The TB 2.0 chipsets use a x4 PCIe 2.0 link per controller. Guess that means that each pair of two TB ports shares the bandwidth of a controller (6 ports / 3 controllers / 12 PCIe 2.0 lanes total.

Probably not fast enough for external graphics that would outperform the (extremely fast) internal graphics solution but still orders of magnitude more bandwidth than any current external consumer or prosumer storage solution.

Anyhow... that's a lot faster than any consumer or prosumer storage solutions. It might be a little slow only if you were driving an external video card but the internal cards can handle 3X 4K displays already.

Thunderbolt 2 is 20Gb/s. There are 6 ports and 3 Thunderbolt controllers (each controller handles a full 20Gb/s across 2 ports).

FWIW, PCIe 1.0 x8 is only 16Gb/s and x4 is only 8Gb/s.

The bandwidth here is basically faster than 6 x8 slots.

One thing you should be happy about... putting all the expansion OUTSIDE of the computer using STANDARDIZED interfaces (Thunderbolt was actually developed by Intel and you can get PC adapters) means that any money you put into expanding a computer will be easily portable to other computer or when you upgrade a computer. This isn't necessarily true with internal cards (think ISA / VESA / PCI / PCIe / PCIx). Also, you don't have to worry about upgrading your computer's power supply or cooling when you add expansion.

Which I will release to the public in a 1.7TB archive. If I'm arrested, I will release the one-time pad decryption key.

The PC market is currently losing money for most manufacturers as well.

In the day of the horse and buggy, many people were against horseless carriages. They were loud, spooked horses on the road, and much more prone to accidents... especially without "proper training and regulation". Yes, imaging how bad things would be if everyone had a horseless carriage.

FWIW, they did the same thing on the PS3. Disabling one of the SPU cores to get higher yields. Even on machines where all the SPU's passed, they still had to disable one though to "standardize" performance... so sometimes functional chips are actually crippled to meet demand for lower specs but it's more often a factor to attain higher yield. Intel did "crippling" on functional Pentiums at first to meet Celeron demand (before actually making a new die for celerons). It's a little bit of both to be honest.

I have a number of coworkers who basically don't function until their second cup of coffee in the morning. Providing coffee, tea, and soda is a no-brainer for increased productivity.

FWIW, most "free food" programs encourage workers to come in earlier (for breakfast) or stay later (work past dinner time) or to not spend a long time off the company property over lunch. The extra time at work usually pays for the food costs. When we have "crunch time" and are working late, my company orders food for people putting in extra hours. It's probably cheaper than overtime as well.

Just remember that unlimited donations to provide political advertising or independent political funding from corporations is considered constitutionally protected "free speech" in the US due to the Supreme Court (Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission - 2010). And "independent" is a very weak word here. Also in the US, "Corporations are People my friend" remains true even though Romney lost.

I think the proposed Buffett Rule does... in which people are required to pay a minimum tax rate based on their income so a billionaire doesn't have a lower rate than his secretary. Since "corporations are people" (according to the Supreme Court), we could apply a Buffet Rule to corporations as well, where they are required to pay a minimum tax rate on their earnings regardless of how many loopholes they have taken advantage of.

Corporations, as well as the rich, will rarely consider taking advantage of a tax loophole to be "morally wrong". In fact, by the code of corporations, in which maximizing profits for shareholders is one of the prime decrees, to not take advantage of an available loophole would be "morally wrong" to their shareholders.

Therefore, it is up to lawmakers to remove the loopholes. But of course, that will never happen with a Republican House and with Senate Republicans forcing a super-majority 60+ vote on ALL legislation with an ever-present filibuster threat since Obama took office.

My first published computer program came out YEARS before he was born and I continue to learn new things all the time. I've been programming video games professionally since the 80's and full time since 1993. Every few years, I have to learn entire new OS, new hardware for console, direct low level programming on completely unique custom chips, new IDE's or debugging tools, SDK's, TRC's etc... even new computer languages. Often when the next console comes out, anything I've learned in the previous round is "obsolete" and I have to start over.

But learning and embracing change is a way of life for a good developer. Heck, when I first started programming C wasn't even a certified language. I taught it to myself. Then C++ came our and I taught myself. And template programming and C++11 etc. etc.

In my industry, you have to be driven and constantly researching and teaching yourself new skills. It's good to at least examine some of what is "shiny" to everyone and see what it's about in many fields but in mine it's a matter of survival.

If he's afraid of learning new things now and embracing trends or even disruptive changes, there's no way he'll have a competive skill set in 20 years. If I was stuck on old trends that were around when I started, I'd be programming legacy database code in COBOL and PL1.

When you are using "FREE" SERVICES (FaceBook, GMail, Google Seach, Yahoo, etc), then you need to realize that *YOU* are the product being sold.

Or Hyperdrive