USB-C Power Upgrade Delivers a Whopping 240W for Gaming Laptops and Other Devices (cnet.com) 110
AmiMoJo writes: The USB-C standard will let you plug in power-hungry devices like gaming laptops, docking stations, 4K monitors and printers with an upgrade that accommodates up to 240 watts starting this year. The jump in maximum power is more than double today's 100-watt top capacity. The USB Implementers Forum, the industry group that develops the technology, revealed the new power levels in the version 2.1 update to its USB Type-C specification on Tuesday. The new 240-watt option is called Extended Power Range, or EPR. "We expect devices supporting higher wattages in the second half of 2021," USB-IF said in a statement.
USB began as a useful but limited port for plugging keyboards, mice and printers into PCs. It later swept aside Firewire and other ports as faster speeds let it tackle more demanding tasks. It proved useful for charging phones as the mobile revolution began, paving the way for its use delivering power, not just data. The 240W Extended Power Range option means USB likely will expand its turf yet again. Cables supporting 240 watts will have additional requirements to accommodate the new levels. And USB-IF will require the cables to bear specific icons "so that end users will be able to confirm visually that the cable supports up to...240W," USB-IF said in the specification document.
USB began as a useful but limited port for plugging keyboards, mice and printers into PCs. It later swept aside Firewire and other ports as faster speeds let it tackle more demanding tasks. It proved useful for charging phones as the mobile revolution began, paving the way for its use delivering power, not just data. The 240W Extended Power Range option means USB likely will expand its turf yet again. Cables supporting 240 watts will have additional requirements to accommodate the new levels. And USB-IF will require the cables to bear specific icons "so that end users will be able to confirm visually that the cable supports up to...240W," USB-IF said in the specification document.
Can’t wait (Score:2)
For those flimsy connectors to catch fire. They can really take 12 amps reliably?
Re:Can’t wait (Score:5, Informative)
The cables are rated 5A max, that doesn't change. What changes is the voltage. For example 100W USB PD goes in steps from 5V to 20V. Where you get a wall is around 50V (>250W) because it starts becoming high voltage and a shock hazard, and not safe for you to have coiled up in your lap.
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Spec says it can go up to 48V. At the moment that's a little tricky as many switch mode regulators can't deal with that voltage, but I expect now it's a standard there will be plenty available.
Re:Can’t wait (Score:5, Informative)
That's about the same voltage as POTS as well as PoE, so it makes sense.
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yeah 20V can just drive enough current to burn your dick and scrotum, won't stop your heart so you can experience the pain. no worries.
Re:Can’t wait (Score:4, Interesting)
I've cooked hotdogs with 1.2V... so what?
You should be able to drop your USB PD in the bathtub and it'll give you a 100mA 5V tingle, not a 48V@5A blast. Because there is a handshake that your bath water isn't going to perform.
That said, I would strongly urge people with frayed or damaged power cables of any kind to cease using them, seek replacement, and discard them.
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so what??!! The point is 20V can do real harm, it's dangerous. And for that matter the NEC's 50V death level is too high, can and has happened at lower voltage, there are 24V deaths you can find.
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When more children die from USB than from handguns we can do more than give them thoughts and prayers. I'm going to focus my attention to cars, drowning, and suffocation as the areas of avoidable death. Burns are pretty serious too, but usually from fires or kitchen scalds. I'm not saying we shouldn't make USB PD safe, but higher voltage and increased amperage are seemingly unavoidable.
Laptops for the past 20 years have included power adapters around 19V, and most of them have no safety circuitry to prevent
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people have been burned and electrocuted by laptop supplies, guess you're just ignorant and too lazy to look at problems.
Electric blankets irrelevant to discussion, 5000 fires a year from those so you have no point.
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ah you missed the point. the point is that people don't seem to be concerned.
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You will, it'll be your pants, when your 75W laptop is also supplying 240W to something else. Rocky mountain oysters, primate flavored, will be on the menu.
