• 1.0 out of 5 stars

    Useless in windows, Good in OSX

    Without native plug and play support for windows this adapter is useless. It runs fine when using windows in a VM but i prefer to boot to windows as my primary OS when performing tasks that require heavy CPU. Very disappointing... If I could do everything i need to do in OSX it would serve me well, but sadly a large number of tasks are easier to accomplish in windows.

    There is a workaround to get functionality in windows but the adapter stops functioning when the computer is placed in sleep mode. After resuming you are required to reboot in order to get a functioning adapter again.

    36 of 47 people found this useful

  • 1.0 out of 5 stars

    Disappointed

    I love Apple products but they failed here. Stopped working reliably after a couple months and now it's bad. It worried me how warm it got and I think that's the problem.

    47 of 49 people found this useful

  • 1.0 out of 5 stars

    A bad dongle

    If you have a Wacom Cintiqu 21 UX, sad news

    Apples dongle will not work, as it is missing the 4 pins around the little flat blade. Apples habit of make new dongle for every new computer is a real pain the neck and pocket book. It looks like I will stop upgrades to new systems when i have to scrap a very good $3,000.00 Wacom because I can't get a cable connector. The thunderbolt was a bad buy in my pocket book.

    21 of 48 people found this useful

  • 1.0 out of 5 stars

    Do not buy this adaptor

    It simply does not work. Spent 14 hours trying to get it to work. DO NOT BUY AN AIR IF NEED ETHERNET CONNECTION.

    27 of 51 people found this useful

  • 1.0 out of 5 stars

    Fried after only a few weeks

    My thunderbolt-ethernet adaptor just died in the middle of transmitting data from a brand new Retina MBP, 2 months after I bought it. Shame on Apple for removing time-proven robust and reliable internal Gigabit Ethernet and Firewire ports for the sake of unreliable Thunderbolt interfaces and slower WiFi.

    71 of 92 people found this useful

  • 1.0 out of 5 stars

    Disappointed because this does not work with MBA 2010 and Later

    When I bought the device I was so excited and thought this would be an excellent purchase. What I didn't know is that it is not supported on all Macs. I wish Apple had put a note on the package saying what machines are supported with this device. Needless to say, I now have a $30 paperweight. Does anyone know how to make this work or have workarounds been found for older Apple products

    27 of 48 people found this useful

  • 1.0 out of 5 stars

    lasted 1 month

    Always ran hot, bad design or bad ICs not worth the money, All other brands have the same problem. this one lasted about 200 hours

    28 of 33 people found this useful

  • 1.0 out of 5 stars

    Hangs bootcamp Windows 7 on lid close

    Thunderbolt Gigabit Ethernet Adaptor DOES work on Windows 7, but requires a reboot after you connect it. The problem I have every time I close/reopen the lid, bootcamp doesn't come out of sleep/hibernation and you have to reboot again.

    25 of 30 people found this useful

  • 1.0 out of 5 stars

    Loose thunderbolt ethernet adaptor after five months

    I have been using the Thunderbolt ethernet adaptor for five months now. While it worked well till up to this week, the connection to the laptop is getting loose and I lose connection to the internet. This is very frustrating. I miss not having the ethernet port directly in my new laptop. The price for the adaptor is high, considering that it loosens up and behaves unpredictably. I may have to purchase a new one every six months. I will try the USB adaptor, since it is a little wider and hopefully more stable. I also do not like the length of the adaptor. If it is not supported by a table, it puts quite a torque on it. I wish that it was smaller and without any movable parts. I love my new retina display laptop and if this bit of an inconvenience was resolved, I would be thrilled.

    56 of 62 people found this useful

  • 1.0 out of 5 stars

    Expensive and flawed

    I can understand the removal of ethernet ports if it was for reasons of size (since the Retina is quite thin and I'm not entirely sure Ethernet would fit too well), otherwise not a very good decision.
    That said the adaptor does what it's mean to do, but it has some major flaws.
    First of all, the price tag. After having purchased a rather expensive computer, having to throw in another 30 just to be able to go online isn't really ideal. They could've thrown one in for free, but I guess that's not how Apple rolls.
    The second problem is that, despite being light and portable to bring behind when out, the cable part of the adaptor is quite thick and not very flexible, which can be pretty annoying if you're trying to work in cramped spaces (or just don't have 15cm to the left of your laptop). The cable part can, obviously, be bent, but I wouldn't be surprised if it would soon destroy the adaptor. I try not bending it as much as possible, and having had it for just over 4 months I can see it's getting pretty ruined.
    But the last, and definitely most annoying problem, is that the adaptor does not fit snugly in the port and wobbles. The slightest twitch can cause your connection to drop, forcing you to disconnect and reconnect the cable for it to be recognized again.

    121 of 158 people found this useful

  • 1.0 out of 5 stars

    Does not work with Windows 7 under Bootcamp

    Beware when buying this for use with Windows 7 running on Bootcamp - have tried fixes offered online and still does not work. Works fine under Mac OS.....

