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Why Doesn’t the Surface Laptop Have a USB-C Charger?
- rbanffy 9y agoThere is little upside for Microsoft in having USB-C on their laptop. Peripheral support is still small and adopting it could be interpreted as validating Apple's choice and further drive availability of devices Apple laptops could use.
- duxup 9y agoI'm really not sure "validating" an apple design choice is more than ego at this point. Even if there are few peripherals there are more than a proprietary charging cable / port will ever have...
- mattnewton 9y agoI don't really understand that? USB c happened outside apple devices first, and its usage is going to grow. If you still have the old style USB ports, you have a device that is more peripheral compatible than the current MacBook, while being just as future proof, no?
- zyx321 9y agoThere was just no room in the design for it. Replacing USB-A would hurt backwards compatibility. Replacing MiniDP would lead users to expect Thunderbolt 3 functionality Replacing the proprietary power/dock connector would brand it as a cheaper second-class device along the lines of the non-pro Surface 3
- outside1234 9y agoCost perhaps? I don't know about the pricing differential between the two, but that's the simplest answer. Also, if this is for an educational market, another answer might be simplicity. Kids and teachers and parents likely didn't want to have to shell out multiple times for lost dongles.
- Ajedi32 9y agoThe surface laptop starts at $999; I'd be really surprised if they couldn't fit in a USB-C port at that price point. Also the article isn't arguing that the laptop shouldn't have any USB-A ports, just that the charging cable should be USB-C rather than a proprietary cable.
- ropiku 9y agoI'm thinking the cost for not including Thunderbolt 3 (needs a chip, more power, etc.) but not for missing USB-C.
- ghostly_s 9y agoDon't Intel's latest chips have a couple TB3 busses included?
- douche 9y ago> Also, if this is for an educational market Break-away magnetic charger connections are huge if you're going to be issuing them to students. There goes a big chunk of your out-of-commission broken laptops, because somebody tripped over the cord.
- maxxxxx 9y agoThis is a pretty expensive laptop so I don't think price should be an issues here
- ocdtrekkie 9y agoFWIW, it's a pretty expensive laptop, and they still put a free version of Windows 10 on it rather than the full version. (Barring the temporary free upgrade promotion.)
- rileymat2 9y agoWhenever I am fumbling around with the usb-c power on my MacBook Pro, I miss MagSafe.
- qntty 9y agoIt's a shame apple doesn't make a usb-c cable with a magnetic break at the computer end of the cable.
- sithadmin 9y agoWhat would the point of that be? Having a USB-C port provides versatility in function. Having a weird proprietary USB-C cable that hooks onto a proprietary magnetic charging interface doesn't provide a ton of improvement over magsafe (even if it could support other USB-C peripherals with an adapter, who wants a USB drive or other device to snap off with a bit of pressure?)
- baldfat 9y agoApple may do it. But it is already in the wild. https://www.amazon.com/Lightning-Magnetic-Charging-Transmission-Smartphone/dp/B01N2AI237/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1493914076&sr=8-3&keywords=magsafe+to+usb-c https://www.amazon.com/Lightning-Magnetic-Charging-Transmiss...
- redler 9y agoScratching that plug around the nearly featureless edge of the MBP is an extremely unsatisfying experience, especially compared to the old "snick" of a MagSafe plug practically attaching itself.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- cptskippy 9y agoForm over function is just part of the Apple experience. Next you'll be complaining about how the sharp edges of the MBP cut into your wrists or how your have to use your pinkie to hit some of the touch targets in iOS.
- nailer 9y agoI like the surface connector. It's magnetic, plug a single cable in and you get external displays, USB and power. If USB C had a magnetic version I'd consider it.
- ropiku 9y agoYou can get the same from other kinds of USB-C docks, not just proprietary Microsoft. Griffin makes magnetic USB-C cable if that's what you are looking for and possibly other producers will start.
- Eridrus 9y agoWhy are the default cables that come with laptops not magnetic cables? Are the Griffin-style magnetic cables just crap? It seems like a usability regression for no great reason.
- xattt 9y agoI'd say signal loss is a sigificant factor in magnetic solutions given the speed of the protocol. USB-C and Thunderbolt provide metal "envelopes" over the connector when they are inserted. Magnetic connectors cannot do this to facilitate quick removal.
- nailer 9y agoThe Griffin magnetic USB C cables are just USB C -> proprietary magnetic connector -> USB C. See https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/61M0YzqUbOL._SX450_.jpg https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/61M0YzqUbOL... I have a proprietary magnetic connector now and I don't have a dongle sticking out of the laptop.
- cptskippy 9y agoThat's a function of the cable and not the laptop. With MagSafe any MagSafe charger will work. With that you only get protection when you bring your Griffin Magnetic dongle with you and remember to use it.
- ocdtrekkie 9y agoSo, I have a Surface Pro 4, and for various things I have an Ethernet adapter, a portable disc drive, flash drives, etc. ...Everything I want to plug into it is USB-A. I actually have a single USB-C device, which is one of my wireless charging pads for my phone. The phone itself is Micro-USB, and the wireless charging pad... it's own cable is A-to-C. I'd be really disappointed if I bought a laptop and it didn't have a USB-A port, but USB-C is a trivial thing I do not need. I honestly think the practical call if I have to pick one or the other is still USB-A. That isn't to say this won't change in the future, but I don't feel we're at a place where on a PC you can only fit one or the other you should be picking C. It's just not there yet. (And, as a SP4 owner, I'm glad Microsoft is still pushing SurfaceConnect, it gives me hope my Surface crud won't all be useless soon.)
