18 ms·

USB-C cable with the bandwidth and USB type imprinted on the connector

299 points by alphabettsy 3y ago

hiddencost 3y ago
Having the wrong USB cable has been the hardest part of my hobby electronics projects. Maybe I should try harder projects.
coldtea 3y ago
What we actually needed was the USB standards body to mandate this information on the USB cable for it to be labelled and sold as USB.
- lazide 3y ago
  Random amazon/alibaba sellers ain’t got time for that!
  - Tagbert 3y ago
    then we can avoid buying from them. A super cheap price may not be worth the trouble.
  - coldtea 3y ago
    Most expensive sellers from known brands seem to not have time for that either...
  - vel0city 3y ago
    The solution is to stop shopping Amazon/Alibaba. They make trash because people buy the trash. Quit buying the trash.
    - lazide 3y ago
      Good luck trying to shame buyers into not buying cheap junk! If that worked, our economy would look very different.
- Ajedi32 3y ago
  It's not mandated, but they do have specific logos available for cables that pass compliance testing: https://www.usb.org/sites/default/files/usb-if_usb_type-c_cable_logo_usage_guidelines_final_20230818.pdf https://www.usb.org/sites/default/files/usb-if_usb_type-c_ca... If consumers would stop buying cables that don't have these logos, that would (mostly) solve the problem.
  - StillBored 3y ago
    And where is the list of cables that have passed the compliance test and use the cable logo? I can't say I've ever seen one of the package logo's, and yes I've been aware of them for a while now. This is obviously a case of "mistakes were made" but I think the fact that they haven't mandated the logos as part of the license to use the USB specifications says a lot about the companies that run the organization. (or maybe their products). Edit: There is this, but no actual type-c -> type-c cables, https://www.usb.org/products https://www.usb.org/products. Oh maybe they are under "retail -> cable assembly" but I still can't find one with a logo, which is the same problem. Once I buy it, how do I know what it can do in a year or two when I pull it out of a pile of cables.
- benj111 3y ago
  Or just remember what the U is USB actually stands for. We've been through the mutually incompatible plug standards. USB was introduced to solve that. Now we're back to mutually incompatible cable standards.
  - izacus 3y ago
    We are not.
  - JohnFen 3y ago
    Yeah, the U in USB is a bit of a joke.
  - coldtea 3y ago
    >Now we're back to mutually incompatible cable standards. Not exactly, we have a single standard with different tier cables for power and speed. If you buy a USB-C cable with high power delivery, it will work for lower powered devices as well (but the inverse will not). If you buy a USB-C with high speed, it will work for devices will very low throughput rates too. So buy the most expensive highest power+speed USB-C version, and you don't have to worry, it would support all (or close) lower-level uses.
    - benj111 3y ago
      Hypothetically yes. The problem is, if you pull a cable out of your drawer, you don't know if it'll be the correct one. This is strictly worse than the 'bad' old days. If I pulled a SCSI cable out, I would know before hand that it wouldn't work on my VGA monitor.
emmet 3y ago
What we really need is to stop the USB-IF's reign of terror
- meepmorp 3y ago
  Reign of unforced errors. There's no reason it needed to be the clusterfuck it currently is.
Ajay-p 3y ago
Related to this, a group did fascinating work using a "CT scanner to uncover the hidden engineering differences between" Lightning cables. https://www.lumafield.com/article/usb-c-cable-charger-head-to-head-comparison-apple-thunderbolt-amazon-basics https://www.lumafield.com/article/usb-c-cable-charger-head-t...
- Sakos 3y ago
  Wow, that's really interesting. I'd love to see comparisons between Apple and more well-known third party manufacturers like Anker, CSL or UGREEN.
  - izacus 3y ago
    They'd be the same because they've been scanning cables with eMarkers vs. cables without.
    - crote 3y ago
      Not eMarkers but retimers / redrivers. Basically, once you go beyond a certain length you need the cable to "boost" the signal. The tested cable is longer than that, so it needs active electronics.
- adra 3y ago
  I just watched a puff piece on Adam tested comparing apple thunderbolt $150 cables to introductory $5-10 usb cables. They seemed more in love with the tech to visualize the cables than actuallu giving meaningful information and like for like comparisons.
dist-epoch 3y ago
A lot of USB-C cables only support USB 2.0 speeds (480 Mbps = 60 MB/s). I found out this while searching for a USB-C cable for a HDD enclosure. There are a ton of "charging" cables, but very few "fast data" cables, at least in the $10-15 range. I'm sure for $100 you can find a cable with everything in.
- minimaxir 3y ago
  And some of those charging cables are capped at 60W too.
- lxgr 3y ago
  You can definitely find decent 5 Gbps and even some 10 Gbps cables under $20. $100 is firmly in the "premium" cable range; you can find decent active 40 Gbps cables by reputable brands for around $50 these days.
- izacus 3y ago
  Yes, but that's because manufacturing faster cables costs more. If all cables would have to carry USB 3+ speeds, you just wouldn't have 10$ charging cables.
gosub100 3y ago
I've wondered why consumers don't usurp the naming conventions for USB? For whatever reason, the USB consortium completely screwed up with all the variants which led to headaches and money wasted on cables. Why not just self-organize online and apply meaningful names to devices. So, for instance, a 10gb USB3 with oval plug and power delivery could be called "USB3P", 40gb could be called "USB4P", and so on, regardless of what advertisers or the organization calls it (don't get hung up on my example name, the community could collaborate and vote on the best nomenclature). Tech reviewers could publish lab results of each cable SKU (and laptop model number) and provide lookup tables. Then sell cheap stickers or bands so you can label your own cables. Just completely bypass the standard and put the power in the hands of the people.
- dist-epoch 3y ago
  > Tech reviewers could publish lab results of each cable SKU What are you talking about? Nobody reviews USB cables, there are thousands of them and too few people care to make it worth the reviewer time.
  - martyvis 3y ago
    I guess one is more than nobody. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benson_Leung https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benson_Leung
    - Dylan16807 3y ago
      Has he done any in the last five years? There have been important spec updates, and available brands and models change over time.
- bborud 3y ago
  > which led to headaches and money wasted on cables or as the members of the consortium would say: hey, extra revenue!
- jon-wood 3y ago
  [Insert “now there’s n+1 standards” XKCD here]
throw932490 3y ago
There was a backlash when Apple tried to put microchips and DRM into USB-C cables. I hate Apple, but I would fully support them on this. USB-C cable problem is 10 years old. In 2013 Google introduced Pixel laptop, and some guy from Google bought all USBC cables on Amazon, only to test them and write reviews!
- hiatus 3y ago
  It's a shame, I think the posts were all on google plus and hard to find now.
- black3r 3y ago
  Microchips in cables are already a semi-optional part of the USB-C standard, mandatory for charging with more than 3A... The backlash was against rumors that Apple was planning an additional paid certification program which would mean only cables whose manufacturers paid for Apple certification would be able to achieve higher speeds...
  - lxgr 3y ago
    Markers are also mandatory for all speeds above USB 2. This part of the spec is actually quite well thought out. It’s a shame that no device I know just displays the marker data (e.g. a message like “this connection might be limited by your cable”, assuming it’s also possible to figure out the other end’s highest theoretical speed, or simply the cable capabilities in some system menu).
- izacus 3y ago
  "Cable chips" - or as they're actually called "eMarkers" are mandatory for all USB-C cables above basic capability. What Apple wanted was to leech on every single cable sold for their own profit with their proprietary licensing. You already have what you wanted - now you're just demanding Apple tax for no reason. Remember, you can always just buy that 120$ Apple cable and be a happy camper. Right now. With no extra DRM.
- radicality 3y ago
  Think I remember that story. And then he got one cable that was so badly miswired it fried his laptop I think?
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
