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EU reaches deal to make USB-C a common charger for most electronic devices

engadget.com

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Re: EU reaches deal to make USB-C a common charger for most electronic devices

#411

Post by pwinnski »

vel0city wrote: post #380
MrBuddyCasino wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Cars can still look cool compare cars from 40s-70s to what came after, its a different world you can argue it was worth it, but you can’t argue cars didn’t get homogeneous and boring in the process

A 1964 Ford Galaxie 500 had a wheelbase of 119" and was 210" long. A 2021 Mustang Mach E has a wheelbase of 107" and is 188.5" long. Which one is humongous? Even if you looked at the original 1964 Mustang, its not that much smaller than the Mach E which is a 5-door crossover. The '64 had a wheelbase of 108" and an overall length of 181.6", just 7 inches shorter for a coupe. Older American cars were often land yachts.…

The word was homogeneous, which means "of the same kind."

Re: EU reaches deal to make USB-C a common charger for most electronic devices

#412

Post by vilhelm_s »

Nextgrid wrote: post #20
stewx wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The issue with the Nintendo Switch is that Nintendo designed their own faulty USB-C charging implementation rather than merely using the reference design. It's not a failure of the spec, it's a failure to adhere to the spec. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16706803

It's still not a great spec if it's so complex that you can screw it up. I understand the complexity for data, but for power I wish it was as simple as power & ground wires and that's it. Compare that with USB-A where even cheap Chinese cables from the lowest bidder usually work (work well enough at least - you might get voltage drop but it will still charge if you leave it on long enough) because the spec is so simp…

USB-C is infamous for being complex like that, but I think the charging part is basically fine? People talk about the Nintendo Switch often, but I have never heard any _other_ example of something where the charging didn't work, so I think maybe it's a rare exception.

(This is distinct from the "fast charging" mode(s?), which does seem to have compatibility problems. But in that case, the failure mode is that device charges slowly, which is probably not a big issue for the kind of small phones/gadgets that the EU regulation targets. The previous standard was micro-USB, which can't do fast-charging anyway.)

Re: EU reaches deal to make USB-C a common charger for most electronic devices

#413

Post by erddfre3423 »

asutekku wrote: post #163
spacexsucks wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Basically obsolete. As someone who uses a 7 yr old ipad, a 10 yr old windows phone and a 9 yr old Nexus 7 this is hot garbage

Just because you are using old tech with a connector that's prone to break and is not able to transfer data quickly doesn't mean everyone else has to.

Everyone else should not have a choice to buy new equipment as cheap as they can do today, whenever they wish. That's simply not sustainable.

Re: EU reaches deal to make USB-C a common charger for most electronic devices

#414

Post by microtonal »

mrjin wrote: post #67

Oh well. I just returned 3 USB-C hubs in a row, one almost fried my computer. Since the introduce of USB-C, I have more cables than ever. There are virtually so many types of USB-C cables with different capabilities and all looks almost exactly the same. Some cannot handle charging current of 2A or less. Some might be able to do 3A, some maybe 5A. And some of it is USB 2.0, some are USB 3.x 5Gbps, 10Gbps, 20 Gbps or…

It's simply a random combination of any of the previous stuff. [...] Now I have a whole bunch of them and I cannot tell which can do what except very few long thick ones for my monitors.

Get a Thunderbolt 4 cable, they can carry Thunderbolt 3, Thunderbolt 4, every USB protocol up to and including 4, DP alt-mode, and 100W power delivery. Moreover, most of them are clearly marked. The Apple cables are expensive, but some other good brands (like CalDigit) offer them at reasonable prices.

I just returned 3 USB-C hubs in a row, one almost fried my computer.

Most USB USB-C hubs (USB-C is only the connector) are terrible. Even many premium brands (like Satechi) often use cheap Chinese reference designs that will fry themselves pretty quickly, cause a lot of interference, and have all kinds of annoying limitations (mostly because they use 5 or 10 GBit/s USB 3 standards).

Since I have switched to quality Thunderbolt Docks, I haven't had any issues.

