Thunderbolt Question

Hi,
I know thunderbolt is a fairly new technology so nothing is ever certain, but I have a future looking hypothetical question. I'm shopping for a Macbook Pro at the moment and the new thunderbolt port is a large selling point for me because of the thought of external PCIe video cards becoming a possibility.
I know the current speed is 10Gbit/s which might still be too slow for a high end dedicated GPU, but I've been reading that the speed could be scaled to 100Gbit/s in the future. If the speed were increased in a year from now, would these current ports be able to handle the increased speed or would more than new cables be needed? I know the cables will move from copper to optical, so would simply replacing the cable be all that's needed for increased speeds in the future?

This was dated on 1/2/13. Interesting that optical was part of specs from the beginning.
http://reviews.cnet.com/8301-13727_7-57561610-263/optical-thunderbolt-cables-in- mass-production-coming-soon/

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Mac mini and Promise Pegasus Thunderbolt Question

I'm a semi-pro photographer and my wife is a graphic designer. I just bought a new mac mini with the Promise Pegasus 8 TB RAID drive. I know the mini HD is slow and the small so I want to use the RAID as a boot disk and to house my applications and files - effectively by-passing the weakest mac-mini link and as our primary music/media server o movies, music and photography. I've never used a RAID array before - usually individual multiple external hard drives. How do I go about using this RAID array for everything? Is it as simple as selecting this drive as the target or are there other hoops to jump through? I want to get as many answers as I can while everything is being shipped. I've had two HD crashes recently and I need the security of knowing all our data is safe...plus the additional speed and redundancy are very important.

Welcome to the Apple Support Communities
You can get the maximum resolution for the Thunderbolt Display (2560x1440) on both monitors, but the graphic performance may decrease

Mini Display and Thunderbolt Question

So I have a Macbook Pro with mini display port and I bought a Thunderbolt enabled iMac. I thought because of the supposed "backwards compaitbilites" that everything would be fine to connect. I bought the Thunderbolt cable recommended by an Apple Authorized Reseller, only to find out that it cant connect the laptop to iMac for use as a bigger display. Further research confirmed that a thunderbolt device can go to mini display, but not the other way around.
So I am wondering, if I have a mini display to hdmi, can I buy a Thunderbolt to hdmi and use the hdmi to link to two since the signal will be converted for hdmi?
I really need this to work...

That will not work. Your iMac can only be used as an external display for another Mac through a Thunderbolt cable, not a Thunderbolt adapter.
Instead, the only way you have in order to use your iMac as an external display is ScreenRecycler > http://www.screenrecycler.com You just need that both computers are connected to the same network

Thunderbolt / USB3 questions about external backup drives for my new MacBook Pro

I have a new MacBook Pro retina 13". It has two USB3 and two Thunderbolt2 ports.
Until now on my iMac I've kept two backups on two WD USB2 drives. I have never had any problems with any of my WD Passport drives. One for Time Machine and one for CCC (a complete bootable clone incrementally created at 3:30 am every day).
I'd like to get new portable drives for my MBP for these backups going forward and have a few very basic questions, since this is the first time to have a device with a USB3 port, and the first time I even heard about Thunderbolt.
If I get a USB3 drive and need to use it to restore things on my older iMac, which just has USB2, will it generally connect and run with USB2 at a slower speed? Or would I have to get a drive with both USB2 and USB3 ports?
Is Thunderbolt just an Apple thing? Or is it a new standard widely used by peripherals now? I just never heard of it before. Is it faster than USB3?
Is it common for drives to have both Thunderbolt and USB2 connections?
Are there "hubs" for Thunderbolt like there are for USB? Considering the limited number of ports, I'm wondering the best way to connect 2 external drives. My iMac has 4 USB2 ports on the back, and I connect one drive separate to each of those ports, rather than going through a hub.
Is USB3 like USB2 in that if you have even 1 USB2 device (e.g. my Logitech headset) connected to a USB3 hub it will slow down everything on that hub to USB2?
Any recommendations for good, portable backup drives?
Thanks,
Doug