- stinos 9y agoI honestly think the practical call if I have to pick one or the other is still USB-A. Reading MS's reply that is likely what they thougt as well. It is just, currently, the most practical for (likely) the majority of their customers. At one point you could say they are 'blocking' wide acceptance of USB-C. On the other hand: it will imo still take years before most USB devices sold will be USB-C and the legacy of USB-A devices still being around at that time will be huge anyway. Yes dongles fix all that, but no matter how cheap they are, it's yet another piece to carry around, which can break, get lost, ...
- news_to_me 9y agoI mean, the laptop still has USB-A ports. It's just the charging port that's discussed here – USB-C vs their proprietary charger.
- lmm 9y agoRemember that port isn't just for charging, it's also used to connect to their dock.
- ocdtrekkie 9y agoArguably, the eventual Surface Phone could even use that connector and dock setup.
- stevehawk 9y agoI guess I'm an old fogey now (35) but I don't want a USB C charger. I want a non data transferring power plug that can't be used to compromise my machine should a manufacturer opt to do that. I also only use power bricks to charge my phones/tablets at public charging places instead of the supplied USB cables. Are there power only Type C cables for charging? Is there some pressing need to reduce the ports on the side of a laptop? I didn't buy the thing to be stylish and impress women, I bought it to get shit done.
- nailer 9y agoThat's a reasonable concern - there are USB 'condoms' that ensure the connection is for charging only. http://syncstop.com/ http://syncstop.com/
- solatic 9y agoFor USB-C phones only, not laptops: http://www.portablepowersupplies.co.uk/portapow-data-block-charge-usb-c-cable/ http://www.portablepowersupplies.co.uk/portapow-data-block-c... What's really needed is both a magsafe-style port as well as a USB-C port capable of charging. Use the magsafe charger when you've got it around, and retain the flexibility to charge through USB-C when that's what's available.
- franciscop 9y agoLaptop chargers are not as mobile chargers; when you connect a USB, the USB cannot just read the computer's data. It also cannot execute a program. This all comes from USB sticks that got so infected. 0-days aside of course.
- megous 9y agoSure it can. All it needs to do that is to emulate a HID device and act as an keyboard or mouse. You might notice when it starts opening cmd/shell and typing commands, or not, or at least not fast enough. Or you may not understand what's happening and ignore the black box that popped up for a while on your desktop.
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- ksk 9y agoThe article could be summed up by the title itself. It doesn't seem to provide much else.
- ghostly_s 9y agoNo kidding. Since when is 500 words restating a one-sentence question considered an 'article'? Reads like a book report by a 6th-grader who forgot to read the book.
- rdl 9y agoI prefer power-only chargers, vs. data+power. If we train people to plug their devices into two-way data ports unthinkingly, bad stuff will happen. Realistically if you give someone a USB charger, they'll eventually use USB to another device. With HID profiles being unlocked except in very locked down enterprise environments, doom. (This can be solved by hardware/OS people, though.)
- baldfat 9y ago> If we train people to plug their devices into two-way data ports unthinkingly, bad stuff will happen. It can't go wrong if EVERYTHING is USB-C this is what our future is going to look like.
- treebeard901 9y agoWhat does USB stand for again? Maybe it's time to admit defeat and start the whole universal process over.
- dimman 9y agoI've heard several stories about problems with USB-C to DisplayPort. To be honest it's been one of my main concerns when looking for a new Ultrabook, HDMI (as practically implemented) mostly doesn't work with 2560x1440 and higher res external displays. Wonder if that's a reason to why they went with USB type A and separate miniDP?
- cwyers 9y agoAs lmm notes, the Surface Dock is a really nice peripheral that works with the Surface charging port: https://www.thurrott.com/mobile/microsoft-surface/7098/hands-on-with-surface-dock https://www.thurrott.com/mobile/microsoft-surface/7098/hands...
- billpg 9y agoI miss barrel power connectors. ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coaxial_power_connector https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coaxial_power_connector ) Standardize a physical size and electrical characteristics and we're done. You can plug one in the dark since there's no wrong way round. No data lines so no worrying about security, just plug it in and you're charging up.
- toast0 9y agoUnfortunately, that ship has sailed. The industry had years to decide on a standard for this, but never even got to the point where one company would standardize on a single charger for its whole product line for more than about three years: most companies would do a full business line with compatible chargers, but consumer laptops had something different, and when they did a big hardware refresh, they'd change up the power connectors too.
- cptskippy 9y ago> consumer laptops had something different Or in Lenovo's case each consumer laptop has a different connector. You'll be happy to know that they've also come full circle and the 2017 laptops are using barrel connectors again. All of the different sizes too.
- cptskippy 9y agoMy favorite are Lenovo's USB doppelganger chargers. I'm not sure what's worse, trying to cram your charger into a USB port or trying to cram a USB plug into the charge port.