Thunderbolt 3 in windows

[armand]

With the Z7 I realized I'll probably have to upgrade my computer sooner than later. One criteria that I came up with is Thunderbolt 3 because I need a much larger drive than my current mix of internal SSDs with about 4 TB total. Obviously it has to be fast. I have a backup Synology in the network that is ok for now. What Thunderbolt 3 DAS is yet to be decided.

I'd like to stay with Windows for various reasons.
So when I look for Thunderbolt support I see it's still lacking, after several years.
The laptops have it but most will not give a large boost in speed over my current processor, a i7-4790. With the new i9 in a Dell XPS laptop I will get up to 20% in single core and up to 45% in multicore, decent but not that great.

Moving to a Dell XPS desktop I'll get up to 33% in single core and 85% in multicore for about the same price. Problem is the TB3 support comes with an added card, I don't particularly trust this option considering what is available.

So going to my preferred option, build your own. I did this for the last 20+ years. Problem is there are very few motherboards that support TB3 without issues. I see Puget Systems use a Gigabyte X299 but the LGA2066 is a little older and slightly limited in what processors I can put in. I can get maybe a 7820x, if I find it.

Any ideas regarding these options, or others?
Thanks

PS. the laptop will give about 50% more speed for video card while the desktops, XPS or DIY, will give 200-250% more.

[kers]

Just made a hackintosh with a ASUS prime deluxe motherboard...
It comes with a TB3 card.

BTW i have a desktop now that can contain about 8 HD's -( i use 5 at the moment) no need for external storage..
it is a fractal design r6 box...

more details here:
https://forum.luminous-landscape.com/index.php?topic=125073.60

[mcbroomf]

I had Puget make me a desktop this spring with the X299 and an i7800 specifically to get TB3 and extra internal drives  Not sure what is available now.  I have a pair of M2 drives for the OS and PS/LR cache and 4 other drives in the box (and space for more) but I backup to a NAS and a 4 drive (3 occupied) TB3 box by Akiato.  No problems so far (except a failed power supply that had to go back to Puget for diagnosis and fix, free shipping both ways).

[armand]

I have a current Asus MB who I thought supports TB so I got their card (this is several years back). Turns out they forgot to clearly document that you need a compatible TB header on MB and from here I have a little aversion for Asus TB but I'll take another look. It didn't show up on Newegg (or when googling) when I looked for TB3.

I currently have 6 drives and a Blu-ray writer, could probably fit more if I want to because 5 are SSD and they are small and can literally go anywhere. I would rather take it out of the case though, will make it easier to upgrade and/or access with a different computer, such as a laptop. If it has many HDDs or I populate it with SSD it should be faster than my current internal SATA SSD.

PS. I think it only showed the MB that have the TB3 intrinsically, not the TB EX header with the exception of the Prime X299-Deluxe which had 3/5 star rating out of 22 ratings. Either way, if I look for the TB EX compatibility I find more. Plus Gigabyte might be an option.

[DP]

The laptops have it but most will not give a large boost in speed over my current processor, a i7-4790. With the new i9 in a Dell XPS laptop I will get up to 20% in single core and up to 45% in multicore, decent but not that great.

the gains noteboook vs notebook (not vs desktop) are much higher because newer mobile platforms do speedup (to turbo freq when needed and back) much faster - so if you are not doing batch processing, they are much more agile...

[DP]

So when I look for Thunderbolt support I see it's still lacking, after several years.

MSI Vortex G25 for example has TB3 and it is a notebook like formfactor sizewise but with desktop CPU & GPU

[armand]

the gains noteboook vs notebook (not vs desktop) are much higher because newer mobile platforms do speedup (to turbo freq when needed and back) much faster - so if you are not doing batch processing, they are much more agile...

MSI Vortex G25 for example has TB3 and it is a notebook like formfactor sizewise but with desktop CPU & GPU

The only reason I'm also looking at laptops is because I might get away with a device to do it all and can do stuff from more places than just my office. I know some people make it work with higher end MacBook Pro and these Dell XPS are comparable. I might compensate for the lack of a powerfull laptop with an iPad pro when the Photoshop gets ported to it next year.

If I build a desktop I will not use a notebook motherboard, too tight to add different things. Prefer full size ATX.

[Joe Towner]

Why TB3? I mean, I am completely dependent on it as a laptop user, but for a desktop you're not the target market.  Especially for storage, when you have a PCIe slot or two, plus lots of SATA ports internally, they'll treat you better than an external TB3 solution.

Now, having said that the OWC ThunderBay 6 is on my to purchase list. 6 3.5" slots plus a NVMe slot.

It sounds like you should focus on USB3.1(types A & C) - 10gbps and lots of options compared to the TB3 40gbps and limited options.

[armand]

Why TB3? I mean, I am completely dependent on it as a laptop user, but for a desktop you're not the target market.  Especially for storage, when you have a PCIe slot or two, plus lots of SATA ports internally, they'll treat you better than an external TB3 solution.

Now, having said that the OWC ThunderBay 6 is on my to purchase list. 6 3.5" slots plus a NVMe slot.

It sounds like you should focus on USB3.1(types A & C) - 10gbps and lots of options compared to the TB3 40gbps and limited options.

Mostly because it will be easier to use with both a desktop and a laptop and when I upgrade either I don't have to worry about it.

I currently have internal stuff but upgrading it is a little too annoying. TB3 because it will be as fast or faster than the current SSD SATA that I have now.

I'm running through the scenarios to keep everything internal vs external TB3.

[armand]

As a quick update, the options with TB3 for Windows are slowly showing up more.
For a photo/video editing purpose the Gigabyte Z390 Designaware seems to be a prime candidate: https://www.gigabyte.com/us/Motherboard/Z390-DESIGNARE-rev-10#kf with 2 native TB3 (no add-on cards) and support for 8K should you desire.

There is also the idea that the next USB, USB4, will be almost the same as TB3, so waiting a couple more years should make this even easier.

[Philmar]

Thunderbolt - I 've been watching that interface develop slowly for a few years. Several years ago when I built my current Windows hobbyist photoprocessing PC I purchased the ASUS P8Z77-V PRO/THUNDERBOLT motherboard. At the time it was the same price as the non-TB equivalent board. So I thought lets get this mobo and one day when TB matures this board will allow me to use this new fast interface. At the time there were few windows compatible devices and over the years the number of windows TB external drives has increased but their price made the USB drives the sane choice. Thunderbolt has remained a mythological interface for me - anything I buy today will run on my TB1 port, not TB3. So I've never used this TB port....although I did toy with using a TB monitor but even that was too expensive. TB has been a waste of my time. No harm done though. I've only considered using it for external storage or monitors.