EU Consumer Protection Committee Votes To Expand Scope of Common Charger Rules (techcrunch.com) 132
European Union lawmakers have taken a step closer to agreeing rules to standardize how a range of mobile gadgetry is charged. From a report: Today MEPs in the European Parliament's internal market and consumer protection (IMCO) committee adopted their position on a Commission proposal announced last fall, ahead of a full vote by the parliament next month to confirm how it will negotiate with Member State governments on the detail of the legislation. The Council adopted its position on the common charger proposal back in January. The IMCO committee voted 43:2 in favor of a negotiation position that will push to standardize charger ports for a range of mobile devices on USB Type-C, including smartphones, tablets, handheld games consoles, e-readers, digital cameras, electronic toys and more -- with MEPs voting to expand the original proposal to cover laptops, among other additional products.
Good (Score:5, Informative)
There is no excuse for not using USB C now. It's easy, it's cheap and it supports up to 240W.
If you device needs more than that it should still at least charge off USB C.
Re:Good (Score:4, Insightful)
Key word in your first sentence - "now". Will they update the required/allowed technologies when something else comes along? We've seen how long this discussion has gone on, so how long will it take to move to the next thing it should move to.
I"m just imaging there is like some Star Trek level plasma charger technology, but in the EU you can only use USB C since this law is still there in 200 years.
Re:Good (Score:4, Informative)
According to the following link, the idea is to define by 2026 the interoperability strategy for any future updates of the charging solutions, such that the legislation will update on new interoperable solutions. https://www.iclarified.com/856... [iclarified.com] Also, wireless charging is explicitly excluded from the scope of this particular legislation, so plasma chargers can be included as soon as they become available. If and only if the designer chooses to add a wired charger solution, then it must be a USB-C.
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IIRC, some people (possibly you) argued that standardizing on micro-USB meant that the subject of TFA would never ever happen. But it did.
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Indeed it did, because we didn't standardise. We came close, but unfortunately there's currently 3 competing standards with similar level of widespread use, micro-USB (still shipped on some devices today), Lightning, and USB-C.
This is as much a jab at Apple as it is at those companies who persist to ship an outdated USB standard to save on what literally amounts to $1 in the BOM for the connector and appropriate charge controller. Actually $0.50 since micro-USB isn't magically free.
Re:Good (Score:4, Interesting)
A much more rugged 2-pole connector could serve the same purpose an be much less prone to failure. I've had USB C ports fail on several phones now due to wear, dust/water ingress. Furthermore the USB C port is often attached to a flexi-PCB specific to one model of phone, making replacement by the average DIYer nigh on impossible
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So you're proposing smartphones come with two connectors in the future? A "more rugged 2-pole connector" for charging and a (potentially proprietary) connector for data transmission?
That certainly sounds like something a manager at Apple would consider as a "solution" for this EU rule.
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You'd be the first to sue them when an update bricks the device and, lacking a physical port for low-level access, it cannot be reflashed without a complete disassembly.
We have a gazillion USB-powered devices now and the common person owns at least 1 to 100 of them now, so your new 2-pole connector standard would increase the problem or create a gazillion pieces of e-waste. No, thank you.
Obligatory comic for this case, because what you proposed has been proposed a googol times and every day, a new guy or gi
Re:Good (Score:4, Informative)
USB C is a shit connector when used solely for charging. The pitch is too fine.
With USB-C and PD delivering 240W it is currently the best in class charging connector of its size.
I've had USB C ports fail on several phones now due to wear, dust/water ingress
WTF are you doing, using your phone as a lasso? Of all the ways I, the disaster of a girlfriend and all my friends have mistreated and outright murdered several of our phones (not even joking my mother knocked both the phone and the kitchen knife off the counter and the knife ended up tip first skewering the phone, it was hilarious and I keep telling her when Skynet goes live she'll be the first to go after the guys at Boston Dynamics who kick robot dogs), I've never come across anyone who has damaged a USB-C socket.
Cable yes, plenty, but not the socket.
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You haven't had Dell laptops with USB-C charging connectors.
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I've had several, and regretted every one. However, that's because Dell laptops are crud, not because of USB C.
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USB-C just makes them worse. The connector can easily break off from the motherboard.
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Typing on one now. Not just charging, but it's also the main dock connector and my work computer. It gets plugged and unplugged maybe 15-20 times a day as we move between meeting rooms.
