ChargerLab, a web publication that focuses on all things, well, charging claims to have gotten a hold of some exclusive photos featuring the upcoming iPhone 15 series’ USB-C port PCBs (Printed Circuit Board). After conducting analysis on the visible parts of the component, they’ve discovered something very interesting: there’s a chance that Apple’s next generation smartphones could also offer Thunderbolt support.
According to the publication, featured on the component appears to be a Retimer chip that is situated above the USB-C port. This particular hardware is often featured on Thunderbolt/USB 4 devices, and is responsible for rebuilding signals and mitigating jitter. Essentially, it helps to augment signal transmission stability for high-capacity data ports and extends transmission ranges, enabling for fast data transfers across devices.
For comparison, the existing Lightning port that’s based on UBS 2.0 caps at a transfer rate of 480Mbps, while a typical Thunderbolt interface can go up to a whopping 40Gbps. Anyway, having the Thunderbolt standard also means that faster charging rates could also be in the cards for the new iPhone models.
However, ChargerLab speculates that Thunderbolt support may only be featured on at least three iPhone 15 variants based on what was observed from the images. Of course, there’s no way to confirm whether this may be the case. But if the publication’s prediction is to be believed, chances are that only the Pro and Pro Max may be the only models from the iPhone 15 series to feature this capability.
(Source: ChargerLab, via GSMArena)
