Sparkle’s ‘Thundermage’ idea pitches Thunderbolt as a GPU port

Historically, PC graphics playing cards have included two sorts of ports: DisplayPort and HDMI. Now, they could be including a 3rd: Thunderbolt.

Sparkle confirmed what it known as “Challenge Thundermage” this yr at Computex, a prototype OPC graphics card that put HDMI, DisplayPort, and a pair of Thunderbolt ports onto the identical graphics card. The inform, nevertheless, was the associate: Intel, whose “Battlemage” Arc GPUs have been paired with the Intel “Barlow Ridge” Thunderbolt 5 controller.

To this point, graphics playing cards have taken benefit of both the most recent DisplayPort or HDMI ports, which each supply the bandwidth vital for gaming-class shows — resembling within the graphics card above, which isn’t from Sparkle. In the meantime, shows with built-in USB-C ports have been sometimes paired with laptops with Thunderbolt 3 or Thunderbolt 4 ports for laptop computer docking stations: good for productiveness, however missing assist for the high-refresh-rate shows usually related to gaming.

Thunderbolt 5, nevertheless, alters that equation. Thunderbolt 5 affords 80Gbits/s upstream, and even 120Gbits/s in sure instances. That’s sufficient for each high-resolution content material creation in addition to high-speed gaming, supplied that producers assist it. It’s not clear whether or not show makers can be prepared so as to add one more port to their shows, however Intel associate Sparkle is clearly making the case that it might.

Videocardz, which famous a @akiba_ten_M’s photograph displaying off Sparkle’s sales space, notes that Thunderbolt’s built-in energy supply may very well be used to energy exterior shows, too. That appears much less doubtless, however definitely may very well be a strategy to cut back the price of an exterior show.