes 15y ago
        I expect there'll be options for this, but I also expect they won't become very popular for a number of reasons. The biggest that springs to mind is that this puts a lot more strain on the battery of the phone, the device that you most want to stay charged. No doubt this will be mitigated by lower-power electronics and better battery technology, but I think we're still many years from people having tons of battery capacity to spare on their phones. Anyway, I hope systems like this will be built, in part because I like to see all the evolutionary options explored! But I don't see anything functionality-wise that appeals to me personally from systems like the Atrix, while the disadvantages seems pretty clear. EDIT: I should say that there is one clear benefit of an "all-in-one" system: having all your data with you all the time. But cloud-storage with automatic push of documents and media allows a similar benefit.
jokermatt999 15y ago
So basically the Motorola Atrix? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motorola_Atrix_4G http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motorola_Atrix_4G
- wmf 15y ago
  Except the "webtop" mode is garbage.
  - sukuriant 15y ago
    Could you expound upon that? Except for my understanding that it uses tethering bytes instead of phone bytes, I thought that they webtop mode would be sufficiently cool to be useful for emailing, more verbose texting, some web-browsing and ssh sessions. Is it really that bad?
jarek 15y ago
Back in my days, the future involved wireless keyboard and file access... But why do it with Bluetooth when you can do it shinier with Thunderbolt?

glhaynes 15y ago

But is that really what people want? I don't want my phone being tied up being a CPU. I want to be able to pick it up (without unhooking any wires) at any time and make a phone call, walk around, etc. Or check Twitter on it while I'm working on my big screen. Just because it'll have enough processing power/storage capacity to be my "computer" doesn't mean I'd want it to - I still want both form factors.

mrsebastian 15y ago
Yes, multiple form factors will exist. As you say in your other comment, there are different use cases -- you don't want to read a book on a display the size of a wristwatch, for example :) I mean, it's impossible to say what we'll be doing in a few years, let alone 10 or 20, but if we still spend a lot of time moving around and interacting with the physical universe then I think smartphones will beat out tablets. You might have a tablet at home or at the office, but I suspect it will just be a dumb display. Admittedly you wouldn't want to use a Thunderbolt cable in that case -- you'd want a wireless solution of some kind. There are wireless solutions that support extension of the PCIe bus, though, like the upcoming WiGig thing: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wireless_Gigabit_Alliance http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wireless_Gigabit_Alliance
- glhaynes 15y ago
  Definitely agree it's impossible to say. :) Why do you think the tablet would become a dumb display? It's hard for me to imagine there being much cost savings there - you could remove some smarts but you'd have to replace them with almost-equivalent-costing smarts because you still have to handle networking, presentation of remotely-generated video and audio, receiving and transmitting user inputs, etc. Guess you could save a bit on flash storage, too. But compared to the extra latency, added dependence, etc, it doesn't seem a win to me at all.
  - mrsebastian 15y ago
    Hrm, good question. I guess I just don't see us using 10 discrete computers to interact with the cloud. I don't see us having a TV computer, a tablet computer, a smartphone, a desktop, an office machine -- I see us having one computer (with a secure link to the cloud) that then interfaces with our surroundings. I agree, the cost difference wouldn't be that significant between a normal tablet and a dumb tablet, but I don't think it will come down to costs. It will come down to security, flexibility, customizability...
    - glhaynes 15y ago
      I expect there'll be options for this, but I also expect they won't become very popular for a number of reasons. The biggest that springs to mind is that this puts a lot more strain on the battery of the phone, the device that you most want to stay charged. No doubt this will be mitigated by lower-power electronics and better battery technology, but I think we're still many years from people having tons of battery capacity to spare on their phones. Anyway, I hope systems like this will be built, in part because I like to see all the evolutionary options explored! But I don't see anything functionality-wise that appeals to me personally from systems like the Atrix, while the disadvantages seems pretty clear. EDIT: I should say that there is one clear benefit of an "all-in-one" system: having all your data with you all the time. But cloud-storage with automatic push of documents and media allows a similar benefit.

jokermatt999 15y ago

So basically the Motorola Atrix? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motorola_Atrix_4G http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motorola_Atrix_4G

wmf 15y ago
Except the "webtop" mode is garbage.
- sukuriant 15y ago
  Could you expound upon that? Except for my understanding that it uses tethering bytes instead of phone bytes, I thought that they webtop mode would be sufficiently cool to be useful for emailing, more verbose texting, some web-browsing and ssh sessions. Is it really that bad?

jarek 15y ago

Back in my days, the future involved wireless keyboard and file access... But why do it with Bluetooth when you can do it shinier with Thunderbolt?