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The spec says it has to have over current protection. Thing is it's DC so even if you did get electrocuted via water it wouldn't be as bad as getting hit with 100V+ AC.
Since you shouldn't have an outlet near your bath anyway, that limits it to battery banks. Due to no path to ground through your body they aren't likely to electrocute you anyway, although you would have a nasty lithium fire in your hands.
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I had a USB-A cable start to smoulder and smoke, yet there was no visible damage prior to that.
250 watts? Cables that handle these kinds of loads have thick wires and connectors for a reason. :-\
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and since they're USB-C, they're designed for either 3A or 5A. Your USB-A cables may have been designed for up to 1A (wild guess, I don't have your cables), but of course if it is damaged then it will go in smoke regardless. There is little design you can do to avoid that. A 1.5V AA cell could push 1A+ through a thin wire, like one that has been damaged, and turn it red hot almost immediately. And USB deals with significantly more energy than that.
Some number of cables will go up in smoke, some will get hot
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When did you test my bathwater? How do you know my hand was not shaking at the time?
Enquiring minds want to know!
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yeah 20V can just drive enough current to burn your dick and scrotum, won't stop your heart so you can experience the pain. no worries.
We'll take your word on that one.
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You don't have to take my work, take mainstream news (theregister)
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The next day he noticed irritation and oedema of his penile prepuce. Furthermore, the ventral part of his scrotal skin had turned red, and there was a blister with a diameter of about 2 cm. These findings were verified when I saw the patient 1 day later. There were no signs of phimosis or balanitis. The patient recalled that, while sitting 2 days earlier with his computer on his lap, he occasionally had felt heat and a burning feeling on his
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Re: Can’t wait (Score:1)
It doesn't suddenly become high-voltage though. It's gradually more and more problematic.
At that many amps, even 12V is plenty of questionable design for such ridiculously flimsy and badly designed connectors.
I mean there is a reason actual power cables usually have a female side that's live, instead of two hermaphrodite sides with the live lines coming almost right up to the front.
I miss proper connectors that you could literally kick and have them still work fine. (Not having the device side soldered onto
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Depends on the jurisdiction and safety standard, but greater than 50V is high voltage in enough places for it to matter to consumer device manufacturers. It means the difference between being able to sell a product in a region and having it effectively banned as unsafe.
Re:Can’t wait (Score:4, Insightful)
Where you get a wall is around 50V (>250W) because it starts becoming high voltage and a shock hazard, and not safe for you to have coiled up in your lap.
There is no fixed wall, and DC safe voltages are higher than those for AC, but when they become hazardous they are more likely to be lethal (i.e. AC is good at stopping your heart, DC is not, but its far easier to let go if you get strung up by AC compared to DC.
Safe voltage for DC for example is defined as 60VDC in IEC62368 and 70VDC in IEC 61010.
But really your comment is silly. The safety of having something coiled in your lap is determined by engineering. It's perfectly safe to coil up 110V in your lap, or 230V, or 415, or even 1000V. The question is on the design of insulation protecting you from the voltage in question.
No go on, touch that power cable behind your PC, I double dare ya ;-)
Re:Can’t wait (Score:5, Informative)
AC voltages are lower because they couple and don't stop your heart, they cause it to beat erratically (aka ventricular fibrillation). The coupling means you don't have to touch an AC conductor to get current induced - you just have to be beside it. The AC nature causes the heart to lose its timing.
But AC has a side benefit over DC - because it's alternating, it crosses a 0V point, at which point you have a chance to remove yourself from the danger. Current causes the muscle to contract, and AC causes it to contract with the line frequency. Just knowing that means you can potentially save yourself. It's an everyday occurance that someone unplugging stuff may bridge the prongs of a plug (especially North American plugs - bit harder with sleeved conductors) and get shocked, but for the most part, it's not fatal.
