When we use the PC, it is inevitable to deal with peripherals such as U disks, card readers, monitors, mobile hard disks, gallium nitride chargers, etc., and then the host needs to have a sufficiently versatile interface.
In 2023, when you buy a new computer, whether it is a notebook that can be mobile or a mini computer that can save desktop space, it is best to choose products with Thunderbolt 4 or USB4 interface as standard.
Why?
Because these two guys belong to the "golden oil" of the interface, they can connect almost all the peripherals you need, and their speed is more than 80 times that of the USB2.0 interface that is still stuck in the PC field.
Today let's talk about the [Emperor] in the interface, Thunderbolt and USB4.
Simply put, Thunderbolt is exclusive to Intel platforms, and the current latest standard is Thunderbolt 4. USB is a flat replacement of the AMD Ryzen platform, which we can see as the vest of Thunderbolt 3.
It should be noted that Thunderbolt is not actually a physical interface, it is essentially a [computer protocol], proposed by Intel in 2009, and then Apple also participated.
Because Lightning is just a protocol, it needs to be [parasitic] on top of existing physical interfaces. In the early days, the Thunderbolt 1 and Thunderbolt 2 interfaces were [reincarnated] into the appearance of Mini DP, and from Thunderbolt 3, they changed the door and relied on the more mainstream USB-C (USB Type-C) interface.
It should be noted that Thunderbolt 3 and Thunderbolt 4 must be USB-C, but the USB-C interface does not necessarily support Thunderbolt 4, and if you want to add support for the Thunderbolt 4 protocol, you need to add a dedicated Thunderbolt controller chip and strengthen the power supply capacity of the line.
Therefore, even since the 10th generation Core, the mobile platform has been natively integrated with the lightning controller, but this interface has not been popularized in the notebook field, the reason is that it is also necessary to match the Retimer signal booster, anyway, it requires manufacturers to pay more costs.
In 2019, Intel donated the Thunderbolt 3 protocol specification to the USB-IF organization, which developed a new USB4 standard based on it. As a result, the AMD platform finally has the opportunity to experience the magic of the Thunderbolt interface.
The reason why the Thunderbolt interface is "noble" is that it has always been at the forefront of the physical interface of the PC, choosing PCI Express as the internal high-speed bus on the basis of backward compatibility with USB. It also allows supported peripherals to be daisy-chained together while maintaining their original speed.
Not long after the birth of USB3.0, when it was still showing users its 5Gbps transmission speed (480MB/s) and 5V/0.9A power supply capability, the same period of Thunderbolt 1 has twice the speed of USB3.0 (10Gbps), and also integrates DP (DisplayPort) video communication protocol.
At that time, an interface that grew into a Mini DP form could simultaneously meet high-speed data transmission and many input/output functions such as DP, HDMI, DVI, VGA, RJ45, and card reader, and the output power of 12W could also provide stable power supply for peripheral devices. At the same time, Apple will also take a louder "Thunderbolt" name, and this interface was once one of the core selling points of Apple's Mac computer different from Windows camp equipment.
Seeing the three core functions of data transmission, audio and video output and high-power power supply featured in Thunderbolt 1, are you very familiar with it?
Isn't this the [full-featured USB-C] that many notebooks are focusing on today. Today, this full-featured USB-C has not been popularized in the field of notebooks, and people can gather these 3 major functions with Thunderbolt more than 10 years ago, and have to admire the forward-looking ability of Intel and Apple.
In 2013, Thunderbolt 2 was born, doubling the transmission rate to 20Gbps, laying the physical foundation for its ability to connect to external graphics cards to improve 3D performance. The Thunderbolt 3, which appeared in 2015, further doubled the transmission rate to 40Gbps, switched to a more versatile USB-C interface, and also supported USB PD charging up to 100W, which can connect to 6K resolution displays (subsequent optimizations slowly support 8K).
It should be noted that Thunderbolt 3 has a special working mechanism, which requires at least 18Gbps of available bandwidth for DP signals in any case, and has the priority allocation of the remaining bandwidth. Therefore, the bandwidth that Thunderbolt 3 can actually use to transmit data is only 22Gbps at most, which is far from the theoretical value of 40Gbps. And this is also the main reason for the shrinkage of 3D performance through it connected to the desktop graphics card docking station - not enough bandwidth.
