Hands-On Tech 275 Transcript

Please be advised that this transcript is AI-generated and may not be word-for-word. Time codes refer to the approximate times in the ad-free version of the show.

Mikah Sargent [00:00:00]:
Coming up on Hands-On Tech. Look, you've got lots of USB C cables and it gets very confusing. I understand. Let's take a look and try to sort through the mess. Stay tuned. Hello and welcome to Hands-On Tech. I am Mikah Sargent and today we are taking your tech questions and answering them.

Mikah Sargent [00:00:26]:
You can email me hot@twit.tv if you have tech questions that you would like answered. Today's question comes in from Doug. Doug writes, Mikah, I have a drawer full of USB C cables and I genuinely cannot tell them apart. Fair enough. Some charge my laptop fast, some take all night, and one apparently can't move files at all even though it fits perfectly. They all look identical to me. Is there a way to tell what a cable can actually do just by looking at it? And is it worth buying specific ones instead of grabbing whatever's in the drawer? This drives my whole family nuts. Well, I understand it can be a bother and it's something that I have certainly struggled with as well.

Mikah Sargent [00:01:10]:
And so I completely understand having this issue and going, what? Like there's got to be some way to tell the difference between them. And unfortunately, I wish it was like chicken sexing where you could sort of pick up the chick and go, oh, I know this is male, this is female and move along. But it's not, you're not imagining it and you're not bad at this. The system is confusing and frankly, I'd argue it's confusing by design because it's all about making a cable connector that works across so much. And so this is the thing. The one sentence that makes everything make sense also is an issue. USB C is a connector shape. It is not a guaranteed performance level.

Mikah Sargent [00:01:55]:
That same ovular plug can carry basic charging, it can carry high speed data, it can carry video. It could carry all three, depending on the cable. So two cables can look identical because we're talking about connector shape, not about capability. So they can look identical and do completely different jobs. Here is how things may or may not vary for a USB C shaped cable because it's, if you can kind of think of it like, you know, the three raccoons in a trench coat situation. These are three specks in a trench coat. Three potential specs in a trench coat. John is joining in like, okay, there's a weird metaphor, Mikah.

Mikah Sargent [00:02:35]:
I mean, it's true, it is weird. So you've got, got power, that's one of the potential raccoons, how many watts it can carry. And you, you have different certification tiers. There's 60 watt, 100 watt and now 240 watt. You also have data speed. That's the second raccoon anywhere from USB 2.0 speeds at 480 megabits per second up to 1020 or 40 gigabits per second. So that will, those are possible raccoons you can find in here. And then the final raccoon that you may or may not have in the USB C trench coat is video, whether it can drive a monitor.

Mikah Sargent [00:03:14]:
And yes, those are separated out because video is something that needs to kind of run separately for the sake of being able to display at super fast frame rates and at higher resolutions. Now the good news is if a cable is made up to spec and certification, there's going to be something inside called an E marker chip. And it will help to explain this slow charging mystery you are dealing with. Okay. Any USB C cable that charges above 60 watts or that runs faster than USB 2.0 has to contain a, a little E marker chip inside. This is a way of communicating the capabilities of the cable. A cable without one is capped by the spec. So if you have a cable and it doesn't have an E marker chip and it's got the USB C connector on the end, then the system, whether it's your phone or some other device, is going to cap the capabilities of that cable at 60 watts and 480 megabits per second, no matter what's printed on the package.

Mikah Sargent [00:04:30]:
Okay, so you can almost imagine it's kind of like you have two people walk up and they both say, I am certified as a, I don't know, a water quality technician. Right? And the one person, because you've got, you've got, you've got water that's contaminated at your home and you need to have somebody come and fix it. So two people walk up, they both say, I'm water quality certified technician. And the person on the left has no proof of credentials or credentials to provide you. The person on the right has the credentials to provide you. Which person are you going to let do more? Is it the person who isn't credentialed or the person who is? It's the person who is, right. Otherwise you're going to say, you know, oh, you could take a look at it. Yeah, go have a look.

Mikah Sargent [00:05:25]:
Essentially that's capping it. It's saying, I don't know what you're capable of, so I'm not going to give you any more than 60 watts and 480 megabits. However, if it does have that chip in it, then it will work much better. So even if you have a 100 watt charger, you know, the charging plug actually shows that it can charge at 100 watts. If you pair it with a no E marker cable, you're probably going to get around 20 of power from it. That ends up being your quote unquote, take all night cable. Right. And the one that can't move files, well, that's a charge only cable.

Mikah Sargent [00:06:03]:
And that cable's only wired for power, not for data. So annoying. All right, so how can you tell them apart? By looking. I ask that question about my twins all the time. No, you check the connector and the packaging and you look for printed or sometimes embossed markings. Certified cables are going to show power marks like 60 watts, 240 watts, 100 watts. And the faster ones will also show combined labels that show 60 watts 40 gigabits or 240 watts 40 gigabits, depending on what you have. Also good to look for USB logos, a Thunderbolt logo.

