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Word of warning, for those reading this far: The Switch and Switch Dock are not USB-C devices. That you’re able to plug in a USB-C charger or USB-C device and

Word of warning, for those reading this far: The Switch and Switch Dock are not USB-C devices. That you’re able to plug in a USB-C charger or USB-C device and see it supposedly work just means that you haven’t yet encountered the scenario(s) that can electronically damage the Switch. Nintendo’s warranty does not cover this damage when it occurs, requiring a full-cost repair or replacement as you connected unlicensed and unauthorized hardware to it.

dheera 6y ago
I wish there were legal protections around this. Using a standard plug means it should accept the standard for that plug.
- mikepurvis 6y ago
  It depends, though. In all likelihood it would end up thrown back on the consumer— "Did you use a licensed/approved/certified charger? Sounds like you need to take this up with whoever made the charger that fried our product." It might help resolve certain really common cases like compatibility between the chargers and devices of the mainstream entities. I guess I'd argue that that should be happening on its own, but Nintendo definitely dropped the ball with releasing a USB-C product in 2017 that was interoperable with Apple and other name-brand chargers which had been in existence for two years previously at that point.
  - dheera 6y ago
    The chargers that use standard plugs should also be made to support the standard or they should be held legally responsible. In this particular case I think even well-known name brand chargers which follow standards (Apple, Anker) are breaking the Nintendo, and that's unacceptable.
    - floatingatoll 6y ago
      Nintendo’s Switch plug happens to physically and electrically seem to accept USB-C charger connectors, but it’s not a USB-C plug, and the Switch should not be considered compatible just because it uses a similar plug. Nintendo should have taken more steps with their charger to restrict the Switch to authorized chargers only, rather than permitting unsupported chargers (such as standard USB-C ones) from being able to power it. Or even just outright used a proprietary connector! None of this is any fault of the chargers. They’re the ones adhering to the standards correctly. The Switch is at fault.
      - danhor 6y ago
        All (or most) of the reports of switches being bricked stem for 3rd party docks, where the dock is at fault and using 9v for signal pins, see https://hackaday.com/2019/08/04/the-not-quite-usb-c-of-nintendo-switch-accessories/ https://hackaday.com/2019/08/04/the-not-quite-usb-c-of-ninte...
        beowulfey 6y ago
        Whether or not this is the case, Nintendo makes it very clear in their warranty that using an unauthorized charger is not covered. They definitely did not intend for it to be a universal port.
        colejohnson66 6y ago
        The problem is that most consumers don’t read those warnings. And the “reasonable person” would assume that any USB-C cable would work if the USB-C-like receptacle mates with their USB-C cable.
        DanBC 6y ago
        Nintendo say that for all their devices, even the ones that use Nintendo-specific connectors.
        setr 6y ago
        Why would nintendo warranty try to cover scenarios entirely out of their hands? Just because the other guy claims they've produced a usb-c charger doesnt mean they actually did it correctly (which is apparently the case with these docks) If you shove 9V into a 5V device, bad things will happen, regardless of Nintendo is anti-standard or not
    - afiori 6y ago
      I would rather like it if USB standards had better names and a definition of a "safety score" then device manufacturers have to advertise a minimum supported score (for devices) and a minimum guaranteed score (for chargers).
    - mcv 6y ago
      All of this just underscores what a terrible standard USB-C is. You have no idea what's what anymore by looking at it. Everything seems to fit together, but if you do it, you damage your devices. It would have been better if they'd launched another dozen different plug standards. In situations when there's only one thing you should be connecting to your device, that's the way to go. Universal sockets only make sense if they're actually universal.
      - Goronmon 6y ago
        All of this just underscores what a terrible standard USB-C is. Nothing above seems related to the standard. At the end of the day, its still comes down to the manufacturers to follow the standard in order for everything to to work. But the standard itself can't stop any particular manufacturer from making a non-compliant product.