    Apparently the USB to ethernet works under Windows 7 on Bootcamp but only delivers 100Mbps

    21 of 26 people found this useful

  • 1.0 out of 5 stars

    Defective Thunderbolt Ethernet adapter

    I purchase the adapter some 6 weeks ago. Everything was working fine although I can't really see a difference between my USB Ethernet adapter. This night it just stopped working. I though it might be the router or my network card but it's actually only the thunderbolt adapter which went defective. 6 week life cycle is a bit short... Not very happy with that... I have a D-Link power over ethernet switch behind my router. Could that explain the issue ?

    31 of 44 people found this useful

  • 1.0 out of 5 stars

    1 step forward 2 steps back

    Well Apple has the amazing ability to ignore the little things.. And they did it again.

    Got a new Macbook pro with retina a few weeks ago, love the machine.. But,,,

    First,,, why did Apple take the network port out? REALLY?? The world is NOT wireless yet.. Right now us IT folk still dwell in the data center with lots Of wire, and most network switches, power strips printers etc need some direct connection attention once in a while..

    Second,,, The Lighting Bolt network adapter ,,, its NOT an adaptive port like the older model MacBook Pro's had. So if your business is working with hardware you get to carry a hub with you or a flipped ethernet cable.. BOOOOOO! They had it right then "fixed" it..

    Darnit...

    90 of 133 people found this useful

  • 1.0 out of 5 stars

    Worked for about a month

    Speed was fine. I used it constantly because we have no wifi here, and after the first time I unplugged it, I got a DNS error. Some random rebooting and unplugging fixed it, but after unplugging it a second time the same thing happened and nothing I've tried has fixed it. Looking around the internet, other people with mid-2012 macbook airs seem to be having the same problem with it. Fix this apple!

    28 of 31 people found this useful

  • 1.0 out of 5 stars

    JUST DOES NOT WORK...

    Bought this to connect ethernet in my dorm on my Macbook with Retina Display. Since August, I have not been able to get any internet access. Why??? I don't get it! Never experienced such disappointment with an Apple product!

    39 of 54 people found this useful

  • 1.0 out of 5 stars

    Doesn't work - get USB 3.0 to Gigabit instead

    Got one from apple store, had trouble getting it to work with Windows 7 or Windows 8 (worked on Mac side fine though). Since i use bootcamp a lot and needed a full gigabit speed - ended up returning and buying a USB 3.0 one from usb3gigabit.com. This one worked on mac and on Windows without any issues plus it left my thunderbolt usable for the display or storage.

    63 of 81 people found this useful

  • 1.0 out of 5 stars

    Do not use if you want this to work with WIndows 7

    I dual boot my MBP to Windows 7 in order to do work on it. Although I can get this adapter to work in Windows 7, there are two major drawbacks. First is that the dongle has to be attached to the MBP AT BOOT or it will not see it. You cannot plug it in after it has booted and expect Windows to see it. Second is that once you do have it working, the laptop CANT GO TO SLEEP! It goes into hibernation mode, which is a deal-breaker. If you need a network adapter that'll work with Windows 7, this is NOT your product. I am very disappointed with Apple about this.

    54 of 71 people found this useful

  • 1.0 out of 5 stars

    Nearly useless

    This item is not plug-and-play under Windows 7, nor Windows 8. You have to have it connected BEFORE you start Windows on your Mac.
    Quality of service under MacOS is questionable, too.

    I am reverting to USB adapter.

    48 of 103 people found this useful

  • 1.0 out of 5 stars

    This adapter takes more battery juice than Wifi

    Is everyone experiencing this? I've tried testing both wifi and thunderbolt adapter. My conclusion was wrong.

    Using Battery Health app I got this:
    The watts usage after 1 minute:

    Wifi ~ 9.34 Watts
    Thunderbolt to Gigabit Ethernet ~ 12.31 Watts

    I'm using ML 10.8.1 and MacBook Pro Retina.

    It's disappointing because I bought this to minimize battery usage in the first place.

    44 of 61 people found this useful

  • 1.0 out of 5 stars

    Apple lacks when it comes to updates...

    I purchased the adapter for my MacBook Air the day it was debut. Held off for the first update due to the issues claimed. I use my Air for I.T. purposes daily and thankfully the USB 10/100 adapter I purchased still allows me to troubleshoot LAN based networks. The known fact "buying the first/new is not always best" should have made me pause during my purchase but when converting everything to Mac and going with an Air, having gigabit ethernet was the last piece of the puzzle I needed. It's been a huge curve dropping all things M$ and going Mac to maintain corporate environment domains, and though most all of the many locations have wifi installed that does not help in configuring networks when the router/firewall goes on the fritz. Get it together engineers and post the updated fix!!!

    25 of 44 people found this useful