Re: EU reaches deal to make USB-C a common charger for most electronic devices

#415

Post by 8ytecoder »

ChuckNorris89 wrote: post #92
mrjin wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just pick a couple of those USB-C docks on the market and check how many are actually working for you. I used over 10 different USB-C docks from different vendors. It doesn't matter which vendor, they all have various issues. They might be perfectly fine for some machines but lots lots of troubles for some other machines which are also perfectly fine with some of the other docks. I have never seen something worse tha…

>Just pick a couple of those USB-C docks on the market and check how many are actually working for you. 1) How is it the spec's fault that random OEMs go to extreme cost cutting measures in order to price dump themselves to the bottom by not following the spec? Of course they won't work properly. But again, for the 100th time, that's not the specs fault that manufacturers actively choose to ignore it. If a driver cho…

Well, if a spec has no validation procedure, compatibility enforcement or certification, what’s even the point? If the switch isn’t actually working as intended they shouldn’t be allowed to call it usb-c. There should be some minimum mandatory requirements. I haven’t studied these spec, but if there exists a min spec to qualify to call yourself USB and the switch case isn’t covered, OR, there’s no minimum spec, it IS the spec’s fault.

Re: EU reaches deal to make USB-C a common charger for most electronic devices

#416

Post by 908B64B197 »

jayd16 wrote: post #409
maccard wrote: post #7

The problem with USB-C is that you can't just pick up a device cable and power brick and expect them to work together. As an example, my Apple 96W USB-C charger doesn't charge my nintendo switch. The cable that came with my phone doesn't charge said fully Mac when used with the 96w charger. There is no indication of incompatibility between these devices until you realise they don't work. This is going back to the dc…

>you can't just pick up a device cable and power brick and expect them to work together I never understood this sentiment. That would be even more true if USB-C wasn't the standard so I don't really understand the complaint. Obviously "same shape" isn't an indicator that it will "just work" for USB-C, so why would we expect that to be the case for anything else with modern complexity? It would be nice if fits == work…

Except if you use Lightning. It just works.

Re: EU reaches deal to make USB-C a common charger for most electronic devices

#417

Post by ehsankia »

samatman wrote: post #211
mrtksn wrote: post #123

By the way, that's also how Tesla and all other cars have the same electric plug in EU(not the USB mandate but the car plug standardisation mandate). Of course, the first thing that comes to mind is what happens if better solutions are found. Will EU block innovation? That question is addressed in the Q&A: https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/QANDA_... In essence, they seem to believe that wired char…

> Will EU block innovation? It already has. Tesla's connector is nicer (you can call that subjective but it isn't) and the supercharging network in the US is deploying the clunky standard sort of connector as well. If EU legislation were universal, that would preclude any future where the superior connector is licensed and takes over from the crappy designed-by-committee alternative, because Tesla would be forced to…

I would rather have a shared and slightly less optimal cable, than a unique and "nicer" cable. USB-C is the perfect example, you can argue that lightning cable is actually nicer, but being able to charge all my different devices with a single cable is far nicer.

If every company thought like Tesla/Apple, we'd quickly go down a very untenable road.

Re: EU reaches deal to make USB-C a common charger for most electronic devices

#418

Post by cmckn »

I kind of understand this from an e-waste angle, but why (as a consumer) do I care if different phones use the same cable? I only have one phone. Even if I get a new phone every year, unless I’m switching back and forth between iPhones and Androids, I’m not having to buy new cables. If I go to a public place, and need to plug my phone in, I can already do that regardless of the connector on the phone end. If a friend is over and they need a phone charger, there’s only two possible needs, and I’ve already filled them. Apple charges license fees on Lightning, but I can already buy a nice third party cable for like $10.

Why is this so important as to require a large scale device maker to redesign their entire product line, and make millions of existing cables obsolete? Genuinely interested in the reasoning behind this, what problems is it solving?

Re: EU reaches deal to make USB-C a common charger for most electronic devices

#419

Post by pwinnski »

cowtools wrote: post #259
mikkergp wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What does work together mean in this case, it’s not like we’re talking Ethernet where these devices are communicating to each other. Like I can’t use an android charger? Lightning to usb-c cables are pretty much standard. It seems like in the short term anyways this increases e-waste as all my old Lightning chargers become deprecated.

I can just plug a usb-c dock and use my android phone with a keyboard and mouse if I wanted to. I could plug two android phones together with usb-c and transfer files from one to another. Apple's phones are quite locked down, and I think a big reason why is that proprietary lightning connector. When you have a usb port for charging, there is no excuse for not implementing the full standard software-side.

There is zero chance that an iPhone with a USB-C port is going to allow phone-to-phone file transfer. You have the cause and effect reversed.

Re: EU reaches deal to make USB-C a common charger for most electronic devices

#420

Post by microtonal »

rbanffy wrote: post #127
PinguTS wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What you expect will average Joe buy at Amazon? What will be the key of comparing one cable with another?

Why would Amazon be selling non-compliant cables? Wouldn't that kind of be against the law?

Well, with Amazon's co-mingling, you can't be sure that even brand cables are authentic.
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