Apple's new 12 ″ Macbook, the ultrabook that dethroned the MacBook Air as the company's thinnest laptop, brought with it a radical design change which will set the standard that many others will follow by being the first to incorporate the already so famous USB Type-C port, however unfortunately and from what we have been able to know, this port that integrates the equipment will not support the speeds established by the standard of Thunderbolt 3.
Intel announced at Computex that the Thunderbolt 3 connection will be able to transfer data between computers and external peripherals at speeds of 40 GbpsIn other words, it will be the fastest technology among all those that integrate the other connections today. Being even twice as fast as its predecessor, Thunderbolt 2, which is found in many current Apple computers.
The biggest changes that we will see in Thunderbolt 3 is the support for the USB protocol and a distancing of proprietary connectors assuming this time the same USB Type-C connector. To differentiate Thunderbolt from USB Type-C connectors to use we will have to check if they include the logo of the lightning so characteristic since otherwise this would indicate that they would not be compatible and would only operate within the protocol and transfer speed of USB 3.0, so it would stay at a modest 5Gbps, which is what would happen in the current 12 ″ MacBook.
Thunderbolt 3 is designed to run with the new Intel Skylake chips, which will be delivered in the second half of the year at the earliest and 30 laptops and other desktops are expected to already support the connector technology for shipment by the end of the year. Thus, Mac users who want to change or purchase a new computer, will have to wait for these Mac-based Skylake to appear.
Users will be able to upload their laptops with Thunderbolt 3, able to deliver up to 100 watts of power. Even Thunderbolt 3 will allow the connection of two monitors in 4K resolution on the same computer simultaneously with a single cable, being in turn capable of transferring a 4k movie from an external storage device to a PC in 30 seconds.