Why aren't motherboards mostly USB-C by now? (2021) • Hacker News Board

Re: Why aren't motherboards mostly USB-C by now? (2021)

#31

Post by jacquesm » Sun, Nov 19, 2023, 2:21 AM UTC

korginator wrote: post #30

aslilac wrote: post #3

calling USB A “legacy” and a “relic” is so misplaced. we all still own USB A devices. I challenge the author to go find a wired keyboard or mouse that comes with a USB C plug. it’s possible, but not easy. the thing is, we could just have both! this isn’t some winner/loser scenario. the real question should be why these computers with enough bandwidth for 11+ connectors don’t at least split the difference with 6/5 of…

USB-C is simply more convenient to use, and you get it right 100% of the time, instead of your orientation being wrong 50% of the time with USB-A.

If you get it wrong 50% of the time let me substantially reduce that for you: logo goes 'up' for whatever the normal orientation of your device is. That should clear up 99% of the cases.

Re: Why aren't motherboards mostly USB-C by now? (2021)

#32

Post by abhinavk » Sun, Nov 19, 2023, 2:21 AM UTC

aslilac wrote: post #3

calling USB A “legacy” and a “relic” is so misplaced. we all still own USB A devices. I challenge the author to go find a wired keyboard or mouse that comes with a USB C plug. it’s possible, but not easy. the thing is, we could just have both! this isn’t some winner/loser scenario. the real question should be why these computers with enough bandwidth for 11+ connectors don’t at least split the difference with 6/5 of…

Weirdly, the port on a cheap mechanical keyboard I have is USB-C but the cable they packaged is USB-C -> USB-A instead. They likely didn't package C->C because of the chicken and egg problem. Not everyone has enough Type-C ports.

Re: Why aren't motherboards mostly USB-C by now? (2021)

#33

Post by themerone » Sun, Nov 19, 2023, 2:21 AM UTC

korginator wrote: post #30

aslilac wrote: post #3

calling USB A “legacy” and a “relic” is so misplaced. we all still own USB A devices. I challenge the author to go find a wired keyboard or mouse that comes with a USB C plug. it’s possible, but not easy. the thing is, we could just have both! this isn’t some winner/loser scenario. the real question should be why these computers with enough bandwidth for 11+ connectors don’t at least split the difference with 6/5 of…

USB-C is simply more convenient to use, and you get it right 100% of the time, instead of your orientation being wrong 50% of the time with USB-A.

My pixel slate has a USB-C port that will only charge in one orientation.

Re: Why aren't motherboards mostly USB-C by now? (2021)

#34

Post by anakaine » Sun, Nov 19, 2023, 2:22 AM UTC

korginator wrote: post #27

USB-A should be relegated to the rubbish-heap of poorly designed interfaces for the simple reason that it has no physical indication (e.g., RS-232C) or clear visual indicator for orientation, and you get it wrong 50% of the time. It's way beyond time the USB-A interface is eliminated. USB-C can't get here fast enough. My MacBook pro only has USB-C ports, they work well for data, video out, as well as power (charging)…

This said, USB-C needs to have its standards updated, and standardised. Eg all cables must support a minimum of USB 3.1 with power and data, with appropriate shielding. Stop yielding so many concessions. I'm already in a spot where I have a number of USB-C to C cable varieties that all look basically the same, but have very different characteristics. One cable basically refuses to charge anything. Another has no data capabilities. Another can carry decent power, but data is seemingly slower than USB 2.0. It's an absolute shitshow that manufacturers can ship something with USB-C ends and carrying USB-C markings that meets an arbitrary free for all standard.

Re: Why aren't motherboards mostly USB-C by now? (2021)

#35

Post by dharmab » Sun, Nov 19, 2023, 2:22 AM UTC

imoverclocked wrote: post #26

nfriedly wrote: post #13

> mechanical hard drive and a feeble 8 GB of RAM (is that even enough to run Windows by itself?) Windows 10 runs acceptably on a Core 2 Duo with 4 GB of RAM - this was my son's gaming PC until a couple of months ago. (It did have an SSD, though - a mechanical hard drive would certainly have reduced the snappiness.)

