Intel Connects PCs To Devices Using Light

CWmike writes "Intel is working on a new optical interconnect that could possibly link mobile devices to displays and storage up to 100 meters away. The optical interconnect technology, Light Peak, could communicate data between systems and devices associated with PCs at speeds of up to 10Gbits/sec., said David Perlmutter, vice president and general manager of Intel's mobility group. The technology uses light to speed up data transmission between mobile devices and connected devices like storage, networking and audio devices, the company said. The technology could help transfer a full-length Blu-ray movie in less than 30 seconds, says a post on Intel's site. Light Peak can run multiple protocols simultaneously over a single cable, enabling mobile devices to perform tasks over multiple connected devices at the same time. 'Optical technology also allows for smaller connectors and longer, thinner, and more flexible cables than currently possible,' according to the Intel entry. It could also lead to thinner and fewer connectors on mobile devices, Perlmutter said."

Trying to work out why this is news...

[TheRaven64]

Sending data via light? Not really news; fibre-optics are used for most bulk data transfer. Using fibre for peripheral connections? Not really; there have been standard fibre connections for audio, FireWire, and SCSI for quite a few years. Intel doing the same thing everyone else is doing buy shouting loudly about it? No, that's been going on for years too.

Can anyone enlighten me as to which part of this story is meant to be news?

Re:optical structured cabling?

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

Cat-5 is certainly the best option today; but I'm guessing that grandparent is hoping for something that wouldn't raise the costs of endpoint devices significantly.

You can run pretty much anything you want over ethernet, as long as you can get it in under 1Gb/s; but only if you are willing to put a full general purpose computer(or a dedicated embedded device, if the market has seen fit to provide one for your application) at each end. This is less than wholly useful when it comes to older devices, or cheaper devices that are still only shipping with some sort of non-ethernet connections.

If, say, you want to connect a projector and a DVD player, that is normally cheap and easy. A few analog video cables, supported by even the most awful players and projectors, or DVI/HDMI in the expensive seats. If you wanted to do that over ethernet, you'd need a comparatively high end projector, and a DVD player that supports ethernet connected projectors. I'm not sure any of the latter exist, so you'd have to use a full computer for the purpose. Doable; but hardly optimal.

I'm not sure exactly how grandparent's desire would actually be made to work in a real world setting; but ethernet isn't quite it. It would arguably be a suitable basis for what he wants; but it wouldn't be the whole picture.

Re:Who would use this?

[Threni]

You could call it "S/PDIF"...

Re:Who would use this?

[Lumpy]

Yes I do, and Yes I do.

I have a bundle of at least 16 100Gb/s cables that run over 2Km. the only thing not letting my fiber optic cable run 160Gb/sec is the transceivers at each end are too low of quality to do so. so we live with 2 paltry 100Bt fibers a couple are used for video, and the rest are dark for future use.

This cable was laid 5 years ago way before Intel decided to discover fiber optics.

Re:Cheap Fiber?

[Ephemeriis]

Is this just cheap components for Fiber? 100 meters is pretty far, I am guessing that this could have networking uses beyond ripping media to external drives.

100m is a good distance... More than I'd probably need for connecting a mobile device to anything else in my house... But it isn't amazing. Doesn't good ol' ethernet cap out around 100m?

What?!

[konohitowa]

OMG! You can use light to transmit data over a cable? That's freaking crazy!! Wow.

What's next? Some way to switch circuits without using tubes or relays? Yeah -- like that would ever happen.

Transceiver likely molded into cable

[marciot]

dust and stuff getting on the connectors, and whatnot .. and still work despite accumulations of pocket lint

Although this isn't mentioned specifically in the video, it appears as if the transceiver is meant to be permanently attached to the fiber. This would be the easiest solution to the lint issue, plus it would eliminate the complexity of making good optical connections. Essentially, I think they intend to have the transceivers molded into both ends of the fiber and it would probably look just like an USB cable to the average user, only with fiber running end-to-end, rather than copper. Of course, I'm not sure USB can reach 10 Gbs, so it probably would have a different type of electrical connection to the host PC.

I think the key innovation here is that they can have a short, high-speed electrical connection between the PC and the transceiver, and a large arbitrarily long fiber link between the transceivers themselves.

Re:optical structured cabling?

[xZgf6xHx2uhoAj9D]

Why is it not the same thing? Scenario 1: redefine everything (e.g., phone, audio) to work over some "universal bus". Scenario 2: redefine everything (e.g., phone, audio) to work over Ethernet. They sound like the same thing to me.

obligatory

[Anonymusing]

Do not stare into cable with remaining eye.

Re:Who would use this?

[thijsh]

Hahaha... you're right. They must have used a float to calculate this... damn those Intel rounding errors!
Intel, try googling before you run: http://lmgtfy.com/?q=10+terabytes+%2F+10000000000+bps [lmgtfy.com]