Quote:
Originally Posted by melodydetective
I’ve been told by an Antelope tech that the Orion requires that the cable length be within length limitation spec, whether optical or copper - but went on to say that he knew of someone who used active Thunderbolt cables to get some amount of extension - which would work if the issue was signal loss, which the optical cable doesn’t have. So no further clue here.
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It's likely hard/impossible not be within specifications length, and you should not get problems by adding a optical cable on the end of a copper cable. The thunderbolt adapter and transceiver in the optical cable are boosting the signal again into the other cable.
There are Thunderbolt passive copper cables, typically limited to 0.5m and there are active copper cables, typically limited to 3m (or 2m in some cases, but the Apple Pro 3m ones sure as heck meet performance specs). Thunderbolt 3 optical cables typically are limited to 50m or 60m. The active cables have transceivers built into headshells that drive the signal over the longer cable.
You simply cannot purchase any reputable Thunderbolt copper cable that is "too long"... it only really exists if people try to use a non-Thunderbolt DisplayPort or USB-C cable or a power only/charging cable. Thunderbolt optical cables have similar transceivers built into their headshells permanently bonded to the optical fiber. Again there is simply no such thing as a too-long Thunderbolt 3 optical cable. And connecting the optical cable to anything resets the length spec count.
What a support person at Antelope should be asking is are you using a genuine/quality Thunderbolt 3 or 4 cable, say from Apple (those "Pro" cables are really nice) or Corning (fantastic cables) and that should be the end of any discussion about cable length. But again the issue is likely to be simply Thunderbolt optical cables do not pass power.