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>and we end up with Homer-cars with a thousand ports. And what exactly is wrong with that? Ever seen musician's gear? Even the cheapest, smallest mixer board

>and we end up with Homer-cars with a thousand ports. And what exactly is wrong with that? Ever seen musician's gear? Even the cheapest, smallest mixer boards support XLR, RCA, 1/4", and often USB for audio I/O -- and have many of them. Because yes, everyone has something essential to their flow, and number of configurations grows exponentially.

chrisseaton 5y ago
> Ever seen musician's gear? I guess some of those are analogue? I guess you can't squeeze those all through the same physical form factor connector. You can with digital, so let's reduce the clutter and do it!
- laurent92 5y ago
  Yes, exactly, let’s suggest musicians to use USB-C, and every third cable won’t work, and they will be able to make a concert but with no guitar, exactly like the devices in front of us when we try to work. The only insurance against “the USB-C downtime” is a subscription to Amazon Prime 24hrs delivery and another $68 (no kidding) Apple cable.
  - chrisseaton 5y ago
    > Yes, exactly, let’s suggest musicians to use USB-C Not sure what you mean - I said didn't really apply to analogue.
- romwell 5y ago
  Except for USB, they are all analogue, and some are mutually interchangeable. 3.5mm TRS, dual 3.5mm TS, dual RCA, 1/4" TRS, dual 1/4" TS, XLR cables transfer the same kind of signal, and you can easily convert between the connector with dongles. Mixers have all of these so that you wouldn't have to. The utility is not thinking about where the f***ing dongle is when you just want to plug something in.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - 1vuio0pswjnm7 5y ago
    my gear has toslink as well
  - vict00ms 5y ago
    Most modern mixers support toslink (and even coaxial sometimes), especially ones that are specifically oriented towards timecode control.
- II2II 5y ago
  I'm not a musician, but I've seen plenty of DJs setup their gear. It is clear that the connectors and cables are designed to be physically durable. They work in environments where even a beefed up USB cable would only last a few gigs, since building compact connectors for consumer grade electronics is at odds with the day to day reality of commercial applications. I'm sure that other factors play a role. The economics of going digital would be terrible if it meant replacing a significant amount of equipment every time a new standard took over the market. Again, pointing to USB (since that it what everyone seems to associate with universal digital connections), we have seen three major iterations and a number of minor ones over the past 30 years. That's hardly the type of cycle that businesses want to hop onto given that a tiny operation requires thousands of dollars of equipment, where any given component may be anywhere from a couple of years old to over a decade old.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - InitialLastName 5y ago
    > we have seen three major iterations and a number of minor ones over the past 30 years. ... None of which broke existing functionality. I can plug a full-speed device from 2000 into a USB-3 A port and it will work perfectly (as long as there is still software support for the vendor-specific drivers that might have been necessary for non-class-compliant devices).
- tomc1985 5y ago
  One man's clutter is another man's treasure. I hate dongles and extra parts, give me a fuckton of different ports!
TeMPOraL 5y ago
> And what exactly is wrong with that? Honestly? Presentation. That's why I consider it a dumb argument in general. People mention "Homer's car" or equivalent memes from works of fiction as some kind of ridiculous contraptions, but don't bat an eye when a show like Star Trek does the same. The big difference, IMO, is that Homer's car is delivered to you up front, a solution looking for problem(s). Star Trek's tricorder or roundabout or a starship only happen to show a different one-off feature every episode - so the realization that the equipment is deeply multipurpose, and has all those features already present, kind of flies past people who're not into this sort of thing.
- chrisseaton 5y ago
  The issue for me is how silly it is to hard-code these arbitrary and often single-purpose connectors in the laptop. A laptop should be a general computing device. So why hard-code something as weirdly specific as an SD card reader into it? Give it the functionality to have any IO device attached (USB-C) instead.
  - romwell 5y ago
    > Give it the functionality to have any IO device attached (USB-C) instead. Because a laptop is a portable device, and carrying something with dongles dangling from it is something that nobody wants to do.
    - int_19h 5y ago
      Hence the solution that the Framework offers: a device body that allocates space for USB-C dongles such that they fit flush when installed. Now all we need is an industry standard for those.
      - romwell 5y ago
        Yup, I'm singing praise to Framework here. The sanest system I've seen in a decade at least. I don't even need a new laptop, and I still want this one.
ioseph 5y ago
I'm not sure a mixer is the best comparison here since its sole purpose is to combine inputs.
- romwell 5y ago
  Yeah, and what's the point of having I/O ports on a computer?
smoe 5y ago
From what I have seen, it is more the hobby/semi professional range that has all the possible connectors built in whereas in the high end it is more modular and you buy different modules dependent on the connectivity you need. Especially if you need to fit it into a rack. E.g. you might only have some DSUB 25 pin connectors, but they cover dozens of analog I/O channels on minimal amount of space.

