Miss that Magsafe adapter from your older MacBook? The Magrig Adapter not only restores Magsafe functionality to USB-C computers, it also works perfectly with USB 3-1 gen 3, aka Thunderbolt-3. In case you don't know, Thunderbolt-3 is screaming fast, as demonstrated herein with a Samsung X5 SSD. Tech expert Dave Taylor of https://www.AskDaveTaylor.com/ demonstrates what makes the Magrig a really cool update for your high-speed setup.
You can find Magrig on Indiegogo.com
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A MagSafe adapter that supports Thunderbolt 3? Let's check this out
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Dave Taylor here, and you know, there's a lot I really like about all the generational
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updates to the MacBook line and two other devices that are now using USB-C
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but the thing I really miss is that MagSafe connector that typified and characterized
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all Apple laptops until they switched to USB-C. Now, I don't know what it is about USB-C that
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meant they couldn't do MagSafe, but it's more dangerous now. So, third parties are coming out
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with MagSafe adapters, and you can use them for power, sure, that's pretty easy, but can you use
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it as a Thunderbolt 3 connection? Well, one of these companies can do that. That's this. This
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is the MagRig adapter, and it's easiest to show you that the tip comes off. It's a magnet, so
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you can see that, right? So, obviously, I can plug it in. It's USB-C on one side and USB-C on the
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other, so I can power my computer with this. That's not very interesting, and of course
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if someone trips on the wire, the whole thing just comes off super easy. That's really handy
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but what makes the MagRig adapter so cool is that it actually does support Thunderbolt 3
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and they're the only company that does that. Thunderbolt 3, you might not even be using it
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but you should. So, here's what I have. I have this glorious Samsung X5 Thunderbolt 3 SSD drive
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and it is screaming fast. It is just ridiculously fast. In fact, I just reviewed it, so go and check
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out that video, too. Now, the question is, can I use this with their adapter? Now, they say yes
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but let's actually give it a test. So, first off, let's open up my computer, and it's handy. They
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gave me two of them. So, there's a gray one and there's a silver one, so we can use both in this
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test, right? So, I'm powered up. That's great, and I have this adapter, but before I do that
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I'm just going to plug it in, and I'm going to run a speed test. There's a Blackmagic
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disk speed test, and you can see here the results, and it is pretty darn fast. If you ran this for
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your drive, even your internal drive, you might not get numbers this fast. Now, what MagRig says
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is that these work for any USB-C device. They'll work with USB 3.1 Generation 1, which offers 5
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gigabits a second, USB 3.1 Generation 2, which is known as Thunderbolt 2, and that's at 10
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gigabits a second, but then the glorious one is USB 3.1 Generation 3, known much more commonly
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as Thunderbolt 3, and that gives you 40 gigabits per second. It's a tricky one to say. That's
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really fast, but what makes Thunderbolt 3 super interesting is that you can daisy chain up to
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six devices, so you could have a display and a hard drive and another Thunderbolt 3 device all
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hooked up off of one. You can also power two 4K or one 5K display off of a Thunderbolt 3 wire
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Now, you need special wire. You need a wire that identifies itself as being Thunderbolt 3. If it
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doesn't say that, it probably doesn't support it. These are not inexpensive wires, but you need it
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because it's just vast amounts of data pushing through. It can also deliver up to 100 watts of
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power, so again, that Thunderbolt 3 can do all sorts of magic stuff. It's actually a pretty sweet
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system, but wouldn't it be nice to have MagSafe with it? Well, enter the MagRig, and what's nice
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is the MagRig actually has the company logo on one side, but on the other side, there's a subtle
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little LED indicator that tells you if it's powered on. So, if I take this and I turn it upside
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down, you can see in this close-up, the little LED just lights up, and it's actually really handy to
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see that. Again, not only did we lose that MagSafe ability to not worry if someone trips on your cord
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but we also lost that visual indicator that things were charging, and ideally were fully
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charged. Why did we lose all that, Apple? I really miss that. It's really nice, but back to this
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Thunderbolt 3, right? So, what I'm going to do is I'm going to plug in the MagRig, and I can put this
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on either end. This is really handy, so I can say, let's plug it into the drive, and then I will have
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the, you know, plugged hard into the computer, or we can do it the other way, and I kind of prefer
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the other way. So, we have our Thunderbolt 3 drive, and then we have the wire, and that is
