How much power is the tiny copper jack going to offer? The big Display Port jack supplies 8W. I can't find mDP power specs, but I would expect it to be smaller, say 4W, roughly what USB offers. There aren't a lot of multi-gigabit speed data devices that can sip power that efficiently. Most bus powered USB devices are very slow.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Sacto Joe
Amazing that some posters think this is bad news for Apple! Oh, that's right; we get lots of PC fanatics that post here....
\
Still, USB did have the market for the better part of a decade, once USB 2.0 was available, FW400 couldn't hold on to much market beyond professional users and enthusiasts. The acceptance of FW 800 was almost negligible, which was unfortunate because my favorite dual drive enclosure never supported FW 800 with SATA drives. Most video cameras dropped Firewire years ago. I've only heard of one FW "thumb" flash drive, and it was part of a package of diagnostic software for Mac, intended for rescue use. There are three products announced right now, Lacie plans to offer their first Thunderbolt compatible drive in Summer? Promise's device is supposed to be released in Q2, which could be in 5 weeks or 4 months from now.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Apple ][
Me too, Firewire is far better than USB 2.
Specs sometimes lie. Even though USB 2.0 is supposed to be rated at 480 and the original Firewire is rated at a lower 400, the Firewire beats the USB 2.0 in real life usage, such as when using external drives. Firewire (400) has better sustained throughput and is faster than USB 2.0.
This is known by the people that pay attention, but it's tough to convince people to go for FW as it does add to the cost of the product and it requires more components and board space to construct, witness Apple's dropping of FW support on their iDevices.
Quote:
Originally Posted by SpamSandwich
I think they'll start adding Thunderbolt to all of their products, which would ensure wide adoption. Think about it. iPhone 4, next iPods, all computers going forward, iPads. Come on!
Would it make a difference in sync speed? Last I timed an iPhone sync, it only moved data at about 50Mbps, I don't know if Thunderbolt would make much difference in sync speed.
Quote:
Originally Posted by majortom1981
NO the part that converts optical to electrical will be in every optical lightpeak cable. Right now when you say run fiber that part is in the adapter. With lightpeak it will be in the cable itself. This way a lightpeak optical cable can plug into todays lightpeak ports .
Are you sure about that? Where do you get that? I'm skeptical that the converter can operate at what meager power that the jack can supply.
How much power is the tiny copper jack going to offer? The big Display Port jack supplies 8W. I can't find mDP power specs, but I would expect it to be smaller, say 4W, roughly what USB offers. There aren't a lot of multi-gigabit speed data devices that can sip power that efficiently. Most bus powered USB devices are very slow.
Still, USB did have the market for the better part of a decade, once USB 2.0 was available, FW400 couldn't hold on to much market beyond professional users and enthusiasts. The acceptance of FW 800 was almost negligible, which was unfortunate because my favorite dual drive enclosure never supported FW 800 with SATA drives. Most video cameras dropped Firewire years ago. I've only heard of one FW "thumb" flash drive, and it was part of a package of diagnostic software for Mac, intended for rescue use. There are three products announced right now, Lacie plans to offer their first Thunderbolt compatible drive in Summer? Promise's device is supposed to be released in Q2, which could be in 5 weeks or 4 months from now.
This is known by the people that pay attention, but it's tough to convince people to go for FW as it does add to the cost of the product and it requires more components and board space to construct, witness Apple's dropping of FW support on their iDevices.
Would it make a difference in sync speed? Last I timed an iPhone sync, it only moved data at about 50Mbps, I don't know if Thunderbolt would make much difference in sync speed.
Are you sure about that? Where do you get that? I'm skeptical that the converter can operate at what meager power that the jack can supply.
It has been stated in every info sheet I have seen that the TB port will provide 10W power over the tiny connector.
I was going wow the minidisplay port is going to get popular, then boom, exclusivity until 2012. WTF they want to make sure it doesnt work or what?
Apple "control-freak" attitude is going to kill the company some day.
Read the article for what it reports and don't add your personal biases to it. There is no exclusivity, it will just take manufacturers time to incorporate Thunderbolt into their products.
For folks expecting Thunderbolt on upcoming iOS devices, this from an article at Macworld (which does a good job of laying out the specifics and is worth reading in its entirety):
Quote:
Will iOS devices get Thunderbolt?