Mikah Sargent [00:06:42]:
If it's a Thunderbolt cable, those are ways to determine what the cable's capability is, the cablebility, if you will. You won't. And then also if a cable doesn't clearly tell you its power, its speed, its video support, then I think it's best to go, that's an unproven cable. Rather than assuming it does everything. Just because it has a USB C connector on the end of it does not mean that it's a more powerful cable. And in some cases it's not. It's the opposite. And so it's better to go, okay, this is the cable that doesn't have certification markings.

Mikah Sargent [00:07:18]:
And therefore I can't confirm that it can do more than just charge. And if you want to be sure if the cable is the real deal, I've got good news for you. You can actually go to the USB Group's website, USB.org products and you can search to see if the product is celebrated by. Celebrated is is cataloged by the USB Implementers forum, which lets you learn about the cable or the power supply or whatever it happens to be and understand what it's what. What, what it is capable of doing. Okay? So you can look it up there, find the certification if it's there. Now, here's what I would actually do for you specifically, Doug. I think it's best if you stop fighting the drawer.

Mikah Sargent [00:08:18]:
You know, you've got this drawer, it's full of stuff. You grab one and you're not sure. Let's get sure. Buy a few Known good cables, label them when you buy them so that even if they don't have the little markings on them, you have added them. So you can say this is a laptop charger, it has fast data. You could say, say it is a charge only cable and then go ahead and retire those mystery ones. Or if you want to keep them, put them into like a, you know, a charging station that you offer guests where they can just plug in real quick. It doesn't, you don't necessarily have to get rid of them, but using them and having this frustration of ambiguity is not fun, right? If you want a single cable that does everything, my recommendation has always been to go the route of Thunderbolt.

Mikah Sargent [00:09:05]:
So a Thunderbolt 4 cable is also a USB 4 cable. And a Thunderbolt 4 USB 4 cable is great because it is high wattage charging, it is fast data, it is video, and most importantly, it is backward compatible. So you're basically getting the best that you possibly can regardless of what you are plugging in here. That means that you know that if it's possible for the device and the interface to ramp things up, it can. But if it isn't, then fine. So I actually have almost all of my USB C connector cables, meaning on the end of it is a USB C connector. Almost all of them that I use regularly are Thunderbolt cables. I've got a Caldigit Thunderbolt cable plugged in right now to my Mac with an empty port, just waiting for something to be plugged in.

Mikah Sargent [00:10:07]:
I've got another one that's Belkin just sitting here waiting for something to be plugged into it. And I have a third one on a hook behind my desk with nothing on either side, also waiting for something to be plugged into it. I use Thunderbolt cables because then I'm not spending time going is this giving as much as it possibly can. So that is a very handy way to do so. One important reality check though, a great cable can't create features that your devices port don't that your device support does not support. Does that make sense? It's not going to add features. If the laptop can't output video over its port, then it doesn't matter what cable you use there, it's not going to be able to do that. So keep that in mind.

Mikah Sargent [00:10:53]:
You're not adding capability. You're only able to use the capability of the device that's plugged into it and whatever's on the other end. So Doug, here's what you need to remember. The shape lies, but the markings, if they're there will tell you the truth. Look for the wattage, look for the speed printed on the cable. When you purchase a new cable somewhere, mark down what the packaging says so that you have that. Or take a photo of the packaging and save it in an album called USB C cables. Some way of being able to check and Indic what what the cable is possible is capable of doing.

Mikah Sargent [00:11:36]:
Let me see this CalDigit cable, which is Thunderbolt 4. It's marked with the Thunderbolt logo. Kind of hard to see because it's dark, but it's the thunderbolt logo with a 4 on it. So I know it's a thunderbolt 4 cable, it's got CalDigit written on the other side. But let me see if there are any other markings. Sometimes there are, sometimes there aren't. And that's partially because with this cable I can see that it is Thunderbolt 4. And that is enough to give me what I need to know.

Mikah Sargent [00:12:06]:
But the cool thing is this actually does have on the cable itself, sort of not engrained, but engraved is the text 100 watt. So I do know that this is capable of 100 watt charging. Other than that, if I know the specs for a Thunderbolt 4 cable, USB 4 cable, then those are the specs that I can expect from this. I have another cable here from Anker and it has, it looks like 60 watt charging for this one and it's USB C on both ends. So look at your cables, label your cables and if it's in the budget, Thunderbolt 4, USB 4 for your most powerful devices, you should be good to go. Doug, remember that along with looking at wattage and speed above 60 watts or faster than USB 2 means that it does need an E marker chip and it should have one. Buy a couple of these labeled certified cables and that way the family can stop grabbing the wrong ones. Maybe you, you know, the next gift giving holiday everybody gets a Thunderbolt 4 USB 4 cable.

Mikah Sargent [00:13:27]:
And you know, they, they're told they need to take care of it. But if that can be the most powerful device or most powerful cable in their arsenal, that's quite nice as well. Doug, thank you for writing in with your question. I love this question because it can apply to so many people. And so I would love to hear folks out there if you have special ways of organizing your cables or special ways of marking your cables. I'd love to hear about that as well. hot@twit.tv is how you get in touch and I look forward to bringing you another episode next week. Thanks everybody.

Mikah Sargent [00:14:06]:
Have a good day. Bye bye!