7 ms·

From a Pi consumer perspective, this is not that big of a deal. However, it damages the purpose (in name) of USB C. Isn't C supposed to be the 'all purpose' sp

From a Pi consumer perspective, this is not that big of a deal. However, it damages the purpose (in name) of USB C. Isn't C supposed to be the 'all purpose' spec? If we have popular manufacturers failing to follow the spec, we end up with cables marked as 'compatible with Raspberry Pi' or 'compatible with Nintendo Switch'. To the average consumer (and even most techies), USB C was supposed to be the 'one size fits all' connector. We're slowly heading in the opposite direction.

oftenwrong 7y ago
USB Type-C is an example of the second-system effect: http://catb.org/jargon/html/S/second-system-effect.html http://catb.org/jargon/html/S/second-system-effect.html
- ChristianBundy 7y ago
  Alternatively: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second-system_effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second-system_effect
  - m463 7y ago
    alternatively, "There are 14 competing standards"... https://xkcd.com/927/ https://xkcd.com/927/
- umvi 7y ago
  So basically Type-C is like the F-35 of the USB world?
CriticalCathed 7y ago
USB C has confused me for the same reason. I read often about how there is no expectation that two USB-C cables/ports will work together. Why design them to fit together if they won't always work right?
- weberc2 7y ago
  > Why design them to fit together if they won't always work right? I too don’t understand dynamic typing. ;)
- jakobegger 7y ago
  Because it's useful to have a bunch of multi-purpose ports on a computer. You can attach a mouse, a keyboard, a printer, a hard drive, a screen, a dock, a charger, or whatever you want, all to the same port. In my experience, finding the right cable has never been an issue. All the USB-C devices I've bought came with a suitable cable in the box.
  - johnbrodie 7y ago
    It's not the initial cable that's the problem, it's those that come after. My wife wanted a charger with a longer cable for her phone. We need it to be able to fast charge, which is called a variety of different names on both the phone and charger sides. Can I get the $10 charger, or do I need the $40 charger the size of the MBP charger? We ended up just biting the bullet and getting one of the more expensive, MBP-charger-shaped chargers, since I have laptops that use USB-C - but it was a confusing mess, and I still wasn't really sure fast charging would work on her phone till I plugged it in the first time.
    - silversconfused 7y ago
      You needed a $5 AC power extension cord.
      - michaelt 7y ago
        Carry around a 3,000 watt mains extension, because someone decided making USB C cables all support 100 watts was just too demanding, eh?
        silversconfused 7y ago
        Well sure if it's for a airconditioned-hottub-phone, but I'm pretty sure a small 600 watt cable would be more cost effective here.
loeg 7y ago
This has always been a criticism of USB C and it proves true time and time again. USB-C tries to be too many things to too many people and ends up with a huge matrix of incompatibility as a result.
- teilo 7y ago
  And the criticism is completely invalid here. The power spec is very clear and unambiguous, and there is only one way to get it right. It is not the fault of the spec when manufacturers cannot be bothered to produce a circuit that has already been designed for them in the spec itself.
  - TazeTSchnitzel 7y ago
    The USB Power Delivery specification is very complicated and covers, despite the name, a lot more than power delivery.
    - cesarb 7y ago
      But in this particular case, USB Power Delivery was not involved, only basic USB-C. The USB-C plug was designed so that simple uses, like the 15W charging RPi has, do not need USB Power Delivery at all, just a couple of identification resistors and a way to read the resulting voltage (which will tell whether you can use the full 3A or must use less).
  - silversconfused 7y ago
    Too complex and overreaching is certainly a valid fault.
    - oceanswave 7y ago
      If a spec defines a fully working part, and you go off and tackle the complexity by designing your own part that turns out to be non-compliant, then the blame is on the spec?
hanniabu 7y ago
Would be nice if they at least had a code on them to know what the compatibility is, such AV means the port is audio and video compatible, AVP would mean the former plus you can use it to charge or power a device. The same codes could be used on the cables as well.
- dsfyu404ed 7y ago
  And then you'd get and arms race that leads to "USB C AVPDEFWXYZLGBTQ" cables and ports that are compatible with every possible use and eventually everyone would just use those thus fulfilling the goal that USB C had in the first place.
  - rrss 7y ago
    > AVPDEFWXYZLGBTQ RISC-V, is that you?
- komali2 7y ago
  I don't think that solution works, because I have one converter that is audio, visual, power capable for my Nintendo Switch, but incompatible with my Surface Go, and another that is vis versa.
- tracker1 7y ago
  Disagree... you should have two types of cables, one low end, low power, etc... one high end, supports it all. That would be easier. As to the audio adapter, would just assume to have an inline dac, I have a USB2 A to 3.5mm 4-pole adapter that would be entirely doable in USB3, maybe a slight bump at either end. Then the device would have to support the given DAC, you'd have the same compatibility issues for audio, but that's already true. 3 failed attempts to get a cheap replacement for my lost my pixel 2 xl adapter.
Florin_Andrei 7y ago
> From a Pi consumer perspective, this is not that big of a deal. Well, didn't seem that way to me when I bought an RPi4, tried it with two different power supplies and cables, and it didn't work at all. I thought the device was DoA so I did an RME with the distributor. Today I learned a different story, and now I'll have to scrounge up yet another cable to see what the true story is. The one cable I have not tried may or may not be "dumb" enough for the RPi4 to work. It's annoying at best.
- heyoni 7y ago
  Would be less of an issue if they included a usb c power cable but they don’t :/
  - Florin_Andrei 7y ago
    Yeah. At least the "dumb" cable I use in the car with my phone is dumb enough to feed power to the RPi4 anyway, so I'm going to keep the device and just remember to only use it with cheap, dumb cables. I was very confused a few days ago when I plugged it into the MacBook Pro power supply, thinking "this ought to have more than enough juice for the Pi" - except the thing stayed dead and silent altogether. :)
OrgNet 7y ago
All purpose spec will be a round connector
- m463 7y ago
  We got rid of that for space reasons. courage.
giobox 7y ago
I find it incredible that presumably no one tried using a MacBook charger before this shipped. If they did and didn't document the shortcoming that's arguably just as bad. Surely a not insignificant number of customers have MacBooks? If I was writing some test specs this use case would almost certainly feature, given the MacBook Pro's USB C adapter must be one of the most widespread high power USB C charger designs in existence. Especially when the stock device does not ship with a power supply, not like it was unforeseeable some customers would just use the chargers they already have.
- Narishma 7y ago
  You over-estimate how popular Macbooks are outside the US.
  - giobox 7y ago
    About two thirds of all Apple's computers are sold outside the US. It's significant enough. In British engineering circles there are plenty of them (relevant given the location in which the Pi team works). The key point here is the standard charger design used on almost all laptop models from the world's 4th largest computer vendor. In my experience laptops from the top three have nothing close to the level of standardization in their charger design, given none of the top three have standardized solely on USB C for laptop charging. It was entirely foreseeable many people would try this and be disappointed when it didn't work.
- petecox 7y ago
  It seems a case of rushing a product 9-12 months ahead of schedule, scrapping two silicon revisions, as mentioned in the announcement[0] in their haste to be "production ready". "Good, low-cost USB-C power supplies (and USB-C cables) are surprisingly hard to find, as we discovered when sending out prototype units to alpha testers" In hindsight that reads that they tried a bunch of off-the-shelf cables and were perplexed about why some of them didn't work. So they built their own official power supply that worked around the design flaw. [0] https://www.raspberrypi.org/blog/raspberry-pi-4-on-sale-now-from-35/ https://www.raspberrypi.org/blog/raspberry-pi-4-on-sale-now-...

