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USB-C is about to go from 100W to 240W, enough to power beefier laptops

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Re: USB-C is about to go from 100W to 240W, enough to power beefier laptops

#261

Post by ekianjo »

sz4kerto wrote: post #257

USB-C bashing threads represent the 'HN echo chamber' for me. :) I understand the problems of different cables, I've run into them already. One cable can do Thunderbolt, the other cannot. One cable transmits 4K video signal, the others doesn't transmit anything. And so on. However, it is sooooo much better than anything before because at least _most of the time_ stuff works. Chargers charge. Sometimes slower, sometim…

> USB-C bashing threads represent the 'HN echo chamber' for me. :)

If only they had proper labeling and specs, all of this could be avoided. If you make all cables look the same, why on Earth would end users believe they are different?

Re: USB-C is about to go from 100W to 240W, enough to power beefier laptops

#262

Post by OldGoodNewBad »

Dylan16807 wrote: post #251
OldGoodNewBad wrote: post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yikes dude you work for Intel?

Do you have an actual disagreement? A 14nm Intel chip might waste an extra 20 watts, but when you get into hundred watt territory it's fair to call that a GPU thing.

The Intel astroturf isn’t even artful, it seems either bot or Amazon Turk driven.

Re: USB-C is about to go from 100W to 240W, enough to power beefier laptops

#263

Post by martyvis »

dangerlibrary wrote: post #243
dragontamer wrote: post #219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We are talking about a significant amount of current. Are we? I'm not sure how they deliver more power in this specification. But traditionally, the additional power (from 5W to 20W to 100W) was through additional *voltage*, not current. > And it's not something trivial that power supplies and phones can detect, there is not a way to determinate the voltage drop in the cable built into the standard (basically all t…

> Voltage can't go up arbitrarily, but voltage can safely be increased to ~48V or so in most applications. After 48V, humans start to get shocked / hurt, so that's probably the reasonable limit. Car batteries in ICE cars are nominally 12v. Grab both terminals and tell me it doesn't hurt.

I have never felt anything holding 12V DC in my hands. Putting your tongue across 9V "transistor" battery terminals is another thing though.

Re: USB-C is about to go from 100W to 240W, enough to power beefier laptops

#264

Post by crooked-v »

smoldesu wrote: post #192
jeffrallen wrote: post #7

Plus, if you thread the cable through your hot dog, it will be warm in time for lunch. Meanwhile, Apple's M1 chip is showing us that 240 watt laptops are the problem, not the solution...

For the record, the M1's GPU performance doesn't even start to compete with the 2021 laptop market, much less the 2014 one. GPUs have always been the biggest power draw in these laptops, and it's honestly no surprise that Apple can cut their power consumption down to 10w when their GPU is as pathetic as it is.

Sure, but multiply that by several times (such as the leaks saying that the M1X chip will have 16 or 32 graphics cores compared to the M1's 8) and it'll still be well within the territory of the current 100W spec while handily outperforming pretty much everything else with the same power draw.

Re: USB-C is about to go from 100W to 240W, enough to power beefier laptops

#265

Post by pmlnr »

standardUser wrote: post #225

I'm having a hard time understand the negative comments here. Can some explain precisely what the commenters here know that the USB-IF doesn't? Because according to the comments here this won't work, will cause frequent fires and is an all around insane and unworkable idea.

> Can some explain precisely what the commenters here know that the USB-IF doesn't

Safety margins.

Re: USB-C is about to go from 100W to 240W, enough to power beefier laptops

#266

Post by Klinky »

wearywanderer wrote: post #231
Klinky wrote: post #228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except people have damaged ports forcing incorrect form factors. Also we've had tons of other standards where cables vary with performance. HDMI, DisplayPort, IDE, USB1/2/3. You'll get people complaining about the cable not working with their new device, and then people complaining it didn't work with their old device. Eventually USB-C will be so capable and ubiquitous, this will be a non-factor. I don't miss the day…

I would love to see somebody attempt to damage a micro-USB or USB-C port by forcing a USB-A plug into it. Not going to happen, sorry. They may as well try to force a NEMA-5 plug into a VGA port. It's nonsensical. At a certain point on the usability continuum, user error becomes so severe that only dementia can explain it. But USB-C incompatibilities are so far from that point that arguing otherwise seems like bad fai…

What is your suggested solution? Every potential configuration USB-C can offer needs its own physically different cable? We're going to need a dozen different form factors now. How do you do that at scale economically?

How does it help when someone inevitably buys the USB-C cable with shape y when they need USB-C cable with shape x? It physically doesn't fit, great, but they still have the wrong cable and their device still doesn't work, not even in a degraded fashion. They still have to take it back to the store.

Typically these issues bite people who bought cheap junky cables that weren't USB-IF certified off Amazon by sorting for lowest price. If it's not working, check that your cable is certified for what your intended use case is. This applies to everything, not just USB-C.

