Thunderbolt 4 KVM

Fan of the work you do with KVMs. I was wondering if you have plans on making a Thunderbolt 4 KVM. I found one from a company called SSI called SI-452TB4.

I reached out to them, but they are looking for a branding company to do an OEM on this. I am not even sure if it would be any good. Was curious if you had plans to make anything similar.

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CC @wendell

Already way ahead in this one.

Will have to get Intel’s blessing which may be in the works

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:saluting_face:

Just looking at what entry level Thunderbolt 4 docks cost I would estimate a very niche market, you can find decent Thunderbolt 3 docks for like 50 bucks or so and use Displayport? :slight_smile:

You can find Thunderbolt 3 docks for 50 bucks, but decent docks start around 200.

Remember that every mm of cable from the laptop to the display causes signal degradation.

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HP Elite Thunderbolt 3 docks doesn’t qualify? PCIe nic too :slight_smile:
We’re using a digital signal (with some error correction) so no, it doesn’t degrade for every mm.

Off topic: Signal quality, not picture quality.

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The wire signal absolutely degrades, because signal itself is actual analog, and is translated into “digital” when it’s received. A digital transfer protocol just mean the result on your screen is the same, until there’s too many issues for the conversation thresholds and ECC to compensate for.

The longer the cable, and the more data you are trying to shove over it, the harder it is to correctly receive what was sent.

This is why it’s a complete pain in the ass to just find a quality DisplayPort cable even for the older KVM’s. Thunderbolt/USB/Network cables are no different

Wendell has a wonderful video on the subject, talking about why DisplayPort (a “digital” protocol) can get screwed up, and shows his $15,000 cable tester that can show you what the signal actually looks like. Dr Strangeport: How I learned to stop worrying and love the Displayport KVMs - YouTube

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nooo
HP can’t build docks to save their miserable life!

I really do not want a dock. I want to be able to seamlessly switch between computers without having to constantly change cables.

Amazing news! Do you have a very rough timeline on when this could happen? Of course not holding you to anything, just want to get a sense of the timing. Thanks.

q3 2023 maybe

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