And we have not started talking about eGPUs yet ;-)
My point being that the scenario you envision is now being sold by some manufacturers, but not necessarily delivered. These docks also have their own firmware, sometimes _multiple_ different firmwares, and at least those I've tried only let you update via Windows. There's UEFI updates that are supposed to help as well, again only updatable via Windows. So far, I can't say I'm super impressed with the reality of non-Mac Thunderbolt.
Also, as far as I understand there just isn’t enough pins to support all the modes at once so trade offs have to be made...
Works today with Linux here! It's just magical, I tell you.
The world started to happen already, it may not become all that good and 100% universal soon or anytime, but good enough for a wide spread adoption.
Nintendo Switch uses the USB-C connector, but they're off spec which lead to people breaking their devices by connecting them to cabling/docks that weren't to the Switch's implementation. Think there was more nuance to it than just that, but grand scheme of things, the whole fiasco around that highlights concerns as no one wants to brick their devices.
This seems like a relatively easy fix that as you mention isn't 100%, but exists. On my MacBook Pro, the only reason I know my ports are Thunderbolt is because I know their specifications: the ports aren't marked in any particular way. The body/bodies involved with USB/Thunderbolt should make it a requirement that ports (and perhaps cables) indicate what it is capable of in a similar way to how USB 3.x TypeA/B cables have blue coloring within the port and the plug. At that stage, if I see a blue colored port or plug, I know I'm dealing with a 3.x USB one. If you refuse/can't meet the specification, you then shouldn't be able to use USB Type C for your product.
Instead, in their rush to get everything on USB Type C, they have seemingly tossed out any pretense of standards needing to be met to use the port and may stifle the port's adoption going forward.
The downside is when I want to use the same kb/mouse with my desktop, I have to unplug them from the monitor and plug them into the desktop.
I use a cheap USB hub which has a button that can switch between two outputs for this:
I don't run Windows so I can't answer that but Ubuntu 19.04 runs fine, although I've had minor issues with the laptop coming out of sleep and not outputting to the display occasionally.
EDIT: It's really nice in portrait for coding. I don't use the supplied stand but a desk mounted arm.
Linux on Dex was never particularly useful.
Is there some setting I need to enable on my phone, or is my setup just different in some way?
There's also a setting to switch between modes under Settings -> Connections -> More connection settings -> HDMI mode.
The dream kills cheap machines. The reality is that they will cut corners to compete on price, and who you gonna call?
The dock works without issue on both of my laptops, a MacBook Pro (13") and Dell Precision laptop.
Then I plugged my LG G6 and I could download at 80mb/s with the ethernet cable and I can use my mouse and keyboard, it even recognized my NAS.
I would love to reach the point where a desktop computer only had a single power cable leading to the wall, with everything else getting powered via it.
The real limiting factor here is that, assuming you could get a GPU with USB-C-out, you'd have to pass that power and any for accessories hooked up to the monitor through the GPU, and the nice ones currently are hitting the limits of available power already all by themselves (75W PCIE, 2x 150W power connectors - and a Vega 64, for example, can briefly peak at 360W).
So, to power your monitor over the same cable (and have at least another 15W for accessories plugged into it), you'd need a GPU that maxes out well under current ones on the market, which kind of defeats the point, you know?
On a side note, the way GPUs are increasingly hitting power constraints is why you see new designs switching to weird proprietary stuff like Apple's MPX modules, which allow a dedicated 500W per graphics card.
Edit: spelling
I wish that were true, but I won't hold my breath.
What is far more likely is that more standards and complexity will infiltrate the market before USB-C stabilizes into something that vendors can be consistent with and which consumers understand.
At least, I can't think of any other explanation for allowing 1.5Mbit/sec and 12Mbit/sec devices to call themselves 'USB 2.0'
Apple wants white cables, some people want red, blue or yellow cables, so on. And the connectors are so small there is no place to put anything on them.
But at least there were clear markings for those who care.
It would take up about 2 cm on each end of the cable, a set of bands, like a barcode. It doesn't even have to be that strikingly different in color.
> it's usb-c and be done with it...
It's even worse: most cables I've seen in stores labeled "USB-C cable" are actually USB-A to USB-C cables. Other than these, so far I've only seen an unlabeled USB-C to USB-C cable, and a Sony brand USB 2.0 USB-C to USB-C cable, both costing around R$ 100 (way more expensive than I'd expect for a basic 2.0-only cable).
Ditto dongles to connect to older devices. Will it work? No way to know, just try it and find out.
I'm hoping the thunderbolt 3 devices I have will "just work" with usb4 ports.
of course
Since the audio player had USB-C we needed a basic USB-C to USB-A adapter.
Being audio only, it was low bandwidth, USB 2.0, no power transfer: we didn't need any fancy features from the cable. Just a plain USB-C to USB-A adapter.
I think we tried five different USB-C to USB-A adapter cables from different vendors before the audio player recognised the amp it was connected to.