Now the dock itself, that lasts about a year before it fails ... the USB-C connector that is. The Dell socket is fine. ... Surprisingly it's about the only thing which does work on this piece of shit.
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USB C is designed so that if it gets over-stressed the cable breaks, not the socket on the device.
It's also designed to be much more resistant to breakage than Lightning. Lightning has a weak plastic tab that goes into the socket so all the force is placed on that. USB C has a metal housing that takes the force and aligns everything before the plastic parts mate.
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USB C is designed so that if it gets over-stressed the cable breaks, not the socket on the device.
Tell that to my last phone. The socket wore out, and it wouldn't charge any more, and it didn't have wireless charging. I'm using the exact same cable that wouldn't work with that phone with my new phone, so it wasn't the cable. It was the phone. The port wore out long before the phone did. Now they want to put USB-C on devices that are expected to last even longer than phones? This is a shitty fucking idea.
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It's just because your phone has a crap USB C port, or maybe your cable is a bit out of spec.
Anyway, if you are damaging a USB C port then pretty much any other practical connector is going to die too. What is thin enough for a phone and more robust than USB C?
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It's just because your phone has a crap USB C port,
It's a Moto, which generally has very reliable hardware. If I can't trust them to make a decent phone, I literally cannot trust anyone.
or maybe your cable is a bit out of spec.
A slightly out of spec cable can destroy the connector? Oh look, that design is shit. The cable inserts cleanly and positively, no cable which does that should be able to harm a connector, or the connector design is shit.
The truth is that USB-C is just another garbage connector design. It had to accommodate too many committees'-worth of pins. You could maybe do a decent conn
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I don't know what to tell you. USB C has proven robust for most people, and I don't see any better alternatives. Lightning is much less robust, big chunky barrel jacks won't fit in phones.
Re: Good (Score:4, Insightful)
Almost certainly your usb port was fine, but just full of crap. Get a heavy duty staple (I use swingline hd 3/4 inch staples), bend one side straight and dig that shit out. Problem solved. I have done this on literally dozens of phones and it worked every time but one. The one time it didn't work was because the guy who owned it tried to clean it with a fork and broke the center stud off. Everyone else just thought their usb port was broken because their phone wouldn't charge from it anymore and asked if knew how to fix it. The staple won't break the stud because staples are far too bendy, which makes them perfect.
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Tell that to my last phone. The socket wore out
The fact that USB-C is well designed to move stress onto the cable has nothing to do with you buying either a cheap phone, or a phone where the manufacturer attempted to scrape the very bottom of the barrel cost optimising.
In you scenario you'll never be happy. There's literally no connector design out there which doesn't fail if you put enough effort into finding the cheapest variant of it. The only reason you don't hear this happening about Lightning connectors is because there's only 1 part being manufac
Re: Good (Score:2)
Smartphone of my wife, daughter and me are still happily charging. +3 years of daily charging.
I am actually impressed by the rigidity of those connectors.
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We have USB-C for charging our Dell laptops at work and it sucks big time. It's way too easy to damage the connector in the laptop and then you have a panic time to secure your data elsewhere before you can send it for repair. The fat round connector that Dell has had for ages have rarely been a problem.
I have also recognized that the USB-C connector seems sensitive to wear. I also worry that if the voltage is increased and something goes wrong and a high voltage shorts with a data line you can toast your d
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The easy solution for this is get a dock or USB-C hub. Let the external device receive all the wear and tear. When it wears out, it is much easier to replace than the built-in connector.
I try to do this for all my high-use connectors. I use a USB extender on my desktop to plug in all my flash drives and external devices. I have one port on my UPS with a 12" extension cord that I plug short-term items into instead of the cramped outlets on the UPS. When these extenders wear out after a few hundred conne
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And the dock in turn is connected to the computer using USB-C and you'd have the same issue anyway when you dock in/out the computer.
So nothing is gained.
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True. If you connect and disconnect every day, for example to transport the laptop from home to office, then the dock would not help. The only thing I can think of would be a short, 2-inch USB-C extension that would remain connected to the side of the laptop. It would possibly receive the brunt of the wear and tear, but be another thing to get in the way when carrying the laptop.
