Most annoying thing for me is that they just lose their grip over time, just like Micro-USB did. I bought a late 2016 Macbook Pro which was the first to sport USB-C. After a good two years with admittedly heavy usage, both of them were flimsy enough to develop regular dropped connections to monitor and power. This is something which seems to be near impossible to do on a 2015 machine with HDMI/USB-A/Magsafe.
USB-C was supposed to simplify our lives, but instead it’s a total mess
521–530 of 624 posts
Re: USB-C was supposed to simplify our lives, but instead it’s a total mess
#522USB-C felt like it forgot the entire design intention of previous cable standards: That connectors had a direct relationship to functionality.
When you build a PC, generally parts and cables only fit in places that they will function. When plugging devices into a computer, historically if you plug them in where they fit, it works.
USB-C's decision to buck this behavior made it more confusing for users, not less.
Re: USB-C was supposed to simplify our lives, but instead it’s a total mess
#523Earlier quoted context omitted.
I’m sure for some it’s a nightmare worthy of writing about, but yeah I’ve never had a problem. I love that USB-C trivially expanded my laptop to having two DisplayPort devices so I can run 3 4K screens at 60hz
What laptop do you have that does 3×4K@60Hz? Is it loud?
Xps15 9560. It sounds like a jet engine taking off when I’m playing Subnautica but otherwise isn’t actually too hard on the gpu
Re: USB-C was supposed to simplify our lives, but instead it’s a total mess
#524Earlier quoted context omitted.
What laptop do you have that does 3×4K@60Hz? Is it loud?
Xps15 9560. It sounds like a jet engine taking off when I’m playing Subnautica but otherwise isn’t actually too hard on the gpu
That sounds neat! Are you daisy chaining from one monitor to another? I think my monitor supports that too.
Re: USB-C was supposed to simplify our lives, but instead it’s a total mess
#525The solution, I believe, is rather simple. The standards group should require any cable/device with USB 3 support to include a label on its packaging detailing which capabilities of USB 3 are supported. Think of the nutrition labels on food packaging, instead showing what the device does and does not support, something like this: Power Delivery——–30w max Thunderbolt————No support Bandwidth————–800Mbps max Video——————…
Some of these values are determined only after hooking the devices together. The devices may support 5V/5A (25W) but cable may only support 3A (but it can do 36W at 12V/3A), after connecting the devices you'll get max 15W. :)
A device using 5V/5A is nonstandard to an ugly extent but that's fine, because the actual spec of the cable is amps and there are only two options: 3 amps and 5 amps.
And we could fold the thunderbolt/bandwidth/video into one single speed rating without much trouble, if the desire was there...
Re: USB-C was supposed to simplify our lives, but instead it’s a total mess
#526My problem with USB-C is that the physical connector wears out over about a year of regular use becoming loose and unreliable. Until that is fixed, USB-C will be substandard.
Re: USB-C was supposed to simplify our lives, but instead it’s a total mess
#527Earlier quoted context omitted.
>"If it fits, it works" is pretty easy to explain. It also isn't correct. It wasn't true as far as VGA and DVI adapters were concerned. Nor is it true for connecting two HDMI-In ports, for example.
If I recall correctly, DVI had three main variants: -I, -A, and -D. A DVI-to-VGA adapter would have a DVI-A plug. The video card would have either DVI-I or DVI-D. If the card had DVI-D, it only offered digital and the DVI-A plug would not physically fit. If the card had DVI-I, it would offer both analog and digital and both DVI-A and DVI-D would fit. So, if it fits it works! And yeah, the HDMI thing is of course true…
The pin helped sometimes but there were a few arrangements that fit but did not work. Female DVI to Female VGA adapters existed for going from VGA to DVI-A but this meant you could fit a pinless DVI-D cable and a VGA cable together this way.
Re: USB-C was supposed to simplify our lives, but instead it’s a total mess
#528Earlier quoted context omitted.
I did read it, and for my use cases, I don't have issues. I understand others' use cases may not match mine, but this situation seems basically like any other connectivity standard in the history of technology. Except this time, the universality for what most people use it for has actually managed to catch on. :)
"Universality" that involves many people finding that cables that look identical don't actually work the same way. Interesting definition there. Universality of physical plug, I guess?
I'm not sure I see how this is an interesting definition. How is it different from HDMI or LAN cables? There the cables also define capability so "cables that look identical don't actually work the same way".
Re: USB-C was supposed to simplify our lives, but instead it’s a total mess
#529Earlier quoted context omitted.
Aha - you may find that your Switch CANNOT in fact share a charge - Nintendo's port is not necessarily safe to use with anything but its supplied charger. And I've just learned this lesson with a $60 bill from Nintendo repair after the port went pop and couldn't charge the device. I only have reputable chargers in the house from Apple and one from Anker aside from the Nintendo's own. All my apple kit works fine off t…
From my research a few years ago, this is caused by the Switch asking the charger for 20V, but it actually expects 15V. The Nintendo charger obeys this hidden rule, but any other charger will happily provide 20V. I think the difference between a 20V and 15V charge isn't significant enough to blow the Switch up the first time you use it, but, over time it will blow up.
This is really interesting, do you remember where you read this, or have a writeup somewhere? I'm curious as to whether the Mariko/Switch Lite variants have the same problem.
Re: USB-C was supposed to simplify our lives, but instead it’s a total mess
#530Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Mainly that all the usb-c cables you sprinkle across your house might not have the same functionality. this is a problem if you expect things to be like USB2 where you can collect all these random cables and power blocks and use them interchangeably. this wasn't always true with USB2 anyway, with all the out of spec "fast charge" implementations. there are a lot of optional features and speed tiers for USB3, which…
> this is a problem if you expect things to be like USB2 where you can collect all these random cables and power blocks and use them interchangeably. this wasn't always true with USB2 anyway, with all the out of spec "fast charge" implementations. Silly question time, why would we not expect that?
Let me counter with another question: Do you also expect random HDMI and LAN cables to have the same capabilities?