INTERCONNECT TECHNOLOGY

Today’s emerging and evolving interconnect technologies differ in their trade-offs among bandwidth, power consumption, range, security, and cost.
These include Ethernet, USB and HDMI which are widely-used technologies that continue to advance in capabilities. Let’s look closer at some of the advancements…
Ethernet is part of a family of wired networking technologies mostly used in local area networks (LAN), metropolitan area networks (MAN) and wide area networks (WAN). It was commercially introduced in 1980 and first standardized in 1983 as IEEE 802.3.
Multi-speed twisted-pair Ethernet interfaces can now be built which operate at 10-, 100-, or 1000 Mbps, using the Auto-Negotiation protocol to automatically configure their speed.
When it comes to Ethernet Cable Speeds, there are multiple choices depending on your needs. Cat 6 and Cat 6a cables ensure fast speeds and are cost-effective. Cat 7 cables don’t offer a huge advantage over Cat 6a in most applications. That said, they do offer improved shielding and can help maintain speeds where long Ethernet cables are needed.
USB (Universal Serial Bus) is an industry standard that establishes specifications for cables, connectors, and protocols for connection, communication and power supply (interfacing) between computers, peripherals, and other computers. A broad variety of USB hardware exists, including eleven different connectors, of which USB-C is the most recent.
USB4 requires USB-C connectors, and for power delivery, it requires support of USB PD. In contrast to USB 3.2, it allows tunneling of DisplayPort and PCI Express.
The USB4 specification is based on the Thunderbolt 3 protocol specification.
The primary differences between Thunderbolt 4 (announced at CES 2020) and Thunderbolt 3 are support for USB4 protocol and data rates, a minimum bandwidth requirement of 32 Gbit/s for PCIe link, support for dual 4K displays (DisplayPort 1.4), and Intel VT-d-based direct memory access protection to prevent DMA attacks.
With over 8 billion HDMI-enabled devices sold, it has become the most popular way to transmit uncompressed audio and video between a source and a receiver or display.
Standard HDMI connector (Type A), Mini HDMI connectors (Type C) and Micro HDMI connectors (Type D) have the same 19 pins but may have different pin assignments. Functionally, they all support the resolutions and features of HDMI 1.4 onwards.
HDMI 2.1, the latest standard, Increased bandwidth to 48 Gb/s with resolutions up to 10K at 120 frames per second.
HDMI Cables are available in male and female versions, with options such as right-angled connectors and gripping or locking connectors.
With the growing data and power demands of today’s networks and electronic devices, These specifications are part of a new generation of high-speed, multi-functional solutions.
Circuit Assembly is ready to help you take advantage of emerging technologies to meet the demands of the next generation. Call us today to discuss how we can assist you in leading the charge.