Intel plans to roll out Light Peak, a high-speed connection technology that Apple is also likely to adopt, says “CNET” (http://macte.ch/iP2Uy), quoting an unnamed “industry source familiar with the details of the event.”
Intel released a statement to the media today saying that on Thursday in San Francisco it will “host a…press briefing to discuss a new technology that is about to appear on the market.” “Maybe not coincidentally, Apple is expected to roll out new MacBook Pros — and possibly other products — on Thursday, notes “CNET.”
Intel has said in the past that the first products using Light Peak should appear in the first half of 2011. When Intel initially demonstrated Light Peak at its developer conference in 2009 it used a machine running Apple’s Mac OS X.
Light Peak paves the way for a new generation of extreme computer input and output (I/O) performance, delivering 10Gb/s of bandwidth, with the potential ability to scale to 100Gbs over the next decade, according to David Perlmutter, executive vice president and general manager, Intel Architecture Group. At 10Gb/second, a user could purportedly transfer a full-length Blu-Ray movie in less than 30 seconds.
The optical technology allows for smaller connectors and longer, thinner, and more flexible cables than currently possible. Light Peak also has the ability to run multiple protocols simultaneously over a single cable, enabling the technology to connect devices such as peripherals, displays, disk drives, docking stations, and more.
— Dennis Sellers