• Margot Robbie@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    But in practical use, people found out that even a 50/50 chance of plugging the connector in the right way is annoying enough to warrant the additional complexity of reversability, hence the development of USB Type C.

    The USB-C design turned out to be much more durable and versatile (signal and power wise) in addition to reversability compared to the previous USB designs, and it is developed specifically to address the problems people found with USB-A/B/MicroUSB.

    Sometimes problems only reveal themselves through real life usage, and iterative improvement through a scientific trial and error process to address these problem is how you get development progress.

    • MeekerThanBeaker@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      For USB-A, it’s usually not even 50/50. It’s the witchcraft superposition when the first two tries don’t work.

      • OneOrTheOtherDontAskMe@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        Yeah, people don’t take into account quantum positioning, pass-through phenomenon, or the fact that I can’t “see” when I plug it in wrong and that makes me think maybe my fingers are dumb and I missed the hole and not that I need to reverse it and try again.

      • Moneo@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        First try doesn’t go in: oh I guess I have to flip it. Second try doesn’t go in, fiddle it a bunch still doesn’t go in. Fuck I had it the first time. Third try goes in immediately

    • Echo Dot@feddit.uk
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      1 year ago

      USB-C has more connectors for data and power than A/B so it’s not a surprise that it’s more capable.

      What’s really changed is demand. No one really expected USB to be used to power everything, it was only ever really expected to be used on computers and maybe digital cameras, smartphones used to arrange matters for themselves. It was only when they two began to adopt USB aas well that calls for smaller ports and higher capacity cables started to arise.

      • Socsa@sh.itjust.works
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        1 year ago

        We are way past it being just a power thing though. USB-C is effectively the standard wired general purpose data bus these days. It’s slowly cannibalizing HDMI and DP as well (via thunderbolt), in addition to power cords.

    • SilverFlame@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      I wish it was 50/50. A lot of the time it wouldn’t plug in so I flipped it. Still didn’t work so I flipped it back to the original orientation and it magically plugs in.

    • 418teapot@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      Can someone explain to me why I keep reading about people having problems plugging in USB A connectors upside down? I feel like I’m taking crazy pills. Per the spec, the holes always go up. They indicate the correct way to plug in the port. Not only that, but the printed logo on the connector also always goes up.

      The only time this is SLIGHTLY confusing is if you have a desktop tower where the motherboard is essentially mounted sideways, but for that case it just takes an extra second to think which way is “up” from the perspective of the motherboard.

      And before anyone says “who reads the spec?”, it feels like I subconsciously knew this for something like a decade before I even knew what a spec was.