I agree with you that the earlier barrel connector was more robust. We almost never had the connector fail on hundreds of lapt
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And leaving a USB-C extension in the laptop won't help because it will then certainly damage the connector in the computer by breaking it off from the PCB, something that has happened on the Dell laptops I have encountered.
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IMO, USB C is good for small devices, but I'd rather have 2.5/5.5 or 2.1/5.5 barrel connector for larger devices.
Two reasons:
1. Anything that requires more than 5V needs to have a chip. The power supply also needs to have a chip and be able to provide multiple voltages. Even devices that need only 5V need to have a chip or there would be compatibility problems. For example, Raspberry Pi4 does not run on one of my USB-C power supplies (even though that PSU can provide 5V and has enough current), but runs fro
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So my phone will come with USB-C charging port. It will also allow me to remove it. Once it is removed, it will become lightening. So all that Apple needs to do is attach lightning to USB-C to iPhone and provide "instructions" to remove it when they want to use lightening port. It is now compliant!
USB-A (Score:2)
My colony and I still use old USB-A! Yes, they're slower but still work. Slowly, we will get rid of them when they break and die.
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Yes. Politicians work for their constituents in the EU.
Otherwise we would be at the mercy of corporations, like in the US.
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The charge cable will come with a convenient fart glass [cc.com] for the fan's olfactory enjoyment.
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I hear Apple are working on iChargers that charge iDevices cordlessly by channeling the energy of owners smug self-satisfaction into them.
The biggest issue they're dealing with at the moment is that the devices glow white hot and thus can't be used in practice, due to their immense overcharging.
(...I say as someone with an iPhone, Mac, iPad, etc. who can still enjoy a funny joke at "my" expense)
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Not just. The law covers (and I quote clause 6 of the resolution):
"handheld mobile phones, tablets, digital photo/video
cameras not intended for professional use, headphones or headsets, handheld
videogame consoles and portable speakers"
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Devices that need 240W will cost a bit more, but you can get a 100W power controller IC for under a Euro. 65W chargers are getting quite common too.
In any case, it's not going to be significantly more expensive than a non USB charger.
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The chip in the device that can request up to 20v 5A is less than a Euro. Chargers... 65W is about 20 Euro, but of course it chargers everything, not just your laptop. And anyway that's cheap for a laptop charger.
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If you bother to read the proposal you will see that it has provision for updating to newer versions of USB PD.
Just require manufacturs to provide a charger (Score:2)
Can't we just require manufactures to provide a charger free of charge? You don't have to require it in the main packaging - it can be an extra to avoid folks who don't want/need one from having waste, but sheesh, don't lock into a specific technology by law. That's just dumb.
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That's how you get absurdly expensive proprietary replacement chargers (for when the fragile wires of the "free" charger break).
Standards usually reduce costs.
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I don't want a new, different charger for every device I buy. It'll go into a drawer & never be used. Chargers should cost extra & be sold separately so that we don't have mountains of electrical waste sitting around in people's drawers until they're thrown out. It's a stupid, unnec
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One of the main points is to limit e-waste and throwing in chargers people don't need is a good way to create e-waste.
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Can't we just require manufactures to provide a charger free of charge?
The whole purpose of the law is the reduction of e-waste. That is the exact opposite of what you propose.
For new product lines only. (Score:2)
When companies have invested in product lines that support third-party peripherals, requiring USB Type-C for power might not be the greatest idea. And yes, I am thinking of the iPhone. Switching to USB Type-C would have a big impact on the millions of Lightning peripherals currently in use.
So such a law should be applied to new product lines only. And by new product lines I am referring to products that, if they were to switch to USB Type-C, would result in numerous peripherals becoming inoperable. W
Re:For new product lines only. (Score:4, Informative)
Switching to USB Type-C would have a big impact on the millions of Lightning peripherals currently in use.
Get an adapter. And if the peripheral is specific to the form factor of your phone (like an extended battery case) it likely won't work with your next phone anyway.
electric cars need this and no non dealer lockout (Score:2)
electric cars need this and no non dealer repair lockout allowed.
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Drawbacks (Score:2)
Standardization is great, half the success of capitalism is from standardization. But forcing everyone to use the one plug has drawbacks too. We get 15 poorly defined standards all using the one plug and it takes several years for them to become compatible and consistent as the law demands. In the meantime, consumers are buying equipment that 'meets' the standard but doesn't work.
This is why regulatory committees are needed: They have the option of defining new hardware as technology changes.
