4 ms·

Hard disagree: I think it's awesome how all our recent 20V chargers double as perfectly fine (even if wildly overbuilt) chargers for simple one-cell devices lik

by usrusr 3y ago

Hard disagree: I think it's awesome how all our recent 20V chargers double as perfectly fine (even if wildly overbuilt) chargers for simple one-cell devices like mice or Gopros or, well, anything you throw at them. It's awesome, so much better than having a zoo of chargers standing at the ready. The only thing I miss from the micro-USB days are really lightweight cables (and plugs)

StillBored 3y ago
Do they? My laptop charger can't fast charge my phone. And well, its sorta dumb in that regard and is something like the normal 5V 2A max of pre PD charging for nearly everything that can't negotiate the 15V (or is it 20) the laptop wants and the little charger it comes with provides. The aftermarket chargers are much better at supporting a wide variety of voltages, and even QC/etc nonstandard charge modes. But even then, I have a charge dock on my desk which has different colored ports because only one can do 100W PD, two can do QC charging, and some others are 30W limited, etc. Its a crazy mismatch and probably more than half of the time, people are just getting 5V charging.
- usrusr 3y ago
  Plenty of devices are perfectly fine with plain 5V charging. That's my entire point: instead of a zoo of chargers, you have that one charge dock on your desktop that does it all. I call that victory, not defeat.
hedora 3y ago
The USB-A -> USB-C cable that charges my sennheiser headphones can't charge my iPad, but a longer USB-A -> USB-C cable can (using the same USB-A port on the same charger). Also, the majority of USB chargers that came with my Apple devices can't charge my M2 laptop (even when it is suspended), assuming it's not a cable incompatibility issue.
- usrusr 3y ago
  Devices that consider themselves special enough to deserve a specific fast charge technology can't be expected to charge on just about any USB A, what's complicated about that? Your Sennheiser will fill up just fine in a pinch on the iPad's charger or on the M1 charger. Will the iPad charge on the charger for the M1? Likely, unless Apple sells noncompliant PD chargers or if the iPad uses some oddball fastcharge alternative that isn't PD. PD is carefully specced as a pyramid of "bigger sources can serve all lower level sinks and not just a subset" (yes, cables need to encode their level)
  - hedora 3y ago
    As an end user with unlabeled cables, chargers and devices, that encoding may as well not exist. I have 10 chargers, 10 cables and 10 devices. It could be that only one charger and one cable provides the highest level, so now I have to try 100 permutations to charge something. Also, many cables get flaky after a month or so, so I might have to try the winning combination multiple times. Finally, having the cables form a compatibility hierarchy is some strange theoretical property. We could have every device come with a cable that is mutually incompatible, but have one special cable that works with all devices in a vault at nist next to the standard kilogram, and then we would have a pyramid of compatibility. For instance, I’ve encountered situations where I need two different USB-C cables if I want video out to HDMI to work on two different laptops.

by usrusr 3y ago

StillBored 3y ago

Do they? My laptop charger can't fast charge my phone. And well, its sorta dumb in that regard and is something like the normal 5V 2A max of pre PD charging for nearly everything that can't negotiate the 15V (or is it 20) the laptop wants and the little charger it comes with provides. The aftermarket chargers are much better at supporting a wide variety of voltages, and even QC/etc nonstandard charge modes. But even then, I have a charge dock on my desk which has different colored ports because only one can do 100W PD, two can do QC charging, and some others are 30W limited, etc. Its a crazy mismatch and probably more than half of the time, people are just getting 5V charging.

usrusr 3y ago
Plenty of devices are perfectly fine with plain 5V charging. That's my entire point: instead of a zoo of chargers, you have that one charge dock on your desktop that does it all. I call that victory, not defeat.

hedora 3y ago

The USB-A -> USB-C cable that charges my sennheiser headphones can't charge my iPad, but a longer USB-A -> USB-C cable can (using the same USB-A port on the same charger). Also, the majority of USB chargers that came with my Apple devices can't charge my M2 laptop (even when it is suspended), assuming it's not a cable incompatibility issue.

usrusr 3y ago
Devices that consider themselves special enough to deserve a specific fast charge technology can't be expected to charge on just about any USB A, what's complicated about that? Your Sennheiser will fill up just fine in a pinch on the iPad's charger or on the M1 charger. Will the iPad charge on the charger for the M1? Likely, unless Apple sells noncompliant PD chargers or if the iPad uses some oddball fastcharge alternative that isn't PD. PD is carefully specced as a pyramid of "bigger sources can serve all lower level sinks and not just a subset" (yes, cables need to encode their level)
- hedora 3y ago
  As an end user with unlabeled cables, chargers and devices, that encoding may as well not exist. I have 10 chargers, 10 cables and 10 devices. It could be that only one charger and one cable provides the highest level, so now I have to try 100 permutations to charge something. Also, many cables get flaky after a month or so, so I might have to try the winning combination multiple times. Finally, having the cables form a compatibility hierarchy is some strange theoretical property. We could have every device come with a cable that is mutually incompatible, but have one special cable that works with all devices in a vault at nist next to the standard kilogram, and then we would have a pyramid of compatibility. For instance, I’ve encountered situations where I need two different USB-C cables if I want video out to HDMI to work on two different laptops.