exabrial 3y ago
...or just vote with your Dollar
- BitwiseFool 3y ago
  >"...or just vote with your Dollar" What do you mean by this? People can't really vote with their dollar when it comes to the USB Implementers Forum and the decisions they make.
- mrweasel 3y ago
  Isn't the problem that you can't tell in advance what you're buying, due to crappy manufacturers and resellers.
rini17 3y ago
That does not help with counterfeits. We need an easy way to check the cable instead. Best would be if you can plug both ends into computer and the controller measures resistance (charging capability) and data bandwidth. Or at least some standalone tester, shouldn't be hard to build , dunno about the bandwidth part.
- iudqnolq 3y ago
  Ideally you'd want to measure actual rather than reported charging capacity. For about $15 you can get a USB load generator and a USB current monitor on AliExpress.
  - dist-epoch 3y ago
    How do you measure actual without risking fire.
    - iudqnolq 3y ago
      By being careful? If you were otherwise going to use it without testing you're not any worse off plugging it into a test setup up to your expected load. You can step up the load gradually and keep an eye on it. I would be more worried about the cheap no-brand test gear catching fire. I wouldn't plug my 100W charger into it.
      - dist-epoch 3y ago
        My point was that if you can't test safely with zero user intervention, adding this capability to computers will just cause fire incidents.
        lazide 3y ago
        It wouldn’t cause more fire incidents than just using the cable without testing, right? The tests would only run for a tiny period of time. Most fires come from too much current through too small conductors for too long. It takes time for heat to build up to fire causing levels. The type of time required to actually try to charge something.
whalesalad 3y ago
We need to fix the version naming first. USB 3.2 Gen 2x2 is such a silly name.
- lxgr 3y ago
  The USB-IF already recommends a branding scheme other than that. For the mode you mention it would be “SuperSpeed USB 20Gbps“, for example.
  - usrusr 3y ago
    It's certainly much less bad now than it used to be, but the existence of "x1" connections (half lane count and bandwidth as its contemporary "x2" sibling) does undermine trust. Is a cable advertised with the number "20" really an x2 cable accurately described according to "Gen 2" metrics, or is it really just an x1 cable, daringly called "20" because that's what a gen 3x1 connection could achieve? Looking at the Wikipedia page I get the impression that the new naming simply ignores the x1 links. That's like an invitation for misleading product descriptions. Maybe it would have been helpful to assign slightly off but clearly confusion-resistent numbers to the x1 siblings? Perhaps taking a page from supermarket pricing, "4.99Gbps", "9.99Gbps", "19.99Gbps"?
    - lxgr 3y ago
      > Looking at the Wikipedia page I get the impression that the new naming simply ignores the x1 links. Yes, and that probably makes some sense: All compliant USB-C cables (other than USB 2 only) need to have two high-speed lane pairs, i.e. four high-speed lanes in total. (I'm not sure why that's the case, i.e. whether the aim was to avoid further confusion or if it's required for orientation-reversible operation in some ports). Whether the host/device actually support lane bonding or not is arguably not really the cable's choice, so it makes some sense to specify whatever the cable would support in an optimal configuration (i.e. maximum number of lanes used at the maximum supported modulation rate).
      - archagon 3y ago
ChrisMarshallNY 3y ago
If it were mandated, I guarantee that every damn cable would have "10GB/3.1" on them, except, maybe the big manufacturers, with large US presence. I wouldn't mind a good tester, but the ones that can test for that kind of thing are quite pricey.
- HPsquared 3y ago
  Need to trademark the symbols.
  - nrp 3y ago
    They did! I’ve posted this comment before: To use any of the USB-IF logos (including the official ones that clarify power and signal compatibility) a product has to go through the certification process: https://www.usb.org/logo-license https://www.usb.org/logo-license USB-IF also maintains a list of products that are certified: https://www.usb.org/products https://www.usb.org/products The question then is, “Why is this still confusing?”. The answer is probably that the popular retail and e-commerce channels are flooded with products that aren’t certified, and consumers don’t realize that a certification process even exists.
    - ChrisMarshallNY 3y ago
      This is true, but it’s been my experience, that scammers don’t pay any attention to stuff like that. It’s really up to the distributors and promoters, to vet the products they push, but we all know how well that’s going…
    - thomastjeffery 3y ago
      The problem is that you can flood the market with 2 categories of product: 1. A cheap version that didn't bother to get certified (to save cost). 2. A fraudulent version that relies on the existence of a poorly regulated market (like Amazon) that allows "mistakes" in advertising details. That market is already flooded with cheap uncertified cables that do work, making it trivially easy to falsely advertise cables that don't work. What needs to happen is for USB-IF to minimize #1 by making their standardization process as accessible (and affordable) as possible. Otherwise, the bulk of cables that customers are willing to buy will be uncertified.
aaron465 3y ago
HDMI cables too! As a techie who understands that there are many different types of USB-C and HDMI cables depending on what you need to use it for, it's an incredible amount of effort to find the right thing to buy. When you consider that most brick and mortar stores (I'm looking at you, Currys PC World) massively rip you off with £100+ gold plated HDMI cables, and the search results on Amazon are filled with knock-off Nigel rubbish (or worse, listings that out-right lie to you)... it's a total minefield! Imagine what it's like for the average consumer! A complete disaster!
- lxgr 3y ago
  This would be difficult with HDMI cables – unlike USB-C, they’re not electronically marked. Only HDMI 2.1 introduced link training (before that it was just the source picking a resolution that the sink supports and hoping for the best!), but even that is an end-to-end thing; the cable is not part of the conversation, so you wouldn’t know if the cable is bad or the socket/internal wiring beyond the cable on either side.
  - notyourwork 3y ago
    Most (all? But I’d have to double check) of my hdmi cables have the version printed on the cable jacket. Seems entirely sensible to do.
    - falcolas 3y ago
      All but one of mine. The one has a plastic braid "protecting" the cable, which hides any potentially useful markings. I just had to go through the "do I have any good HDMI cables" dance, and the answer was effectively no.
    - lxgr 3y ago
      Oh, sorry, I thought this was in the sub thread about “why not mark cables in software”! Fully agreed – the maximum supported data rate would be even more important to be printed on the cable for HDMI. One reason I could see why manufacturers would be hesitant to do this is that some future improvements might not have higher requirements for cabling, so the printed data rate might be underselling actual capabilities.
AprilArcus 3y ago
Cable has a nice little "3.0" logo embossed, but don't those fools at Elgato know that it's called USB "3.2 Gen 1x1" now?
- lxgr 3y ago
  No, the consumer-facing name is “SuperSpeed USB 5Gbps”. Gen 1x2 has been deprecated as far as I understand, so there is no more ambiguity when just referring to modes by their maximum data rate. USB 4 would make this even more complicated, but they fortunately have decided that 3x1 (20 Gbps just like 2x2) also does not get a marketing designation, so there’s also no more ambiguity there.
  - crote 3y ago
    "Gen 1x2" wasn't deprecated because as a marketing term it was never a thing to begin with. And they recently dropped the whole "SuperSpeed" part so now it's just "USB 5Gbps".
blueflow 3y ago
Idea: Lets give them different plugs so they don't fit if they don't match. [current variant of "suggest previous status quo as improvement"]
- gedy 3y ago
  But see there's no room (when we bevel the laptop edges up to give a false impression of thinness)
- marcosdumay 3y ago
  They have the same plug so we can choose anyone we want to use. It's way better than the previous "oh, no, my computer only has 1 parallel port, we can't connect this one".
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  - jon-wood 3y ago