Wall sockets (Score:2)
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They should at least have a physical on.off switch on the input.
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What about other devices ? (Score:2)
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Can we get this... (Score:4, Interesting)
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Absolutely! Anything with a wall wart producing DC power should be USB-C. I've noticed that many of my wall warts output AC power at different voltages. I'm not sure how many of those could use DC power instead and convert to USB-C (I would guess half with no analysis whatsoever).
Re:Can we get this... (Score:4, Insightful)
EU citizen here. A lot of devices being sold here in the EU already are like this. Examples are chargeable lamps for in the garden, devices that spread fragrances into you living room, I've seen rechargeable remote controls for all sorts of appliances, rechargeable remote audio, keyboard, mouse, etc, watches, vacuum cleaners and some garden appliances. Although for gardening the DIW I think more standardization on chargers for the batteries should still be done.
A lot of those electronics here already are USB-C port chargeable with a standard USB charger. And every year I see more and more electronics being sold in stores that are like this.
What you also see more and more, although slowly (too slowly in my opinion), are wall sockets with a USB or even USB-C port for example in modern electrically wired houses/kitchens and also at restaurants.
I personally find it fantastic that the EU tells companies what to do. So that they stop making consumers buy their silly charger or cable just so that they can charge extra money. And that way create more electronic waste and make consumers have to carry around 80 fucking thousand different solutions to the same problem. As if we are slaves to their 80 f. thousand solutions and as if we care at all about them and their moron-branding or religion about what goddamn charger or cable is so called the best.
Just standardize already. And if you can't, won't or don't want to: get the fuck out of our EU market. Now. Go sell your crap elsewhere.
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What you also see more and more, although slowly (too slowly in my opinion), are wall sockets with a USB or even USB-C port for example in modern electrically wired houses/kitchens and also at restaurants.
I've installed several of those. The good ones are expensive as hell. The bad ones aren't worth installing. And really they don't make much sense anyway. The power connection will be around long after USB-C has been abandoned and hopefully replaced with something with a decent number of cycles. My last phone's USB-C wore out long before the rest of the phone and it was cheaper to just buy another phone than to have it serviced. My new phone has twice the battery life or more so hopefully the reduced number
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I think I would prefer things like keyboards and mice to use AAA cells though. Built in batteries are consumable and rarely a standard size or easy to replace. It's nice being able to just throw some NIMH cells in there and recharge them when needed.
But yeah, if it has to have a USB port for some reason then it should be USB C.
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Nice. EU doing some neat things lately. (Score:2)
A common currency, GDPR and this are those things that actually make me really like this EU thing that has been going on for a few decades now (EU citizen here). You can bicker all you want and the EU still has quite a bit of homework to do if it wants to become attractive to the dropouts in the provinces (unified foreign policy for instance) but this unified charger move is one of those good things. Well done I say.
Re:And here's how the technological progress ends (Score:4, Insightful)
Millions of iPhone users raise their hands ...
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Just because Apple just want to mess up things for the rest of the world.
Re: And here's how the technological progress ends (Score:2)
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As far as the 'reason' behind this law, it's not like there's some 800 pound gorilla that refuses to go with USB-C so it can get more money through proprietary lock-in... I mean... innovation! How courageous!
Re:And here's how the technological progress ends (Score:5, Insightful)
Killing lightning connectors and bullshit headphone chargers is a huge win for basically the entire planet. I'm not sure why anyone would look at it any other way.
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To be honest I wish they'd have settled on a simpler standard than this mess that is USB-C. Like the good old chargers with a round plug and a + and - sign... Way more sturdy than this connector that has a MTBF of 10000 pull and plug cycles.
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Way more sturdy than this connector that has a MTBF of 10000 pull and plug cycles.
"Minimum" != "MTBF"
(not even in PHP)
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The problem with a simple barrel connector is that it is fixed voltage and can't indicate the maximum current it can supply.
The latest revision allows the voltage to be set quite precisely, so that it can charge a battery without needing voltage conversion in the device itself. As well as reducing the size and heat generated in the device, it moves one of the most common points if failure to the much more easily replaced charger.
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The problem with a simple barrel connector is that it is fixed voltage and can't indicate the maximum current it can supply.
There is absolutely nothing whatsoever preventing voltage and current negotiation over a barrel connector. You can absolutely do the negotiation on the same pins as power, even while they are delivering power. Your hint is that the connector itself doesn't do any of that stuff.