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via the MagRig. I'm going to just plug that into the side of my, this is a 2019 MacBook Pro, and it
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supports Thunderbolt 3 on all four of its USB-C ports, and the drive is up, the display is, you
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know, everything's working, and so the question is, what if we run that speed test? So, I'm going to
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run that Blackmagic speed test again, and you'll see it actually gives me not only the same results
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it's actually a smidge faster. So, running this test a lot, I've seen that it varies a little bit up and
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down, so don't get hung up on exact numbers, but just look at that throughput. We're definitely
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not seeing any performance penalty by using this, and if someone says, hey, can I borrow your drive
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and they do this, you're like, but you didn't break anything, right? There's nothing broken and stuck
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in the USB port or anything. Now, you know, from the perspective of disk caches and stuff, what I just
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did is not really recommended. It's not really how you want to deal with external drives, but hopefully
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especially if you're just doing it for reads, because you're reading data, then it's not going
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to really affect you much, but generally speaking, you should eject your drive. I just test things
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right? But what's important to notice is it works. It actually offers a bridge that gives me MagSafe
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in the Thunderbolt 3 world, and that is pretty darn cool. Now, here's the thing, is that these guys are
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actually busy, and they're up on Indiegogo, and they're offering a really good deal. So, let me
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close this, and let's unplug these. Oh, one thing I should tell you is that the package comes with
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this funky little plastic pliers or tongs or something, right? You will need this. You will
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not want to lose this, because when I do this, now I have to get this out, right? If I do this
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I can definitely unplug this, and I have this piece, but I now have that stuck on either side
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right? So, use these little mini wrench or whatever you want to call it, and it just makes it super
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easy to get the tip out, which you can then just drop in. Now, check out this close-up. There are a lot
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of pins on that connector. This is not just power and ground or something like that. This is a very
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complicated piece of electronics. So, you know, you definitely want to treat it with care, and you want
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to be able to get this thing out. There we go. There's the other one, and I'll just put that on here
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and take this off. So, here they are, and gray, silver, and let's talk about the price. But before we get
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to the price, and I tell you about the whole Indiegogo thing, let me ask if you can subscribe to my
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channel. Super helpful. I get access to tons of gear, even stuff that's not even out yet, and I am
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really honest with my reviews and really straightforward. So, please subscribe to my channel
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and we'll be able to stay in touch. How handy is that? Great. So, these little tiny guys are the
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MagRig adapters. They are Thunderbolt 3 MagSafe, basically, and they're really cool. Their retail
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price will be $89 for a set of two, but on Indiegogo, they're $55 if you want to back them now
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and that might sound kind of spendy, but remember, this isn't about MagSafe for power. This is about
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MagSafe for Thunderbolt 3, and that's kind of a different world and much more complicated
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and way more useful if you're actually working in that Thunderbolt 3 universe, and you should be
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because it's totally worth it. Or, if you really want to go hardcore, you can get four MagRig
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adapters, which will retail for $179, but you can get four of them for $108. You do the math, that's
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pretty darn inexpensive for something with this much technological expertise and, I don't know
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evolution, right? So, I like these. I like MagSafe. I wish I didn't have to get a third-party adapter
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for this sort of stuff, but that's how it goes. So, at least we have a good solution, and this does
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give you Thunderbolt 3, and you really want to use it if you can. So, go to Indiegogo, search for MagRig
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You can find all about what they're doing, and once their campaign is over, I'm sure that will link to
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their official website. Definitely worth checking out if you're working with these high-speed devices
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This is a really nice add-on. It's going to really save your butt. Just that one time that someone
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knocks something over, or someone pulls out a wire without realizing, and it doesn't damage anything
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That will be making this very well worth the investment. So, with that, I'm going to plug things
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back in. I'm going to run some more speed tests, because it's just fun to see how fast it is
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and that means I'll catch you in my next video. Bye
#Consumer Electronics


