5 ms·

I love the idea of USB-C - Being able to have one cable which can do everything is great. But I've become very leery about actually trusting it in practice - T

by e1ven 9y ago

I love the idea of USB-C - Being able to have one cable which can do everything is great. But I've become very leery about actually trusting it in practice - There are so many examples of bad cables, or devices which don't quite follow the specification, causing things to break badly. If you end up having to follow a defacto "Only use 1st party tools" rule for safety reasons, I'd almost rather manufacturers went back to proprietary connectors. Those aren't inter-operable, but at least they don't pretend to be and risk me breaking everything.

bluedino 9y ago
Regular USB had all the same problems. I can't charge my JBL speaker with my iPad charger. And I can't charge much of anything with my older Toshiba laptop USB ports. Why anyone thought it would be different this time around, I don't know.
- leeoniya 9y ago
  what you're describing is simply that those ports were not designed to deliver a lot of amps because usb devices at that time did not need it. i dont think it's the same as not being fully spec compliant at the protocol level. i've never had 2 usb 2.0 devices refuse to work together.
- stordoff 9y ago
  Different classes of failure though. Older USB ports would just fail to work (in the majority of cases), whereas with USB-C there is the risk of damaging the device.
- digi_owl 9y ago
  That is a different Kettle of fish. First of all, Apple came up with a slightly different set of resistors on the data pins (leaning that the data in and data out will read slightly different V) to signal to their devices that they could go above 1A draw while charging. The official charging spec says to put a resistor between the data pins (inside the charger to support detachable USB cables), or simply to short them with a blob of solder. Your JBL speakers are likely reacting as if it was plugged into a normal USB port. also keep in mind that the charging spec came about as China and EU wanted to deal with the piles of incompatible chargers that was going into landfills. Thus older USB ports max out at 5V 0.5A, as that was the spec back when USB 1.0 was launched. Also why some external HDDs come with a Y cable that draws power from two USB ports to get the motor spinning.
lbotos 9y ago
My favorite is I have an HP Envy USB-C monitor to use with my Macbook, and using the HP factory supplied cable, every time I power it on I get a warning that I should use an "official HP USB-C cable". It's literally the one straight from the box!
- lou1306 9y ago
  What they meant is that you should use an official HP Envy laptop :)
- LanceH 9y ago
  My macbook won't wake up my usb-c monitors consistently. I have tried 8 cables at this point. I have to unplug the cable and plug it back in. I also refuses to mount my phone straight usb-c, and the known workaround is to go usbc -> a -> c. At this point in my relationship with Apple, I can only assume this is deliberate.
  - indecisive_user 9y ago
    So _that's_ why my monitor doesn't wake up. I got the new xps13, it only has thunderbolt/USBc-C ports and it's pretty much 50/50 whether my external monitor will wake up. I figured it was the cable and was about to buy another one but you saved me the trouble. I also got a hootoo adapter that's supposed to support power delivery but that hasn't worked either :/
    - olyjohn 9y ago
      This isn't just a problem with USB-C. There are also tons of video adapters on the market that say they support 4k, but really don't. We have grips of 2560x1440 monitors at work, and they had tons of issues like this where the monitors may or may not wake up, may handle the native res for a while, then power down or switch back to 1080p. The only consistent fix for them has been to buy one particular brand of adapter that we found works and making sure it's active. So I guess what I'm saying is, display tech has already been having issues for a long time with crappy components, and USB-C is just adding one problem into the mix now.
gambiting 9y ago
It's insane to me that you can have two USB-C cables that look exactly the same externally yet provide different(and incompatible!) connections. You can have a USB 2.0, USB 3.0, USB 3.1, Power-only, Display-only, Thunderbolt-3-only "usb-c" cables that all look identical outside yet won't work for your use case. Prime example to me was that the USB-C cable supplied with the MacBook Pro cannot be used to connect the LG displays sold by apple which also use USB-C, and the user gets absolutely zero explanation as to why it doesn't work, no error, no warning - just a blank screen. That's nuts.
- lmm 9y ago
  > You can have a USB 2.0, USB 3.0, USB 3.1, Power-only, Display-only, Thunderbolt-3-only "usb-c" cables that all look identical outside yet won't work for your use case. Half of those are not spec-compliant. There are only 4 different legitimate types of cable: 3.0 non-power/thunderbolt, 3.1 non-power/thunderbolt, power-capable non-thunderbolt, and thunderbolt. That's 3 more types than there should be, but let's not make the problem worse than it is.
  - lugg 9y ago
    Wait what. That is insane. Who thought this would be ok? Is there any cables that are fullspec?
    - lvh 9y ago
      Yes: Thunderbolt. I only buy those because the $10 extra I spend on a cable now will never matter if I have to deal with this nonsense even once.
      - edude03 9y ago
        Only 0.5M TB3 cables are full spec. Longer ones only support USB 2.0 apparently
        dijit 9y ago

by e1ven 9y ago

bluedino 9y ago

Regular USB had all the same problems. I can't charge my JBL speaker with my iPad charger. And I can't charge much of anything with my older Toshiba laptop USB ports. Why anyone thought it would be different this time around, I don't know.

