6 ms·
Unless you want all cables to be thick, $60, and cap out at 1 meter long, this is not a reasonable standard. 480mbps USB-C is perfectly adequate for many applic
by Kirby64 2mo ago
Unless you want all cables to be thick, $60, and cap out at 1 meter long, this is not a reasonable standard. 480mbps USB-C is perfectly adequate for many applications. Likewise for 60W cables.
- ryandrake 2mo agoSo, call it USB-D or something, if one cable is significantly different (in purpose, performance, form factor) than another cable. Don't just call everything the same label, and let the non-technical buyer beware.
- MetaWhirledPeas 2mo agoThe naming could be better for sure.
- stouset 2mo agoOkay, great, it’s called USB-D. Is this a new connector? Or do we now need to resort to labeling cables and checking the label? Do we do this for every new version and combination of versions for USB? USB-PD? Thunderbolt? DisplayPort?
- ReactiveJelly 2mo agoThe computer / phone should auto-detect and tell you on-screen
- zx8080 2mo agoThe hell Apple or Google cares.
- deleted 2mo ago[deleted]
- QuantumNomad_ 2mo agoApple should care because customers will blame slow charging times and slow transfer speeds on the phone
- stingraycharles 2mo agoI think Apple much rather tells users that this is exactly what they warned them about when they were forced to support USB-C and will advise users to only buy official cables from Apple.
- brookst 2mo agoYou mean USB-C, the standard that they largely led development of?
- stouset 2mo agoNo, they mean USB-C, the port they switched all but a handful of their devices to before any other manufacturer. While GP’s take is ridiculous (if common), I do think the notion that Apple led the charge on USB-C is mostly a myth, outside of them being active participants on the USB Implementor’s Forum.
- brookst 2mo agoEh, I can’t find it now so a thousand grains of salt, but I read a good article back in the day about how much Apple’s experience with in-market Lightning shaped USB-C’s physical connector and electrical handshake.
- mrheosuper 2mo agoThey've already done that afaik, like warning about charging at slower speed.
- dmos62 2mo agoEhem, we already do that. USB-C is an umbrella term and everyone has a homebaked organizing system to tell which USB-C cable can do what, or a homebaked testing routine where we run through 5 cables each time we need to connect something. That's what the article is about. Calling all these cables USB-C and making them look indistinguishable is a very leaky abstraction.
- brookst 2mo agoSo there are 4 different current-carrying levels, from 2.5A to 5A EPR. There are 6 different transfer speeds, from 480mbps to 120gbps. There’s DisplayPort yes/no. There are 4 thunderbolt genrations, each with its own marker. Some of those are dependent (480mbps cables don’t have markers), so it’s not a full permutation problem. Only about 20 different combinations are valid. Is the proposal to have 20 different physical connectors? Or to prune the space down to 6 or so by requiring all cables to be very thick, or to support higher transfer speeds than make any sense for a charging cable? It’s not a leaky abstraction. It’s a physical interface standard that does not guarantee electrical properties. Same way you can plug a 6A cord and a 20A cord into the same electrical outlet.
- josephg 2mo agoThat can be solved the same way it was solved for SD / CFe cards. Just have a single mark which guarantees a baseline set of requirements. - "USB Speed 2" means [20gbps, thunderbolt 3, displayport, 20 watts]. - "USB Speed 3" means 100gbps, thunderbolt 4, etc. - "Power 100" means 100 watts minimum. Make a little logo for each standard - "S2" / "S3" / "P100" which can be branded onto each end of the cable. People who care can look at the logos and tell what a given cable can do.
- ProZsolt 2mo agoYou mean something like this, which we have since 2021: https://learn.adafruit.com/understanding-usb-type-c-cable-types-pitfalls-and-more/overview https://learn.adafruit.com/understanding-usb-type-c-cable-ty...
- a2ff6eeb0 2mo agoYes, a new connector would be great. It could be a notch on the standard usb-c form factor, so that usb-c connectors could fit into usb-d plugs.
- hulitu 2mo ago> Do we do this for every new version and combination of versions for USB? USB-PD? Thunderbolt? DisplayPort? Yes.
- stouset 2mo agoI don’t think you fully comprehend the matrix of legal possibilities for a cable with USB-C connectors.