    Annoyingly while that’s true on Apple devices there’s a plethora of cheap laptops where only one of the USB-C ports is capable of DisplayPort, and a different one can do USB-PD. Good luck working out which is which.
    - izacus 3y ago
      And there's many more laptops where all of them work. And on all of them the ports are clearly marked and will always support at least USB3 speeds.
- fassssst 3y ago
  Terrible idea. Most of the time I just want to charge stuff, which any old USB-C mostly works fine for up to like 60 watts. And very few peripherals actually need more than like USB 2.0 speeds.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
spaceywilly 3y ago
What a mess… couldn’t this be done in software instead? As in, if you try to charge your phone with a cable that doesn’t support fast charging, the phone could detect it and pop up an alert. I’m not sure the average consumer would know what to make of these labels, and that’s assuming the cable manufacturers would comply and put accurate labels in the first place.
- marcosdumay 3y ago
  That's way too slow and way too late. It doesn't help finding the cable in a drawer, and it certainly doesn't give you any assurance it's a power-only cable before plugging in some unknown power supply. But yeah, let that happen too. It's also useful. > assuming the cable manufacturers would comply and put accurate labels in the first place Putting the wrong label on the cable is plain simple fraud. You can easily get some civil recourse, and if you are feeling revengeful, you can make a criminal complaint against the seller. Compare that with our current situation.
  - lazide 3y ago
    Good luck perusing that course of action with a random Amazon or Alibaba seller. A well known brand? Sure. But those are not generally the source of the problems because of that.
- lxgr 3y ago
  That’s how it’s already done. I don’t know why no device actually exposes that information, but the e-marker in every USB-C 3.0 (or beyond) cable tells the device exactly that: The highest supported physical data rate and charging speed.
  - spaceywilly 3y ago
    There you go. Seems like software could display this in a much more useful way than these labels ever could. Even the example in the article isn’t complete, it lists the data rate but doesn’t say anything about the amperage support for charging. Just a simple information window that lists the max charging Wattage and data transfer speed of the current cable/charger/device configuration would suffice.
JohnBooty 3y ago
This is very cool. I've resorted to physically labeling them with a Brother label printer. For MacOS, here's a terminal snippet to determine the current charging capacity of a cable. /usr/sbin/system_profiler SPPowerDataType | grep Wattage This will tell you the charging capacity of your current cable+charger combo. In other words, a 100W charger + 100w cable will return "Wattage (W): 100". A 100W charger + 15W cable will return "Wattage (W): 15". A 15W charger + 100W cable will return "Wattage (W): 15". So, you kinda need a charger that meets or exceeds the power delivery of the cable you're testing. And I believe this relies on the cable's self-identified capacity via the e-chip or whatever, so it could be fraudulent if you have some dodgy cable from an unknown manufacturer? But it's better than nothing. There is a lot of info in `/usr/sbin/system_profile`, not sure if there's other bits related to identifying USB-C cable capacity. I'm sure there has to be something.
- lxgr 3y ago
  I’ve also tried to get that information on macOS before, but annoyingly all promising (i.e. related to the SOP protocol which is how the computer talks to the chip in the cable) log lines seem to be redacted. This is doubly frustrating in that it shows that it’s clearly available to the OS (and not handled by a lower layer controller), but also leaves the faint hope that Apple might implement just such a feature in the future.
  - bartvk 3y ago
    My suspicion is that this is security related. I'm on the lookout for a brand-name quality Thunderbolt-capable cable with an LCD showing current power.
    - lxgr 3y ago
      Who's security? Is Apple trying to protect me from the information that my $20 USB 4 cable is just as good as their own $69 version?
      - MagerValp 3y ago
alberth 3y ago
Wasn’t this solved last year? Official new logos below: https://tidbits.com/2022/09/29/usb-simplifies-branding/ https://tidbits.com/2022/09/29/usb-simplifies-branding/
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- Arnavion 3y ago
  Yes, see the "Cable logo" column in https://www.enablingusb.org/certification https://www.enablingusb.org/certification , though it's still the manufacturer's option whether to put the packaging logo on the packaging or the cable logo on the cable or both.
- ajmurmann 3y ago
  If I read this correctly, those logos are for "packaging and marketing". Unless they are on the cable itself, as Elgato does, this is gonna be of little help when I'm looking for a cable in my cable box even six months later. Or if you have shared cables in a household.
nottorp 3y ago
And now, dear usb consortium: why isn’t this mandatory in the -ing standard? Oh I know, because you allowed usb 2.0 normal speed and super speed. Were you bribed at least or did you do it for free?
- crote 3y ago
  It is mandated. Most companies just choose to deliberately ignore that part of the spec.
aerophilic 3y ago
It occurs to me some sort of labeling system really should be part of the standard. I was thinking it could be as simple as colored bands (with maybe dots/dashes for those color blind folks). If such a standard could be adopted, it would make all our lives less of a headache….
cornedor 3y ago
This has been done for years on HDMI/Cat cables, but instead of on the connector on the cable itself. Why make the connector larger to print very little detail on it, if you have literally a whole meter to write complete sentences. This is roughly the same solution, but in my opinion more poorly implemented. So please make more USB cables like HDMI or Cat cables, print all the relevant info on the cable.
- skinner927 3y ago
  Because then how will you wrap it in pretty textiles?
  - unethical_ban 3y ago
    You jest, but flexibility and endurance is important for consumer cables, and except for LAN parties, Ethernet doesn't get moved much (and is much cheaper to replace).
- TheRealPomax 3y ago
  But what's your solution for braided cables? Because I'll pick braided over "just plastic" any day of the week, and there is no way you're going to cleanly print information on the braid.
  - vel0city 3y ago
    I've got many graphic tshirts with text on fabric. I don't see why it's impossible on braided cables. Even a quick laser etch could be done after the braid. It doesn't need to be super high resolution.
    - TheRealPomax 3y ago
      Braiding is not fabric: fabric is a tight-weave, stable sheet, where the fibers are locked in place because it's been loomed specifically for that purpose. That's basically the opposite of what braiding is meant to do: each braid is explicitly meant to move independently, and constantly, so even if you managed to print something on the braining, in a way that looked fine coming right out of the printer, whatever you printed will be unrecognizable after even a few days of coiling and uncoiling the cable, let alone the years of use that apply to USB cables.
bgm1975 3y ago
Considering the number of features and capabilities that can be given to a usb-c cable, I think a better alternative would be to take cue from the humble resistor and use color coded bands around each of the ends. Text can only really cover 1-2 capabilities and it’d be nice to have a way to know exactly what a given cable can do, even if it requires a decoder ring.
- patmorgan23 3y ago
  Might not always require a recorder ring! You could label ports with the same color if it's a capability like displayport.
- skinner927 3y ago
  This is also an international solution
  - reidjs 3y ago
    But not accessible. It's generally better to use colors AND designs (dashed, dotted, etc) over color to prevent color-blind issues, what I see as red may differ from what you see as red.
- Tempest1981 3y ago
  Decoder ring made me think QR code
- andix 3y ago
  If I understand it correctly most parameters can be negotiated by the usb controller of a device. It should be possible to plug it into a device and see the specs of the cable and the charger somehow.
  - LorenPechtel 3y ago
    Yeah. A lot of IT people would pay for a box that you plug a USB cable into and it tells you what the cable can and can't do. Simply reading out the specs, not actually testing whether it can perform to spec. (Although a simple test of the latter should be possible. Baby computer, it sends data at all supposedly supported speeds and sees if it gets the results. That would catch the ones that couldn't but could miss a flaky one.)
