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> Legislators deciding who gets to be VHS and who has to be Betamax is bad, actually. They didn't make the decision. It's more like legislators observing that
by gwbas1c 4y ago
> Legislators deciding who gets to be VHS and who has to be Betamax is bad, actually.
They didn't make the decision. It's more like legislators observing that Betamax is failing and deciding that it's in everyone's best interests to tell Sony that they have to adopt VHS instead of creating confusion in the marketplace.
> Tesla's connector is nicer
Tesla's system only goes up to 400 volts. CCS goes up to 800 volts. The higher voltage supports faster charging.
(This is similar to Betamax's critical flaw. The smaller, more elegant Betamax tape compared to the clunky VHS tape meant that VHS could record 6 hours on a tape when Betamax was limited to about 3.5 hours on a tape. It also meant that feature length films were often recorded at slower tape speeds, thus meaning that prerecorded VHS tapes were often a better quality than the Betamax version.)
- theluketaylor 4y agoCCS spec limits are actually 1000V and 500A. Electrify America uses 350A units, hence the 350 kW chargers (1000V x 350A). Lucid battery packs are 924V to maximize CCS capability. DC Fast charging has to match pack voltage, so with 400ish volt pack voltage Tesla gets big charging speed by providing extreme amperage. CCS is limited to 500A, so the best way to provide really fast charging is higher pack voltages. Higher voltage does have some benefits around heat and losses, but also has downsides like cost of electronics and installations over 600V generally require special electrical licensing. It's hard to deny the tesla connector is a lot nicer to work with (especially V3 with thin, liquid cooled cables), but I still wish my model 3 sr+ had CCS like euro cars. I'd love to be able to have more charging options.
- _ea1k 4y agoI'm not sure that Tesla's connector is a limiting element there. The Tesla system can also go to higher amperages than CCS, which is an advantage. For example, the F150 Lightning charging rate is hampered by its 400 volt CCS system. It can't do more than 200kw. That's creating a lot of the pressure to move to 800 volt. Tesla doesn't have a similar limitation and can do 250-300kw on the existing 400-450V cars.
- orangecat 4y agoIt's more like legislators observing that Betamax is failing and deciding that it's in everyone's best interests to tell Sony that they have to adopt VHS instead of creating confusion in the marketplace. Or like 1996 when Apple was failing and everyone should have been forced to standardize on Windows.