It's important to understand that Thunderbolt provides (external) access to the PCIe bus.
Nothing more/less
Under ideal circumstances, you can expect performance on-par with PCIe.
To achieve PCIe level performance, you have to meet all the following conditions:
- Running one of the latest Z170, Z270, or X99 motherboards that provide Thunderbolt-3 via USB-C port
- Running an up-to-date install of Win10
- Need a USB-C to Thunderbolt adapter
- Your audio interface needs full "PCIe via Thunderbolt" driver
Currently, only MOTU and UA have "PCIe via Thunderbolt" drivers that are actually available for Windows.
For a Mac user, Thunderbolt is critical.
On any current generation Mac, Thunderbolt is the *only* way to access the PCIe bus.
PC users have PCIe slots... so Thunderbolt is much less critical.
Thunderbolt is owned by Intel... so it won't be going anywhere anytime soon.