As noted above, Thunderbolt relies on PCI Express, the architecture that underpins Macs and most PCs. But iOS devices don’t use a PCI Express architecture, which would presumably make it difficult to simply stick a Thunderbolt port on an iPhone. Plus the dock-connector port on iOS devices provides quite a bit of additional functionality—it’s got 30 connection pins for a reason, after all. Finally, it’s not clear what benefits Thunderbolt would provide that the dock-connector port is missing. We suspect it’s far more likely that Apple will eventually sell an optional Thunderbolt-to-dock-connector cable for charging and syncing.
For folks expecting Thunderbolt on upcoming iOS devices, this from an article at Macworld (which does a good job of laying out the specifics and is worth reading in its entirety):
"Finally, it’s not clear what benefits Thunderbolt would provide that the dock-connector port is missing."
They clearly didn't think very hard. The dock connector is incapable of outputting digital video and data transfers are limited to USB 2.0 speeds. It's in dire need of an update. I'd say they are wrong on this one. The dock connector will last a few more generations for legacy reasons, but I'd expect iOS devices to start including this port as well very soon.
Docking stations were also listed among the potential applications for the new interconnect, with Intel noting that Thunderbolt can "extend to reach other I/O technologies by using adapters that use widely available PCI Express controllers. It's simple to create a Gigabit Ethernet, or FireWire, or eSATA adapters using existing device PCI Express drivers."
Even if im thrilled about those speeds im still tinking about the other aspects!!!
Is this like a firewire bus so that you can do stuff without the cpu being involved? If they didnt make any security alterations to pci express then this sounds as good as wireless firewire.... \
The dock connector is incapable of outputting digital video and data transfers are limited to USB 2.0 speeds. It's in dire need of an update. I'd say they are wrong on this one. The dock connector will last a few more generations for legacy reasons, but I'd expect iOS devices to start including this port as well very soon.
The shortcomings of the dock connector isn't the point, however. It's simply a fact that Thunderbolt is based off of the PCI Express architecture and iOS does not implement that architecture. Apple could start moving towards such an implementation, but the article is responding to the idea (which is being tossed around this thread) that Apple could just stick a Thunderbolt port on an iPad and do some internal wiring and be good to go. It can't, and it won't be able to without some serious work.
Then you'll have to wait for the fiber implementations. Current Thunderbolt is 10 feet. Fiber Thunderbolt will be 100 meters and 100Gbps, but no power.
We also get Apple fanatics who cheered the rise of FireWire and wept at its death. The same thing is happening here.
The death of firewire? You mean the studio/industry standard that is sat there next to thunderbolt on the new macbook pros? The audio and video interfaces that are installed in studios worldwide died? When did that happen?
I remember apple dropping the port and the public outcry, less than a year ago - that's far from dead!
How much power is the tiny copper jack going to offer?
10w, didn't it say? Perfect for charging an iPad and whatnot. Copper Thunderbolt carries 10w, while fiber can't. There was some talk of doing a copper/fiber combo to give the faster implementations power, as well.
How could they be stupid enough to make this thing of beauty into another FireWire?!
Can't be added? Yeah fricking right. How long before someone makes a PCIe Thunderbolt card for Mac Pros? I don't care if those don't do video?that's why my graphics card exists?I just want the transfer speed.
Shoah there. What's the problem?
We should be seeing cheap soundb dlaster cards to Apogee/Mackie/ProTools/etc to hard drives, displays and more. Now we know why fw 800 AND 400 were dropped, only thing is:
1) Will they make available and not just to Aoole Store employees, the next two weeks of returns at a discount to Joe and Jane Apple shopper, the old MacBook
Pros AND
2) how fast and easy will it be how fast the products hit the steers. I'm guessing audio and hard drives are first as the demand is there.
OT fwiw I ran bench a few times yesterday on the new machines and when it hit the user interface test, it kind of froze. Do run it on the device you buy before leaving the store.
The shortcomings of the dock connector isn't the point, however. It's simply a fact that Thunderbolt is based off of the PCI Express architecture and iOS does not implement that architecture. Apple could start moving towards such an implementation, but the article is responding to the idea (which is being tossed around this thread) that Apple could just stick a Thunderbolt port on an iPad and do some internal wiring and be good to go. It can't, and it won't be able to without some serious work.
Yes, that seems like the only reasonable argument they made in that section, but how long has Apple been working with Intel on Thunderbolt now? It's not like they'd just be starting now if they wanted to add it.
10w, didn't it say? Perfect for charging an iPad and whatnot. Copper Thunderbolt carries 10w, while fiber can't. There was some talk of doing a copper/fiber combo to give the faster implementations power, as well.
