Raspberry Pi 4 not working with some chargers

Re:Raspberry Pi 4 not working with some chargers by candiodari on Friday July 05, 2019 @09:46AM (#20362452)

USB-C is not a standard, USB-C is a combination of a dozen different standards, some of which you mention. There's electrical standards, optical standards, slow, fast, using 2, 4, 5, 6 and/or 8 electrical conductors.

So no, there's not one cable, there's a boatload of them.

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Re:Raspberry Pi 4 not working with some chargers by ethbro on Friday July 05, 2019 @09:59AM (#20362544)

The problem seems to be identifying.

I get not physically keying: that's the whole point of the USB-C idea.

What I don't get is why the hell they didn't mandate standardized identification (at least in manuals) regarding port / cable feature compatibility. The entire point of the trademark is to use it to make things easier for the customer and promote adoption.

Make a logo for every feature (4k 60hz!), trademark them too, then mandate implementers advertise featuresets via the logos. Problem solved.

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Re:Raspberry Pi 4 not working with some chargers by tracker1 on Friday July 05, 2019 @01:17PM (#20364122)

Where do you put this variety of a dozen or so features... the end of the USB cable is already really small, and varying logos on that end? I'm not sure I'd even be able to distinguish.

The fact is, it really sucks and they should have limited it to maybe a subset of two... one that can only deliver basic charging and data, and one that can deliver all features. A $5 sku and a $25 sku (or close to). Unfortunately, it's all a mess.

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Re:Raspberry Pi 4 not working with some chargers by ethbro on Friday July 05, 2019 @01:34PM (#20364235)

> Where do you put this variety of a dozen or so features

> (at least in manuals)

... and come to think of it, why not colored rings around each end of the cord? There aren't that many features.

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Re:Raspberry Pi 4 not working with some chargers by tracker1 on Friday July 05, 2019 @05:55PM (#20366196)

From a couple other comments... the combination is 6 distinctions on two feature classes. Shoot, do I need red, or yellow for this device? It'd be worse than mini/micro usb transition.

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Re:Raspberry Pi 4 not working with some chargers by ethbro on Friday July 05, 2019 @08:37PM (#20366983)

Two rings, one with 3 colors and one with 2 colors? Seems pretty simple.

"2018 MacBook Pros support green-purple for the highest feature set"

Far simpler than things people use every day: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electronic_color_code

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Re:Raspberry Pi 4 not working with some chargers by jmiserez on Friday July 05, 2019 @06:52PM (#20366526)

Well now you still need to know, or else it doesn't work. How do you choose if they all look the same?

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Re:Raspberry Pi 4 not working with some chargers by afiori on Friday July 05, 2019 @10:59AM (#20362996)

This is especially needed as with so many possible variations full feature cable can have problem listing all the features.

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Re:Raspberry Pi 4 not working with some chargers by cesarb on Friday July 05, 2019 @11:38AM (#20363348)

> with so many possible variations full feature cable can have problem listing all the features

There are only six variants: https://people.kernel.org/bleung/how-many-kinds-of-usb-c-to-...

And it's actually the product of three variants (2.0 only, 5 Gb/s, 10 Gb/s) by two maximum current ratings (3A, 5A), so a pair of logos would be enough.

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Re:Raspberry Pi 4 not working with some chargers by tracker1 on Friday July 05, 2019 @01:18PM (#20364136)

And they couldn't limit it to two for cables, one with the lowest specs (low power chargers/data), one with the highest support (anything else)?

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