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USB Type-C brings a lot of protocols into one physical connector, but is there room for one protocol to handle all our IO needs? Mike Hoffman and Daniel Bogdanoff sit down with high speed digital communications expert Jit Lim to find out.
0:00 This is Jit’s 3rd podcast of the series
1:00 We already have one connector to rule them all with USB Type-C, but it’s just a connector. Will we ever have one specification to rule them all?
2:00 Prior to USB Type-C, each protocol required it’s own connector. With USB TYpe-C, you can run multiple protocols over the same physical connector
3:00 This would make everything more simple for engineers, they would only need to test and characterize one technology.
3:30 Jit proposes a “Type-C I/O”
4:00 Thunderbolt already allows displayport to tunnel through it
4:30 Thunderbolt already has a combination of capabilities. It has a display mode – you can buy a Thunderbolt display. This means you can run data and display using the same technology
6:30 There’s a notion of a muxed signals
7:00 The PHY speed is the most important. Thunderbolt is running 20 Gb/s
7:15 What would the physical connection look like? Will the existing USB Type-C interface work? Currently we already see 80 Gb/s ports (4 lanes) in existing consumer PCs
9:20 Daniel hates charging his phone without fast charging
9:40 The USB protocol is for data transfer, but is there going to be a future USB dispaly protocol? There are already some audio and video modes in current USB, like a PC headset
11:30 Why are we changing? The vision is to plug it in and have it “just work”
12:00 Today, standards groups are quite separate. They each have their own ecosystems that they are comfortable in. So, this is a big challenge for getting to a single spec
13:15 Performance capabilities, like cable loss, is also a concern and challenge
14:00 For a tech like this were to exist, will the groups have to merge? Or, will someone just come out with a spec that obsoletes all of the others?
15:30 Everyone has a cable hoard. Daniel’s is a drawer, Mike’s is a shoebox
16:30 You still have to be aware of the USB Type-C cables that you buy. There’s room for improvement
17:30 Mike wants a world of only USB Type-C connectors and 3.5mm headphone jacks
18:30 From a test and measurement perspective, it’s very attractive to have a single protocol. You’d only have to test at one rate, one time
19:30 Stupid questions
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Any chance you guys are on Spotify? My buddy would love to follow you, but couldn’t find you on Spotify (downloads and all that jazz make it easier)
No, but I’ll look into it again. Last time I checked we had to natively upload to Spotify and couldn’t just use the standard RSS feed.