Quote:
Originally Posted by Quoth
There are two kinds of chips in cords: malicious ones (such doing wireless) or ensuring proprietary operation (Apple with some cords).
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It's not exactly proprietary. It's Thunderbolt which is a public (though not open) standard from Intel and Apple. The controllers in a Thunderbolt cable's plugs manage muxing/demuxing signals on the wire which is how they can fit power, PCIe data, USB data, Ethernet, HDMI/DP and whatever onto such thin collection of strands.
Thunderbolt cable plugs are marked with a thunderbolt icon to differentiate them from USB cables.