At the Intel Developer Forum (IDF) in San Francisco, Intel has finally revealed the second-generation Thunderbolt controllers that will eliminate the de facto monopoly of mega-speed peripheral interconnectivity that Apple has enjoyed since early 2011. Dubbed Cactus Ridge, the new controllers will come in dual- and quad-channel flavors — but unlike the larger, first-generation four-channel chip, all Cactus Ridge controllers will be just 12mm by 12mm; small enough to squeeze into just about anything.

More importantly, it is hoped that Cactus Ridge will be cheap enough to power some kind of peripheral renaissance — and judging by the sheer variety of Thunderbolt-enabled devices on display at the IDF, it at least looks like Thunderbolt won’t suffer the same ignominious fate as FireWire. There is a Thunderbolt Display without the display (port expansion hub) from Belkin (pictured right — more info at MacRumors); Blackmagic has a video breakout box; and Magma has a three-slot PCIe enclosure (below right) that you can put anything in, including a graphics card. There was also a Seagate storage enclosure that, according to a photo captured by AnandTech, looks an awful lot like the PlayStation 3.

At IDF, Intel also demonstrated a Windows 7 PC with a Thunderbolt port, and it was announced that Acer and Asus would bring Thunderbolt-enabled ultrabooks to the market sometime in 2012.

Unfortunately, the one question that still hangs in the air is by far the most pertinent: how much will these zero-latency, blink-and-you’ll-miss-it devices actually cost? It is assumed that Intel’s second-generation Thunderbolt controllers will be cheaper than the first — which would explain the large number of devices on display at IDF — but it’s possible that manufacturers are simply getting on board because Thunderbolt is finally coming to Windows.

As of today, with Thunderbolt being available on just a handful of Apple computers that constitute less than 1% of the global installed base, it just doesn’t make sense for manufacturers to invest in the new interconnect. With the possibility of Windows laptops and desktops (and tablets?) sporting Thunderbolt, peripherals with the new and mostly-untested socket now make more commercial sense.

Finally, while manufacturers will be able to place these second-generation controllers on motherboards, Intel has confirmed with ExtremeTech that its 2012 platforms (such as Ivy Bridge) will not feature chipset-integrated Thunderbolt. USB 3.0, on the other hand, will be baked into Ivy Bridge, and probably every other chipset that’s released in 2012. In other words, Thunderbolt might now be 100 times more appealing than it was in February 2011 — but it’s still incredibly unlikely to unseat USB 3.0 as the next-generation interconnect.