oftenwrong 7y ago

USB Type-C is an example of the second-system effect: http://catb.org/jargon/html/S/second-system-effect.html http://catb.org/jargon/html/S/second-system-effect.html

ChristianBundy 7y ago
Alternatively: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second-system_effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second-system_effect
- m463 7y ago
  alternatively, "There are 14 competing standards"... https://xkcd.com/927/ https://xkcd.com/927/
umvi 7y ago
So basically Type-C is like the F-35 of the USB world?

CriticalCathed 7y ago

USB C has confused me for the same reason. I read often about how there is no expectation that two USB-C cables/ports will work together. Why design them to fit together if they won't always work right?

weberc2 7y ago
> Why design them to fit together if they won't always work right? I too don’t understand dynamic typing. ;)
jakobegger 7y ago
Because it's useful to have a bunch of multi-purpose ports on a computer. You can attach a mouse, a keyboard, a printer, a hard drive, a screen, a dock, a charger, or whatever you want, all to the same port. In my experience, finding the right cable has never been an issue. All the USB-C devices I've bought came with a suitable cable in the box.
- johnbrodie 7y ago
  It's not the initial cable that's the problem, it's those that come after. My wife wanted a charger with a longer cable for her phone. We need it to be able to fast charge, which is called a variety of different names on both the phone and charger sides. Can I get the $10 charger, or do I need the $40 charger the size of the MBP charger? We ended up just biting the bullet and getting one of the more expensive, MBP-charger-shaped chargers, since I have laptops that use USB-C - but it was a confusing mess, and I still wasn't really sure fast charging would work on her phone till I plugged it in the first time.
  - silversconfused 7y ago
    You needed a $5 AC power extension cord.
    - michaelt 7y ago
      Carry around a 3,000 watt mains extension, because someone decided making USB C cables all support 100 watts was just too demanding, eh?
      - silversconfused 7y ago
        Well sure if it's for a airconditioned-hottub-phone, but I'm pretty sure a small 600 watt cable would be more cost effective here.

loeg 7y ago

This has always been a criticism of USB C and it proves true time and time again. USB-C tries to be too many things to too many people and ends up with a huge matrix of incompatibility as a result.