        colejohnson66 6y ago
        There are trademarks on the USB logos, so the USB consortium not enforcing their trademark on standards violators (using their logo) is something they could do, but don’t.
        Gibbon1 6y ago
        It's a bad standard if shorting adjacent pins fries equipment. That the people created a standard like that means they aren't competent to create these sort of standards.
    - dkonofalski 6y ago
      That is not the case. The current reports, as far as I've seen, have all (or at least mostly) been from 3rd party docks where pins on the dock side were bridged and shorted the charger, frying the Switch's port. Edit: A poster below this question said they fried their Switch by using their Macbook charger so I may have been naively optimistic in my original statement.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
- floatingatoll 6y ago
  I wish the same about people who sell adapters for plugging 15A electrical devices into 25A electrical outlets. Sadly, the legal burden is placed exclusively on the buyer (via electrical code).
  - jessaustin 6y ago
    I don't see how such a product would be useful for anyone. At least in USA, anywhere a 25A circuit is available, a 15A circuit is also available. The converse (using a 25A device on a 15A circuit) would be useful, but also wouldn't be dangerous in any way.
    - toast0 6y ago
      Looking at us (NEMA) plugs, there's plugs for 15A, 20A, 30A, and 50A. I'm going to assume everyone means 30A instead of 25A. Generally, where there's a 30A circuit, a 15A circuit is also available, but there are exceptions. You may have wired a RV hookup with only a 30A receptacle, but you want to run some lights, or tools or ? with a 15A plug from that on a temporary basis. The circuit is (presumably) good for 30A, so adapting to a lower amp receptacle is reasonable --- it won't hurt anything to draw fewer amps through the circuit. Adapting from a 15A socket to a 30A socket can be dangerous; the 15A or 20A[1] breaker or fuse on the circuit won't immediately open with a 30A draw, and the wiring will heat up during the time it takes for the circuit protection to open; possibly long enough to cause a fire. Of course, just because a load has a 30A plug doesn't mean it draws 30A all the time, there are conditions where using such an adapter is safe, but it requires knowledge of the load. [1] US NEC code allows for a 20A breaker on circuits served by 15A receptacle, as long as there is more than one receptacle
      - mikepurvis 6y ago
        If the 15A device fails short, it's going to get a much bigger load between failure and the breaker tripping on a 30A breaker than a 15A one.
  - blinky1456 6y ago
- bleepblorp 6y ago
  Yes. USB-PD is in a twilight zone where it can deliver enough power to cause safety risks but, due to its low voltage, is not subject to the level of regulatory scrutiny that other electrical products receive. To date, the USB-IF's approach to safety and interoperability does not adequately protect consumers. USB-PD devices should not be incompatible to the point of damage but USB-IF has been unable to ensure this by keeping non-compliant products off the market. USB-PD needs to be pulled under the IEC, NRTL (US) and CE (EU) regulatory systems and compliance overseen by entities with the legal authority to deter legitimate manufacturers/importers from selling non-compliant products. "You can plug it in, but it might catch fire" just isn't good enough for a power delivery system that can provide 100W.
  - Gibbon1 6y ago
    Yeah anything that can drop 100W into a device absolutely needs to be under regulatory compliance.
    - jsjohnst 6y ago
      100W really isn’t that much power comparatively speaking to things that are currently regulated. The issue is the specific circumstances (tiny copper traces feeding into SMT components), not the fact that it’s 100W of power alone.
- thetinguy 6y ago
  Nintendo is following the protocol. They’re using an officially supported alternate mode.
jaypeg25 6y ago
what about the switch pro controller? I'll sometimes charge it on whatever usb-c cable is nearby when I'm gaming and the controller starts to die. Is that OK?
- danhor 6y ago
  The pro controller doesn't use PD, so there's very little risk to destroy anything with a somewhat compliant charger. (There are some out there that repurpose normal USB-A for higher voltages, but they're very rare)
danhor 6y ago
