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Don't let anyone take away your big box of cables

blog.jim-nielsen.com

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Re: Don't let anyone take away your big box of cables

#201

Post by PorciiVorbesc »

lowken wrote: post #194

I recently purged my cable box. I had 8 HDMI cables... 8. What do I need 8 HDMI cables for? I tossed them in the garbage with a ton of other use less cables. I kept one HDMI cable (not 8) and a few odds and ends. I kept one rj45 Ethernet cable and tossed the rest. I even tossed my rj45 crimping tool kit. Why? Because I don't see the need to crimp Ethernet cables anytime soon and should the need arise I can buy a kit…

HDMI and Ethernet are comedies at this point, no need to hoard so many. The point is to not throw away the more rare/niche ones since getting one after will be hard and/or expensive.

Re: Don't let anyone take away your big box of cables

#202

Post by ChoGGi »

godelski wrote: post #114
SmasherEpilepti wrote: post #106

Recently, I was screwed by my big box of cables, when I pulled out a SATA power connector for my modular power supply, and learned very quickly that though the ports universally fit across modular PSUs, the pinouts are not actually intercompatible, and you can and will fry your hard drives. I didn't know this; I had foolishly assumed that SATA power connectors were standardized on both ends.

They aren't even consistent within manufacturer! They're standardized on the device side, but not the PSU side. So always check pinout before you make the very reasonable assumption that if it fits it works

> They aren't even consistent within manufacturer!

Especially if the "manufacturer" is just a reseller.

Re: Don't let anyone take away your big box of cables

#203

Post by squarefoot »

I have surplus/military bare cables dating from the 1970s or so, extra shiny silver plated copper with PTFE jacket: a joy to solder, then more "normal" ones from the late 80s and 90s, then "old" modern ones, that is, power/audio/data cables usable with recent stuff. I'll never throw away any of them because unlike most crap they bundle with consumer devices today, they're made of real copper. Take a cheap cable bought today and chances are that it either sticks to a magnet, meaning it's copper plated steel or other crappy alloy, or it doesn't and it's super light which indicates it's made of aluminium; in all cases not good where power dissipation can be a problem or where resoldering may be necessary. Keep old cables!

Re: Don't let anyone take away your big box of cables

#204

Post by edgarvaldes »

lowken wrote: post #194

I recently purged my cable box. I had 8 HDMI cables... 8. What do I need 8 HDMI cables for? I tossed them in the garbage with a ton of other use less cables. I kept one HDMI cable (not 8) and a few odds and ends. I kept one rj45 Ethernet cable and tossed the rest. I even tossed my rj45 crimping tool kit. Why? Because I don't see the need to crimp Ethernet cables anytime soon and should the need arise I can buy a kit…

I had four unused HDMI cables. One day, I needed to send a signal from my PC to my tv. I usually use Plex for convenience and the "resume where I left off" feature, but that day a certain update was acting up, so I decided to use a cable instead. Easy. The next day, I wanted to send a signal from my laptop to the tv downstairs (I still hadn't fixed the Plex issue) and pulled out the second cable because I needed a different length than the first one... but it turned out to be incompatible, so I ended up using the third one.

Re: Don't let anyone take away your big box of cables

#205

Post by kiddico »

lowken wrote: post #194

I recently purged my cable box. I had 8 HDMI cables... 8. What do I need 8 HDMI cables for? I tossed them in the garbage with a ton of other use less cables. I kept one HDMI cable (not 8) and a few odds and ends. I kept one rj45 Ethernet cable and tossed the rest. I even tossed my rj45 crimping tool kit. Why? Because I don't see the need to crimp Ethernet cables anytime soon and should the need arise I can buy a kit…

I also did the "only keep one of each" purge, but that last part about throwing away a tool because you can just buy another one later is nuts to me. Yeah you could do that. You could also throw away all your cables and just buy them when you need another lol.

Re: Don't let anyone take away your big box of cables

#206

Post by edgarvaldes »

marcogarces wrote: post #198

I use big drawers for "types" and ziplocks for within; i have a network drawer , a media one and a generic one that says "stuff that glues or grabs" (zip ties, tape, etc)

Same here. I also keep an inventory and labels for Box A, Box B, etc.

Re: Don't let anyone take away your big box of cables

#207

Post by groby_b »

Flip side? I have, in almost half a century of tech dabbling, never once needed a cable from that box that I couldn't have bought again.

I still keep _some_. A basic supply of standard cables "just in case", and clearly labeled things for "who the fuck needed to invent another connector" cases. (Looking at you, printer manufactures and WD hard drive enclosures)

But I strongly suggest tossing most of it. You need the space more than you need more cables.

Re: Don't let anyone take away your big box of cables

#208

Post by karim79 »

This is so strange because I have a big box of cables. And I had a dream about it the other day. Which was more like a nightmare.

I think there was some point in the dream where I was going ape shit because the USB type C ones were missing or I couldn't find them and I was blaming [someone].

I'm not like this when awake FYI.

Re: Don't let anyone take away your big box of cables

#209

Post by tom_ »

tikhonj wrote: post #6

In my big box of cables I have, among other things, a double-ended USB-A cable. I understand that this is absolutely not standards compliant, and I have absolutely no idea of where I got it from. I have never used it. But it is a thing that exists. Getting rid of almost 10 different proprietary charging cables for pre-smart phones and some old laptops felt great though :P

I've got a 7 port USB 3.0 hub that connects with a double ended USB-A cable.

Re: Don't let anyone take away your big box of cables

#210

Post by cyclopeanutopia »

booty wrote: post #24

Key for me is to "group" cables. For example, I have a bag of USB-C cables, a bag of USB-A cables, etc. Grouping them is key to deduplicating. It's easy to look at a single legacy USB A-to-B "printer" cable in isolation and think "I might need this someday!" Because you really might need it someday. However, if you group them you might see that you have ten of them. And then you can get rid of... maybe 8 of them. I a…

And then, when you really need them, it turns out that out of ten maybe one still works and you couldn't predict which one it will be. :)
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