Hi Doug,
Lets see if we can address some of these:
If I get a USB3 drive and need to use it to restore things on my older iMac, which just has USB2, will it generally connect and run with USB2 at a slower speed? Or would I have to get a drive with both USB2 and USB3 ports?
USB3 is "backwards compatible" with USB2 so plugging a USB3 drive into a USB2 port should work, but at USB2 speeds.
Is it common for drives to have both Thunderbolt and USB2 connections?
Drives sold as Thunderbolt often (not always) have USB as well, drives sold as USB never (in my experience) have Thunderbolt connections.
Are there "hubs" for Thunderbolt like there are for USB? Considering the limited number of ports, I'm wondering the best way to connect 2 external drives. My iMac has 4 USB2 ports on the back, and I connect one drive separate to each of those ports, rather than going through a hub.
Yes there are (but don't expect them to be comparable in price to a USB hub) e.g. see here: http://www.belkin.com/uk/p/P-F4U055/
Is Thunderbolt just an Apple thing? Or is it a new standard widely used by peripherals now? I just never heard of it before. Is it faster than USB3?
I'ts an Apple technology (like firewire) and is far from widely used on peripherals. There ARE Thunderbolt drives etc by companies such as LaCie, WD etc but they are still very expensive (3 or 4x the price of an equivalent sized USB drive). For some this was a worthwhile expense since Thunderbolt is many times faster than USB2. But the arrival of USB3 has, in my opinion, changed the landscape. Yes, Thunderbolt is theoretically faster than USB3 (up to twice as fast) but benchmark tests have shown that in real world situations, the speed difference varies from no difference to Thunderbolt being 25 or 30% faster. When you take into account that USB3 drives are more common than Thunderbolt and are only a little more expensive than USB2 drives at present, then it's a "no brainer" as far as I am concerned.
Hope this helps.
Jon

I am going to buy a mac mini i7 with 3 thunderbolt displays for forex trading. the question is if i use bootcamp and run windows on the mac mini will the displays still run the same way as if i was running it on Lion?

I am going to buy a mac mini i7 with 3 thunderbolt displays for forex trading. the question is if i use bootcamp and run windows on the mac mini will the displays still run the same way as if i was running it on Lion?

No idea if Windows will do it, but you can run Windows without Bootcamp & have OSX available at the same time, which should give you all the Monitors that OSX uses.
Parallels...
http://www.parallels.com/
VmWare Fusion...
http://www.vmware.com/mac

A question about Thunderbolt Raid 0's as drives for Premiere

Hi all,
I've had a browse through the forum, and found some material relating to this topic, but I'm looking for a definitive as possible answer to this.
I've just left the company I used to work for, and I've begun to set up a small editing suite at home for freelance work. I've always had engineers build me workstations in the past, so I'm a little lost. I, so far, have the follwing hardware:
iMac 27" (late 2012)
32gb RAM
i7 3.4ghz
1 x 1tb internal 7200rpm drive
1 x 4tb Lacie Raid 0 Thunderbolt drive
I'm thinking about going for the classic 3 drive structure: 1.) Internal drive for apps, 2.) 1 x drive for media, and 3.) 1 x drive for previews, cache et al.
My question then, finally, is can I use these Thunderbolt Raid 0 drives as my drives 2.) and 3.)? I ran a speedtest on my current Lacie, and it was pretty impressive. I just don't want to go out and get another one to find that it's not up to the tasks I need it for above.
Thanks in advance for any of your help.
Ken

Yes use Lacie R0 as the media and cache and I suggest you do. Adding TB devices chained will raise the latency. That 1 Raid 0 will be more than fast enough for both.
Eric
ADK

Apple Thunderbolt Adapter Questions

I just bought a new iMac.
I still use FireWire peripherals, including a tape-based HDV camcorder.
I just bought two of Apple's Thunderbolt-to-FireWire Adapters. These adapters serve as "patch cables" to convert Thunderbolt to FireWire 800.
I have a couple of questions about the Thunderbolt interface.
1: If I want to connect other Thunderbolt peripherals (such as a Thunderbolt display, or Thunderbolt hard drives) down the road, both of my Thunderbolt ports on the iMac will be occupied . What choices do I have for Thunderbolt splitters/hubs?
2: Regarding the Thunderbolt-to-FireWire adapter: what other cable/patch/adaptor do I need to connect this adaptor to a DV or HDV camcorder?