It’s pretty crazy that an operating system needs that much at all. I mean, we all get used to these big numbers but 4GB is actually a lot of bits. A single GB can store more books than a human can read in their lifetime. Somehow, we have accepted that the most fundamental piece of software on a computer should require many lifetimes worth of books of RAM. We have come a long way from thinking we would never need more…

By point of comparison, my fairly minimal Linux partition uses ~200MB of RAM after booting, and I suspect a good chunk of that is cache.

Re: Why aren't motherboards mostly USB-C by now? (2021)

#36

Post by dec0dedab0de » Sun, Nov 19, 2023, 2:22 AM UTC

makeitdouble wrote: post #11

aslilac wrote: post #3

calling USB A “legacy” and a “relic” is so misplaced. we all still own USB A devices. I challenge the author to go find a wired keyboard or mouse that comes with a USB C plug. it’s possible, but not easy. the thing is, we could just have both! this isn’t some winner/loser scenario. the real question should be why these computers with enough bandwidth for 11+ connectors don’t at least split the difference with 6/5 of…

> I challenge the author to go find a wired keyboard or mouse that comes with a USB C plug.. I can confirm, it's a journey. It's the same kind of journey than finding a hair trimmer that charges on USB C. I see it more as makers being complacent and not giving a fuck though. There's no technical reasons for those to be USB A, and the USB C ones work great. So yes USB A will be there for a while, and more often than n…

So yes USB A will be there for a while, and more often than not it's a symbolic middle finger to the buyer, a signal that a product should probably be avoided.

maybe it’s the opposite, it’s a warm hug reassuring you that they’re not going to change things just because some of the cool kids are.

Re: Why aren't motherboards mostly USB-C by now? (2021)

#37

Post by gweinberg » Sun, Nov 19, 2023, 2:22 AM UTC

aslilac wrote: post #3

calling USB A “legacy” and a “relic” is so misplaced. we all still own USB A devices. I challenge the author to go find a wired keyboard or mouse that comes with a USB C plug. it’s possible, but not easy. the thing is, we could just have both! this isn’t some winner/loser scenario. the real question should be why these computers with enough bandwidth for 11+ connectors don’t at least split the difference with 6/5 of…

Maybe it's a chicken and egg thing, but why do we still have usb-a keyboards and mice and thumb drives? wouldn't it make more sense for them all to be usb-c?

Re: Why aren't motherboards mostly USB-C by now? (2021)

#38

Post by jacquesm » Sun, Nov 19, 2023, 2:23 AM UTC

danbolt wrote: post #24

I can’t speak for other people, but I feel like my life is a revolving cocktail of USB Type-A, Type-B, Micro, and Type-C. I can’t just cut and re-crimp my old 2001 Sony Memory Stick USB adapter (which still has drivers available for Linux) to support USB-C. One thing that stuck out to me about the article is that the author didn’t talk much about their use cases with USB.

I still have a bunch of devices on USB-mini, that's the hardest one to source stuff for.

Re: Why aren't motherboards mostly USB-C by now? (2021)

#39

Post by Animats » Sun, Nov 19, 2023, 2:23 AM UTC

korginator wrote: post #27

USB-A should be relegated to the rubbish-heap of poorly designed interfaces for the simple reason that it has no physical indication (e.g., RS-232C) or clear visual indicator for orientation, and you get it wrong 50% of the time. It's way beyond time the USB-A interface is eliminated. USB-C can't get here fast enough. My MacBook pro only has USB-C ports, they work well for data, video out, as well as power (charging)…

> USB-A should be relegated to the rubbish-heap of poorly designed interfaces for the simple reason that it has no physical indication (e.g., RS-232C) or clear visual indicator for orientation, and you get it wrong 50% of the time.

That's a crap connector implementation problem. If the connector is compliant with the spec, it will only go in one way. (Looking at you, Yubikey.)

Re: Why aren't motherboards mostly USB-C by now? (2021)

#40

Post by themerone » Sun, Nov 19, 2023, 2:24 AM UTC

barrkel wrote: post #28

kevin_thibedeau wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Power Delivery was an addendum to USB 2. It is specified for USB-A ports.

You aren't going to get 20W of fast phone charging power out of USB 2; you get 2.5W tops. USB 3 gets you to about 5W. Meanwhile USB C goes up to 240W. You're probably never going to get that directly out of a motherboard.

The majority of USB C ports will never support 240W power delivery.