I think you have that backwards. What I read was that the standard fiber implementation will likely be a fiber/copper combo (with power) and there was some talk of a fiber only implementation for spanning very large distances.
The shortcomings of the dock connector isn't the point, however. It's simply a fact that Thunderbolt is based off of the PCI Express architecture and iOS does not implement that architecture. Apple could start moving towards such an implementation, but the article is responding to the idea (which is being tossed around this thread) that Apple could just stick a Thunderbolt port on an iPad and do some internal wiring and be good to go. It can't, and it won't be able to without some serious work.
Is it possible that that the "serious work" could have begun some time ago -- say, about the time that Apple began the "serious work" on Thunderbolt inclusion in the Mac products?
I guess what I am asking is: Are there physical (power, heat, space, battery, etc.) or cost considerations that prevent it being on the iPad 2 (in particular)?
Or is this, mainly, an engineering consideration? Hardware? Software? Both?
An iPad with Thunderbolt capability would have significant advantages over tablets offered by the competition.
And, it would be very un-Apple-like to not have considered this in its long term planning.
Yes, that seems like the only reasonable argument they made in that section, but how long has Apple been working with Intel on Thunderbolt now? It's not like they'd just be starting now if they wanted to add it.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Dick Applebaum
Is it possible that that the "serious work" could have begun some time ago -- say, about the time that Apple began the "serious work" on Thunderbolt inclusion in the Mac products?
I guess what I am asking is: Are there physical (power, heat, space, battery, etc.) or cost considerations that prevent it being on the iPad 2 (in particular)?
Or is this, mainly, an engineering consideration? Hardware? Software? Both?
An iPad with Thunderbolt capability would have significant advantages over tablets offered by the competition.
And, it would be very un-Apple-like to not have considered this in its long term planning.
Good point and good questions. I too would be curious if PC Express is power hungry/volume using/heat generating.
If not, if it could be incorporated into a phone sized device (or at least iPad sized device) without undue consequences, then I'm persuaded that Apple would probably have started work on this a while back.
Then the question is, would they bring this out to its own port or just incorporate it into the dock connector (I seem to recall the dock connector has some unused pins)? Apple has seemed very keen on keeping the dock connector as the one and only I/O on their iOS devices (outside of the headphone port). And, how soon?
Being able to sync your iPad to your late model Mac in seconds would be a great selling point, but it's not compelling until Apple has sold a lot more Macs with Thunderbolt on board. And outside of that, what does the format bring to iOS devices? Not using external drives, not wiring up printers or scanners, no video cameras or DSLRs with the connector for the time being, likely not a lot for a while.
So if this does come to iOS, I would expect next year at the earliest, when there's some actual ecosystem to take advantage of. And I wouldn't rule out Apple selling a dock connector to Thunderbolt dongle even then, because they just seem to roll that way.
And outside of that, what does the format bring to iOS devices?
HD video out, 10W of power (faster charge times), faster syncs (ensuring that the flash memory is the bottleneck).
Edit: Also one cable keyboard, monitor, mouse nettop/netbook potential. I think as iOS becomes more advanced Apples going to start implementing a desktop UI option (similar to but better than what the motorola Atrix does) for the iPhone and iPad.
Quote:
So if this does come to iOS, I would expect next year at the earliest, when there's some actual ecosystem to take advantage of.
When you have a head start, it's best to make use of it. It's fine to add the port as long as you still have legacy support. It's quite interesting that the MBP refresh and the iPad 2 event were spaced less than a week apart, especially considering the previous case leaks with what looked like a mini-displayport opening up top.
Quote:
And I wouldn't rule out Apple selling a dock connector to Thunderbolt dongle even then, because they just seem to roll that way.
The dock connector doesn't have enough free pins for TB, nor do they need separate pins for USB and Firewire with TB. If they added this to the dock connector, it would be a brand new and likely incompatible one.
The royalty income from the dock connector may be hard to let go of, but I think they might ultimately end up doing that because TB can act as a total replacement for the dock connector once they get around whatever technical issues there may be (which would be beyond my level of understanding).
The dock connector serves a purpose as it combines multiple I/O formats into one port, but TB already does that so there's little reason to change the shape of the plug (the only reason would be to add pins to support analog audio and video but I think we're moving away from that).
I guess we'll see what happens Wednesday. I suspect we'll see the dock connector and one TB port (and hopefully a splitter or a dock for TB), but perhaps you're right and it isn't coming yet.
Comments
Fiber's 100Gbps and no power.
Copper's 10Gbps and power.
They'll both have their uses.