The Brick-Gate issue, where many switches where bricked, was not an issue with generic chargers, but specifically 3rd party docks. And, as it turns out, the issue in that case wasn't on the switch side, but the manufacturers of the 3rd party docks, that used 9v on a normal signal pin (cc) [very much not spec compliant], which destroyed the pd chip inside the switch: https://hackaday.com/2019/08/04/the-not-quite-usb-c-of-nintendo-switch-accessories/ https://hackaday.com/2019/08/04/the-not-quite-usb-c-of-ninte.... There have been few -if any- reports of switches being destroyed otherwise.
- floatingatoll 6y ago
  That is excellent news!
- ender341341 6y ago
  This is really good to hear. I hadn't heard this follow up and besides joysticks (going back to the n64 era) Nintendo's traditionally had an insanely good hardware QA so I was surprised to hear about the issues initially.
hobofan 6y ago
How are there multiple people here in the thread that say that the port on the Switch is not a USB-C port, when it says so in the official specs _right on their website_? https://www.nintendo.com/switch/tech-specs https://www.nintendo.com/switch/tech-specs
- floatingatoll 6y ago
  I think I'm wrong, honestly, given the two replies to my two comments on the matter. It's too late to edit them but I am upvoting those replies anyways! I do think there's still the matter of "Not all USB-PD adapters provide the specific electrical demands of a Switch or Switch Dock" to contend with — and that does tie back to the original article's point about USB-C being kind of a nightmare. EDIT: There are still reports of someone frying a Switch with an Apple USB-C power adapter (which is USB-C compliant), no dock or anything involved. Whatever else does or doesn't work, Nintendo won't cover damage under warranty if you used a third-party charger.
- brigade 6y ago
  Probably a corruption of the fact that the protocol to get HDMI out of the Switch is a proprietary alt-mode, which is why standard docks and USB-C to HDMI adapters don't work. But USB-PD chargers are very much intended to work. The docks that do work generally reversed-engineered the proprietary protocol, and some have damaged Switches because they got details wrong.
  - ascagnel_ 6y ago
    The protocol to get video-out isn’t proprietary, just rare —they’re using Mobility DisplayPort from the Switch, and converting DP to HDMI in the dock. Of course, had they used the native HDMI side-channel (which I’m not sure had been finalized at the time), they would have been able to skip this step.
- aspaceman 6y ago
  The port is USB-C but the power and data follow a custom protocol.
vr46 6y ago
They're not but the tech specs have the words USB-C right there. https://www.nintendo.com/switch/tech-specs/ https://www.nintendo.com/switch/tech-specs/ It is very annoying.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
martinve 6y ago
I have been using Switch in both docked and handheld mode with my Thinkpad charger without any issues. Maybe I am the lucky one.
qwerty456127 6y ago
> The Switch and Switch Dock are not USB-C devices. Why? Why was it so hard for them to implement USB-C the proper way? Why were they allowed (and why did they want) to use patented USB-C plugs if they didn't want to actually implement USB-C? The only explanation I can come up with is they intended to earn money from repairing.
- QuercusMax 6y ago
  Simpler than that - they don't want others to produce Switch-compliant accessories which compete with their own.
  - qwerty456127 6y ago
    Why use a standard connector then? Why not use a proprietary one? The USB-C connector itself is far from perfect and I can see no reason to use it if actual compatibility is not what you seek.
    - hobofan 6y ago
      Because with a standard connector they could use existing cheap suppliers for that part? And apparently one that was too cheap to properly implement the standard.
      - qwerty456127 6y ago
        Why choose the USB-C connector standard then? There are many alternatives which can be cheaper, better and less confusing this way.
Khaine 6y ago
I thought it wasn't USB compliant, based on this google plus post[1] and hacker news discussion [2] If it is true that third party charging devices is fine, then that is great news. [1] https://plus.google.com/102612254593917101378/posts/2CUPZ5yVTRT https://plus.google.com/102612254593917101378/posts/2CUPZ5yV... [2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16706803 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16706803
- waterhouse 6y ago
  Archive link because Google Plus is dead: http://web.archive.org/web/20180330003039/https://plus.google.com/102612254593917101378/posts/2CUPZ5yVTRT http://web.archive.org/web/20180330003039/https://plus.googl...