danbulant 3y ago
It'a weird that this isn't normal. I bought an "AlzaPower" cable, which is just a rebrand of some chinese manufacturer by a local reseller ("czech amazon"), and they have their wattage as well as speed on them (100W/5Gbps). Then also a samsung usb c cable, which was pure white, has nothing on it and doesn't seem to support any fast charging or higher speeds..
- usrusr 3y ago
  5Gbps is conveniently unambiguous, but 10 and 20 exist in variations that use four lanes and in variations that use two lanes. According to Wikipedia, the symbols with a number are only specified for the four lanes version, but there's little doubt that half-width cables will also be be advertised with whatever bandwidth latest devices could funnel through.
brotchie 3y ago
At this point I'd probably pay ~$100 / year for a subscription service that annually sends me 4-5 cables of the "max rating." I don't want to waste my life keeping on top of the every-changing spec, but would 100% just turn-over my cables once a year to ensure highest performance. Perhaps change their color every year (red -> green -> blue -> purple) to keep track of which are the latest cables. I have dozens of almost identical black USB-C cables :|
- AdamN 3y ago
  Just get certified Thunderbolt 4 and be done with it then. Cheaper is TB3. If you stick with the legit ones you're done and it will basically support everything.
  - technofiend 3y ago
    That's my solution: I just buy Caldigit TB4 cables and I know they will do everything required. There's also the Dockcase Smart USB-C Hub 10-in-1 Explorer which exposes what's actually happening across your various connections including USB-C. Unfortunately it doesn't seem to support video passthrough over USB-C, so it isn't perfect.
  - MrDrMcCoy 3y ago
    Certified Thunderbolt cables with a length over 4 feet don't really exist, though. If you need a cable longer than that which can handle 100w+ and video/data, you're going to have a much harder time finding something decent.
    - AdamN 3y ago
      Here's a 6 ft cable for $176: https://www.cablestogo.com/usb-and-pc/usb-c-cables-adapters-and-hubs/thunderbolt-cables/6ft-2m-thunderbolt-4-usb-c-active-cable-40gbps/p/cg-c2g28887 https://www.cablestogo.com/usb-and-pc/usb-c-cables-adapters-... In the end, the technology just doesn't exist to send 100w and full data speed over the usb-c interface longer than that reliably (and economically enough for the market) so it just isn't an option to go longer. You'll have to find a different solution (optical plus separate power) or do a cross-your-fingers method with a non-certified cable that may or may not work under different circumstances.
andix 3y ago
Is there any simple way to check the capabilities of a cable, without using specialized equipment? For me it's always a gamble, with my devices I actually can barely even see how fast they are charging on a specific cable/charger combo. Only by measuring charge time and then trying to calculate how many watts they delivered.
- Night_Thastus 3y ago
  Personally, no. Testing equipment is the best way if you want to be sure. If you buy directly from a reputable brand, you may be able to trust what they've said a given product can do. If you buy from a reseller like Amazon, that all goes out the window and you should assume nothing.
  - andix 3y ago
    I would be so happy if I could find a manufacturer that sells all common USB-C cables (to USB-C, lightning, micro-usb, mini-usb, ...) in good quality, with reliable specs, all common lengths and common color variations. A plus would be to even have the option to get one or both ends 90 degrees angled. Personally I prefer my charging cables to be red, really helps people not to trip over them. In other places the color preferably matches the environment.
    - callalex 3y ago
      Monoprice mostly fits your description.
      - andix 3y ago
        I need to check if their cables are available outside of the US. A quick search didn’t look promising.
    - Night_Thastus 3y ago
      Anker is one I've had decent success with.
  - 3y ago
eviks 3y ago
Except no consumer should be expose to this bit nonsense, the units should be the ones they actually use
micw 3y ago
Haha, there are so many parameters for USB-cables, they'd need to put a booklet on the connector...
make3 3y ago
Charging capacity too please
Am4TIfIsER0ppos 3y ago
lol you do realize manufacturers will just lie, don't you? They'll print the usb logo or whatever they like regardless of licensing restrictions. Did you always check for the official logo on CDs and was it always standard conforming if present?
donatj 3y ago
I have so many USB-C cables that are only capable of either USB 2 speeds or just power that I've taken to just throwing them away when finding them. USB-C really made the problem worse and not better when it comes to incompatible connectors.
joecool1029 3y ago
It ultimately won't tell me if the cables are actually connected inside but I have two USB testers that can read and print the information on each emark (if it's present) in the cable, which is a pretty useful thing to have when grabbing a mystery usb-c cable. I have the avhzy ct-2 and ct-3 testers, there's a bunch of other distributors of the same thing as well. The FNB48 looks like same board, different programming. I used to be able to recommend the avhzy ones but during the chip shortage they started using some clone chips inside which don't appear to be as accurate.
ComputerGuru 3y ago
FYI for HDMI the licensing group actually forbids doing this, iirc. Go figure.
tonymet 3y ago
Let's just review all the various configurations of a "standard" USB-C cable (usb-c is really just the connector pinout). Data channel: yes / no PD support: yes / no USB version: 2.0, 3.0, 3.1, 3.2 Amperage: 3 amp, 5 amp, 6+ amp 48+ possible varieties of "standard" USB-C cable and no practical way to determine what you have without plugging it in. What a great "standard"!
- archagon 3y ago
  Don’t forget alt mode support of various kinds!
  - ProZsolt 3y ago
    There is no such thing. It's only depends on the USB version.
    - archagon 3y ago
      Are you saying that every USB-C cable is required to support DP alt mode? I’ve heard that’s not the case — that active cables, for example, will usually not support DP functionality.
- Dylan16807 3y ago
  > Data channel: yes / no "no" is violating the standard. > PD support: yes / no "no" is violating the standard. > USB version: 2.0, 3.0, 3.1, 3.2 Yes, there are a handful of speeds. But I don't see a good way of avoiding that problem while having backwards compatibility. > Amperage: 3 amp, 5 amp, 6+ amp 6+ amp does not exist. There are two 5 amp specs, but the new one obsoletes the old one.
  - LorenPechtel 3y ago
    Data channel: no is a charging-only cable, *preferred* for dealing with untrusted sources of power. While it might violate spec it has a very valid use case.
Johnny555 3y ago
That's cool and very useful, should have been in the USB specs ("connectors shall have supported version and speed imprinted"). But realistically, I can't remember the last time I cared about the data speed of a USB cable, I use USB cables almost 100% for charging. I have a few memory sticks I plug in from time to time, but those get plugged in direct without a cable.
- crote 3y ago
  It's already part of it - see https://www.usb.org/sites/default/files/usb-if_usb_type-c_cable_logo_usage_guidelines_final_20230818.pdf https://www.usb.org/sites/default/files/usb-if_usb_type-c_ca... .
dukoid 3y ago
I think it's pretty common to have "Cat X" printed on ethernet cables... Perhaps the same advanced technology could be applied for HDMI and USB :)
smsm42 3y ago
It's so refreshing to encounter a manufacturer that gives a hoot about users. And then I feel sadness for realizing that this situation should be normal and routine, and it is so much not that it deserves an HN frontpage when somebody finally does the right thing.
dwaite 3y ago
The difference is that the USB-IF logos to indicate bandwidth/charging capacity on packaging and plugs require certification, while numbers written arbitrarily on the plug don't require testing and don't have to be true.
onewheeltom 3y ago
Devices come with compatible cables. Everything else is an unknown.
JohnFen 3y ago
The USB standards body really should fix this by requiring all USB-C cables to indicate what their capabilities are. It seems insane to make them all the same shape and not to have a requirement for some other way they can be easily differentiated. This is one of the two things that makes me dislike USB-C (the other is that I find the physical connectors more fragile than the predecessors).
ElizabethMorgan 3y ago
[dead]

