Why isn't there a Fiber-Optic equivalent to USB?
Why isn't there a Fiber-Optic equivalent to USB?
Jaxon Diaz
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Cameron Smith
There really isn't any need for it. The types of data transfer you do on usb is light weight enough that having a super high speed fiber optic cable wouldn't do much good.
Juan Scott
1.Fiber is brittle
2. Still a lot of bandwidth available over copper with improved modulation (though not as much now)
3. Optical PHYs are more expensive (need laser/diode and photoreceptor)
4. Optical PHYs are hard to miniaturize (though this is improving w/chiplet solutions)
5. Most USB devices (certainly HID and even moderately fast storage devices) wouldn't need the extra BW
Oliver Perez
Toslink u nigger
Zachary Butler
This plus no power delivery, that's like 70 percent of USB's job nowadays.
Christian Robinson
toslink is effectively an analog signal
There are fiber-optic USB cables, but they function with a USB-Fiber bus at both ends, and are absurdly expensive per foot until you reach the several hundred meter length. Look up corning optical thunderbolt, it's a consumer fiber data cable.
Jayden Robinson
youtube.com
You're welcome.
Justin Brown
There is though? Thunderbolt has optical versions.
Pretty sure HDMI and USB 3.1 do too.
The difference being, the emitter and receiver are in the connector, making hosts cheaper and still being able to use copper, while any upgrades to the optics itself can be done in the cable, but only miniscule raising the cables on price since the components are cheap, specially if you go by cost/length.
Hudson Hall
First post worst post
What is Thunderbolt 3
Kevin Collins
Mostly this.
My work server is plugged in to my main switch with 10gb direct attach copper sfp+. No need for the more expensive fiber version unless your cable run is more than 5 metres
Henry Miller
Optical only becomes efficient once you are going to lengths that the average consumer would consider extreme. By "extreme," I mean greater than 40 meters. If you need to go beyond that, glass fiber optic can allow this.
However, this comes with some significant trade-offs. Firstly, the cable will be extremely brittle. A single kink will destroy it. Secondly, you're going to have to be extremely careful with the ends, as if you scratch the glass at the ends, you can expect significant performance reduction, if not outright killing it. This also goes for the ports that you would be plugging them into.
tldr: because the benefits wouldn't affect most individuals, and the tradeoffs would.
Benjamin Ramirez
Why would there be? Toslink's only use these days is as a legacy standard for compatibility, there's no need for the complexity nor expense of fibre optic for consumer use when standard electrical connections work perfectly fine.
Connor Nelson
There is.
Thunderbolt 1 and 2 are available in optical, and TB3 supports it, but no such cables exist
Additionally, theres shit like Fibre Channel and SFP
Isaac Reyes
>What is thunderbolt
Another fucking Port nobody gives a fuck about which only adda to the ever growing and pointless horde of ports either forgotten or not cared about in the first place.
Or if you prefer it's not USB so who gives a single shit?
Asher Fisher
>a brittle expensive form factor
yeah, because no one has problems maintaining the average usb cable
Carter Williams
>toslink is effectively an analo
Why are you here?
Owen Watson
>pointless horde of ports
Thank you for the correct usage of "horde".
Over 90% of /b/ would have written "hoard".
Tyler Gutierrez
Not him, but I get what he's saying. The data limit is horrendously low, and it's very easy to fuck even that low speed up. Furthermore, even if everything is pristine, all it takes is one of the Toslink ports to be slightly off to screw with your signal. Despite being digital, Toslink can be as finnicky as an analog cable.
Charles Clark
Tyere is a proprietary cable. LTT did a video about it a couple years back.
Andrew Barnes
Power
Parker Ward
because you cant provide power by optical cable
Austin Russell
Go stare at a 10w laser then idiot
Adam Mitchell
>needs 10w laser
>for 500mA of power
retard
John Morales
>just make it 20v instead of 5v
Nicholas Brooks
To spite photons
Carson Walker
That's actually what Thunderbolt was going to be, but then power delivery was brought up and everyone realised that optical was not needed and now Thunderbolt is essentially USB.
Nathaniel Gray
Isn't USB 4 going to include Thunderbolt 3?
Angel Clark
It exists, OP must be a phone poster that has never used any real hardware.
Fucking Lightpeak, aka optical-cable Thunderbolt.
Also available: fiber Ethernet, fiber SCSI, fiber Infiniband and fiber PCIe.
Parker James
tb3 is a superset of usbc 3 gen2. i wish my pc had it, because 2 gen2 ports alone isnt enough for me
Blake Thomas
More expensive hardware to use it, no real benefit.