The Apple Thunderbolt Display Review
by Anand Lal Shimpi on September 23, 2011 2:56 AM EST- Posted in
- Displays
- Mac
- Apple
- Thunderbolt
- Thunderbolt Display
Testing the Pieces
Before we get to the display and Thunderbolt specific testing I wanted to confirm that the individual controllers in the Thunderbolt Display were just as capable as those in the Mac it was connected to. For the most part, they are.
Following in Brian Klug's footsteps, I created two RAM disks - one on a MacBook Air and one on a MacBook Pro. I connected both systems to my local GigE network and copied giant files between them. I measured over 780Mbps going from the MacBook Air to the MacBook Pro, and 832Mbps in the other direction (images below). That's about as good as it's going to get.
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Next I tested performance over FireWire 800 and USB 2.0. For FireWire 800 I used a Western Digital My Book Studio Edition II configured in RAID-1 and measured peak read speed from the device. For USB testing I turned to a Corsair Flash Voyager 3.0 (USB stick) and a SF-2281 SSD connected to a SATA-to-USB bridge. In both of the USB tests I measured write speed to the USB 2.0 devices. Apple appears to have chosen its FireWire controller well as performance was only off by 2MB/s compared to the FW800 port on the 15-inch MacBook Pro. USB 2.0 performance wasn't nearly as good however, I maxed out at 16.4MB/s and saw typical rates closer to 15MB/s:
| Transfer Rate Comparison | |||||
| FireWire 800 | USB 2.0 (stick) | USB 2.0 (SSD) | |||
| Apple Thunderbolt Display | 70.0 MB/s | 14.1 MB/s | 16.4 MB/s | ||
| Apple 15-inch MacBook Pro (2011) | 72.0 MB/s | 21.2 MB/s | 32.2 MB/s | ||
Both the audio controller and FaceTime HD cameras interface via the Thunderbolt Display's internal USB controller. It's likely that one of those devices is forcing the controller to negotiate at a lower speed and thus ultimately limit peak USB 2.0 performance through the display. Note the gap in performance is much smaller if you're looking at transfers to a USB stick vs. an SSD. I happen to have a lot of SSDs around so I tend to use them as glorified USB sticks, I suspect the majority of users won't notice much of a difference due to the lower overall performance of standard USB sticks.
FaceTime HD Camera
Although Photo Booth in Lion captures at 1080 x 720, using iSightcapture I was able to confirm that the sensor in the Thunderbolt Display appears to be able to capture 1280 x 720 natively. Quality is what we'd come to expect from the current generation of FaceTime HD cameras.
I tested the camera both in Photo Booth and in a FaceTime chat with our own Brian Klug. The experience worked fine in both cases.
FaceTime seems to have issues when one party is in a noisy environment but that doesn't appear to have anything to do with the Thunderbolt Display hardware as I duplicated the issue on a MacBook Air as well. If you're curious, the problem I'm talking about occurs when the party in a quiet environment is trying to talk to the person with a lot of background noise. The quiet party will hear audio just fine but the noisy party will get a lot of broken up audio from the other side. It seems like FaceTime is trying to do some active noise cancelation that ends up doing more harm than good. I confirmed it's a FaceTime software problem by calling Brian via Skype without any issues.
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GotThumbs - Friday, September 23, 2011 - link
It's a hardware review and the specs are in the article. This is not intended to be an MTV production to keep ADD kids entertained. Either you find the content interesting or now. If not, change the channel.Iketh - Friday, September 23, 2011 - link
OSDs would have only distracted me... i was listening to him like we were having a 1 on 1... overlays would have fucked that upxodius80 - Friday, September 23, 2011 - link
i must say is not only entertaining to see the video but its so much easier to understand, notes on what ive seen u might need:Fisrt a green screen so u can put your logo anywhere so you dont compromise your publicity on depending hardware reviews, your persona blocked your logo, and thats not good for bussiness, all the time it was reading nandtech, def not good =), a little more post production if u got the time, even tho it was perfect , heres an idea, like the time u where explaining the motherboard inside the monitor, it should have disolved to the picture into a main whole frame, while your voice in off, then disolve back to you. things like that make videos more intresting.
sorry for my english, just helping you out since ive studied video here in my country, nice job man! ohh yeah and cool mic haha.
fynamo - Friday, September 23, 2011 - link
Just for everyone's reference, these displays do work with Windows. I've been using one for a while and love it. The only issue I had was when trying to adjust the brightness. You have to do some weird tweaks with AppleControlPanel.exe but I was eventually able to make it work.KLC - Friday, September 23, 2011 - link
Interesting hardware information, but why doesn't anyone talk about the stupid name? What's a thunderbolt? I know lightning bolts and I know thunder claps. Who made up this name Google Translator?jecs - Friday, September 23, 2011 - link
The technology is from Intel and I am not sure if the name itself is Intel or an Apple idea based on the Intel name. This is the first implementation and has a lot more potential but depends on how it will be adopted by the industry.Dug - Friday, September 23, 2011 - link
I really enjoyed it too. This gives a far more personal touch to the review and the visuals give a clear example of what you are talking about.I've always liked seeing things in action because stagnant pictures don't tell the whole story.
SickBeast - Friday, September 23, 2011 - link
How much does the thing cost?This website needs to stop functioning as marketing PR and should get back to its roots as a hardware review website. The price of this display should be boldly listed both in the introduction and the conclusion of the article.
The review of Windows Vista on this website really opened my eyes to the fact that AnandTech has gone in a completely new direction. It's too bad.
Anand, please revert to your role as a journalist and stop acting as a puppet for these large corporations.
jecs - Friday, September 23, 2011 - link
$1000 formally $999But tell me what product, a decent one deserving a good review, does not comes with a brand name and marketing?
Your whole observation is very emotional.
Anand, please keep with the good work! not because I ask for it.
mharding - Friday, September 23, 2011 - link
The Thunderbolt Display's motherboard is full of controllers driving all of the rear facing IO ports. On the front we actually see the very first non-SFF Eagle Ridge IC. Although the MacBook Air uses Eagle Ridge, it uses the SFF version in a cheaper package. I'm sure what determines whether or not Apple uses the flip-chip packaged version.Thanks for the review - I much prefer reading quickly than watching a video slowly.