Thundebolt vs Type C USB

maklabouhlel · 22 Jan 2021 at 10:50

What's the difference between a thunderbolt display and a normal display with type C connectivity?

fez · 22 Jan 2021 at 13:11

USB-C is simply a port in the same way that USB-A (the one that you can never put in the right way around) is. Thunderbolt is a data and power transmission technology from intel. Its all a little confusing at this stage as you have various types of USB and different generations of thunderbolt.

To oversimplify, most monitors have some sort of hub built into them to allow you to connect hard drives, keyboards or whatever else you might want. These days most monitors will have USB-C ports as part of that. That would be "with USB-C connectivity".

If a monitor says its a thunderbolt display that will usually mean that you can connect it to a computer via thunderbolt (which will be a USB-C type cable) for the actual picture and usually some sort of power delivery if connecting a laptop.

maklabouhlel · 22 Jan 2021 at 13:15

fez said:
USB-C is simply a port in the same way that USB-A (the one that you can never put in the right way around) is. Thunderbolt is a data and power transmission technology from intel. Its all a little confusing at this stage as you have various types of USB and different generations of thunderbolt.

To oversimplify, most monitors have some sort of hub built into them to allow you to connect hard drives, keyboards or whatever else you might want. These days most monitors will have USB-C ports as part of that. That would be "with USB-C connectivity".

If a monitor says its a thunderbolt display that will usually mean that you can connect it to a computer via thunderbolt (which will be a USB-C type cable) for the actual picture and usually some sort of power delivery if connecting a laptop.

I have a monitor with type C that is not thunderbolt and my thunderbolt PC outputs to that display via type C.

fez · 22 Jan 2021 at 15:01

maklabouhlel said:
I have a monitor with type C that is not thunderbolt and my thunderbolt PC outputs to that display via type C.

I have the same with my mac. I have an LG ultrafine which connects over usb-c non-thunderbolt but it connects to the thunderbolt port on my PC. Its much the same as most digital connectors which don't have to have the same connection at both ends or do not have to have the same speed capabilities both ends. Non thunderbolt has limitations on the data throughput however so I cannot do the usual thunderbolt 3 daisychaining of the 2 4k monitors because they cannot transfer that amount of information via the USB-C 3.1 connection.

I don't believe that most monitors with usb-c ports on them are using them for display simply because most computers that connect to them won't be able to output video via a usb-c port. There are very few GFX cards that do this.

Like I said, its all a bit convoluted.

maklabouhlel · 22 Jan 2021 at 15:10

fez said:
I have the same with my mac. I have an LG ultrafine which connects over usb-c non-thunderbolt but it connects to the thunderbolt port on my PC. Its much the same as most digital connectors which don't have to have the same connection at both ends or do not have to have the same speed capabilities both ends. Non thunderbolt has limitations on the data throughput however so I cannot do the usual thunderbolt 3 daisychaining of the 2 4k monitors because they cannot transfer that amount of information via the USB-C 3.1 connection.

I don't believe that most monitors with usb-c ports on them are using them for display simply because most computers that connect to them won't be able to output video via a usb-c port. There are very few GFX cards that do this.

Like I said, its all a bit convoluted.

My PC has a thunderbolt port and my display has type C and this is how connect them. I'm due to upgrade my monitor soon and was wondering what is so special about a thunderbolt display when my relatively cheap display can do the same. Looks like daisy chaining and probably higher resolutions are the only benefits which might be beneficial for some people.

fez · 22 Jan 2021 at 16:44

maklabouhlel said:
My PC has a thunderbolt port and my display has type C and this is how connect them. I'm due to upgrade my monitor soon and was wondering what is so special about a thunderbolt display when my relatively cheap display can do the same. Looks like daisy chaining and probably higher resolutions are the only benefits which might be beneficial for some people.

For laptops the idea is that you literally come home with your laptop, plug in a single thunderbolt 3 cable and all your monitors are connected, your laptop is being powered and all your peripherals are also connected and powered. For most desktops thats not really a concern because you wouldn't have a desktop if you needed to move it on a regular basis. Display connections over usb-c have only been a thing for 4 or so years since Apple released the MBP with only thunderbolt 3 ports. Before that everything just used HDMI/mini-DP/DisplayPort etc which is what most things still use today.

What PC do you have? Are you using the term PC to mean a desktop or just in the generic sense?

maklabouhlel · 22 Jan 2021 at 16:47

fez said:
What PC do you have? Are you using the term PC to mean a desktop or just in the generic sense?

It's the motherboard in my signature.

james.miller · 22 Jan 2021 at 17:04

main differences right now that i can remember: usb 3.2 gen2: max 20gb, hdmi support, single display. Thunderbolt 4: max 40Gb, displayport support, multiple displays.

chaparral · 22 Jan 2021 at 18:51

To me it feels like a really stupid design as if am correct a USB-C and thunderbolt both use the exactly the same style socket (I.E a USB-C socket)

I have no idea why but i always thought thunderbolt was an apple mac connection

fez · 22 Jan 2021 at 19:31

chaparral said:
To me it feels like a really stupid design as if am correct a USB-C and thunderbolt both use the exactly the same style socket (I.E a USB-C socket)

I have no idea why but i always thought thunderbolt was an apple mac connection

It’s a good thing. Most people don’t realise that USB-A has very different speeds depending on the generation. It means that we don’t get a new connection type every time we get a data rate boost.

maklabouhlel · 22 Jan 2021 at 20:08

chaparral said:
I have no idea why but i always thought thunderbolt was an apple mac connection

"Thunderbolt is the brand name of a hardware interface developed by Intel in collaboration with Apple" (Wikipedia).