leeoniya 9y ago
what you're describing is simply that those ports were not designed to deliver a lot of amps because usb devices at that time did not need it. i dont think it's the same as not being fully spec compliant at the protocol level. i've never had 2 usb 2.0 devices refuse to work together.
stordoff 9y ago
Different classes of failure though. Older USB ports would just fail to work (in the majority of cases), whereas with USB-C there is the risk of damaging the device.
digi_owl 9y ago
That is a different Kettle of fish. First of all, Apple came up with a slightly different set of resistors on the data pins (leaning that the data in and data out will read slightly different V) to signal to their devices that they could go above 1A draw while charging. The official charging spec says to put a resistor between the data pins (inside the charger to support detachable USB cables), or simply to short them with a blob of solder. Your JBL speakers are likely reacting as if it was plugged into a normal USB port. also keep in mind that the charging spec came about as China and EU wanted to deal with the piles of incompatible chargers that was going into landfills. Thus older USB ports max out at 5V 0.5A, as that was the spec back when USB 1.0 was launched. Also why some external HDDs come with a Y cable that draws power from two USB ports to get the motor spinning.

lbotos 9y ago

My favorite is I have an HP Envy USB-C monitor to use with my Macbook, and using the HP factory supplied cable, every time I power it on I get a warning that I should use an "official HP USB-C cable". It's literally the one straight from the box!

lou1306 9y ago
What they meant is that you should use an official HP Envy laptop :)
LanceH 9y ago
My macbook won't wake up my usb-c monitors consistently. I have tried 8 cables at this point. I have to unplug the cable and plug it back in. I also refuses to mount my phone straight usb-c, and the known workaround is to go usbc -> a -> c. At this point in my relationship with Apple, I can only assume this is deliberate.
- indecisive_user 9y ago
  So _that's_ why my monitor doesn't wake up. I got the new xps13, it only has thunderbolt/USBc-C ports and it's pretty much 50/50 whether my external monitor will wake up. I figured it was the cable and was about to buy another one but you saved me the trouble. I also got a hootoo adapter that's supposed to support power delivery but that hasn't worked either :/
  - olyjohn 9y ago
    This isn't just a problem with USB-C. There are also tons of video adapters on the market that say they support 4k, but really don't. We have grips of 2560x1440 monitors at work, and they had tons of issues like this where the monitors may or may not wake up, may handle the native res for a while, then power down or switch back to 1080p. The only consistent fix for them has been to buy one particular brand of adapter that we found works and making sure it's active. So I guess what I'm saying is, display tech has already been having issues for a long time with crappy components, and USB-C is just adding one problem into the mix now.

gambiting 9y ago

It's insane to me that you can have two USB-C cables that look exactly the same externally yet provide different(and incompatible!) connections. You can have a USB 2.0, USB 3.0, USB 3.1, Power-only, Display-only, Thunderbolt-3-only "usb-c" cables that all look identical outside yet won't work for your use case. Prime example to me was that the USB-C cable supplied with the MacBook Pro cannot be used to connect the LG displays sold by apple which also use USB-C, and the user gets absolutely zero explanation as to why it doesn't work, no error, no warning - just a blank screen. That's nuts.

lmm 9y ago
> You can have a USB 2.0, USB 3.0, USB 3.1, Power-only, Display-only, Thunderbolt-3-only "usb-c" cables that all look identical outside yet won't work for your use case. Half of those are not spec-compliant. There are only 4 different legitimate types of cable: 3.0 non-power/thunderbolt, 3.1 non-power/thunderbolt, power-capable non-thunderbolt, and thunderbolt. That's 3 more types than there should be, but let's not make the problem worse than it is.
- lugg 9y ago
  Wait what. That is insane. Who thought this would be ok? Is there any cables that are fullspec?
  - lvh 9y ago
    Yes: Thunderbolt. I only buy those because the $10 extra I spend on a cable now will never matter if I have to deal with this nonsense even once.
    - edude03 9y ago
      Only 0.5M TB3 cables are full spec. Longer ones only support USB 2.0 apparently
      - dijit 9y ago