Light Peak technology, including its own protocol, acts as a platform for a range of existing protocols that run on top of it. In a , Jason Ziller, manager of Intel's Light Peak project, explained that the "Light Peak protocol defines the speed. The protocol is running at 10 gigabits per second. So, if the native protocols that you're running on top of it are also running at 10 gigabits per second, or something close to that, then the effective bandwidth for a device on the other end would be equivalent to that (10Gb/s)."

The inverse is also true, Ziller explained: "If the protocol is running less than that, for example USB 2.0, it's just kind of riding on Light Peak but the effective transfer rate would be equivalent to the native protocol, like USB or FireWire."

Ziller noted that today's video streaming protocols like HDMI and DisplayPort 1.1 run at 10Gbps. Data protocols that could run over Light Peak include PCI Express, USB, SATA, FireWire and USB 3.0. USB 3.0 has transfer rate in theory of 4.8Gbps, with typical rates being just over 3Gbps.

John Cox covers wireless networking and mobile computing for "Network World."Twitter: Email: john_cox@nww.comBlog RSS feed:

in Network World's Data Center section.