You know what's nice about Type-C ports though? They're also USB1 and USB2, and USB3 ports (with a cheap adapter), so they work with like every peripheral made for the last 20 years.

- my cassette player is a CD player (with a cheap adapter)

- my VGA port is an HDMI port (with a cheap adapter)

- my wall outlet is a micro-USB port (with a cheap adapter)

- my Lightning port is a headphone jack (with a cheap adapter)

Adapter-based compatibility is so convenient.

All of these are active adapters USB-C to USB-A is passive(except a resistor). You can use USB-C to MicroUSB-B instead of USB-A to MicroUSB-B cables if your device is not hardwired.

> Type-C ports

> They're also USB1 and USB2, and USB3

> work with like every peripheral made for the last 20 years

too bad there is no guarantee they will work with devices with Type-C ports as the type-C port is a mess and there is no mention on the standard on how to communicate capabilities of the port. Can it do thunderbolt? who knows?! can it charge the device? who knows?! Can it run PCIe lanes? who knows?!

Actually the basic USB fallbacks and simple charging are all handled through passives (resistors) and 100% of Type C cables will support them. Sadly that's the only thing you can depend on by inspection.

Communication of port capabilities are described in the spec; not sure about cable capabilities though.

You'd think that companies couldn't mess up a simple resistor. https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1vnpEXfo2HCGADdd9G2x9... proves that wrong.

The charging thing in particular seems like a disaster— the situation is bad enough with dedicated power supplies, where we have Amazon pages listing specific devices and laptop models that are known to work; but then there's this whole classes of setups where the correct behaviour isn't even knowable without directly querying the user. If I plug that USB-C battery bank into my laptop, should it be charging the bank from the laptop, or charging the laptop from the bank? Does it depend on whether the laptop is plugged in or not? If the laptop is plugged in to a current-limited source, should it prioritize charging the bank or its internal battery? Gaah.

Here's what the Android prompt for this looks like: https://www.quora.com/Devices-can-charge-or-be-charged-via-U...

Aren’t the adaptors for USBC quite a bit more expensive? Is t there essentially a chip in the cable?

No, adapters from USB-C to the older USB ports are completely passive, they only have a pair of resistors to identify as an adapter.