299 points by alphabettsy 3y ago

Having the wrong USB cable has been the hardest part of my hobby electronics projects. Maybe I should try harder projects.

coldtea 3y ago

What we actually needed was the USB standards body to mandate this information on the USB cable for it to be labelled and sold as USB.

lazide 3y ago
Random amazon/alibaba sellers ain’t got time for that!
- Tagbert 3y ago
  then we can avoid buying from them. A super cheap price may not be worth the trouble.
- coldtea 3y ago
  Most expensive sellers from known brands seem to not have time for that either...
- vel0city 3y ago
  The solution is to stop shopping Amazon/Alibaba. They make trash because people buy the trash. Quit buying the trash.
  - lazide 3y ago
    Good luck trying to shame buyers into not buying cheap junk! If that worked, our economy would look very different.
Ajedi32 3y ago
It's not mandated, but they do have specific logos available for cables that pass compliance testing: https://www.usb.org/sites/default/files/usb-if_usb_type-c_cable_logo_usage_guidelines_final_20230818.pdf https://www.usb.org/sites/default/files/usb-if_usb_type-c_ca... If consumers would stop buying cables that don't have these logos, that would (mostly) solve the problem.
- StillBored 3y ago
  And where is the list of cables that have passed the compliance test and use the cable logo? I can't say I've ever seen one of the package logo's, and yes I've been aware of them for a while now. This is obviously a case of "mistakes were made" but I think the fact that they haven't mandated the logos as part of the license to use the USB specifications says a lot about the companies that run the organization. (or maybe their products). Edit: There is this, but no actual type-c -> type-c cables, https://www.usb.org/products https://www.usb.org/products. Oh maybe they are under "retail -> cable assembly" but I still can't find one with a logo, which is the same problem. Once I buy it, how do I know what it can do in a year or two when I pull it out of a pile of cables.
benj111 3y ago
Or just remember what the U is USB actually stands for. We've been through the mutually incompatible plug standards. USB was introduced to solve that. Now we're back to mutually incompatible cable standards.
- izacus 3y ago
  We are not.
- JohnFen 3y ago
  Yeah, the U in USB is a bit of a joke.
- coldtea 3y ago
  >Now we're back to mutually incompatible cable standards. Not exactly, we have a single standard with different tier cables for power and speed. If you buy a USB-C cable with high power delivery, it will work for lower powered devices as well (but the inverse will not). If you buy a USB-C with high speed, it will work for devices will very low throughput rates too. So buy the most expensive highest power+speed USB-C version, and you don't have to worry, it would support all (or close) lower-level uses.
  - benj111 3y ago
    Hypothetically yes. The problem is, if you pull a cable out of your drawer, you don't know if it'll be the correct one. This is strictly worse than the 'bad' old days. If I pulled a SCSI cable out, I would know before hand that it wouldn't work on my VGA monitor.

emmet 3y ago

What we really need is to stop the USB-IF's reign of terror

meepmorp 3y ago
Reign of unforced errors. There's no reason it needed to be the clusterfuck it currently is.

Ajay-p 3y ago

Related to this, a group did fascinating work using a "CT scanner to uncover the hidden engineering differences between" Lightning cables. https://www.lumafield.com/article/usb-c-cable-charger-head-to-head-comparison-apple-thunderbolt-amazon-basics https://www.lumafield.com/article/usb-c-cable-charger-head-t...

Sakos 3y ago
Wow, that's really interesting. I'd love to see comparisons between Apple and more well-known third party manufacturers like Anker, CSL or UGREEN.
- izacus 3y ago
  They'd be the same because they've been scanning cables with eMarkers vs. cables without.
  - crote 3y ago
    Not eMarkers but retimers / redrivers. Basically, once you go beyond a certain length you need the cable to "boost" the signal. The tested cable is longer than that, so it needs active electronics.
adra 3y ago
I just watched a puff piece on Adam tested comparing apple thunderbolt $150 cables to introductory $5-10 usb cables. They seemed more in love with the tech to visualize the cables than actuallu giving meaningful information and like for like comparisons.

dist-epoch 3y ago

A lot of USB-C cables only support USB 2.0 speeds (480 Mbps = 60 MB/s). I found out this while searching for a USB-C cable for a HDD enclosure. There are a ton of "charging" cables, but very few "fast data" cables, at least in the $10-15 range. I'm sure for $100 you can find a cable with everything in.

minimaxir 3y ago
And some of those charging cables are capped at 60W too.
lxgr 3y ago
You can definitely find decent 5 Gbps and even some 10 Gbps cables under $20. $100 is firmly in the "premium" cable range; you can find decent active 40 Gbps cables by reputable brands for around $50 these days.
izacus 3y ago
Yes, but that's because manufacturing faster cables costs more. If all cables would have to carry USB 3+ speeds, you just wouldn't have 10$ charging cables.

gosub100 3y ago

I've wondered why consumers don't usurp the naming conventions for USB? For whatever reason, the USB consortium completely screwed up with all the variants which led to headaches and money wasted on cables. Why not just self-organize online and apply meaningful names to devices. So, for instance, a 10gb USB3 with oval plug and power delivery could be called "USB3P", 40gb could be called "USB4P", and so on, regardless of what advertisers or the organization calls it (don't get hung up on my example name, the community could collaborate and vote on the best nomenclature). Tech reviewers could publish lab results of each cable SKU (and laptop model number) and provide lookup tables. Then sell cheap stickers or bands so you can label your own cables. Just completely bypass the standard and put the power in the hands of the people.

dist-epoch 3y ago
> Tech reviewers could publish lab results of each cable SKU What are you talking about? Nobody reviews USB cables, there are thousands of them and too few people care to make it worth the reviewer time.
- martyvis 3y ago
  I guess one is more than nobody. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benson_Leung https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benson_Leung
  - Dylan16807 3y ago
    Has he done any in the last five years? There have been important spec updates, and available brands and models change over time.
bborud 3y ago
> which led to headaches and money wasted on cables or as the members of the consortium would say: hey, extra revenue!
jon-wood 3y ago
[Insert “now there’s n+1 standards” XKCD here]

throw932490 3y ago

There was a backlash when Apple tried to put microchips and DRM into USB-C cables. I hate Apple, but I would fully support them on this. USB-C cable problem is 10 years old. In 2013 Google introduced Pixel laptop, and some guy from Google bought all USBC cables on Amazon, only to test them and write reviews!

hiatus 3y ago
It's a shame, I think the posts were all on google plus and hard to find now.
black3r 3y ago
Microchips in cables are already a semi-optional part of the USB-C standard, mandatory for charging with more than 3A... The backlash was against rumors that Apple was planning an additional paid certification program which would mean only cables whose manufacturers paid for Apple certification would be able to achieve higher speeds...
- lxgr 3y ago
  Markers are also mandatory for all speeds above USB 2. This part of the spec is actually quite well thought out. It’s a shame that no device I know just displays the marker data (e.g. a message like “this connection might be limited by your cable”, assuming it’s also possible to figure out the other end’s highest theoretical speed, or simply the cable capabilities in some system menu).
izacus 3y ago
"Cable chips" - or as they're actually called "eMarkers" are mandatory for all USB-C cables above basic capability. What Apple wanted was to leech on every single cable sold for their own profit with their proprietary licensing. You already have what you wanted - now you're just demanding Apple tax for no reason. Remember, you can always just buy that 120$ Apple cable and be a happy camper. Right now. With no extra DRM.
radicality 3y ago
Think I remember that story. And then he got one cable that was so badly miswired it fried his laptop I think?

