The fact that I can successfully plug in a USB-C cable on the first try as opposed to the 3-7th time is a strict improvement.
Perhaps I've been lucky, but I've only had good experience with external monitors et al.
Perhaps I've been lucky, but I've only had good experience with external monitors et al.
Eg: now that there are cheap 4K 60Hz, displays, we are not happy... We need at them at 144Hz. And being able to chain two of chose. With good speakers... etc etc
Birds eye view: every issue is minor and current state of tech is awesome...
The corollary of this is that some technology getting close to perfect means it's several years old, obsolete and ready to be thrown away to make place for a shiny new thing that's starting from scratch as far as ironing various bugs go.
External monitors with combined USB and display have generally behaved a lot worse with Windows than Mac OS with symptoms like: some endpoints work and others don’t (often the USB Ethernet doesn’t work), the monitor that the Mac enumerates in 5 seconds takes 50 sec on Windows, etc.
Depends on the device, I've had low-quality USB-C devices whose transfer speed inexplicably decreased when connected "the wrong way". Not knowing which orientation is the right one until you initiate the transfer is frustrating, and worse IMHO than physically preventing the wrong orientation.
Of course, this issue affects only a subset of mediocre hardware... But the fact that [1] this is possible is quite a downside to USB-C.
[1] https://hackaday.com/2021/03/22/cursed-usb-c-when-plug-orien...
USB-C has much more complexity and corners that can be cut than USB-A.
The cheapness of USB-A is also valuable. The other day I bought 5 USB-A to B cables for less than 5 bucks for various microcontroller-related hackery. I can treat them as disposable and won’t hesitate to cut one open should I need some kind of shielded multi-core wire.
In USB-C land, a single cable would cost more than that.
Also, you can express disagreement without throwing Reddit-style sarcastic snarks.
I mean I don't know if it has any data connections or anything, I think it came with either a JBL speaker or a power bank, but it's pretty clever.
When the kids were getting to the age where they had their own devices, the learning phase was painful (for me more so than them). They kept getting confused between the lightning cable used for their iPad and the micro-usb cables used for everything else (like their battery pack and the random kid gadgets they had that used micro-usb for power supply). Their learning phase was painful (for me) as they'd try whatever cord they came across first in whatever device they needed it for, and continue that cycle until they got a match. And with no sense of how easy it is to break charging ports, they'd be pretty aggressive about it. Same with trying the USB-A side of the cord in the charger/battery, aggressively trying one direction before finally flipping it to try the other (and flipping it again because third try's the charm).
The kids love them because they Just Work for everything with no fuss (at least until recently when USB-C started popping up in some stuff like their Bluetooth headphones). The durability is a bit mixed, as some of the cords started having issues after just a few months while others are still going strong after years of daily use. But between how handy they are and the price, it's worth just treating them as expected consumables and getting enough at once to stockpile.
My experience has been so frustrating and such a time sink if you have recommendations of working hardware combinations I'm happy to hear. I'm already > $3k in hardware at this point. What's another $1k or so?!
[1] In truth, both sides of USB-A have male/female parts.
Nobody ever really told the general public that, and now manufacturers are messing it up too.