chrisseaton 5y ago

> Ever seen musician's gear? I guess some of those are analogue? I guess you can't squeeze those all through the same physical form factor connector. You can with digital, so let's reduce the clutter and do it!

laurent92 5y ago
Yes, exactly, let’s suggest musicians to use USB-C, and every third cable won’t work, and they will be able to make a concert but with no guitar, exactly like the devices in front of us when we try to work. The only insurance against “the USB-C downtime” is a subscription to Amazon Prime 24hrs delivery and another $68 (no kidding) Apple cable.
- chrisseaton 5y ago
  > Yes, exactly, let’s suggest musicians to use USB-C Not sure what you mean - I said didn't really apply to analogue.
romwell 5y ago
Except for USB, they are all analogue, and some are mutually interchangeable. 3.5mm TRS, dual 3.5mm TS, dual RCA, 1/4" TRS, dual 1/4" TS, XLR cables transfer the same kind of signal, and you can easily convert between the connector with dongles. Mixers have all of these so that you wouldn't have to. The utility is not thinking about where the f***ing dongle is when you just want to plug something in.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- 1vuio0pswjnm7 5y ago
  my gear has toslink as well
- vict00ms 5y ago
  Most modern mixers support toslink (and even coaxial sometimes), especially ones that are specifically oriented towards timecode control.
II2II 5y ago
I'm not a musician, but I've seen plenty of DJs setup their gear. It is clear that the connectors and cables are designed to be physically durable. They work in environments where even a beefed up USB cable would only last a few gigs, since building compact connectors for consumer grade electronics is at odds with the day to day reality of commercial applications. I'm sure that other factors play a role. The economics of going digital would be terrible if it meant replacing a significant amount of equipment every time a new standard took over the market. Again, pointing to USB (since that it what everyone seems to associate with universal digital connections), we have seen three major iterations and a number of minor ones over the past 30 years. That's hardly the type of cycle that businesses want to hop onto given that a tiny operation requires thousands of dollars of equipment, where any given component may be anywhere from a couple of years old to over a decade old.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- InitialLastName 5y ago
  > we have seen three major iterations and a number of minor ones over the past 30 years. ... None of which broke existing functionality. I can plug a full-speed device from 2000 into a USB-3 A port and it will work perfectly (as long as there is still software support for the vendor-specific drivers that might have been necessary for non-class-compliant devices).
tomc1985 5y ago
One man's clutter is another man's treasure. I hate dongles and extra parts, give me a fuckton of different ports!

TeMPOraL 5y ago

> And what exactly is wrong with that? Honestly? Presentation. That's why I consider it a dumb argument in general. People mention "Homer's car" or equivalent memes from works of fiction as some kind of ridiculous contraptions, but don't bat an eye when a show like Star Trek does the same. The big difference, IMO, is that Homer's car is delivered to you up front, a solution looking for problem(s). Star Trek's tricorder or roundabout or a starship only happen to show a different one-off feature every episode - so the realization that the equipment is deeply multipurpose, and has all those features already present, kind of flies past people who're not into this sort of thing.

chrisseaton 5y ago
The issue for me is how silly it is to hard-code these arbitrary and often single-purpose connectors in the laptop. A laptop should be a general computing device. So why hard-code something as weirdly specific as an SD card reader into it? Give it the functionality to have any IO device attached (USB-C) instead.
- romwell 5y ago
  > Give it the functionality to have any IO device attached (USB-C) instead. Because a laptop is a portable device, and carrying something with dongles dangling from it is something that nobody wants to do.
  - int_19h 5y ago
    Hence the solution that the Framework offers: a device body that allocates space for USB-C dongles such that they fit flush when installed. Now all we need is an industry standard for those.
    - romwell 5y ago
      Yup, I'm singing praise to Framework here. The sanest system I've seen in a decade at least. I don't even need a new laptop, and I still want this one.

ioseph 5y ago

I'm not sure a mixer is the best comparison here since its sole purpose is to combine inputs.

romwell 5y ago
Yeah, and what's the point of having I/O ports on a computer?

smoe 5y ago

From what I have seen, it is more the hobby/semi professional range that has all the possible connectors built in whereas in the high end it is more modular and you buy different modules dependent on the connectivity you need. Especially if you need to fit it into a rack. E.g. you might only have some DSUB 25 pin connectors, but they cover dozens of analog I/O channels on minimal amount of space.