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

exabrial 3y ago

...or just vote with your Dollar

BitwiseFool 3y ago
>"...or just vote with your Dollar" What do you mean by this? People can't really vote with their dollar when it comes to the USB Implementers Forum and the decisions they make.
mrweasel 3y ago
Isn't the problem that you can't tell in advance what you're buying, due to crappy manufacturers and resellers.

rini17 3y ago

That does not help with counterfeits. We need an easy way to check the cable instead. Best would be if you can plug both ends into computer and the controller measures resistance (charging capability) and data bandwidth. Or at least some standalone tester, shouldn't be hard to build , dunno about the bandwidth part.

iudqnolq 3y ago
Ideally you'd want to measure actual rather than reported charging capacity. For about $15 you can get a USB load generator and a USB current monitor on AliExpress.
- dist-epoch 3y ago
  How do you measure actual without risking fire.
  - iudqnolq 3y ago
    By being careful? If you were otherwise going to use it without testing you're not any worse off plugging it into a test setup up to your expected load. You can step up the load gradually and keep an eye on it. I would be more worried about the cheap no-brand test gear catching fire. I wouldn't plug my 100W charger into it.
    - dist-epoch 3y ago
      My point was that if you can't test safely with zero user intervention, adding this capability to computers will just cause fire incidents.
      - lazide 3y ago
        It wouldn’t cause more fire incidents than just using the cable without testing, right? The tests would only run for a tiny period of time. Most fires come from too much current through too small conductors for too long. It takes time for heat to build up to fire causing levels. The type of time required to actually try to charge something.

whalesalad 3y ago

We need to fix the version naming first. USB 3.2 Gen 2x2 is such a silly name.

lxgr 3y ago
The USB-IF already recommends a branding scheme other than that. For the mode you mention it would be “SuperSpeed USB 20Gbps“, for example.
- usrusr 3y ago
  It's certainly much less bad now than it used to be, but the existence of "x1" connections (half lane count and bandwidth as its contemporary "x2" sibling) does undermine trust. Is a cable advertised with the number "20" really an x2 cable accurately described according to "Gen 2" metrics, or is it really just an x1 cable, daringly called "20" because that's what a gen 3x1 connection could achieve? Looking at the Wikipedia page I get the impression that the new naming simply ignores the x1 links. That's like an invitation for misleading product descriptions. Maybe it would have been helpful to assign slightly off but clearly confusion-resistent numbers to the x1 siblings? Perhaps taking a page from supermarket pricing, "4.99Gbps", "9.99Gbps", "19.99Gbps"?
  - lxgr 3y ago
    > Looking at the Wikipedia page I get the impression that the new naming simply ignores the x1 links. Yes, and that probably makes some sense: All compliant USB-C cables (other than USB 2 only) need to have two high-speed lane pairs, i.e. four high-speed lanes in total. (I'm not sure why that's the case, i.e. whether the aim was to avoid further confusion or if it's required for orientation-reversible operation in some ports). Whether the host/device actually support lane bonding or not is arguably not really the cable's choice, so it makes some sense to specify whatever the cable would support in an optimal configuration (i.e. maximum number of lanes used at the maximum supported modulation rate).
    - archagon 3y ago

ChrisMarshallNY 3y ago

If it were mandated, I guarantee that every damn cable would have "10GB/3.1" on them, except, maybe the big manufacturers, with large US presence. I wouldn't mind a good tester, but the ones that can test for that kind of thing are quite pricey.

HPsquared 3y ago
Need to trademark the symbols.
- nrp 3y ago
  They did! I’ve posted this comment before: To use any of the USB-IF logos (including the official ones that clarify power and signal compatibility) a product has to go through the certification process: https://www.usb.org/logo-license https://www.usb.org/logo-license USB-IF also maintains a list of products that are certified: https://www.usb.org/products https://www.usb.org/products The question then is, “Why is this still confusing?”. The answer is probably that the popular retail and e-commerce channels are flooded with products that aren’t certified, and consumers don’t realize that a certification process even exists.
  - ChrisMarshallNY 3y ago
    This is true, but it’s been my experience, that scammers don’t pay any attention to stuff like that. It’s really up to the distributors and promoters, to vet the products they push, but we all know how well that’s going…
  - thomastjeffery 3y ago
    The problem is that you can flood the market with 2 categories of product: 1. A cheap version that didn't bother to get certified (to save cost). 2. A fraudulent version that relies on the existence of a poorly regulated market (like Amazon) that allows "mistakes" in advertising details. That market is already flooded with cheap uncertified cables that do work, making it trivially easy to falsely advertise cables that don't work. What needs to happen is for USB-IF to minimize #1 by making their standardization process as accessible (and affordable) as possible. Otherwise, the bulk of cables that customers are willing to buy will be uncertified.

aaron465 3y ago

HDMI cables too! As a techie who understands that there are many different types of USB-C and HDMI cables depending on what you need to use it for, it's an incredible amount of effort to find the right thing to buy. When you consider that most brick and mortar stores (I'm looking at you, Currys PC World) massively rip you off with £100+ gold plated HDMI cables, and the search results on Amazon are filled with knock-off Nigel rubbish (or worse, listings that out-right lie to you)... it's a total minefield! Imagine what it's like for the average consumer! A complete disaster!

lxgr 3y ago
This would be difficult with HDMI cables – unlike USB-C, they’re not electronically marked. Only HDMI 2.1 introduced link training (before that it was just the source picking a resolution that the sink supports and hoping for the best!), but even that is an end-to-end thing; the cable is not part of the conversation, so you wouldn’t know if the cable is bad or the socket/internal wiring beyond the cable on either side.
- notyourwork 3y ago
  Most (all? But I’d have to double check) of my hdmi cables have the version printed on the cable jacket. Seems entirely sensible to do.
  - falcolas 3y ago
    All but one of mine. The one has a plastic braid "protecting" the cable, which hides any potentially useful markings. I just had to go through the "do I have any good HDMI cables" dance, and the answer was effectively no.
  - lxgr 3y ago
    Oh, sorry, I thought this was in the sub thread about “why not mark cables in software”! Fully agreed – the maximum supported data rate would be even more important to be printed on the cable for HDMI. One reason I could see why manufacturers would be hesitant to do this is that some future improvements might not have higher requirements for cabling, so the printed data rate might be underselling actual capabilities.

AprilArcus 3y ago

Cable has a nice little "3.0" logo embossed, but don't those fools at Elgato know that it's called USB "3.2 Gen 1x1" now?

lxgr 3y ago
No, the consumer-facing name is “SuperSpeed USB 5Gbps”. Gen 1x2 has been deprecated as far as I understand, so there is no more ambiguity when just referring to modes by their maximum data rate. USB 4 would make this even more complicated, but they fortunately have decided that 3x1 (20 Gbps just like 2x2) also does not get a marketing designation, so there’s also no more ambiguity there.
- crote 3y ago
  "Gen 1x2" wasn't deprecated because as a marketing term it was never a thing to begin with. And they recently dropped the whole "SuperSpeed" part so now it's just "USB 5Gbps".

