EU Warns Apple About Limiting Speeds of Uncertified USB-C Cables | Hacker News Reader

EU Warns Apple About Limiting Speeds of Uncertified USB-C Cables

macrumors.com

The USB standard includes a method of detecting how much power your cable can handle, so this seems like a non-issue unless Apple decides that standards shouldn't apply to them.

You're aware of how horrible the implementation of USB-C has been on the cable manufacturing side, yes? I'd much prefer my iPhone not "fast-charge" if it's not using a certified cable. I've had one device "loose it's blue smoke" using a bad USB-C cable and a non-certified USB-C cable from my Apple power brick to my MBP start to cinge.

I didn't realize that the USB standard was ineffective against cheap cable manufactures. How would MFI be any different?

Here's two great examples of the standard's ineffectiveness

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10508494

https://debugger.medium.com/usb-c-was-supposed-to-simplify-o...

Apple has stringent regular testing standards on MFI certified cables - they regularly buy them up "in secret" to continuously test that they're meeting cert requirements. If memory serves, the contract stipulates Apple can levy massive penalties for "bait and switching" actual certified cables with inferior product.

When the Nintendo Switch came out, Nintendo, being Nintendo, wired the USB-C adapter not to spec, so you'd need a Nintendo power brick to charge the thing. This lead to people trying to use the Nintendo charger on other devices (because USB-C looks like USB-C) and frying them/ blowing them up.

I used the Nintendo switch charger since the switch came out and nothing bad ever happened. Same in the other direction - regularly charged a switch with a different charger and all worked fine.

MFI certification is as toothless as CE certification. When it is profitable to skim the product, it will happen.

As much as I like to shit on Apple, I dont think you know how the MFI certification works, both in theory and in practice.

You've never needed the Nintendo brick to charge a Switch. You can charge it with a standard 5W iPhone or whatever adapter. To use a Switch DOCKED you do need a power adapter that supports 15V 2.6A. Originally this was not in the USB C PD spec so most bricks couldn't. It now is and for example a 97W Apple brick will do it no problem. Where Nintendo went out of spec is in the dock to make it easier to plug in. The brick is fine and I've used it charge phones and things, never fried anything and I've never heard of the Nintendo brick frying anything. You might be thinking of some 3rd party Switch docks which fried Switchs because they improperly sent power.

So you agree, this all requires esoteric knowledge and looking up specs for what each cable and device can support?

I mean, who in the world is going to do voltage comparisons, aside from us nerds?

Do you consider it a problem that a PC USB 2.0 port won't charge a Lightning equipped iPad while being used? That a 5W iPhone brick won't fast charge it? That a 60W MagSafe brick won't allow a 2015 MacBook Pro to charge and go all out at the same time?

I wouldn't be against this MFI if it meant we could have cheap, standard conformant cables that aren't bad.

Apple uses MFI as an excuse to overprice compatible cables.

Take a look at USB-C cables. Of course, there will be cheap ones, but even the standard conformant, QC-compatible ones are way cheaper than an Apple-certified cable.

See I don’t understand this argument. I wrote a blog post about this recently where I discuss this at length. But are MFi cables overpriced? It doesn’t seem to be the case.

https://daniel.do/article/chromes-manifest-v3-foibles/ (scroll down to the section that says aside as the main post is about something else)

That sucks, but just seems weird in general, not to you specifically. You never hear about these things happening on random cheap Android phones or PC laptops. Well, at least I don't, but you hear about them semi-frequently regarding Apple products.

Anecdotally, I've had numerous Android phones (granted, almost all Google Pixels) and I've just used any random USB cable to charge and never thought about it and never have had any problems.

>You never hear about these things happening on random cheap Android phones or PC laptops. Well, at least I don't, but you hear about them semi-frequently regarding Apple products.

For the same reason that Li-ion batteries degrade over time regardless of what sort of device it's in, but the Planned Obsolescence headlines are reserved for Li-ion batteries in Apple devices.

I wasn't aware of anyone else deciding to slow their device down except for Apple.

Pixel user—I've never had a USB-C cable fry the phone, but I have had a cable fry itself, with melted plastic and the connector stuck into the port (requiring tweezers to pull out).

What evidence do you have to blame the cable for the blue smoke escaping? It isn't really plausible for a bad USB-C cable to cause a device to fail in that way, at least unless the device itself was incredibly poorly engineered.

There is a reasonable argument that standards should be more stringently validated and adhered to (in many areas, not just charging cables), but giving Apple the keys to the market and the ability to charge whatever they want is not the answer.

Apple have always got to do some weird Apple thing. Even when the task is simple, all of the technology required to achieve their task exists and is standardised, they still find something to shoehorn in

Why can't you just be normal, Apple?

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