Re: USB-C is about to go from 100W to 240W, enough to power beefier laptops

#267

Post by qubitcoder »

grawprog wrote: post #113
cletus wrote: post #11

I look forward to USB 4.1a Type C.2 Phase iii.b Gen 3E and the 482646282 different cable capability combinations that all plug in and have no distinction of those capabilities whatsoever. I also look forward to all the necessary and helpful posts telling me how the identical ports on my laptop are in fact diffferent despite their identical appearance. But at least everything uses the same plug, so that’s nice.

I haven't had to delve into the world of trying to find an appropriate USB-C cable until fairly recently. I didn't actually understand the situation thinking a replacement USB-C cable should just work. Oh hell no and none of the packaging actually explains what features a cable supports, none of them actually explain what the cable is actually compatible with. The little android logo doesn't mean shit. Sure, you migh…

Welcome to the world of USB-C! My general approach, and recommendations to others, is to purchase only Thunderbolt 3 cables.

Yes, they're more expensive. But they'll essentially handle everything you throw at them, and behave as expected (due to the large protocol support [0,1]).

Of course, this won't always be the case. But it's generally a safe assumption for now.

[0] https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/products/docs/io/thu...

[1] https://thunderbolttechnology.net/sites/default/files/Thunde...

Re: USB-C is about to go from 100W to 240W, enough to power beefier laptops

#268

Post by dragontamer »

martyvis wrote: post #263
dangerlibrary wrote: post #243

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Voltage can't go up arbitrarily, but voltage can safely be increased to ~48V or so in most applications. After 48V, humans start to get shocked / hurt, so that's probably the reasonable limit. Car batteries in ICE cars are nominally 12v. Grab both terminals and tell me it doesn't hurt.

I have never felt anything holding 12V DC in my hands. Putting your tongue across 9V "transistor" battery terminals is another thing though.

I've left a 9V battery in my pocket once and it touched a penny. I definitely felt that, lol.

But yeah, 9V and 12V don't hurt your skin at all. The worst you'll get typically is when you accidentally short it with some metal, and something becomes burning hot really quickly.

But this "burning hot" issue can happen even with 1.5V NiMH batteries or 3.3V Li-Ion batteries (even hot enough to start a fire in your pocket! Like all those vaping accidents).

That's not "shock" or "electricity", that's literally heat from some other thing messing up the battery pack. So its not really the same.

Re: USB-C is about to go from 100W to 240W, enough to power beefier laptops

#269

Post by SAI_Peregrinus »

cletus wrote: post #68
SAI_Peregrinus wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The issue isn't the number of things supported, it's that there are optionally-supported things. If every cable needed to support everything, and every host port needed to support every valid device type, it'd be fine. But instead you get cables that don't properly work with alternate modes, host ports that don't implement DisplayPort, etc. It's cheaper, but ridiculously frustrating.

Sorry but not true. To get full bandwidth really limits how long the cable can be. Like I don't think you'll find 40Gbps cables longer than about 0.5m. This is more expensive too (eg there are generally chips in the plugs at either end to handle attenuation). But there's obviously a use case for cables longer than that. It is true that we have cables that support data but not power and power but not data or data at d…

No, it's a matter of expense. It's possible to embed a redriver in the cable every 0.5m, and thus get longer cables at full speed. They're just very, very expensive.

There are three alternatives: one cable type that does everything and is easy to use (but gets expensive quickly as it gets longer), multiple cable types that each do somewhat different things but use identical connectors, or multiple cable types that each do somewhat different things and use different connectors. The USB-IF went with the "multiple cable types, identical connectors" option, which is cheap but extremely confusing. The "multiple cable types, multiple connectors" is what USB was created to avoid. So the only remaining option to remove confusion is to have expensive cables.

Re: USB-C is about to go from 100W to 240W, enough to power beefier laptops

#270

Post by selectodude »

qubitcoder wrote: post #267
grawprog wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I haven't had to delve into the world of trying to find an appropriate USB-C cable until fairly recently. I didn't actually understand the situation thinking a replacement USB-C cable should just work. Oh hell no and none of the packaging actually explains what features a cable supports, none of them actually explain what the cable is actually compatible with. The little android logo doesn't mean shit. Sure, you migh…

Welcome to the world of USB-C! My general approach, and recommendations to others, is to purchase only Thunderbolt 3 cables. Yes, they're more expensive. But they'll essentially handle everything you throw at them, and behave as expected (due to the large protocol support [0,1]). Of course, this won't always be the case. But it's generally a safe assumption for now. [0] https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/product…

Spending $65 on a 6 foot cable as a "fix" for that doesn't seem like much of a fix at all.

https://www.monoprice.com/product?p_id=24721

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