dheera 6y ago

I wish there were legal protections around this. Using a standard plug means it should accept the standard for that plug.

mikepurvis 6y ago
It depends, though. In all likelihood it would end up thrown back on the consumer— "Did you use a licensed/approved/certified charger? Sounds like you need to take this up with whoever made the charger that fried our product." It might help resolve certain really common cases like compatibility between the chargers and devices of the mainstream entities. I guess I'd argue that that should be happening on its own, but Nintendo definitely dropped the ball with releasing a USB-C product in 2017 that was interoperable with Apple and other name-brand chargers which had been in existence for two years previously at that point.
- dheera 6y ago
  The chargers that use standard plugs should also be made to support the standard or they should be held legally responsible. In this particular case I think even well-known name brand chargers which follow standards (Apple, Anker) are breaking the Nintendo, and that's unacceptable.
  - floatingatoll 6y ago
    Nintendo’s Switch plug happens to physically and electrically seem to accept USB-C charger connectors, but it’s not a USB-C plug, and the Switch should not be considered compatible just because it uses a similar plug. Nintendo should have taken more steps with their charger to restrict the Switch to authorized chargers only, rather than permitting unsupported chargers (such as standard USB-C ones) from being able to power it. Or even just outright used a proprietary connector! None of this is any fault of the chargers. They’re the ones adhering to the standards correctly. The Switch is at fault.
    - danhor 6y ago
      All (or most) of the reports of switches being bricked stem for 3rd party docks, where the dock is at fault and using 9v for signal pins, see https://hackaday.com/2019/08/04/the-not-quite-usb-c-of-nintendo-switch-accessories/ https://hackaday.com/2019/08/04/the-not-quite-usb-c-of-ninte...
      - beowulfey 6y ago
        Whether or not this is the case, Nintendo makes it very clear in their warranty that using an unauthorized charger is not covered. They definitely did not intend for it to be a universal port.
        colejohnson66 6y ago
        The problem is that most consumers don’t read those warnings. And the “reasonable person” would assume that any USB-C cable would work if the USB-C-like receptacle mates with their USB-C cable.
        DanBC 6y ago
        Nintendo say that for all their devices, even the ones that use Nintendo-specific connectors.
        setr 6y ago
        Why would nintendo warranty try to cover scenarios entirely out of their hands? Just because the other guy claims they've produced a usb-c charger doesnt mean they actually did it correctly (which is apparently the case with these docks) If you shove 9V into a 5V device, bad things will happen, regardless of Nintendo is anti-standard or not
  - afiori 6y ago
    I would rather like it if USB standards had better names and a definition of a "safety score" then device manufacturers have to advertise a minimum supported score (for devices) and a minimum guaranteed score (for chargers).
  - mcv 6y ago
    All of this just underscores what a terrible standard USB-C is. You have no idea what's what anymore by looking at it. Everything seems to fit together, but if you do it, you damage your devices. It would have been better if they'd launched another dozen different plug standards. In situations when there's only one thing you should be connecting to your device, that's the way to go. Universal sockets only make sense if they're actually universal.
    - Goronmon 6y ago
      All of this just underscores what a terrible standard USB-C is. Nothing above seems related to the standard. At the end of the day, its still comes down to the manufacturers to follow the standard in order for everything to to work. But the standard itself can't stop any particular manufacturer from making a non-compliant product.