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True, but think about the practicality of it. You would need a new charging standard, very small barrel sockets to fit thin devices, and a unique size/shape that prevents people shoving other chargers in there. It's also electrically complex enough that it is usually avoided, e.g. AC car chargers have separate signalling and current carrying pins even though we have been doing signalling over mains AC for decades.
If you are delivering 240W at some voltage specific enough to directly charge a battery, any da
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USB-C connectors are crap, but barrel connectors are crap too. What we really need is a power connector standard which has a genderless connector (ala the old token ring connectors) so that you can put an extension cable on it without having to worry about ends. You can do negotiation over two wires, so they should start at some agreed voltage (e.g. 19V) and then negotiate other voltages from there. I chose 19V because with just an adapter plug you could power the bulk of older laptops as well.
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The draft is designed to allow evolutions by the industry, but they will have to allow interoperability. The Commission is due to present the concrete plan. One would guess they want the gadget companies to sit around a table to design new solutions together, similar to what already happens at the ISO/IEC technical committees, the Unicode Consortium or the USB-IF.
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You better like USB-C, because it seems we'll be stuck for quite a while on it, until bureaucrats deign to notice it's 30 years old and completely obsolete, sometime in the future.
Why obsolete? Devices are already negotiating voltages with their USB chargers. That ability can be increased in the future and still be backwards compatible.
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Europe standardized on GSM years ago (vs CDMA). Within the GSM framework we've gone from 2G to 3G to 4G (HSPDA and then LTE) and now 5G.
Standardization does not have to block innovation; it just provides a framework within which to innovate. USB-C itself has evolved already, while retaining the same connector and backwards compatibility.
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because everyone and their mother has already standardized on USB-C without any laws involved.
If you don't think the standardisation had anything to do with laws then I highly recommend a history lesson for you. You can start with the Memorandum of Understanding the EU requested from the industry in 2009 under a threat that if the industry doesn't standardise they will legislate.
https://ec.europa.eu/docsroom/... [europa.eu]
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because everyone and their mother has already standardized on USB-C without any laws involved.
If you don't think the standardisation had anything to do with laws then I highly recommend a history lesson for you. You can start with the Memorandum of Understanding the EU requested from the industry in 2009 under a threat that if the industry doesn't standardise they will legislate. https://ec.europa.eu/docsroom/... [europa.eu]
Yes, and an objective (that is, not "europa.eu") source will quickly tell you that in 2009 pretty much everyone and their mother was already using micro-USB or was in the process of transitioning to it. But it wouldn't be EU if they didn't try to push the propaganda that it's their achievement.
Cue the "waaah Apple daring to use a superior connector of their own boohoo" in 3, 2, 1...
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source will quickly tell you that in 2009 pretty much everyone and their mother was already using micro-USB or was in the process of transitioning to it. But it wouldn't be EU if they didn't try to push the propaganda that it's their achievement.
Errr no. 2009 was when the MoU was agreed between the EU and industry reps. The EU started down this path back when many Slashdotters still had phones without data connections and the accompanying draw full of incompatible chargers to go with it.
But you wouldn't be a Slashdot troll without trying to re-write history with Anti-EU propaganda. Please spare us the revisionist crap.
Cue the "waaah Apple daring to use a superior connector of their own boohoo" in 3, 2, 1...
Apple's user of a superior connector in no way prohibited them from including micro-USB as a charging option, and when USB-C came al
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source will quickly tell you that in 2009 pretty much everyone and their mother was already using micro-USB or was in the process of transitioning to it. But it wouldn't be EU if they didn't try to push the propaganda that it's their achievement.
Errr no. 2009 was when the MoU was agreed between the EU and industry reps. The EU started down this path back when many Slashdotters still had phones without data connections and the accompanying draw full of incompatible chargers to go with it.
But you wouldn't be a Slashdot troll without trying to re-write history with Anti-EU propaganda. Please spare us the revisionist crap.
Yes, the MoU was signed because everyone was already doing micro-USB and it cost them nothing. I'm sure in 10 years you and EU propagandists will also be talking about how USB-C was virtually unused in 2022, and only after they heroically came to the rescue the industry switched.
Cue the "waaah Apple daring to use a superior connector of their own boohoo" in 3, 2, 1...