blueflow 3y ago

Idea: Lets give them different plugs so they don't fit if they don't match. [current variant of "suggest previous status quo as improvement"]

gedy 3y ago
But see there's no room (when we bevel the laptop edges up to give a false impression of thinness)
marcosdumay 3y ago
They have the same plug so we can choose anyone we want to use. It's way better than the previous "oh, no, my computer only has 1 parallel port, we can't connect this one".
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- jon-wood 3y ago
  Annoyingly while that’s true on Apple devices there’s a plethora of cheap laptops where only one of the USB-C ports is capable of DisplayPort, and a different one can do USB-PD. Good luck working out which is which.
  - izacus 3y ago
    And there's many more laptops where all of them work. And on all of them the ports are clearly marked and will always support at least USB3 speeds.
fassssst 3y ago
Terrible idea. Most of the time I just want to charge stuff, which any old USB-C mostly works fine for up to like 60 watts. And very few peripherals actually need more than like USB 2.0 speeds.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]

spaceywilly 3y ago

What a mess… couldn’t this be done in software instead? As in, if you try to charge your phone with a cable that doesn’t support fast charging, the phone could detect it and pop up an alert. I’m not sure the average consumer would know what to make of these labels, and that’s assuming the cable manufacturers would comply and put accurate labels in the first place.

marcosdumay 3y ago
That's way too slow and way too late. It doesn't help finding the cable in a drawer, and it certainly doesn't give you any assurance it's a power-only cable before plugging in some unknown power supply. But yeah, let that happen too. It's also useful. > assuming the cable manufacturers would comply and put accurate labels in the first place Putting the wrong label on the cable is plain simple fraud. You can easily get some civil recourse, and if you are feeling revengeful, you can make a criminal complaint against the seller. Compare that with our current situation.
- lazide 3y ago
  Good luck perusing that course of action with a random Amazon or Alibaba seller. A well known brand? Sure. But those are not generally the source of the problems because of that.
lxgr 3y ago
That’s how it’s already done. I don’t know why no device actually exposes that information, but the e-marker in every USB-C 3.0 (or beyond) cable tells the device exactly that: The highest supported physical data rate and charging speed.
- spaceywilly 3y ago
  There you go. Seems like software could display this in a much more useful way than these labels ever could. Even the example in the article isn’t complete, it lists the data rate but doesn’t say anything about the amperage support for charging. Just a simple information window that lists the max charging Wattage and data transfer speed of the current cable/charger/device configuration would suffice.

JohnBooty 3y ago

This is very cool. I've resorted to physically labeling them with a Brother label printer. For MacOS, here's a terminal snippet to determine the current charging capacity of a cable. /usr/sbin/system_profiler SPPowerDataType | grep Wattage This will tell you the charging capacity of your current cable+charger combo. In other words, a 100W charger + 100w cable will return "Wattage (W): 100". A 100W charger + 15W cable will return "Wattage (W): 15". A 15W charger + 100W cable will return "Wattage (W): 15". So, you kinda need a charger that meets or exceeds the power delivery of the cable you're testing. And I believe this relies on the cable's self-identified capacity via the e-chip or whatever, so it could be fraudulent if you have some dodgy cable from an unknown manufacturer? But it's better than nothing. There is a lot of info in `/usr/sbin/system_profile`, not sure if there's other bits related to identifying USB-C cable capacity. I'm sure there has to be something.

lxgr 3y ago
I’ve also tried to get that information on macOS before, but annoyingly all promising (i.e. related to the SOP protocol which is how the computer talks to the chip in the cable) log lines seem to be redacted. This is doubly frustrating in that it shows that it’s clearly available to the OS (and not handled by a lower layer controller), but also leaves the faint hope that Apple might implement just such a feature in the future.
- bartvk 3y ago
  My suspicion is that this is security related. I'm on the lookout for a brand-name quality Thunderbolt-capable cable with an LCD showing current power.
  - lxgr 3y ago
    Who's security? Is Apple trying to protect me from the information that my $20 USB 4 cable is just as good as their own $69 version?
    - MagerValp 3y ago

alberth 3y ago

Wasn’t this solved last year? Official new logos below: https://tidbits.com/2022/09/29/usb-simplifies-branding/ https://tidbits.com/2022/09/29/usb-simplifies-branding/

deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
Arnavion 3y ago
Yes, see the "Cable logo" column in https://www.enablingusb.org/certification https://www.enablingusb.org/certification , though it's still the manufacturer's option whether to put the packaging logo on the packaging or the cable logo on the cable or both.
ajmurmann 3y ago
If I read this correctly, those logos are for "packaging and marketing". Unless they are on the cable itself, as Elgato does, this is gonna be of little help when I'm looking for a cable in my cable box even six months later. Or if you have shared cables in a household.

nottorp 3y ago

And now, dear usb consortium: why isn’t this mandatory in the -ing standard? Oh I know, because you allowed usb 2.0 normal speed and super speed. Were you bribed at least or did you do it for free?

crote 3y ago
It is mandated. Most companies just choose to deliberately ignore that part of the spec.

aerophilic 3y ago

It occurs to me some sort of labeling system really should be part of the standard. I was thinking it could be as simple as colored bands (with maybe dots/dashes for those color blind folks). If such a standard could be adopted, it would make all our lives less of a headache….

cornedor 3y ago

This has been done for years on HDMI/Cat cables, but instead of on the connector on the cable itself. Why make the connector larger to print very little detail on it, if you have literally a whole meter to write complete sentences. This is roughly the same solution, but in my opinion more poorly implemented. So please make more USB cables like HDMI or Cat cables, print all the relevant info on the cable.

skinner927 3y ago
Because then how will you wrap it in pretty textiles?
- unethical_ban 3y ago
  You jest, but flexibility and endurance is important for consumer cables, and except for LAN parties, Ethernet doesn't get moved much (and is much cheaper to replace).
TheRealPomax 3y ago
But what's your solution for braided cables? Because I'll pick braided over "just plastic" any day of the week, and there is no way you're going to cleanly print information on the braid.
- vel0city 3y ago
  I've got many graphic tshirts with text on fabric. I don't see why it's impossible on braided cables. Even a quick laser etch could be done after the braid. It doesn't need to be super high resolution.
  - TheRealPomax 3y ago
    Braiding is not fabric: fabric is a tight-weave, stable sheet, where the fibers are locked in place because it's been loomed specifically for that purpose. That's basically the opposite of what braiding is meant to do: each braid is explicitly meant to move independently, and constantly, so even if you managed to print something on the braining, in a way that looked fine coming right out of the printer, whatever you printed will be unrecognizable after even a few days of coiling and uncoiling the cable, let alone the years of use that apply to USB cables.

bgm1975 3y ago

Considering the number of features and capabilities that can be given to a usb-c cable, I think a better alternative would be to take cue from the humble resistor and use color coded bands around each of the ends. Text can only really cover 1-2 capabilities and it’d be nice to have a way to know exactly what a given cable can do, even if it requires a decoder ring.

patmorgan23 3y ago
Might not always require a recorder ring! You could label ports with the same color if it's a capability like displayport.
skinner927 3y ago
This is also an international solution
- reidjs 3y ago
  But not accessible. It's generally better to use colors AND designs (dashed, dotted, etc) over color to prevent color-blind issues, what I see as red may differ from what you see as red.
Tempest1981 3y ago
Decoder ring made me think QR code
andix 3y ago
If I understand it correctly most parameters can be negotiated by the usb controller of a device. It should be possible to plug it into a device and see the specs of the cable and the charger somehow.
- LorenPechtel 3y ago
  Yeah. A lot of IT people would pay for a box that you plug a USB cable into and it tells you what the cable can and can't do. Simply reading out the specs, not actually testing whether it can perform to spec. (Although a simple test of the latter should be possible. Baby computer, it sends data at all supposedly supported speeds and sees if it gets the results. That would catch the ones that couldn't but could miss a flaky one.)

