Intel Cactus Ridge to power Thunderbolt on 2012 Macs, PCs

09/14, 9:40pm

Intel Cactus Ridge for Thunderbolt outlined at IDF

Intel in one of the side notes from its Developer Forum presentations has outlined the Thunderbolt controllers that will drive computers based on Ivy Bridge processors. Cactus Ridge will mostly be a refresh of the Light Ridge and Eagle Ridge chips used in current Macs. As such, the high-end Cactus Ridge chip will have four channels that each have a symmetric 10Gbps and two DisplayPort links, while the budget version will have just two of those channels and one DisplayPort link.

New MacBook Air uses tinier, cheaper Thunderbolt chip

07/28, 9:45pm

MacBook Air 2011 uses mini Eagle Ridge chip

An investigation into the new MacBook Air's internals has revealed that Apple is using a new, relatively untested Thunderbolt chip. Nicknamed Eagle Ridge, it has two 10Gbps bidirectional lanes (40Gbps) where the Light Ridge chip in the iMac, MacBook Pro, and Mac mini has a full four. The part tracked down by AnandTech can only drive one display over Thunderbolt but is also much smaller and most likely cheaper, a key to fitting it into even the 11-inch, $999 Air.