      - colejohnson66 6y ago
        There are trademarks on the USB logos, so the USB consortium not enforcing their trademark on standards violators (using their logo) is something they could do, but don’t.
      - Gibbon1 6y ago
        It's a bad standard if shorting adjacent pins fries equipment. That the people created a standard like that means they aren't competent to create these sort of standards.
  - dkonofalski 6y ago
    That is not the case. The current reports, as far as I've seen, have all (or at least mostly) been from 3rd party docks where pins on the dock side were bridged and shorted the charger, frying the Switch's port. Edit: A poster below this question said they fried their Switch by using their Macbook charger so I may have been naively optimistic in my original statement.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
floatingatoll 6y ago
I wish the same about people who sell adapters for plugging 15A electrical devices into 25A electrical outlets. Sadly, the legal burden is placed exclusively on the buyer (via electrical code).
- jessaustin 6y ago
  I don't see how such a product would be useful for anyone. At least in USA, anywhere a 25A circuit is available, a 15A circuit is also available. The converse (using a 25A device on a 15A circuit) would be useful, but also wouldn't be dangerous in any way.
  - toast0 6y ago
    Looking at us (NEMA) plugs, there's plugs for 15A, 20A, 30A, and 50A. I'm going to assume everyone means 30A instead of 25A. Generally, where there's a 30A circuit, a 15A circuit is also available, but there are exceptions. You may have wired a RV hookup with only a 30A receptacle, but you want to run some lights, or tools or ? with a 15A plug from that on a temporary basis. The circuit is (presumably) good for 30A, so adapting to a lower amp receptacle is reasonable --- it won't hurt anything to draw fewer amps through the circuit. Adapting from a 15A socket to a 30A socket can be dangerous; the 15A or 20A[1] breaker or fuse on the circuit won't immediately open with a 30A draw, and the wiring will heat up during the time it takes for the circuit protection to open; possibly long enough to cause a fire. Of course, just because a load has a 30A plug doesn't mean it draws 30A all the time, there are conditions where using such an adapter is safe, but it requires knowledge of the load. [1] US NEC code allows for a 20A breaker on circuits served by 15A receptacle, as long as there is more than one receptacle
    - mikepurvis 6y ago
      If the 15A device fails short, it's going to get a much bigger load between failure and the breaker tripping on a 30A breaker than a 15A one.
- blinky1456 6y ago
bleepblorp 6y ago
Yes. USB-PD is in a twilight zone where it can deliver enough power to cause safety risks but, due to its low voltage, is not subject to the level of regulatory scrutiny that other electrical products receive. To date, the USB-IF's approach to safety and interoperability does not adequately protect consumers. USB-PD devices should not be incompatible to the point of damage but USB-IF has been unable to ensure this by keeping non-compliant products off the market. USB-PD needs to be pulled under the IEC, NRTL (US) and CE (EU) regulatory systems and compliance overseen by entities with the legal authority to deter legitimate manufacturers/importers from selling non-compliant products. "You can plug it in, but it might catch fire" just isn't good enough for a power delivery system that can provide 100W.
- Gibbon1 6y ago
  Yeah anything that can drop 100W into a device absolutely needs to be under regulatory compliance.
  - jsjohnst 6y ago
    100W really isn’t that much power comparatively speaking to things that are currently regulated. The issue is the specific circumstances (tiny copper traces feeding into SMT components), not the fact that it’s 100W of power alone.
thetinguy 6y ago
Nintendo is following the protocol. They’re using an officially supported alternate mode.

