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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

#741

Post by Tijdreiziger »

jnovek wrote: post #507
smoldesu wrote: post #474

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have a launch-model Switch, and it still has trouble charging even on latest firmware. It's very possible that this is one of the "Mariko" fixes; Nintendo silently released a refresh of the Nintendo Switch before the OLED model was announced, dubbed the Mariko models. These had a number of changes, including but not limited to: - New, more secure boot sequence - Updated Nvidia Tegra board - ~20% better battery life…

Just to make this thread a bit more aggravating, I have two pre-Mariko switches — at least they both have the Nvidia Tegra vulnerability, anyway — and I have yet to see either fail to charge on random USB-C cables and chargers. As another poster mentioned, however, they will only dock with the OEM charger. Seems like whatever is happening with the OG switch USB-C implementation it’s not straightforward.

When docking, the Switch specifically wants 15V/2.6A [1]. Any less and it won't dock. There are some third-party vendors which have somehow circumvented this requirement, though [2].

[1] https://switchchargers.com/how-nintendo-switch-charging-work... -- scroll down to "Nintendo Switch Dock"

[2] e.g. https://skullnco.com/collections/nintendo-switch/products/ju... and https://www.gulikit.com/productinfo/506086.html

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

#742

Post by dorgo »

kennywinker wrote: post #715
phkahler wrote: post #702

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> If it comes with being able to buy a $5 cable to act as a charge, I don't see how people could complain. Even better, just use the old cable from your old device since they won't be designing a new one every other year.

As far as a I know, in the history of smartphones - which I'd say starts in 2007 with the launch of the iPhone - there have only really been 4 (or maybe 5) connectors used on widely sold phones: 1. Apple 30pin "iPod" connector 2. Apple Lightning connector 3. Mini USB (I don't think this ever appeared on anything but blackberries and cheapo flip phones?) 4. Micro USB 5. USB-C So, while I agree that cable changes are a…

Its not only about smartphones. How many different connectors (just) Thinkpad's had in the same time frame?

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

#743

Post by creativenolo »

ZekeSulastin wrote: post #586
bloppe wrote: post #485

A lot of people saying "USB-C cables aren't even compatible with each other!" (Nintendo switch etc.) Guess what: that's exactly the problem this regulation is intended to solve. Fake USB-C cables like Nintendo's that have the right shape but do not adhere to spec should gradually disappear along with lightning cables. The regulation actually says that cables can no longer be bundled with the devices themselves, so Ni…

“The regulation actually says that cables can no longer be bundled with the devices themselves” I don’t think anyone’s mentioned that. Oh my god, tech social media is going to melt down when that kicks in if the reaction to chargers being excluded is any indication (not to mention a repeat of the shift from 30-pin to Lightning in Apple’s case, except now without a cable).

I have had usb cables from usb rechargeable bike lights that leaked into my ever growing bundle of cables. So I'm never quite sure which USB cable will work with what. I'd never knowingly buy these crap cables.

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

#744

Post by jchw »

bsnal wrote: post #612
cm2187 wrote: post #532

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In fact interoperability is what enables innovation, vs walled gardens.

Seems like history of computing goes against this

When in history has interoperability not been a catalyst for innovation? Look at everything people do in browsers now. Or if that's not to your taste, perhaps the era of BASIC is a better example. Not all standards are good, but a decent standard is better, or at least much more practically useful, than a lot of better but incompatible proprietary equivalents.

Of course it doesn't have to be mandated, and in the past usually wasn’t, but hell, it’s hard to see many good reasons to not standardize on USB-C. It’s got plenty of pins, it’s already mass-manufactured, and outside of only a single product Apple sells, there’s not much competition aside from legacy stuff that can’t handle a lot of today’s data, form factor and power delivery needs.

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

#745

Post by bloppe »

robonerd wrote: post #637
bloppe wrote: post #485

A lot of people saying "USB-C cables aren't even compatible with each other!" (Nintendo switch etc.) Guess what: that's exactly the problem this regulation is intended to solve. Fake USB-C cables like Nintendo's that have the right shape but do not adhere to spec should gradually disappear along with lightning cables. The regulation actually says that cables can no longer be bundled with the devices themselves, so Ni…

I don't see why "What about innovation?" is taken seriously as an argument anyway. USB-C is more than adequate, we could coast with it for the next hundred years. Nobody is kept up at night by the lack of innovation in AC power plugs, the standards countries have settled on today, while not all equivalent, are all generally satisfactory in practice. Problem solved; stop fixing that which ain't broke and move on to ot…

To be totally fair, it's not like a phone manufacturer is going to put 2 different ports on their device, so this is essentially regulating data as well as power. But also to be fair, USB-C cables that support thunderbolt 3 are a couple orders of magnitude faster (throughput) than Apple's lightning cables (40 Gbps vs ~480 Mbps), and if Apple could possibly support such speeds without releasing a new backwards-incompatible cable, they would have done so long ago.

