Thunderbolt Networking

[Gary Huff]

A good start, but still only 33 feet, with no easy way to daisy chain. Could still be an issue unless someone releases something that makes daisy chaining for networking more useable.

[Jeremy Garchow]

Let’s back up.

“Only 33 feet”.

Do you have anything extended in your edit suite now? If so, how long is the run, and also, what does it take to extend it in terms of repeaters, couplers, and magic?

[Gary Huff]

[Jeremy Garchow] “Do you have anything extended in your edit suite now?”

No, but I had a gig in a small editing office for a large tech firm and we needed 75′ to get to where my workstation was.

[Marcus Moore]

I think we need to get away from the idea that for this to gain any traction that it has to satisfy the most robust requirements.

At this point I’m not even sure what Apple/Intel’s goal behind this is yet.

Based on one article (that’s been pretty bashed up in the comments), I don’t think we can draw any firm conclusions yet.

[Jeremy Garchow]

OK, and do you know, exactly, what was extended and how they had to do it?

We have two smaller extension runs and the wad of cables that is needed, along with sometimes magical repeaters, is far from elegant (but it does work).

They way I see it, Thunderbolt is a boon. It is data AND display. Yes, there are no repeaters (there are no repeaters), but you can simply stick a cheaper pass through device in the middle of it and you can extend data, display, USB, audio, basically anything that you need to extend, through Thunderbolt.

If not, you have everything at your desk, and run SDI around (or whatever else you may need to extend, like fibre/ethernet).

It’s going to be a bit expensive at first, but I am looking forward to cleaning up the clutter, and I can set the tube behind a monitor and you won’t even know it’s there, or I can set it in the machine closet and extend this out from it via one or two TB cables, add a breakout box wherever is most convenient.

I think it’s going to be good, but I like these sorts of things, and I am not scared of Thunderbolt 2.

Plus, all new computers purchased will work with all devices. That will be very slick.

[Gorazd Koncar]

Hi,

You can buy the thunderbolt optical cable up to 30 m long.

https://www.delock.de/produkte/F_848_Thunderbolt_83257/merkmale.html

https://www.delock.de/produkte/F_848_Thunderbolt_83258/merkmale.html

https://www.delock.de/produkte/F_848_Thunderbolt_83259/merkmale.html

These cables are thunderblot 2 compatible. You can buy two 30m cables
for the cost of just one ATTO 10GB or Intel 10GB Ethernet card.

And the ethernet speed messured in Blackmagic Disk speed is a little less than 500 MB/s in just one thunderbolt 2 connection mode. And you can even bond the connection between the thunderbolt 2 ports in the new MACPRO for up to 1000 MB/s ethernet speed when two thunderbolt ports are used on each machine.
For that no 10 GB ethernet switch could make such bandwith in real Blackmagic disk speed tests!Maybe on paper but not in real testing.

Just test 10GB Ethernet port speed between two previous MAC PROs with 10GB Atto ethernet cards each with Areca 1882 raid controled and dedicated Netstor PCI Express storage and you shall see that Thunderbolt 2 ethernet is really the future…

As you probably know the Mavericks uses SMB2 and the speed between ordinary link agregated 1 GB ethernet ports has increased almost 2x compared to the Mountain Lion SMB measured in Blackmagic Disk Speed application what is huge achivement.

Imagine that you buy the new MACPRO and you found out that you need
more CPU power? Do not wory just buy another MACPRO hook it with
Thunderbolt cable and you have more powerful computer on the OS level
without the need of any network rendering application and etc…

This shall be reality. And Apple shall sell more MACPRO machines than
ever before…

Thunderbolt 2 Intel DSL5520 chipset hides so much more interesting things…

Best regards,

Gorazd.

[Jeremy Garchow]

See?

It’s not so bad.

[Frank Gothmann]

[Gorazd Koncar] “These cables are thunderblot 2 compatible. You can buy two 30m cables
for the cost of just one ATTO 10GB or Intel 10GB Ethernet card.
“

I don’t think so. The price of ONE of those 30m cables is over 2100 dollars.

——
“You also agree that you will not use these products for… the development, design, manufacture or production of nuclear, missiles, or chemical or biological weapons.”
iTunes End User Licence Agreement

[Keith Koby]

[Jeremy Garchow] “They way I see it, Thunderbolt is a boon. It is data AND display. “

I think that is coolest part. If I had to build a facility all over again and t-bolt 2 monitors and mac pros are available I’d consider leaving all hardware in the datacenter and only running t-bolt over fiber to the t-bolt display in the edit suite. Probably along with one hd-sdi cable for switched monitoring, but that’s it.

Plenum rated machine control, hd-sdi, gigabit ethernet and fiber is expensive and a pain to run. We’ve got an average of 9 cables running to each edit station now. Those cables cost over a dollar/foot. Some significantly more than that. At hundreds of feet and dozens of stations, it adds up.

I know the new Mac Pro might look incredibly slick on a desktop, but imagine minimizing all of the cable to 15 and 20 ft patches in the data center. It’s way more organized and cost efficient.

[Chris Harlan]

[Frank Gothmann] “I don’t think so. The price of ONE of those 30m cables is over 2100 dollars.
“

Ouch!