danbulant 3y ago

It'a weird that this isn't normal. I bought an "AlzaPower" cable, which is just a rebrand of some chinese manufacturer by a local reseller ("czech amazon"), and they have their wattage as well as speed on them (100W/5Gbps). Then also a samsung usb c cable, which was pure white, has nothing on it and doesn't seem to support any fast charging or higher speeds..

usrusr 3y ago
5Gbps is conveniently unambiguous, but 10 and 20 exist in variations that use four lanes and in variations that use two lanes. According to Wikipedia, the symbols with a number are only specified for the four lanes version, but there's little doubt that half-width cables will also be be advertised with whatever bandwidth latest devices could funnel through.

brotchie 3y ago

At this point I'd probably pay ~$100 / year for a subscription service that annually sends me 4-5 cables of the "max rating." I don't want to waste my life keeping on top of the every-changing spec, but would 100% just turn-over my cables once a year to ensure highest performance. Perhaps change their color every year (red -> green -> blue -> purple) to keep track of which are the latest cables. I have dozens of almost identical black USB-C cables :|

AdamN 3y ago
Just get certified Thunderbolt 4 and be done with it then. Cheaper is TB3. If you stick with the legit ones you're done and it will basically support everything.
- technofiend 3y ago
  That's my solution: I just buy Caldigit TB4 cables and I know they will do everything required. There's also the Dockcase Smart USB-C Hub 10-in-1 Explorer which exposes what's actually happening across your various connections including USB-C. Unfortunately it doesn't seem to support video passthrough over USB-C, so it isn't perfect.
- MrDrMcCoy 3y ago
  Certified Thunderbolt cables with a length over 4 feet don't really exist, though. If you need a cable longer than that which can handle 100w+ and video/data, you're going to have a much harder time finding something decent.
  - AdamN 3y ago
    Here's a 6 ft cable for $176: https://www.cablestogo.com/usb-and-pc/usb-c-cables-adapters-and-hubs/thunderbolt-cables/6ft-2m-thunderbolt-4-usb-c-active-cable-40gbps/p/cg-c2g28887 https://www.cablestogo.com/usb-and-pc/usb-c-cables-adapters-... In the end, the technology just doesn't exist to send 100w and full data speed over the usb-c interface longer than that reliably (and economically enough for the market) so it just isn't an option to go longer. You'll have to find a different solution (optical plus separate power) or do a cross-your-fingers method with a non-certified cable that may or may not work under different circumstances.

andix 3y ago

Is there any simple way to check the capabilities of a cable, without using specialized equipment? For me it's always a gamble, with my devices I actually can barely even see how fast they are charging on a specific cable/charger combo. Only by measuring charge time and then trying to calculate how many watts they delivered.

Night_Thastus 3y ago
Personally, no. Testing equipment is the best way if you want to be sure. If you buy directly from a reputable brand, you may be able to trust what they've said a given product can do. If you buy from a reseller like Amazon, that all goes out the window and you should assume nothing.
- andix 3y ago
  I would be so happy if I could find a manufacturer that sells all common USB-C cables (to USB-C, lightning, micro-usb, mini-usb, ...) in good quality, with reliable specs, all common lengths and common color variations. A plus would be to even have the option to get one or both ends 90 degrees angled. Personally I prefer my charging cables to be red, really helps people not to trip over them. In other places the color preferably matches the environment.
  - callalex 3y ago
    Monoprice mostly fits your description.
    - andix 3y ago
      I need to check if their cables are available outside of the US. A quick search didn’t look promising.
  - Night_Thastus 3y ago
    Anker is one I've had decent success with.
- 3y ago

eviks 3y ago

Except no consumer should be expose to this bit nonsense, the units should be the ones they actually use

micw 3y ago

Haha, there are so many parameters for USB-cables, they'd need to put a booklet on the connector...

make3 3y ago

Charging capacity too please

Am4TIfIsER0ppos 3y ago

lol you do realize manufacturers will just lie, don't you? They'll print the usb logo or whatever they like regardless of licensing restrictions. Did you always check for the official logo on CDs and was it always standard conforming if present?

donatj 3y ago

I have so many USB-C cables that are only capable of either USB 2 speeds or just power that I've taken to just throwing them away when finding them. USB-C really made the problem worse and not better when it comes to incompatible connectors.

joecool1029 3y ago

It ultimately won't tell me if the cables are actually connected inside but I have two USB testers that can read and print the information on each emark (if it's present) in the cable, which is a pretty useful thing to have when grabbing a mystery usb-c cable. I have the avhzy ct-2 and ct-3 testers, there's a bunch of other distributors of the same thing as well. The FNB48 looks like same board, different programming. I used to be able to recommend the avhzy ones but during the chip shortage they started using some clone chips inside which don't appear to be as accurate.

ComputerGuru 3y ago

FYI for HDMI the licensing group actually forbids doing this, iirc. Go figure.

tonymet 3y ago

Let's just review all the various configurations of a "standard" USB-C cable (usb-c is really just the connector pinout). Data channel: yes / no PD support: yes / no USB version: 2.0, 3.0, 3.1, 3.2 Amperage: 3 amp, 5 amp, 6+ amp 48+ possible varieties of "standard" USB-C cable and no practical way to determine what you have without plugging it in. What a great "standard"!

archagon 3y ago
Don’t forget alt mode support of various kinds!
- ProZsolt 3y ago
  There is no such thing. It's only depends on the USB version.
  - archagon 3y ago
    Are you saying that every USB-C cable is required to support DP alt mode? I’ve heard that’s not the case — that active cables, for example, will usually not support DP functionality.
Dylan16807 3y ago
> Data channel: yes / no "no" is violating the standard. > PD support: yes / no "no" is violating the standard. > USB version: 2.0, 3.0, 3.1, 3.2 Yes, there are a handful of speeds. But I don't see a good way of avoiding that problem while having backwards compatibility. > Amperage: 3 amp, 5 amp, 6+ amp 6+ amp does not exist. There are two 5 amp specs, but the new one obsoletes the old one.
- LorenPechtel 3y ago
  Data channel: no is a charging-only cable, *preferred* for dealing with untrusted sources of power. While it might violate spec it has a very valid use case.

Johnny555 3y ago

That's cool and very useful, should have been in the USB specs ("connectors shall have supported version and speed imprinted"). But realistically, I can't remember the last time I cared about the data speed of a USB cable, I use USB cables almost 100% for charging. I have a few memory sticks I plug in from time to time, but those get plugged in direct without a cable.

crote 3y ago
It's already part of it - see https://www.usb.org/sites/default/files/usb-if_usb_type-c_cable_logo_usage_guidelines_final_20230818.pdf https://www.usb.org/sites/default/files/usb-if_usb_type-c_ca... .

dukoid 3y ago

I think it's pretty common to have "Cat X" printed on ethernet cables... Perhaps the same advanced technology could be applied for HDMI and USB :)

smsm42 3y ago

It's so refreshing to encounter a manufacturer that gives a hoot about users. And then I feel sadness for realizing that this situation should be normal and routine, and it is so much not that it deserves an HN frontpage when somebody finally does the right thing.

dwaite 3y ago

The difference is that the USB-IF logos to indicate bandwidth/charging capacity on packaging and plugs require certification, while numbers written arbitrarily on the plug don't require testing and don't have to be true.

onewheeltom 3y ago

Devices come with compatible cables. Everything else is an unknown.

JohnFen 3y ago

The USB standards body really should fix this by requiring all USB-C cables to indicate what their capabilities are. It seems insane to make them all the same shape and not to have a requirement for some other way they can be easily differentiated. This is one of the two things that makes me dislike USB-C (the other is that I find the physical connectors more fragile than the predecessors).

ElizabethMorgan 3y ago

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