DC doesn't have this benefit and if you're shocked by DC, you cannot overpower it unless you use muscles not attached to ones in the path (i.e., you move your body away while your fingers are touching DC). With no alternation and 0V crossing, the muscle is no longer in control. This is how a defibrillator works - it puts a very strong DC pulse that basically causes the heart to reset by overwhelming the random signals with a strong one so the natural sinus rhythm takes over again.
AC switches are often rated higher than in DC - circuit breakers for AC are smaller than their DC counterparts because of this - the alternation means it's much easier to quench the arc caused by opening a contact so a smaller contact is required. DC breakers are rated lower because the only way to break a DC arc is to be able to quench it until it cools enough that the ionization stops. So don't ever use an AC breaker on DC. They make AC/DC and DC breakers.
Anyhow, the big problem with cabling is heating. Carrying a current causes conductors to heat up due to internal resistance. Insulation is required to keep you away from the voltage, and more insulation is needed with higher voltages. But more insulation means thermal conductivity goes down which means you may need a larger conductor so it won't heat up as much.
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What worries me is that we might see devices getting toasted with a 48V surge when all they can accept is 5V just because there's a bug somewhere.
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It already happens. Its a common repair to usb type C ports when an inductor [buffer] dies on a power rail and you get burned pins on a plug or socket from in rush current. eg: reapired a laptop with a 65w switching power supplies burning cables, plugs, sockets when a capacitor or inductor fails.
Three stages to engineering here:
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I'm sure that it will work fine as long as you keep all of your gear in a class 1 clean room.
My phone already refuses to go into "turbo charge" mode unless I meticulously clean the phone and cable contacts with electronics cleaner every few weeks.
Re: Can’t wait (Score:1)
Get a case with a plug on the USB connector.
You know, like the Blackview BV6000 had. Those things had no trouble with a whole day at the beach and snorkeling. (And every damn case screw and part had a rubber seal.)
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I'm assuming they'll up the voltage to 48V or something similar to the latest PoE standards.
12A is about a 14-gauge cable, so expect thick cabling or it will become a fuse.
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If you check the pinout structure and assignment for USB-C, there are currently 4 pairs for power. 240 W at 48 V is 5 A, so each pair handles 1.25 A. Not insignificant, but not 14 awg. Unless of course, you intend to run it way more than 3-5 m... Then you violate all sorts of other USB signalling specs since the cable is also a transmission line at near-GHz frequencies...
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Also, what is this "reliability" concept that you're talking about. Irrelevant piffle, in the wonderful world of apps. If you have reliability issues in your app, then you need to get a reliability app for your app.
Oh yes, "Kewl!"
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The connectors are the worst part, by far. They're very unreliable in terms of actually staying plugged in. Micro USB was a far superior plug design--just mirror it back to back and you could have the keyed notches and reversability. I don't want it falling out constantly.
Re: Can’t wait (Score:1)
Electronics anorexia is a deadly mental illness.
And if forced onto others, in my eyes, a crime. (Planned obsolescence via forced flimsiness.)
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Yep, this. The cheaply replaced connector half should always be the one to fail, not the difficult-to-replace half. microUSB board-mount receptacles are a terrible solution (and micro-USB is in general a bad solution, as I've seen myself and others attempt to mate the connectors rotated 180 deg). A little torque on the cable-side connector (or god forbid, drop the device on the floor and have it hit the mated connector set) and the solder cracks.
While I agree with an earlier commenter that misses the days o
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If your USB type-C cables are falling out, then you have lint/shit in the port. If you clean them out, the connectors will stay in just fine; there's a detent that holds everything in place. Unfortunately, if your port gets even a little bit of lint in it, the detent can't catch and the cable will just fall out. To fix that, remove all the lint. I use a straightened 3/4" Swingline Heavy-Duty staple. It's the perfect gauge to do the job. It fits pretty much exactly between the outside of the port and the inn
Re: Can't wait (Score:2)
It's also great for cleaning AirPods, gets in all the crevices nicely.
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IOW, you shouldn't expect to run 240W with your existing cables.