Apple's user of a superior connector in no way prohibited them from including micro-USB as a charging option, and when USB-C came along they not only lost their superiority, but even hint to this on account of their "Pro" devices like the iPad Pro having USB-C instead of Lightning.
Sure. How many USB connectors don't connect until you fiddle with them for 5 minutes, and then interrupt the connection the moment a gust of air blows by? And how many Lightning? How many Lightning plugs got destroyed by dirt gettin
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Or devices starts to get toast because the USB-C connector fails and puts 20+ volts into a data line in the connector.
Re:And here's how the technological progress ends (Score:5, Informative)
everyone and their mother has already standardized on USB-C without any laws involved
Not true, it was EU legislation the whole time. The previous state of the problem was 2009, everybody standardized to USB 2.0 Micro-B. That already was a voluntary basis proposed by the European Commission, see the document https://ec.europa.eu/docsroom/... [europa.eu] In 2014 the policy expired, and the Commission launched a new round of discussions. That's when everybody and their mother understood they had to standardize to USB-C. The Commission noted they were not successful with their voluntary policy as proprietary solutions still continued to be implemented (read: Apple). That's when they decided to turn it a legislation. Source: the legislation introductory text, https://ec.europa.eu/docsroom/... [europa.eu]
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Governments don't seem to like innovation anymore. I understand people don't like proprietary connectors, but as a consumer I prefer to pick the products that best fit my needs. I don't need politicians to help protect me from myself, I wear mittens for that.
You fit your own charging sockets to your devices?
Which sockets do you prefer over USB-C? Where does USB-C come up short?
What if you find yourself somewhere without your charger and you need to borrow one? Do you cry?
Re: And here's how the technological progress ends (Score:3)
Too bad Apple didnâ(TM)t push it into the public domain so everyone could use it.
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If you shove a toothpick into a Lightning connector you risk damaging the contacts. If you are using so much force that it would damage a USB C connector, you are definitely going to destroy the contacts in a Lightning connector too.
If you need extreme dust resistance then get a rubber plug. I keep my phone in my pocket and don't have issues with it.
USB C is a lot more robust than Lightning too. Lightning cables have a plastic tab that goes into the socket, which is a point of weakness. When inserting the L
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The lightning connector is superior. If the female side gets full of dust, you can go in there and clean it out with a toothpick and clean it out without the risk of destroying the connector. MicroUSB and USB-C packs the dust in there harder every time you plug it in and if you try to clean out the dust with a toothpick you run pretty good odds of destroying the connector.
The lightning connector is inferior. It provides continuous voltage to exposed contacts, resulting in a mild electric shock whenever you touch the connector.
The hole is small enough that it gets clogged with debris more often, even on a phone that is carried in a holster, unlike my USB-C ports, from which I've never had any failures (apart from a bit of looseness).
And USB-C can handle up to 40 Gbps. Lightning? 5 Gbps. There are not enough pins to support more than one data lane in each direction, so USB
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...which also works on USB-C.
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I prefer 2.5/5.5 barrel connectors for larger devices. Easy to replace the plug or the socket if needed, the design of the power supply is simpler (since it's only one voltage).
I dislike USB-C because it has too many tiny pins (because it's also used for data etc, kind-of like SCART, but with power pins as well). Also, it makes the design of devices and power supplies more complicated by requiring a special chip and that the device and power supply support different voltages.
Let's say I want to make my own
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Yes, standardising on 230V AC was a terrible mistake and held everyone back.
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Only a Sith deals in absolutes.
And Yoda: "Do... or do not. There is no try." .
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And Yoda: "Do... or do not. There is no try."
Yeah... well... um... Yoda? You know what? Have you ever thought of getting some teaching qualifications so that you can provide scaffolding, mediate, set short-term achievable goals along a path to greater competence? You know, stuff that effective teachers do? Perhaps the Jedi wouldn't have died out?
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What clue? The clue that regulations benefit consumers? What are they going to learn now that they have to suffer the atrocity of being able to charge any phone anywhere going forward?
Re: In 10 to 15 years, the youth will get a clue. (Score:2)
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Government standards are always trade offs. Will USB solve everything or work for everyone. No. But this past weekend I would have been very happy if my iPhone was USB C.
And it drives me crazy the laptops still requir
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We need the government to protect us from corporations. Look at the shit they get away with in the US!