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Macs can now inform Apple if any liquids have been detected in the USB-C ports

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221–230 of 351 posts

Re: Macs can now inform Apple if any liquids have been detected in the USB-C ports

#221
post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You really dislike a feature that plays a loud sound instead of shorting pins in you USB-C connector together? Guess what is more annoying than a loud sound.

I think the issue is that it triggers when there is even a tiny piece of dirt in there. Ie. the pins aren't shorted, but there is some damp particle of dust in there causing a 10 Megaohm connection which would do no harm whatsoever. Happens a lot for people who leave USB-C cables in the bottom of bags and they get dirt in the connector (and possibly the residue from that beer that exploded in your bag last year and t…

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Re: Macs can now inform Apple if any liquids have been detected in the USB-C ports

#222
post #182
post #35

Possibly not related, but my past two Samsungs have had this feature and it drives me crazy. Usually they seem to trigger when using non standard cords and from 0% battery life. This means that I get a very loud warning sound triggering when trying to charge my phone from a battery pack or borrowing someone's cord. Oddly, charging when on (ie not completely dead), this feature doesn't trigger the alarm. I really disl…

Hold on... Could this by why I hear a really loud buzzing sound when I connect my laptop to a thunderbolt docking station? The sound only happens for a fraction of a second, and doesn't happen every time; but now that you mention it, it does have the acoustic properties of a warning buzzer! All components genuine AFAIK and supplied by the same vendor, Toshiba/Dynabook; but I wonder if a failing component somewhere ca…

I doubt it. My guess is that you have speakers/headphones connected to your dock and they're picking up some kind of transients when you plug it in. Capacitors charging can also have some sound, but it's usually quite high pitched. If you're docking station has an external power source, you might find that adding/removing/changing it helps. Or connecting speakers/headphones via a usb DAC.

Re: Macs can now inform Apple if any liquids have been detected in the USB-C ports

#223
post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It doesn't even have to be waterproof to prevent 99% water damage cases. It just needs to be water resistant against liquid pours from the top, like how a car can withstand rain.

Most of the liquid spills I see are from people carrying water bottles in their bags with the laptop.

I seem to be an outlier.

Most of my cases where me toppling over some classes or bottles in a way where the liquid ended up directly on the open laptop.

On the other hand in my bag I normally have the Laptop in an additional sleeve, sometimes a double one, so any case where liquid ended up spilling in my backpack it at most lead to a slightly damp laptop due to the sleeves getting wet but nothing which causes water damage.

As a side note if used correctly a simple plastic bag (like a thing plastic shopping bag) as an additional sleeve around you laptop sleeve can be a trivial cheap way to get a surprising amount of waterproofing a laptop in a backpack. I don't do this on a daily basis but when traveling or similar I always hope to not forget to do it.

Re: Macs can now inform Apple if any liquids have been detected in the USB-C ports

#224

This is a feature of newer usb-c pd chipsets. See, e.g., https://www.ti.com/product/TPS25751 in the features section. Apple has historically used TI chipsets for their USB power controllers. The feature likely comes from this.

FWIW, liquid (pin-shortage) detection on the USB-port is a standard feature of all Smartphones with IPxx water-ingress certification.

It prevents the device from applying/draining power from any pin in such a state, mainly to reduce corrosion of the contacts and increase longevity.

(Without such a mechanism, an IPxx device may be unable to charge within a few weeks as the contacts of the connector can deteriorate quite fast)

As to why Apple ported the daemon from iOS to macOS....well, for sure a good indicator to reduce warranty repair-costs...

Re: Macs can now inform Apple if any liquids have been detected in the USB-C ports

#225
post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We didn't let them go, they were taken from us by force

Same for sanely-sized screens. It really sucks for someone who doesn't watch any videos on their phone and still treats it mostly as a limited communication device rather than their primary gateway to the internet. The fact that I'm a relatively compact person doesn't help either.

I have quite large hands and the iPhone 13 Mini is kind of the upper limit of what I call comfortable to use with one hand. The perfect phone for me is roughly the size of the iPhone 4, or like the BB Passport where the designers fully committed to the two-handed use case and made that work well.

With Apple's Vision Pro and its controls based on eye movement and finger gestures in mind I think this might become a thing on larger sized phones as well. For example a dedicated button at the bottom of the screen that will just click wherever I look. At least I'd prefer that over having to do finger gymnastics on a 6 inch screen.

Re: Macs can now inform Apple if any liquids have been detected in the USB-C ports

#226
post #3

That's great, hopefully this means easier detection of those attempting to lodge bogus warranty claims for negligent damage.

unlikely

it mainly means even more rightfully warranty claims which have nothing to do with water damage being rejected as water damage

apple repair is already somewhat notorious for this wrongful rejections as the "water intrusion" sensors in their laptops are so sensitive that it's pretty common for them to trigger without there being anything anywhere close to water damage (like you had you window open in the neighbor room on a rainy day; not joking here)

worse if they trigger not only do they reject warranty they do also (often? always?) reject doing repairs at all even if you pay for (but then apple anyway mostly only replaces major parts making many "small easy" repairs unreasonable expensive).

Re: Macs can now inform Apple if any liquids have been detected in the USB-C ports

#227

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The iPhone 12/13 Mini was substantially smaller, but few people bought it, so they cancelled it. The vast majority seem to want large screens. Currently the only compromise are flip phones. I considered buying the Z Flip 5, but the screen protector needs to be replaced by Samsung to maintain warranty and there is no Samsung Store nearby. I asked and Samsung said I'd have to send it to them, losing my phone for a coup…

iPhones run iOS and, honestly, I can't stand it for a variety of reasons regardless of how nice the hardware is. Main one being that apps can only be installed from the app store. I can see myself using a jailbroken iPhone, but jailbreaks are hard to come by these days. Vast majority doesn't know what they want. They would convince themselves that whatever is currently sold must be good. But then I know at least 10 p…

Unfortunately bigger phone means more space for the battery and rest of the hardware, so companies will keep making their Pro Ultra models larger and so of course the larger ones are more of a status symbol.

Re: Macs can now inform Apple if any liquids have been detected in the USB-C ports

#228
post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Water resistant is not water proof.

*water Pure not salt water or tap water, not contaminated toilet water where most phones seem to end up. And only for a certain time at a certain depth (pressure). And not pressurized just static. Maybe they should be named USB-Sea? /s

Have you seen the same Apple ads as me? Because they show it under rain, under the faucet, covered in Coke, etc.

I agree it's resistant and it does what you say... But the way they advertise it....

Re: Macs can now inform Apple if any liquids have been detected in the USB-C ports

#229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does the USB-C specification allow that? Can such devices get USB-C certification? OTOH, I haven't seen any USB certifications on Apple USB cables or devices, so most likely Apple doesn't care.

Yes: because Apple actually got this added to the spec: https://www.usb.org/document-library/usb-type-cr-cable-and-c... which is the real story IMO (I am impressed no one bothered looking at the Type-C spec update after the Type-C iPhone finally came out) This actually replaced the analog audio mode (good riddance- whoever thought adding analog audio into a port that also does digital audio was a good idea?)

Me with an analog headphone?

Re: Macs can now inform Apple if any liquids have been detected in the USB-C ports

#230
post #80

Wait wait wait, they advertise the iPhone as waterproof but still void the warranty and won’t fix it if their waterproofing fails? We lost the headphone jack for this?

They will disable charging if they detect liquids in the port as a way to reduce the chance of causing failures.
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