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Intel's fastest connector to date uses light to transfer data at 1.6Tbps

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Re: Intel's fastest connector to date uses light to transfer data at 1.6Tbps

#2
I presume that over the next decade(s), Cu may be phased out and replaced by Fibre on a large scale for information transfer purposes.

I do wonder about the effects on our environment though, namely wether making copper (metal) or Fibre cables (plastics) produces more waste, uses more or less energy and which one's easier to recycle, and to what degree.

Re: Intel's fastest connector to date uses light to transfer data at 1.6Tbps

#3
post #2

I presume that over the next decade(s), Cu may be phased out and replaced by Fibre on a large scale for information transfer purposes. I do wonder about the effects on our environment though, namely wether making copper (metal) or Fibre cables (plastics) produces more waste, uses more or less energy and which one's easier to recycle, and to what degree.

Most of the high speed connection (10GigE+) for the last 3+ years have already been fiber, and anything longer than 100m is always fiber - it's pretty rare to see copper used for anything faster than 1 Gig connections.

Re: Intel's fastest connector to date uses light to transfer data at 1.6Tbps

#4
post #2

I presume that over the next decade(s), Cu may be phased out and replaced by Fibre on a large scale for information transfer purposes. I do wonder about the effects on our environment though, namely wether making copper (metal) or Fibre cables (plastics) produces more waste, uses more or less energy and which one's easier to recycle, and to what degree.

Naïvely, glass is made from sand and copper is mined. And I can already recycle glass from my house, but not copper. So it looks like an environmental win to me. There may be something I'm missing.

Re: Intel's fastest connector to date uses light to transfer data at 1.6Tbps

#5
Why does Intel even discuss these things? Can I buy this? Can I go out and buy products that use this standard? Can I buy PCs that use AMD CPUs that use this? What about ARMs? What about Infiniband-like networks?

It makes me angry that a large corporation set out on a Tuesday morning with the sole purpose to waste people's time like this. If it is not going to be on store shelves within the next few months and if it doesn't have broad industry support: NO ONE CARES.

This is why Thunderbolt has been a failure: they talked about it for over two years and the final version is Intel-only, effectively Mac only (very few non-Apple PCs have it, and it seems most of them were bought just to be Hackintoshes), and not nearly as awesome as what they originally described; and AMD, Texas Instruments, VIA, and several other VESA members added a USB3-over-DisplayPort feature called DockPort because Intel refuses to license and standardize Thunderbolt.

You can downvote me if you want, but I imagine at least half of us have been thinking this and someone had to just come out and say it: advertise your product when I can buy it, otherwise it just looks like you're trying to pimp your stock to investors.

Re: Intel's fastest connector to date uses light to transfer data at 1.6Tbps

#6
post #4
post #2

I presume that over the next decade(s), Cu may be phased out and replaced by Fibre on a large scale for information transfer purposes. I do wonder about the effects on our environment though, namely wether making copper (metal) or Fibre cables (plastics) produces more waste, uses more or less energy and which one's easier to recycle, and to what degree.

Naïvely, glass is made from sand and copper is mined. And I can already recycle glass from my house, but not copper. So it looks like an environmental win to me. There may be something I'm missing.

Copper is pretty trivially recyclable, which is why you get reports of drug addicts stealing copper piping from people's houses to sell on the black market.

Re: Intel's fastest connector to date uses light to transfer data at 1.6Tbps

#7
post #4
post #2

I presume that over the next decade(s), Cu may be phased out and replaced by Fibre on a large scale for information transfer purposes. I do wonder about the effects on our environment though, namely wether making copper (metal) or Fibre cables (plastics) produces more waste, uses more or less energy and which one's easier to recycle, and to what degree.

Naïvely, glass is made from sand and copper is mined. And I can already recycle glass from my house, but not copper. So it looks like an environmental win to me. There may be something I'm missing.

Don't get hung up on the "green" characteristics of just the active component. You have to look at the whole picture, including packaging and manufacturing. It's not like the choice is between melting a little sand or an old bottle and digging a big hole in the ground to extract copper.

- There's a lot of plastic involved, for either medium

- optical stuff is pretty exacting to manufacture. It's easily possible that it's more energy-intensive to refine the materials, make the lasers, draw the fibers and so on than it is to make the copper equivalent

Re: Intel's fastest connector to date uses light to transfer data at 1.6Tbps

#8
post #4
post #2

I presume that over the next decade(s), Cu may be phased out and replaced by Fibre on a large scale for information transfer purposes. I do wonder about the effects on our environment though, namely wether making copper (metal) or Fibre cables (plastics) produces more waste, uses more or less energy and which one's easier to recycle, and to what degree.

Naïvely, glass is made from sand and copper is mined. And I can already recycle glass from my house, but not copper. So it looks like an environmental win to me. There may be something I'm missing.

I think the real account is in the phenomenal energy costs to convert the mines material to a final form. The glass is going to be mined as well, as even the cheap soda lime glass we see everywhere has many ingredients, and I would be surprised if the typical fiber was made of such cheap material (went and checked, and the optical fibers are likely to be doped and tuned to the application). A furnace consumes huge amounts of energy, for both refineries and glass plants (I worked at a glass plant, and the size of the natural gas line running to it 24/7 full open was shocking). Recycling helps (since the material stores some of the original energy), but there still needs to be a process to remove impurities.

As a sibling comment noted, green energy probably isn't what we would hope it to be.

Re: Intel's fastest connector to date uses light to transfer data at 1.6Tbps

#9
post #5

Why does Intel even discuss these things? Can I buy this? Can I go out and buy products that use this standard? Can I buy PCs that use AMD CPUs that use this? What about ARMs? What about Infiniband-like networks? It makes me angry that a large corporation set out on a Tuesday morning with the sole purpose to waste people's time like this. If it is not going to be on store shelves within the next few months and if it…

If ^this^ is not FUD, I don't know what FUD is. Textbook example.

Seriously, all this post is about is: let's add a layer of confusion and fear on a technological advance. "waste people's time" - haha, nobody forced you to spent time on this. "not being on AMD CPUs, only on Intel Macbooks " - This is a press release about something working in the lab, let's not have anybody announce anything they got in the lab because I can't buy it.

Driving confusion much, are we now ?

Re: Intel's fastest connector to date uses light to transfer data at 1.6Tbps

#10
post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Naïvely, glass is made from sand and copper is mined. And I can already recycle glass from my house, but not copper. So it looks like an environmental win to me. There may be something I'm missing.

Copper is pretty trivially recyclable, which is why you get reports of drug addicts stealing copper piping from people's houses to sell on the black market.

Pipes, wires, metal decorations, air conditioning condensers, old electronics...
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