In addition, Thunderbolt 3 (including the later Thunderbolt 4) can only achieve transmission speeds of more than 20Gbps (2000MB/s) unless connected to ultra-high-speed mobile SSDs that also support the Thunderbolt 3 protocol. When connecting a USB3.2 Gen2x2 interface mobile SSD, there is an inherent upper limit of up to 10Gbps (1000MB/s).
The new Thunderbolt 4 is actually only a slightly optimized version of Thunderbolt 3, the main improvement is that it must be able to support 2 4K displays or 1 8K display at the same time; The theoretical maximum data transmission rate has been increased from 22Gbps to 32Gbps; It can support up to 2 meters of data cable, 1 cable + docking station can expand 3 Thunderbolt 4 interfaces, can connect more devices at a time and so on.
In short, Thunderbolt 4 is the luxury version of Thunderbolt 3, which puts forward more demanding requirements for some technical details, but there are no essential changes at the functional level. Therefore, when AMD was able to add support for USB4 interface from the Ryzen 6000 platform, the Core and Ryzen platforms finally stood on the same starting line in terms of connectivity.
As we said earlier, USB4 is Thunderbolt 3. That year, Thunderbolt 3 was also subdivided into full-speed Thunderbolt and half-speed Thunderbolt, and USB4 was the same, divided into USB4 20 and USB4 40, with speeds of 20Gbps and 40Gbps, respectively. However, the general computer manufacturers are more [face], either do not support, or will definitely be equipped with a full blood USB4 40.
It should be noted that whether it is the latest Thunderbolt 4 or USB4, they must have a theoretical maximum transmission rate of 40Gbps and support DP video output, but 100W PD charging function is optional.
In the thin and light field, as long as there is Thunderbolt 4, it is almost certainly a full-featured type, which can be directly powered by a gallium nitride charger. However, in the field of gaming, due to the higher power consumption of hardware, the 100W power supply supported by Thunderbolt 4 is simply [not enough], so they must come with a standard AC power jack. In this case, canceling the PD charging function of Thunderbolt 4 is not a big problem, and it can also save costs.
Many games would have chosen to make the full-featured USB-C support PD charging and abandon Thunderbolt 4's support for it
Therefore, you will find that there are only a few high-end game books on the market, and their Thunderbolt 4 and USB4 support 100W PD charging at the same time, which is also a good publicity point to reflect the sincerity and technical strength of manufacturers.
Similarly, mini computers (including desktops) do not have high demand for mobility due to long-term adherence to computer desktops, so most products do not support PD charging even if they are equipped with Thunderbolt 4 or USB4.
Some students may ask, isn't there a lower cost [full-featured USB-C] 3.2Gen2 now? 10Gbps data transmission, DP1.4 video output and USB PD charging function is a lot, and you can also connect to an external feature-rich docking station. It doesn't matter if you don't support Thunderbolt 4 or USB4, right?
Yes, if your computer supports [full-featured USB-C], it can indeed replace Thunderbolt or USB4 to a certain extent.
However, Thunderbolt 4 supports dual 4K or single 8K outputs simultaneously, and can daisy-chain more display devices or peripherals. At the same time, due to the higher bandwidth of Lightning, while connecting 8K displays, it can also carry out data transmission capacity of no less than 2000MB/s (with special peripherals), which can ensure that every peripheral connected to the Thunderbolt docking station can run normally or at full speed.
The most important thing is that Thunderbolt 4 and USB4 can be connected to external graphics cards, although the price of such docking stations is not cheap, the price of desktop graphics cards is more expensive, but at least the core thin and light notebook or mini computer also has the opportunity to use the RTX 4090 desktop exclusive display, even if there is performance shrinkage, 3D performance can still bring qualitative changes.
In addition, if the laptop or mini computer is upgraded to the new 13th generation Core platform, it can also support the next generation DP2.1 video output with the new generation Retimer signal booster, and increase the upper limit of data transmission with non-Thunderbolt 4 devices to 20Gbps, and connect to the same mobile SSD to experience a speed of 2000MB/s.
Again, the adult world should have been "I can do without, but you can't do without". Since Intel and AMD have natively integrated Thunderbolt or USB4 controllers at the chip level, PC manufacturers only need to invest a little more cost to move the emperor in this interface home, why can't they work harder?
Therefore, when encountering computers with similar brand power and similar configuration and price, what reason do we have not to give preference to models equipped with Thunderbolt 4 or USB4 interfaces?