How much power is the tiny copper jack going to offer? The big Display Port jack supplies 8W. I can't find mDP power specs, but I would expect it to be smaller, say 4W, roughly what USB offers. There aren't a lot of multi-gigabit speed data devices that can sip power that efficiently. Most bus powered USB devices are very slow.
Amazing that some posters think this is bad news for Apple! Oh, that's right; we get lots of PC fanatics that post here....
Still, USB did have the market for the better part of a decade, once USB 2.0 was available, FW400 couldn't hold on to much market beyond professional users and enthusiasts. The acceptance of FW 800 was almost negligible, which was unfortunate because my favorite dual drive enclosure never supported FW 800 with SATA drives. Most video cameras dropped Firewire years ago. I've only heard of one FW "thumb" flash drive, and it was part of a package of diagnostic software for Mac, intended for rescue use. There are three products announced right now, Lacie plans to offer their first Thunderbolt compatible drive in Summer? Promise's device is supposed to be released in Q2, which could be in 5 weeks or 4 months from now.
Me too, Firewire is far better than USB 2.
Specs sometimes lie. Even though USB 2.0 is supposed to be rated at 480 and the original Firewire is rated at a lower 400, the Firewire beats the USB 2.0 in real life usage, such as when using external drives. Firewire (400) has better sustained throughput and is faster than USB 2.0.
This is known by the people that pay attention, but it's tough to convince people to go for FW as it does add to the cost of the product and it requires more components and board space to construct, witness Apple's dropping of FW support on their iDevices.
I think they'll start adding Thunderbolt to all of their products, which would ensure wide adoption. Think about it. iPhone 4, next iPods, all computers going forward, iPads. Come on!
Would it make a difference in sync speed? Last I timed an iPhone sync, it only moved data at about 50Mbps, I don't know if Thunderbolt would make much difference in sync speed.
NO the part that converts optical to electrical will be in every optical lightpeak cable. Right now when you say run fiber that part is in the adapter. With lightpeak it will be in the cable itself. This way a lightpeak optical cable can plug into todays lightpeak ports .
Are you sure about that? Where do you get that? I'm skeptical that the converter can operate at what meager power that the jack can supply.
How much power is the tiny copper jack going to offer? The big Display Port jack supplies 8W. I can't find mDP power specs, but I would expect it to be smaller, say 4W, roughly what USB offers. There aren't a lot of multi-gigabit speed data devices that can sip power that efficiently. Most bus powered USB devices are very slow.
Still, USB did have the market for the better part of a decade, once USB 2.0 was available, FW400 couldn't hold on to much market beyond professional users and enthusiasts. The acceptance of FW 800 was almost negligible, which was unfortunate because my favorite dual drive enclosure never supported FW 800 with SATA drives. Most video cameras dropped Firewire years ago. I've only heard of one FW "thumb" flash drive, and it was part of a package of diagnostic software for Mac, intended for rescue use. There are three products announced right now, Lacie plans to offer their first Thunderbolt compatible drive in Summer? Promise's device is supposed to be released in Q2, which could be in 5 weeks or 4 months from now.
This is known by the people that pay attention, but it's tough to convince people to go for FW as it does add to the cost of the product and it requires more components and board space to construct, witness Apple's dropping of FW support on their iDevices.
Would it make a difference in sync speed? Last I timed an iPhone sync, it only moved data at about 50Mbps, I don't know if Thunderbolt would make much difference in sync speed.
Are you sure about that? Where do you get that? I'm skeptical that the converter can operate at what meager power that the jack can supply.
It has been stated in every info sheet I have seen that the TB port will provide 10W power over the tiny connector.
That is very very *BAD*
I was going wow the minidisplay port is going to get popular, then boom, exclusivity until 2012. WTF they want to make sure it doesnt work or what?
Apple "control-freak" attitude is going to kill the company some day.
Read the article for what it reports and don't add your personal biases to it. There is no exclusivity, it will just take manufacturers time to incorporate Thunderbolt into their products.
Will iOS devices get Thunderbolt?
As noted above, Thunderbolt relies on PCI Express, the architecture that underpins Macs and most PCs. But iOS devices don’t use a PCI Express architecture, which would presumably make it difficult to simply stick a Thunderbolt port on an iPhone. Plus the dock-connector port on iOS devices provides quite a bit of additional functionality—it’s got 30 connection pins for a reason, after all. Finally, it’s not clear what benefits Thunderbolt would provide that the dock-connector port is missing. We suspect it’s far more likely that Apple will eventually sell an optional Thunderbolt-to-dock-connector cable for charging and syncing.