1: Buy Thunderbolt devices with two Thunderbolt connections so they can be daisy-chained and leave a free Thunderbolt port for the FireWire adapter. Also the Appl Thunderbolt display includes a FireWire 800 port, so doesn't need a FireWire adapter.
2: DV cameras usually use 4-pin FireWire, so you will need to adapter from 9-pin (FireWire 800), such as:
<http://store.apple.com/ca/product/HA834ZM/A/belkin-firewire-800-99-pin-cable-94- pin-adapter>
or
<http://www.amazon.com/CiTi-FireWire-Cable-IEEE-1394B-Firewire/dp/B002U5F56W>

MacBook Pro 13" and Thunderbolt Display Question

I am considering purchasing a 13" MacBook Pro to use with the Thunderbolt display. I do a fair amount of photoshop work and am concerned that the lack of a dedicated video card and the dual-core as opposed to quad core in the 15" will be a limiting factor. I would be purchasing the i7 with 8GB of ram in the 13". Has anyone used this combination (Thunderbolt and i7 13" Pro) for Photoshop, and how has it performed?
Thanks!

Thank you for your response, I will definitely way that option more heavily. I was hoping to be able to accommodate the 13" form factor. As a student I bring my computer everywhere so the smaller size would have been nice.
I
f I may waste a tad more of your time, is the reason behind the GPU and quad core because of photoshop or the 27" monitor in general? The only reason I ask is that I am only a casual photoshop user so that alone may not sway me, but if powering the thunderbolt display is of a concern for the lesser device then the decision becomes much easier.
Sorry to ask so many questions, I know a decent about computers but I am not too familiar with the thunderbolt adaptor and as such am not sure how that interacts with the GPU and such.
Thanks again!

Not sure if this question should be here or not. It's about Thunderbolt ands DVI displays.

On the Thunderbolt info page on the main Apple site, it states that it is possible to put a Thunderbolt Display in the same daisy chain as an Apple LED. How about 2 DVI displays?
The displays in question would be a Viewsonic VX2433wm (currently running off a MacbookPro) and one of 2 Viewsonic VG2230wm's I have collecting dust. Will they continue collecting dust? 8-/

Let me amend that if I may. To focus the question a bit: I'm about to drop the hammer on the purchase of a new Mac. I'm a pro photographer and my current set-up is the 2007 Core 2 Duo MacBookPro with the VX2433 external monitor mentioned above and all my storage (and Time Machine) is/are (?) on a variety of USB and Firewire drives totaling about 12 Tb. So the system is pretty modular. I don't really use the mobile aspect of the laptop much anymore with an iPad for presentations, so I'd like a little more horsepower than a new MacbookPro but I don't want to break the bank doing it. I guess the one thing I am trying to retain is having 2 screens, because that has allowed me to become spoiled in Photoshop (and shhhh, Lightroom) where I keep most of the palettes on the laptop screen and the work on the calibrated external monitor. So what I was thinking about is a Mac Mini with the faster 2.6Ghz quad i7, the 1Tb Fusion Drive, max'd out to 16Gb of RAM and additionally a Superdrive and wireless track and keys (cuz I wore mine out and am limping on 3rd Party crap). All of that would be $1,666 and probably a pretty kickin' machine for the price I think
But now that I've read a little more, it looks like I would need to get a Thunderbolt Display and run a DVI monitor with the included DVI to HDMI adaptor. OR IS there a way to run two DVI displays on the HDMI. There's a sentence on the Mac Mini info pages that implies there is, but it's kind of ambiguous. So clarification of thes issues could help me pull the purchase trigger ASAP - cuz the shooting biz marches on daily! ;-)

Questions about Thunderbolt Display

Hi there,
I'm thinking about buying a 27" Thunderbolt Display to accompany my 15" Macbook Pro. Basically, the current MBP screen is a little small for some of the tasks I'm currently undertaking. The specs of my Macbook Pro are:
- 2.3GHz i7 Quad Core
- 8GB RAM
- AMD Radeon HD 6750M with 1GB VRAM
- Running the latest version of Lion.
I was wondering if anyone can advise of the kind of performance I can expect from the 27" Thunderbolt display if it is hooked up for the following tasks that I use my computer for:
- General day to day internet use and Microsoft Office For Mac use.
- Editing HD movies in iMovie (and potentially at a later date, Final Cut X).
- Recording music in Logic Studio 9.
- Web coding in Dreamweaver CS5.
- Photo Editing in Photoshop CS5.
- Graphics creation in Fireworks and InDesign CS5.
- Running a game like X Plane 10.
- Running Bootcamp with Windows 7 and games like Flight Simulator X.
- Running a game like Football Manager 2012.
- Watching movies.
Ideally I'd want to be running the above tasks in full screen mode.
How would the MBP cope with upscaling the above tasks to the full resolution of the Thunderbolt screen, with good graphical performance on the video editing and games specifically? Ideally I'm hoping for literally no loss in quality.
Any help with this would be greatly appreciated.
T

I've looked into it more and according to this (http://www.apple.com/macbookpro/specs.html) my graphics card supports an external display to the maximum of 2560 by 1600 pixels which should be enough for the Thunderbolt Display considering it's native resolution is 2560 by 1440 pixels.
My question now is though, will the performance of things like video editing of moderate gaming be good on the TBD at full resolution?