- josephg 2mo ago> Or do we now need to resort to labeling cables and checking the label? YES oh please yes! Give me labels! I'm sick of playing guessing games with my USB cables. Which one should I use for my external drive? This cable is thick! Will it work? Maybe it's only thick so it can send power? It seems impossible to tell, even if I plug it in to my computer. The files are there, I just need to somehow guess that it's a bit slower than it's supposed to go. Another cable feels expensive but its 1m. Will it work? Do I get slower data rates? I can't tell. I hate guessing. Label the cables!
- econ 2mo agoColor coding seems good
- Kirby64 2mo agoUSB-A has many variants and we don’t call it a different connector. Heck, USB-B and micro USB both have 3.0 variants that are physically different and we don’t call them something different either. I don’t see the problem here. This is just semantics, especially when they aren’t even labeled period… people just see a cable and will try plugging it in.
- ryandrake 2mo agoThe other USBs are no better TBH. I still remember USB Full Speed and USB High Speed. Do you remember, without looking it up, which one is faster? Same form factor, same physical connector.
- Kirby64 2mo agoUSB2 has been backwards compatible from the beginning though. I can’t think of a time in the past… 15, maybe 20 years where a USB cable wasn’t capable of high speed, unless it didn’t have data lines at all. (And yes, I don’t need to look it up. But also I’m extremely familiar with the USB spec and have been tangentially involved with the USB-IF)
- godelski 2mo agoNo, but I can tell you which is faster by looking at the color
- godelski 2mo ago> USB-A has many variants > especially when they aren’t even labeled period What are you talking about? USB-A is color coded. You'll frequently see white and blue. Admittedly this is harder with USB-C because the size, but I don't see why we can't label these things. Not labeling just leads to confusion and fraud. https://www.corsair.com/us/en/explorer/diy-builder/storage/usb-port-colors-explained/ https://www.corsair.com/us/en/explorer/diy-builder/storage/u...
- consp 2mo agoThe color coding is optional and ambiguous: Blue is recommended, not required, and there is no difference for 3.0, 3.1 (10gbit) or others. And you now also have red, yellow, green, purple and orange, which have no defined meaning in any standard and are just whatever a manufacturer wants to do. There is nothing preventing someone from selling standard 4 conductor A ports with red coloring.
- cameldrv 2mo agoThere are names for all of the features. It would be cool if there were some sort of color code or physical indication of a cables capability, but one of the cool things about usb-c is that the same connector works for really cheap stuff and really high end stuff. For example, in a pinch I can charge my MacBook (slowly) from a $5 gas station usb charger.
- brookst 2mo agoIt could be like resistors, different color stripes for each capability: transfer speed, maximum amperage, DisplayPort, thunderbolt, etc.
- malkia 2mo agoUSB-C1, USB-C2, USB-C3, etc... we had the CAT naming for a while
- honkostani 2mo ago[dead]
- locknitpicker 2mo ago> So, call it USB-D or something, USB-C is the connector type, not the cable. The connector type supports multiple protocols, including for interoperability with other connector types as a cable can have USB-C in one end and something else in the other end and users expect the cable connection to just work the USB way.
- gchamonlive 2mo agoThe terminology is something like TECH PHYSICAL-TYPE USB A/B/C So a USB-D would imply a different physical connection and end up confusing the consumer even more. If the cable supports 60w charging or only 25w, if it's full or half bandwidth, those characteristics seem to me like we are talking about grading quality, so a better expansion would be: TECH PHYSICAL-TYPE GRADE USB A/B/C 1/2/3 And define which quality the cable should present to achieve higher or lower grade levels, depending on the convention.
- MichaelZuo 2mo agoWhy not just USB-C Type 123? That allows for 999 possible permutations of usb-c cables.
- gchamonlive 2mo agobecause USB-C is a shorthand for USB Type C
- MichaelZuo 2mo agoSo? Is there a hard limit on just one “Type” in the formal name?
- gchamonlive 2mo agoNot if your aim is to confuse your costumer
- MichaelZuo 2mo agoSpec committees arent rigid automatons, they can clearly decide on say USB Type C-123 for practical implementation if they chose to.