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I kid, I kid..!
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So USB 2.1 is a later spec than USB 3.2 gen x? (Score:2)
Re: So USB 2.1 is a later spec than USB 3.2 gen x? (Score:4, Informative)
USB-C 2.1 is v2.1 of the connector that is often used with USB 3. USB 3 can use USB-A or USB-C connectors, but USB 3.1 can only use USB-C connectors. USB-3.1 or higher can only deliver these new power levels if they have the USB-C 2.1 connector. Therefore theoretically USB 2 could deliver these power levels because the USB-C 2.1 connector could be attached to a cable that only supports the USB 2 data standard but does have USB C 2.1 connectors.
What? This isn't immediately clear to you?
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Seems simple enough. They've got a ways to go before they get close to even the simplest software packages and their associated libraries.
Re: So USB 2.1 is a later spec than USB 3.2 gen x? (Score:4, Funny)
All I see is that the guys who did the SCSI standard had kids who followed in their daddy's footsteps.
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That's incorrect, but you are not alone. The USB standards are a confusing mess. .. only to find that it worked with the plug in only one orientation. The first Raspberry Pi 4B revision got connected wrong so that it identifies as analogue headphones instead of a power sink to the other end.
When Type C was new, I was an early adopter and got a breakout board that I built a project around
And I'm sure there are more examples, and will be.
USB 3.2 is what is exclusive to Type C.
"USB 3.1 gen 1" is identical to U
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What? This isn't immediately clear to you?
Well, if you could emphasize on the middle part a bit?
Re: So USB 2.1 is a later spec than USB 3.2 gen x? (Score:1)
No, this is USB 3 2.1. Think movies: Toy Story 3, version 2.1 (say, second cut, first little correction).
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throws in the towel...
Nope. USB Type C 2.1 is a later spec than USB Type C 2.0, which is the most current and up to date version having being published only 2 years ago.
Critically it is the specification for the connector which determines the maximum allowable voltage and thus the limiting factor of the USB PD specification.
Not good enough (Score:3)
Call me when I can power my central air conditioner and stove using USB-C.
Re:Not good enough (Score:5, Funny)
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https://usa.banggood.com/6-Gea... [banggood.com]
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Call me when I can power my central air conditioner and stove using USB-C.
You can do that now, if you're into doll houses.
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Yeah, call me when I can recharge my electric car with USB in under five minutes.
(While the parent post is obviously tongue-in-cheek, it also sounds very much like the arguments people throw up as to why EVs won't work for them, and they get more ridiculous every year.)
Controller malfunction (Score:2)
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Designing controller circuitry designed to fail safe (e.g. only giving out 5V rather than going immediately to 20V and frying whatever 5V device you have plugged in, probably your phone) should be an interesting technical challenge.
Yep, I predict that A LOT of people will regret buying cheap Chinese crap on eBay in the near future...
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News for you, your usb charger with vendor name on it was made in same factories.
Or to put it another way, your gear is cheap chinese crap.
Re: Controller malfunction (Score:1)
Or in other words: They *can* also make good stuff. They just chose not to, and raise the prise based on their brand status.
Because somehow we humans got to a point, where not advancing humanity is the highest goal, but making an imaginary number grow bigger that other easily robbable fools believe in too.
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your usb charger with vendor name on it was made in same factories.
Not really. Vendor branded electronics are usually manufactured under strict supply-chain and quality control conditions.
Most crap that you buy on eBay are cheap knock-offs using substandard components and the quality control is "if it works, ship it".
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bullshit, you are being a shill without a shred of proof. Meanwhile over the years, my Chinese made macbook pro swelled up like a puffer fish even though not on recall list. My motorola usb charger smoked and died. It's the same crap with the same electronics made the same way by the same factory workers.
Are you in marketing, you spew like a marketing wank.
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A business that manufactures something will more than happily manufacture more of (identical) it for the same cost.
