MacRumors is reporting that last week, Intel demoed there new ‘Light Peak’ interconnect technology. Intel hopes Light Peak will be adopted as a high performance optical connector.
Intel just showed off a glimpse of the future: Light Peak, an optical interconnect for mobile devices that can run as fast as 10Gbps. That’s fast enough to do everything from storage to displays to networking, and it can maintain those speeds over 100-meter runs, which is pretty astounding. Intel says the idea is to drastically reduce the number of connectors on mobile devices, which should allow them to get even smaller
This technology could replace such connectors as Firewire, USB, and display connectors. Engadget has recently found that Apple originally conceptualized this idea and brought it to Intel.
Apple had reached out to Intel as early as 2007 with plans for an interoperable standard which could handle massive amounts of data and “replace the multitudinous connector types with a single connector (FireWire, USB, Display interface).”
Rumor has it, that Apple will begin integrating this new technology into their desktops in the Fall of 2010, and with a low-power variant due in 2011 for portables. These means that some time in the future all peripherals could have this single connector, and thus reduce the different ports on your computers.
Ok, opinion time. I can see Apple just beginning to roll out this connector in 2010, but don’t expect it to catch on that fast. Apple has recently introduced their minidisplay connector on all of their computers, and USB 3.0 devices are expected any time now.
My guess, is that this will be a slow migration, which is kinda a given.
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TAGS: Intel