It was so tempting to think there was a firmware bug, until we found out it was critically dependent on some mysterious, unknowable quality of the adapter.
Or, it looks like thunderbolt would have been a good option. But it seems overengineered -- the transport layer doesn't need to know anything about the data.
This post shows exactly how useless relying on physical port was.
I break about a cable a week and break a device every now and then. Mostly doing very normal things like charging a phone in my pocket while hiking.
USB-C seems like a perfect example of a product designed by people who sit in an office chair all day and never go hiking, skiing, ice skating, rock climbing, or otherwise seek to understand what their users normally do with plugged-in devices in the field.
I miss the old DC barrel connectors -- they never broke, and they were usually designed such that housing of the electronics took the brunt of everything, not the PCB.
I've patched up so many of these over the years, that doesn't really seem that accurate. Though it is relatively true for properly designed stuff (connector bottoms out on the case and not on the jack) and things using the rather rare panel-mount jacks, which are indeed very solid if only lacking in ingress protection.
And then there's all the guitar pedals I make with chassis-mounted jacks... they can take an amazing amount of abuse.
Same for audio jacks. PCB-mounted 3.5mm jacks need resoldering often enough, but panel-mounted lasts forever.
You're doing it wrong then. I have about 5 USB-C cables and have never broke one in 3 years...
Kinds of cables I have broken over my IT life:
- A few Apple charger cables (on the Mac connecting end)
- A few headphone cables
Apple cables are generally really awful in terms of physically tearing apart, no matter the connector on the end.
What about IEC cables? They're super rugged and virtually impossible to break. Proportionally downsizing that connector to be small enough would likely maintain the same level of ruggedness while being small.
I'd appreciate if people don't downvote me just because you disagree with me. That discourages useful discussion on HN. I downvote trolls and people who abuse the system with spam, not people I disagree with.
Those are only designed to carry power though... not a complex list of protocols...
It doesn't happen often, but I've dropped two phones while they're charging onto the cable. The micro-USB phone never charged the same again; depending on the cable, you needed to put pressure on it to tilt it in the right direction. My new USB-C phone cleanly bent the cable, and the connection seems as solid and as reliable as it ever was with the replacement.
Look what you are asking for is not economically possible. The connectors you are comparing with are much larger and don't even have close to the number of lanes as USB cables. It's a useless comparison.
The solution is fairly simple -- the /housing/ around the plug needs to be standardized and have a snug fit into the housing of the phone. That would relieve strain on the connector or contact.
I really don't understand why people are downvoting me here. I thought downvoting was to deal with trolls and abusers. When did people start downvoting people they disagree with? That discourages meaningful discussion.
Perhaps using wireless charging and putting a rubber band round your phone will be a better solution.
> As a user there is no easy way for me to tell the 12-inch Macbook's USB-C port is different than the Air/Pro unless you explicitly search for it in the tech specs
Seems like manufacturer failure.
> If you see an HDMI port on a laptop you can be sure it's going to output some kind of video signal over that.
But even HDMI/DP have versions. It's especially visible now, as we have >=4k HDR high-frequency displays.
People keep repeating this lie for some weird reason. Similar to the "3.5 had to go because phones are too thin for it" lie. Why? Why do you keep lying? What possible incentive do all these people have? Is it self-deception? "Oh yeah I'm totally fine with losing X, Y and Z because I get thinness and weight reduction in exchange!" You get neither.
iPhone 5 124x59x7.6 mm, 112 g
Six years later
iPhone 11 150x75x8.3 mm, 194 g
Now yes, its true, the iPhone 5 was part of a group of lightweight and thin phones that are now extinct, because clearly things are getting smaller, thinner and more lightweight to boot.
For notebooks the same observations can be made. The 2008 MBA is only about 100 g heavier than the current model, the thinnest part is the same(!) and thickest part about 4 mm thicker (1.9 vs 1.5 cm). A slight but minuscule improvement. You could have a 1.3 kg notebook at the end of the 90s, btw.
This stuff really works and it gets under people's skins in ways that they are not aware of. If you want to keep an even keel I would like to propose that the only way you will be able to do so is to radically limit your ingestion of any kind of media.
The fact that every port used to be different is actually a feature, as it helps you identify which device supports what based on the ports it had. If you see an HDMI port on a laptop you can be sure it's going to output some kind of video signal over that. If you see Thunderbolt then you're sure the machine supports Thunderbolt.
USB-C just jams all these incompatible standards into a pin-count-constrained port (so they can't even all fit in, and trade-offs need to be made) without any way for the user to tell nor select which features should be enabled on which port.
My 12-inch MacBook for example has a USB-C port just like the MacBook Air and Pro, and yet if I plug in a Thunderbolt Display it won't work on the 12-inch one but will on the Air and Pro. As a user there is no easy way for me to tell the 12-inch Macbook's USB-C port is different than the Air/Pro unless you explicitly search for it in the tech specs (which is counter-intuitive as the whole point of USB-C is to be universal so in an ideal world you wouldn't/shouldn't even think about searching that).