TAW: With a transfer rate of ten gigabits per second (fast enough to exchange a full length HD movie in under 30 seconds), Intel's new Thunderbolt connection port seemingly has the potential to send USB and FireWire the way of the floppy disk. Apple certainly hopes so--the company is equipping its new line of MacBook laptops and the second generation iPad with the technology, formerly codenamed Light Peak.
The Thunderbolt 4 connection offers some fantastic improvements when compared to the previous generation of Thunderbolt 3.
Thunderbolt is becoming USB4?
For the last few years, Intel and Apple have worked to create an ecosystem around Intel’s Thunderbolt interface, formerly known as Light Peak. The first generation Thunderbolt interface offered four independent lanes at 10Gbps down a single cable, while Thunderbolt 2 allowed those lanes to be combined into two 20Gbps channels.