Mac air 2010 model just had screen replaced but its dead, no display nothing. the thunderbolt port works fine, this is how I'm asking my question i.e.; on the mac air, if anyone can help get this new screen

hi
im a newby to this but i really need help fixing my macbook air a1369 2010 model display screen, i have replaced all new but its just dead a black screen with no power getting to it at all even the backlit led is dead so the inverter isnt getting power to it either. everything works perfectly through another monitor hoocked into the thunderbolt port, its just theres no power going into the built in display.
i would really appreciate some pointers as to whether theres any fuses that i could change or any pointers on getting the display to work at all. thank you for taking the time to read this and hope you can help a newby get back up & running.

Confused, if you just had screen replaced was it working when you picked it up? I'd call whoever fixed it and report it ASAP.

Question on Using thunderbolt iMac as external display with a Macbook Air

If I connect my macbook air to new thunderbolt iMac - can I access peripherals attached to usb, firewire, ethernet like the thunderbolt 27"?
if so how can i do this?
thanks!
Derrick

Thunderbolt 10.6 Help: Using another Mac as an external display
Only video and in some scenarios audio is transmitted. Nothing else.
Stefan

Questions re: calibrating a Thunderbolt and calibration problems

Is it considered "Normal" or "Wide" gamut?
Is the backlight "White LED", "RGB LED" or something else?
During calibration it tells me to set the brightness to within 4% of target. I can't. One notch of brightness control on a thunderbolt is a huge difference. The closest I can get is about 10% of the target (on the low side), one more notch of brightness overshoots the target by about 30% (maybe more).
I am trying to calibrate with a spyder4 elite and the included software. Maybe I have just grown accoustomed to looking at a display that's too blue but it looks way to oragne/yellow/red to me (too warm) even though spyder says it's calibrated. The calibration they came up with is only good for sRGB and I don't remember an option to use Adobe RGB but that's where I'm workign most. The graph for Adobe RGB and NTSC looks terrible.
I wish I had screen shoted the graphs but unfortunately I didn't. The point is only the sRGB looked like a good match.
Thanks.

I just got off the phone after an hour with Apple Support. The bottom line is that somehow iCloud has decided to use my .mac address as my Apple ID. Yes, I can change it, but if I do, I lose everything - contacts, mail, bookmarks, calendar - everything. For iTunes and this Community help forum, I will have to continue to use the insightbb Apple ID. They could not figure out how this happened, as for MobileMe, I ALWAYS used the insightbb Apple ID. Gremlins in moving from MobileMe to iCloud.
He did say that Apple is working very hard to figure out how to merge multiple Apple ID's as this is becoming more and more of a problem. So, until they sort it all out, at least I know what to do.

Macbook Pro and Thunderbolt display day to day work question

I have a late 2013 15 inch Retina Macbook Pro and recently bought a Thunderbolt display.
When I'm in my office I use it on the display don't have the display anytime I'm not in the office.
Given the larger pixel dimension on the display, when I'm in the office and use the display, I'm having to re-size windows constantly to make maximum use of the real estate.
Are there any settings on the Macbook Pro and/or the Thunderbolt Display where without having to adjust I can have windows maximize the available real estate? Thanks.

I kind of figured this out. The reason I wasn't satisfied was that without the power adaptor when you hit a button on the keyboard the monitor actually wakes up the computer, works fine for a few seconds and then puts the computer to sleep. That kind of proves that it does work, technically at least. The problem is going into sleep mode afterwards.
Anyway i guess it just doesnt work. Thanks.
ps. If there is a way of discharging the battery with software while the power adaptor was still on, would be great help.

My question is, if I CAN connect a Computer with Windows to the display thunderbolt.

You see it in the headline.

If your windows PC has a Thunderbolt port but most do not.

Thunderbolt Question

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