- gchamonlive 2mo ago
- advisedwang 2mo agoRight... label them differently. Now you're just arguing what the label should be
- revolvingthrow 2mo agoI have several 1m long TB4 cables (100W, video, 40Gbps) and they’re neither particularly thick nor were they anywhere close to $60. The best you can get is TB5 (240W, up to 120 Gbps data transfer) and at 1m long they’re $32 or so from CableMatters. Those are admittedly somewhat thicker, but not stiff. I wish there was a higher baseline data transfer mandated for usb-c. Sure, 40gbps isn’t needed for all cables, but is some piddly 5gbps too much to ask? We had usb 2.0 speeds back when CPUs just barely entered 1 GHz range, it’s practically ancient technology. Admittedly most people never transfer any data over usb, but with this logic we might as well have usb-c that does charging only. Being able to pick any cable and have 5 gbps baseline means that any usb-c cable is fundamentally usable, if slow. 480 mbps is… ugh. I don’t have an issue with 60W being the baseline, it’s enough for most laptops and the average GaN charger is 65 W (or less) anyway.
- Kirby64 2mo ago> Sure, 40gbps isn’t needed for all cables, but is some piddly 5gbps too much to ask? 5gbps means you add 8 additional wires to every cable, and also would require that both devices on each side implement 5gbps PHYs for their USB (if you mandated it on devices too). It’s a large cost, especially when you’re talking about billions of cables.
- deleted 2mo ago[deleted]
- maccard 2mo agoAnd for the applications it not adequate for, a different cable should be used. But instead I have a drawer full of USB c cables and no idea which ones are which.
- functionmouse 2mo agoActually, different cables should be called something different.
- hulitu 2mo agoBut they ran out of names. The S in USB still sucks. Just try to transfer a lot of small files over USB.
- tremon 2mo agoThat's still an astonishing design failure: different ports have different connectors for a reason. Can you imagine a what would have happened if the car charging infrastructure would have used your regular 120/230V plugs? There is zero reason why 480mbps USB-C should exist when we already had 480mbps USB-A, except for misguided designers prioritizing aesthetics over usability.
- jrmg 2mo agoCan you imagine a what would have happened if the car charging infrastructure would have used your regular 120/230V plugs? This isn’t a great example because, on the ‘other side', car chargers also have different size cables between the ‘charger’ (EVSE) and the car, with the same plug used on them all (especially with NACS, which doesn’t even differentiate between AC and DC plugs). They rely on negotiation to tell the car how much power it can draw. No-one complains about this.
- po1nt 2mo agoWe are lucky we don't need to transfer (so much) data over these. Just imagine looking for Gen 2x2 or Gen 2 SuperSpeed charging station.
- asteroidburger 2mo agoNo, we need to transfer a lot of power instead. So those with 800v cars need to be mindful to visit certain charger stations/types over other ones in order to get a fast charge, vs relying on the car to boost it from an older station.
- po1nt 2mo agoJust imagine you would visit such charging station and it would support the fast charge. But only the connector, not the cable.
- sokoloff 2mo agoIn a world following your proposed rules, we’d never get to 480Mbps USB-A, because we already had 4-wire 12Mbps USB-A ports with just D+/D- and power and creating 480Mbps USB-A from that would be “an astonishing design failure: different ports have different connectors for a reason” and not all 12Mbps capable USB-A cables would support the 480Mbps spec.
- eek2121 2mo agoIt’s not hard to make a functional standard, the USB folks just don’t care, IMO. If they had simply worked on better naming, things would be much more clear. (now they’d need to do something crazy like USB-C 40G PD60 as a name in order to fix things, unless the next version of USB is a clean break) Now they’ve made a mess of things, and cables AND connectors are all over the place.
- Kirby64 2mo agoHow would better naming make things more clear when manufacturers don’t want to put labeling on cables, generally? Even if it was a USB-IF requirement, that doesn’t have any teeth. Ports tend to be decently well labeled, but you can only cram so much into these things.
- ProZsolt 2mo agoWe have standard labeling since 2021, the problem manufactures don't use it.
- itsamario 2mo agoNow that EU made USBC a power standard I expect the 4k/8k/16k, 3.0/3.1/3.2, and 5/10/20gbps to be replaced with 60/120/240watts. This way it's simpler to enforce a standard across the industries
- Kirby64 2mo agoWhy would speed capability be replaced with power capability? They are orthogonal capabilities intentionally so you don’t have to overbuild cables in either direction if you don’t intend to.