jaypeg25 6y ago

what about the switch pro controller? I'll sometimes charge it on whatever usb-c cable is nearby when I'm gaming and the controller starts to die. Is that OK?

danhor 6y ago
The pro controller doesn't use PD, so there's very little risk to destroy anything with a somewhat compliant charger. (There are some out there that repurpose normal USB-A for higher voltages, but they're very rare)

danhor 6y ago

The Brick-Gate issue, where many switches where bricked, was not an issue with generic chargers, but specifically 3rd party docks. And, as it turns out, the issue in that case wasn't on the switch side, but the manufacturers of the 3rd party docks, that used 9v on a normal signal pin (cc) [very much not spec compliant], which destroyed the pd chip inside the switch: https://hackaday.com/2019/08/04/the-not-quite-usb-c-of-nintendo-switch-accessories/ https://hackaday.com/2019/08/04/the-not-quite-usb-c-of-ninte.... There have been few -if any- reports of switches being destroyed otherwise.

floatingatoll 6y ago
That is excellent news!
ender341341 6y ago
This is really good to hear. I hadn't heard this follow up and besides joysticks (going back to the n64 era) Nintendo's traditionally had an insanely good hardware QA so I was surprised to hear about the issues initially.

hobofan 6y ago

How are there multiple people here in the thread that say that the port on the Switch is not a USB-C port, when it says so in the official specs _right on their website_? https://www.nintendo.com/switch/tech-specs https://www.nintendo.com/switch/tech-specs

floatingatoll 6y ago
I think I'm wrong, honestly, given the two replies to my two comments on the matter. It's too late to edit them but I am upvoting those replies anyways! I do think there's still the matter of "Not all USB-PD adapters provide the specific electrical demands of a Switch or Switch Dock" to contend with — and that does tie back to the original article's point about USB-C being kind of a nightmare. EDIT: There are still reports of someone frying a Switch with an Apple USB-C power adapter (which is USB-C compliant), no dock or anything involved. Whatever else does or doesn't work, Nintendo won't cover damage under warranty if you used a third-party charger.
brigade 6y ago
Probably a corruption of the fact that the protocol to get HDMI out of the Switch is a proprietary alt-mode, which is why standard docks and USB-C to HDMI adapters don't work. But USB-PD chargers are very much intended to work. The docks that do work generally reversed-engineered the proprietary protocol, and some have damaged Switches because they got details wrong.
- ascagnel_ 6y ago
  The protocol to get video-out isn’t proprietary, just rare —they’re using Mobility DisplayPort from the Switch, and converting DP to HDMI in the dock. Of course, had they used the native HDMI side-channel (which I’m not sure had been finalized at the time), they would have been able to skip this step.
aspaceman 6y ago
The port is USB-C but the power and data follow a custom protocol.

vr46 6y ago

They're not but the tech specs have the words USB-C right there. https://www.nintendo.com/switch/tech-specs/ https://www.nintendo.com/switch/tech-specs/ It is very annoying.

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]

martinve 6y ago

I have been using Switch in both docked and handheld mode with my Thinkpad charger without any issues. Maybe I am the lucky one.

qwerty456127 6y ago

> The Switch and Switch Dock are not USB-C devices. Why? Why was it so hard for them to implement USB-C the proper way? Why were they allowed (and why did they want) to use patented USB-C plugs if they didn't want to actually implement USB-C? The only explanation I can come up with is they intended to earn money from repairing.

QuercusMax 6y ago
Simpler than that - they don't want others to produce Switch-compliant accessories which compete with their own.
- qwerty456127 6y ago
  Why use a standard connector then? Why not use a proprietary one? The USB-C connector itself is far from perfect and I can see no reason to use it if actual compatibility is not what you seek.
  - hobofan 6y ago
    Because with a standard connector they could use existing cheap suppliers for that part? And apparently one that was too cheap to properly implement the standard.
    - qwerty456127 6y ago
      Why choose the USB-C connector standard then? There are many alternatives which can be cheaper, better and less confusing this way.

Khaine 6y ago

I thought it wasn't USB compliant, based on this google plus post[1] and hacker news discussion [2] If it is true that third party charging devices is fine, then that is great news. [1] https://plus.google.com/102612254593917101378/posts/2CUPZ5yVTRT https://plus.google.com/102612254593917101378/posts/2CUPZ5yV... [2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16706803 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16706803

waterhouse 6y ago
Archive link because Google Plus is dead: http://web.archive.org/web/20180330003039/https://plus.google.com/102612254593917101378/posts/2CUPZ5yVTRT http://web.archive.org/web/20180330003039/https://plus.googl...