Meanwhile you are selling the idea that a manufacturer would rather more than happily manufacture more identical products for less money
FUCKING RETARD
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You seem to be confused who is getting the extra money. When you grow up, you'll understand how the real world works.
Re: Controller malfunction (Score:1)
Oh boy... you do not want to know how that is "solved"...
USB PD literally... and I mean literally ... re-implements the Enthernet protocol in an incompatible way, with all the bells and whistles. And expectss a chip in the *cable* to speak it!
It's batshit insanity on a WhatWG "living" inner platform level.
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Interesting!
Can you amplify a bit for those unfamiliar?
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I'll have to read their spec. Would not be very surprised if they just bastardized PoE++. I really don't understand the industry factors that let USB get away with this over and over -- produce a crummy thing, then upgrade by assuming the features of some thing that was superior, but do it in a crummy way to produce the next crummy thing, then wash, rinse, repeat. Thoeretically "market forces" should have thrown it in the dust bin ages ago but this standards set seems to be the teflon don of the peripher
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Why? The various shades of USB power delivery already do this pretty reliably. Too reliably, judging from the complaints from people who use the things.
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Interesting as a lab exercise for a second year engineering student maybe, but not actually difficult in any way shape or form.
USB-IF will req the cables to bear icons (Score:2)
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The USB spec isn't a mess, just its naming convention is. The only thing messy is chinese cheap shit not following the spec, and there's nothing the spec can do to change that.
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The USB spec is a mess because it has tried to do way too much. Icons to differentiate between 240 watts and low power? Seriously, icons? Laughable.
And don't even get started on the Thunderbolt spec. Along with USB4 making TB3 optional, but not required...
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Icons to differentiate between 240 watts and low power? Seriously, icons? Laughable.
Indeed they do, and you know what, the spec is entirely backwards compatible. What do you propose? Another connector with another cable with more landfill and more devices that are not interoperable?
I've never come across a device that is not compatible with a USB port. I would seriously look at your drivers or question the controller on your motherboard. I can plug my top of the line portable USB-C SSD drive into a crappy original Raspberry pi and it runs just fine. I can plug my 20 year old oscilloscope w
Plug into what? (Score:2)
If you have a peripheral that draws 240 Watts, you aren't going to be hauling around the battery to power it within the computing platform that serves it. So if you are fixed in one place, there already exist outlets that can deliver 1800 Watts. I've got a number of them on my walls.
One idea would be a DC power standard that could supply 48 Volts from a wall outlet to a number of peripherals through some sort of power supply brick. But previous attempts to establish standards or configurable supplies that
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Faster?
I have a laptop that requires 230W to run. It's a huge fucker, but that is what it is.
Due to this, it cannot use USB-C/PD to charge.
Now it would be able to.
This isn't a matter of "faster" charging- it's a matter of being able to charge it at all.
FTA:
The USB-C standard will let you plug in power-hungry devices like gaming laptops, docking stations, 4K monitors and printers with an upgrade that accommodates up to 240 watts starting this year.
Re:Plug into what? (Score:4, Funny)
If only someone could make a standard interface with a standard plug that can deliver a decent amount of DC power to a wide range of devices, and get a lot of buy in from electronics manufacturers. We could use it for everything from charging cell phones and laptops to powering LED lights.
Hell, you could run some data lines alongside the power so you could use it for communication too. Call it something like the universal power bus. Or maybe universal serial bus to emphasize the data part?
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And now you are going to plug another 240 Watt load (or two) into it?
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It draws 250W on full blast.
Is that all??
My i9 with an RTX2060 pulls 230.
Old gear?
Could this be enough for monitors? (Score:1)
One interesting thought is, if USB-C can deliver enough power maybe a monitor would not need a separate power cable? Just a USB-C cable from desktop to monitor for both display and power... would that be feasible? It seems like with LCD screens, even large ones might be able to be powered this way.
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It will easily handle it.