For folks expecting Thunderbolt on upcoming iOS devices, this from an article at Macworld (which does a good job of laying out the specifics and is worth reading in its entirety):
"Finally, it’s not clear what benefits Thunderbolt would provide that the dock-connector port is missing."
They clearly didn't think very hard. The dock connector is incapable of outputting digital video and data transfers are limited to USB 2.0 speeds. It's in dire need of an update. I'd say they are wrong on this one. The dock connector will last a few more generations for legacy reasons, but I'd expect iOS devices to start including this port as well very soon.
Docking stations were also listed among the potential applications for the new interconnect, with Intel noting that Thunderbolt can "extend to reach other I/O technologies by using adapters that use widely available PCI Express controllers. It's simple to create a Gigabit Ethernet, or FireWire, or eSATA adapters using existing device PCI Express drivers."
[ View this article at AppleInsider.com ]
Even if im thrilled about those speeds im still tinking about the other aspects!!!
Is this like a firewire bus so that you can do stuff without the cpu being involved? If they didnt make any security alterations to pci express then this sounds as good as wireless firewire....
The dock connector is incapable of outputting digital video and data transfers are limited to USB 2.0 speeds. It's in dire need of an update. I'd say they are wrong on this one. The dock connector will last a few more generations for legacy reasons, but I'd expect iOS devices to start including this port as well very soon.
The shortcomings of the dock connector isn't the point, however. It's simply a fact that Thunderbolt is based off of the PCI Express architecture and iOS does not implement that architecture. Apple could start moving towards such an implementation, but the article is responding to the idea (which is being tossed around this thread) that Apple could just stick a Thunderbolt port on an iPad and do some internal wiring and be good to go. It can't, and it won't be able to without some serious work.
Then you'll have to wait for the fiber implementations. Current Thunderbolt is 10 feet. Fiber Thunderbolt will be 100 meters and 100Gbps, but no power.
We also get Apple fanatics who cheered the rise of FireWire and wept at its death. The same thing is happening here.
The death of firewire? You mean the studio/industry standard that is sat there next to thunderbolt on the new macbook pros? The audio and video interfaces that are installed in studios worldwide died? When did that happen?
I remember apple dropping the port and the public outcry, less than a year ago - that's far from dead!
How much power is the tiny copper jack going to offer?
10w, didn't it say? Perfect for charging an iPad and whatnot. Copper Thunderbolt carries 10w, while fiber can't. There was some talk of doing a copper/fiber combo to give the faster implementations power, as well.
There goes adoption.
How could they be stupid enough to make this thing of beauty into another FireWire?!
Can't be added? Yeah fricking right. How long before someone makes a PCIe Thunderbolt card for Mac Pros? I don't care if those don't do video?that's why my graphics card exists?I just want the transfer speed.
Shoah there. What's the problem?
We should be seeing cheap soundb dlaster cards to Apogee/Mackie/ProTools/etc to hard drives, displays and more. Now we know why fw 800 AND 400 were dropped, only thing is:
1) Will they make available and not just to Aoole Store employees, the next two weeks of returns at a discount to Joe and Jane Apple shopper, the old MacBook
Pros AND
2) how fast and easy will it be how fast the products hit the steers. I'm guessing audio and hard drives are first as the demand is there.
OT fwiw I ran bench a few times yesterday on the new machines and when it hit the user interface test, it kind of froze. Do run it on the device you buy before leaving the store.
Godspeed!!!
The shortcomings of the dock connector isn't the point, however. It's simply a fact that Thunderbolt is based off of the PCI Express architecture and iOS does not implement that architecture. Apple could start moving towards such an implementation, but the article is responding to the idea (which is being tossed around this thread) that Apple could just stick a Thunderbolt port on an iPad and do some internal wiring and be good to go. It can't, and it won't be able to without some serious work.
Yes, that seems like the only reasonable argument they made in that section, but how long has Apple been working with Intel on Thunderbolt now? It's not like they'd just be starting now if they wanted to add it.
10w, didn't it say? Perfect for charging an iPad and whatnot. Copper Thunderbolt carries 10w, while fiber can't. There was some talk of doing a copper/fiber combo to give the faster implementations power, as well.
I think you have that backwards. What I read was that the standard fiber implementation will likely be a fiber/copper combo (with power) and there was some talk of a fiber only implementation for spanning very large distances.