If Apple ever wanted to support faster than 40 Gbps, they would have to do so in concert with the rest of the tech industry and release it as an open standard. I'd like to hear somebody try to argue this is a bad thing.

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

#746

Post by lanstin »

goto11 wrote: post #630
bsnal wrote: post #612

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seems like history of computing goes against this

You think AOL had more innovation than the web?

AOL used SMTP and NFS and TCP/IP and many many other open protocol interop things. It wasn't great at sharing back, I am afraid, but it wouldn't have been able to be what it was without the internet protocols and many other open things (network socket programming, DLPI, heck sendmail, SSL, HTTP compression). AOL is a prime example of how a solid infrastructure enables new businesses (but those businesses might not stick with the partner that brought them).

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

#747

Post by tephra »

robonerd wrote: post #637
bloppe wrote: post #485

A lot of people saying "USB-C cables aren't even compatible with each other!" (Nintendo switch etc.) Guess what: that's exactly the problem this regulation is intended to solve. Fake USB-C cables like Nintendo's that have the right shape but do not adhere to spec should gradually disappear along with lightning cables. The regulation actually says that cables can no longer be bundled with the devices themselves, so Ni…

I don't see why "What about innovation?" is taken seriously as an argument anyway. USB-C is more than adequate, we could coast with it for the next hundred years. Nobody is kept up at night by the lack of innovation in AC power plugs, the standards countries have settled on today, while not all equivalent, are all generally satisfactory in practice. Problem solved; stop fixing that which ain't broke and move on to ot…

When they started this in 2009 they did want to make micro usb the thing everybody was forced to use.

It's only by luck that it took enough time to not get stuck on that...

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

#748

Post by zaik »

Gigachad wrote: post #738
sitzkrieg wrote: post #717

Earlier quoted context omitted.

the performance is too bad

The bridges are not horrible. But they aren’t super reliable. I have seen them go down for a few days once, generally be a bit slow, forward messages out of order, etc. The free matrix.org server is also overloaded. The paid server is much faster.

Still, bridges do not really solve fragmentation problems the same way compliance with internet standards does.

For example bridges break important features like end-to-end encryption.

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

#749

Post by layer8 »

scarface74 wrote: post #270
dingleberry420 wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What problem is the EU solving here? Everything works together, except Apple stuff.

Are they also going to insist that Android manufactures support their phones for more than six months with operating system updates? Worrying about cables causing e-waste is instead of phones, is even more evidence of the technical ineptness of legislators.

> Are they also going to insist that Android manufactures support their phones for more than six months with operating system updates?

Yes they are, with a directive from 2019. See for example https://grunecker.de/en/blog/sales-of-goods-directive-and-di..., search for “Update Obligations”.

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

#750

Post by bonzini »

moduspol wrote: post #660
bonzini wrote: post #651

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> charge speeds comparable to ICE fill-ups That's just impossible. Filling a 100 kWh "tank" in one minute requires 6 MW of power, plus all the power that goes into heat. The only solution would be replacing batteries on the fly but Tesla discontinued it. Moving stuff is inherently faster than chemical reactions (unless you're talking about explosions).

It doesn't have to be equivalent. Just being comparable from a user experience and business case perspective would be enough. Getting it down to five minutes to fill to 80% may be sufficient. Right now it's 15-20 minutes.

The problem is not just the time to charge a single car but the capacity in cars/hour.

First, if a car takes five times longer to charge, you need a lot more space to cover the needs for peak days. This may not be a problem on highways (or in the US) but space in Europe is much more limited.

Second, a smallish 6-pump filling station serves 150-200 cars per hour. An equivalent charging station would need 12-15 MW which means working at 40 kV.

Dealing with peak days is easy for filling stations, you just request gasoline trucks more frequently. For charging stations you need to build infrastructure that might hardly exist in more rural places, it's the same as sneakernet vs broadband.

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