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The USB-C cable/connector can run in an alt mode where it uses passes Display Port signals. IIRC, the power part of the USB-C is unchanged in this alt-mode. It just switches some of the usb-3 pairs into dp pairs. So it should be able to do data just as well as display port.
I think the difficulty would be getting a motherboard or video card that was rated to supply 40W+ over USB-C. That's not trivial circuity. I doubt manufactures will think it's worth it.
There's also a USB class for monitors that uses
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but can USB really handle the data part of driving a monitor?
With ease.
Ignoring USB ALT/DP signaling, it has more than enough bandwidth to also just drive the display directly via USB (I do this with my iPad on my new Mac)
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https://www.samsung.com/au/business/monitors/s65ua/ls34a650uxexxy/
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There are a bunch of portable monitors that do exactly this like the AOC I1601FWUX or even desktop models like the ThinkVision T27p-10
With 240W I imagine most "real" desktop monitors can theoretically run via USB C but I doubt it will be that common since most monitors are fixed in place and you can build the PSU right into it or continue to use a dumb external supply rather than a more expensive USB-PD adapter.
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I could maybe see it being useful in a minimalistic daisy chaining setup. What seems to be more popular though is the opposite, where the monitor powers/charges your device (typically a laptop).
Needs a magnetic standard (Score:2)
USB-C does have it's issues but as a connector for phones it has been much sturdier than MicroUSB by a wide margin but for laptops it's just a bit lacking and laptops really are the perfect use case for a magnetic connector since the weight and bulk compared to the cable makes USB-C just not secure enough.
Apple is bringing back MagSafe in some form which is nice for that crowd but the USB-IF really should define a standard that all manufacturers can get behind. Maybe the whole thing is patent minefield ter
Look great, but will all cheap cable supply this? (Score:2)
I love this whole idea of cutting on electric waste and not having to keep dozen different cables in your drawer.
However, will all new USB-C cables required to supply this? I'm asking because it's already an issue. There's hundred of different USB-C cable on amazon, but they deliver different bandwidth. Some are 5Gbps, some are 10Gpbs. Then there's power. A Samsung power cable won't give supercharge to a OnePlus phone etc.
I'm all for that "one connector for all" idea, but from the look of it, it looks like
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The Samsung charger probably provides power in a non-standard way (Qualcomm Quickcharge), but over standard cables. ...)
The OnePlus phones use cables that are not USB standard even. (VOOC)
This is not the USB standards' fault. It is the fault of the smartphone chip manufacturers (and one reason why I hate smartphones
But yes, this new standard requires new cables with a special chip that tells both ends that it is capable of 50V.
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You could just not buy the cheapest nastiest cable you can get away with and be done with it. Seriously get perfectly standard cables meeting the highest USB spec and you can use them on any device with compatible connectors.
Like The Idea, But Connectos Have Short Life (Score:2)
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USB C cables already cost a bunch. Is it too much to ask they last more than 90 days?
News in the year 2032 (Score:2)
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When will physics kick in. (Score:2)
For some reason I can see a future with a tiny USB-C connector hooked up to an inch thick insulated cable plugged into a NEMA 14-15 outlet, so you can charge your car.
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240W would be about 1km/hour charge rate... Well, less because there will be some loss in the DC-DC conversion to bring it up to the battery voltage.
48 Volts is still "low voltage" (Score:4, Informative)
5A @ 48V = 240W. It's still "low voltage" by most legal electrical definitions. 48V is used in PoE and the telecom sector so it's not a surprise. HP 3000/7000 blade centers use it as the main power distribution voltage. Much higher than that (after a reasonable margin) will run into problems with regulations somewhere. Looks like US/Aus is 60VDC EU is 75VDC.
Thank God for USB-C upgrades! (Score:2)
R2D2 (Score:3)
R2D2 can now be forgiven for mistaking power for data.
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Great news for yo momma (Score:2)
USB-C stick welder; soon a reality to be (Score:2)
can't wait to do some stick welding by plugging in just a cable into my laptop.