The shortcomings of the dock connector isn't the point, however. It's simply a fact that Thunderbolt is based off of the PCI Express architecture and iOS does not implement that architecture. Apple could start moving towards such an implementation, but the article is responding to the idea (which is being tossed around this thread) that Apple could just stick a Thunderbolt port on an iPad and do some internal wiring and be good to go. It can't, and it won't be able to without some serious work.
Is it possible that that the "serious work" could have begun some time ago -- say, about the time that Apple began the "serious work" on Thunderbolt inclusion in the Mac products?
I guess what I am asking is: Are there physical (power, heat, space, battery, etc.) or cost considerations that prevent it being on the iPad 2 (in particular)?
Or is this, mainly, an engineering consideration? Hardware? Software? Both?
An iPad with Thunderbolt capability would have significant advantages over tablets offered by the competition.
And, it would be very un-Apple-like to not have considered this in its long term planning.
he was talking osx not ios, but where are your figures for worldwide install base coming from?
He's probably talking about this article:
http://best-gadget-2011.com/apple-le...-manufacturer/
Of course there are also these articles which help show the impact of Apple on the market (yes these 2 are old):
http://arstechnica.com/apple/news/20...et-in-june.ars
http://osxdaily.com/2010/08/05/70-of...hman-use-macs/
Yes, that seems like the only reasonable argument they made in that section, but how long has Apple been working with Intel on Thunderbolt now? It's not like they'd just be starting now if they wanted to add it.
Is it possible that that the "serious work" could have begun some time ago -- say, about the time that Apple began the "serious work" on Thunderbolt inclusion in the Mac products?
I guess what I am asking is: Are there physical (power, heat, space, battery, etc.) or cost considerations that prevent it being on the iPad 2 (in particular)?
Or is this, mainly, an engineering consideration? Hardware? Software? Both?
An iPad with Thunderbolt capability would have significant advantages over tablets offered by the competition.
And, it would be very un-Apple-like to not have considered this in its long term planning.
Good point and good questions. I too would be curious if PC Express is power hungry/volume using/heat generating.
If not, if it could be incorporated into a phone sized device (or at least iPad sized device) without undue consequences, then I'm persuaded that Apple would probably have started work on this a while back.
Then the question is, would they bring this out to its own port or just incorporate it into the dock connector (I seem to recall the dock connector has some unused pins)? Apple has seemed very keen on keeping the dock connector as the one and only I/O on their iOS devices (outside of the headphone port). And, how soon?
Being able to sync your iPad to your late model Mac in seconds would be a great selling point, but it's not compelling until Apple has sold a lot more Macs with Thunderbolt on board. And outside of that, what does the format bring to iOS devices? Not using external drives, not wiring up printers or scanners, no video cameras or DSLRs with the connector for the time being, likely not a lot for a while.
So if this does come to iOS, I would expect next year at the earliest, when there's some actual ecosystem to take advantage of. And I wouldn't rule out Apple selling a dock connector to Thunderbolt dongle even then, because they just seem to roll that way.
And outside of that, what does the format bring to iOS devices?
HD video out, 10W of power (faster charge times), faster syncs (ensuring that the flash memory is the bottleneck).
Edit: Also one cable keyboard, monitor, mouse nettop/netbook potential. I think as iOS becomes more advanced Apples going to start implementing a desktop UI option (similar to but better than what the motorola Atrix does) for the iPhone and iPad.
So if this does come to iOS, I would expect next year at the earliest, when there's some actual ecosystem to take advantage of.
When you have a head start, it's best to make use of it. It's fine to add the port as long as you still have legacy support. It's quite interesting that the MBP refresh and the iPad 2 event were spaced less than a week apart, especially considering the previous case leaks with what looked like a mini-displayport opening up top.
And I wouldn't rule out Apple selling a dock connector to Thunderbolt dongle even then, because they just seem to roll that way.
The dock connector doesn't have enough free pins for TB, nor do they need separate pins for USB and Firewire with TB. If they added this to the dock connector, it would be a brand new and likely incompatible one.
The royalty income from the dock connector may be hard to let go of, but I think they might ultimately end up doing that because TB can act as a total replacement for the dock connector once they get around whatever technical issues there may be (which would be beyond my level of understanding).
The dock connector serves a purpose as it combines multiple I/O formats into one port, but TB already does that so there's little reason to change the shape of the plug (the only reason would be to add pins to support analog audio and video but I think we're moving away from that).
I guess we'll see what happens Wednesday. I suspect we'll see the dock connector and one TB port (and hopefully a splitter or a dock for TB), but perhaps you're right and it isn't coming yet.