teilo 7y ago
And the criticism is completely invalid here. The power spec is very clear and unambiguous, and there is only one way to get it right. It is not the fault of the spec when manufacturers cannot be bothered to produce a circuit that has already been designed for them in the spec itself.
- TazeTSchnitzel 7y ago
  The USB Power Delivery specification is very complicated and covers, despite the name, a lot more than power delivery.
  - cesarb 7y ago
    But in this particular case, USB Power Delivery was not involved, only basic USB-C. The USB-C plug was designed so that simple uses, like the 15W charging RPi has, do not need USB Power Delivery at all, just a couple of identification resistors and a way to read the resulting voltage (which will tell whether you can use the full 3A or must use less).
- silversconfused 7y ago
  Too complex and overreaching is certainly a valid fault.
  - oceanswave 7y ago
    If a spec defines a fully working part, and you go off and tackle the complexity by designing your own part that turns out to be non-compliant, then the blame is on the spec?

hanniabu 7y ago

Would be nice if they at least had a code on them to know what the compatibility is, such AV means the port is audio and video compatible, AVP would mean the former plus you can use it to charge or power a device. The same codes could be used on the cables as well.

dsfyu404ed 7y ago
And then you'd get and arms race that leads to "USB C AVPDEFWXYZLGBTQ" cables and ports that are compatible with every possible use and eventually everyone would just use those thus fulfilling the goal that USB C had in the first place.
- rrss 7y ago
  > AVPDEFWXYZLGBTQ RISC-V, is that you?
komali2 7y ago
I don't think that solution works, because I have one converter that is audio, visual, power capable for my Nintendo Switch, but incompatible with my Surface Go, and another that is vis versa.
tracker1 7y ago
Disagree... you should have two types of cables, one low end, low power, etc... one high end, supports it all. That would be easier. As to the audio adapter, would just assume to have an inline dac, I have a USB2 A to 3.5mm 4-pole adapter that would be entirely doable in USB3, maybe a slight bump at either end. Then the device would have to support the given DAC, you'd have the same compatibility issues for audio, but that's already true. 3 failed attempts to get a cheap replacement for my lost my pixel 2 xl adapter.

Florin_Andrei 7y ago

> From a Pi consumer perspective, this is not that big of a deal. Well, didn't seem that way to me when I bought an RPi4, tried it with two different power supplies and cables, and it didn't work at all. I thought the device was DoA so I did an RME with the distributor. Today I learned a different story, and now I'll have to scrounge up yet another cable to see what the true story is. The one cable I have not tried may or may not be "dumb" enough for the RPi4 to work. It's annoying at best.

heyoni 7y ago
Would be less of an issue if they included a usb c power cable but they don’t :/
- Florin_Andrei 7y ago
  Yeah. At least the "dumb" cable I use in the car with my phone is dumb enough to feed power to the RPi4 anyway, so I'm going to keep the device and just remember to only use it with cheap, dumb cables. I was very confused a few days ago when I plugged it into the MacBook Pro power supply, thinking "this ought to have more than enough juice for the Pi" - except the thing stayed dead and silent altogether. :)

OrgNet 7y ago

All purpose spec will be a round connector

m463 7y ago
We got rid of that for space reasons. courage.

giobox 7y ago

I find it incredible that presumably no one tried using a MacBook charger before this shipped. If they did and didn't document the shortcoming that's arguably just as bad. Surely a not insignificant number of customers have MacBooks? If I was writing some test specs this use case would almost certainly feature, given the MacBook Pro's USB C adapter must be one of the most widespread high power USB C charger designs in existence. Especially when the stock device does not ship with a power supply, not like it was unforeseeable some customers would just use the chargers they already have.

Narishma 7y ago
You over-estimate how popular Macbooks are outside the US.
- giobox 7y ago
  About two thirds of all Apple's computers are sold outside the US. It's significant enough. In British engineering circles there are plenty of them (relevant given the location in which the Pi team works). The key point here is the standard charger design used on almost all laptop models from the world's 4th largest computer vendor. In my experience laptops from the top three have nothing close to the level of standardization in their charger design, given none of the top three have standardized solely on USB C for laptop charging. It was entirely foreseeable many people would try this and be disappointed when it didn't work.
petecox 7y ago
It seems a case of rushing a product 9-12 months ahead of schedule, scrapping two silicon revisions, as mentioned in the announcement[0] in their haste to be "production ready". "Good, low-cost USB-C power supplies (and USB-C cables) are surprisingly hard to find, as we discovered when sending out prototype units to alpha testers" In hindsight that reads that they tried a bunch of off-the-shelf cables and were perplexed about why some of them didn't work. So they built their own official power supply that worked around the design flaw. [0] https://www.raspberrypi.org/blog/raspberry-pi-4-on-sale-now-from-35/ https://www.raspberrypi.org/blog/raspberry-pi-4-on-sale-now-...