Hacker News Reader

HNHacker News

Top New Best Ask Show Jobs

Comment by baconandeggs | Hacker News Reader

Full thread

baconandeggs·

USB-C charging is truly revolutionary.

USB-C data is a clusterf*k, and worse of all, is not UNIVERSAL anymore.

View on HN

>USB-C charging is truly revolutionary.

Is it? I guess it's nice that I can charge my phone with my laptop charger, but it has the same issue as usb-c data where everything physically fits but are incompatible. eg. having to worry about whether a aftermarket charger provides enough voltage/current to charge your laptop.

Well, I tried, and I could charge my Thinkpad using a 5V/2A phone charger and an A->C cable. Very slowly of course, but it worked. If I was somewhere and I had forgotten my laptop charger, I could worry about whether a phone charger will work, but without USB-C, I could be sure that it won't work.

>Well, I tried, and I could charge my Thinkpad using a 5V/2A phone charger and an A->C cable.

Is yours a recent model? AFAIK most laptops can't charge using phone chargers. They require high voltage that isn't available on low wattage chargers.

Yes, it's a T14 Gen1 (AMD).

You can also charge your phone from your laptop and vice versa. Or one phone from other phone. Or just link two phones with a wired data connection with no power exchange.

There's a lot more flexibility than there was prior to USB-C.

Revolutionary? It's a hot mess. Some usb will charge my phone very slowly, maybe at 3w. Some will charge what I call 'medium', at around 15w, and some at 30w. And the charger that came with it is its own special usb-c thing that isn't standards compliant. I noticed that cord doesn't even attempt to charge my Stadia controller. Sure, they all do plugin and most do charge. But have fun guessing which ones charge at which speed.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com