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I hear you, but RJ45 never pretended to be anything other than a physical standard. USB-C, on the other hand, is the latest successor to the USB standard, which

I hear you, but RJ45 never pretended to be anything other than a physical standard. USB-C, on the other hand, is the latest successor to the USB standard, which from the beginning was both a physical specification and a protocol specification. The article correctly points out that there are now so many variations on the protocol implementation that it's confusing to the consumer. And he's clearly right. The whole point is that you shouldn't have to "do a bit of research" before you plug in the only cable connector your device has.

tw04 6y ago
Citation? The USB-C specification is the physical specification. All the other stuff is a USB specification but it has nothing to do with USB-C. https://www.usb.org/sites/default/files/usb_type-c_language_product_and_packaging_guidelines_final.pdf https://www.usb.org/sites/default/files/usb_type-c_language_... https://webstore.iec.ch/publication/25676 https://webstore.iec.ch/publication/25676 The layman confusion the USB-PD and USB-3.2 specifications is no different than someone thinking they can get 10gbe over a 1000m cat-5 cable because the ends plug into their 10Gbe adapter.
- vannevar 6y ago
  You're absolutely right, I stand corrected. But the author's complaint is still legitimate: in the context of billions of consumer devices, the diversity of behaviors is a problem. With RJ45, as long as the cable wasn't defective, it generally wouldn't fail completely. And relatively few consumers ever wired their own networks, whereas virtually everyone has to deal with USB-C-equipped devices.
  - tw04 6y ago
    >With RJ45, as long as the cable wasn't defective, it generally wouldn't fail completely. That's just not true, and I don't mean this to be demeaning but you clearly haven't had to install new hardware into an old datacenter. I can't tell you how many times I've run into situations where a 1Gbe port would auto-negotiate to 10Mbps half-duplex. Did it technically not fail? I guess... but the line was so lossy you couldn't get a ping to complete much less an actual session of any sort.
    - vannevar 6y ago
      I can tell you that, as a consumer who has wired a lot of small office and home Ethernet, I've never seen a failure like that. On the other hand, I've seen lots of unexpected behavior with USB. I don't doubt your sincerity, but the reality is that very few consumers have to rebuild data centers. Lots of them need to power personal devices with shared USB cables and power supplies.

tw04 6y ago

Citation? The USB-C specification is the physical specification. All the other stuff is a USB specification but it has nothing to do with USB-C. https://www.usb.org/sites/default/files/usb_type-c_language_product_and_packaging_guidelines_final.pdf https://www.usb.org/sites/default/files/usb_type-c_language_... https://webstore.iec.ch/publication/25676 https://webstore.iec.ch/publication/25676 The layman confusion the USB-PD and USB-3.2 specifications is no different than someone thinking they can get 10gbe over a 1000m cat-5 cable because the ends plug into their 10Gbe adapter.

vannevar 6y ago
You're absolutely right, I stand corrected. But the author's complaint is still legitimate: in the context of billions of consumer devices, the diversity of behaviors is a problem. With RJ45, as long as the cable wasn't defective, it generally wouldn't fail completely. And relatively few consumers ever wired their own networks, whereas virtually everyone has to deal with USB-C-equipped devices.
- tw04 6y ago
  >With RJ45, as long as the cable wasn't defective, it generally wouldn't fail completely. That's just not true, and I don't mean this to be demeaning but you clearly haven't had to install new hardware into an old datacenter. I can't tell you how many times I've run into situations where a 1Gbe port would auto-negotiate to 10Mbps half-duplex. Did it technically not fail? I guess... but the line was so lossy you couldn't get a ping to complete much less an actual session of any sort.
  - vannevar 6y ago
    I can tell you that, as a consumer who has wired a lot of small office and home Ethernet, I've never seen a failure like that. On the other hand, I've seen lots of unexpected behavior with USB. I don't doubt your sincerity, but the reality is that very few consumers have to rebuild data centers. Lots of them need to power personal devices with shared USB cables and power supplies.