You won’t find these symbols on most devices though (certainly not on any macbook as the picture suggests).
By removing the symbols they were able to shave the case down 0.0003nm, making it the thinnest and lightest laptop ever.
If they etched the symbol they could have reduced the weight of the laptop by 0.003g making it even better
I didn’t take the image to be showing a macbook, it could just as easily be my computer or probably many others.
It could be, but combine the color looking very much like Apple’s space grey, the slimness of it, particularly how slim the lid is versus the body, and what looks like the MacBook’s classic black, rounded rubber stoppers on the bottom, I think it’s safe to say that’s meant to be an MacBook.
Also certain MacBook models tried to go to a single USB C port about a decade ago, and it was on the corner like that.
True, my latest Dell laptop has 3 “usb-c shaped ports”, there is 0 symbol anywhere close to them or the underside cover, you’re on your own as to what it supports, you have to find the doc online somewhere I guess.
I discovered that my Thinkpad apparently supports charging from all of the (unlabeled) USB-C ports after I inadvertently started it charging from my cell phone’s (unlabeled) USB-C port.
I can do you one better: My GPD laptop has a charging indicator on the center type-C port indicating that this is where the power supply goes, but it can actually be charged from either port regardless of the icon. Both ports are USB 3.0 or 3.2 or whatever the current fast standard is this week, but only the center one supports video out via an external GPU enclosure. So if you want to use it docked with an eGPU, it’s actually required to not plug the power supply into the port that says you should plug the power supply into it.
So not only is the marking meaningless, it’s arguably worse than meaningless because in one of the headline hardware setups for the machine it is actually 100% incorrect to do what the marking is telling you to do. Wrap your head around that one…
Tbf my work Dell Latitude 5440 has a USB A with a SS5, an A with a SS5 and charging indicator, a C with a thunderbolt indicator, and a C with a battery and a thunderbolt indicator.
So at least some of their laptops do in fact have the indicators similar-ish enough to what the infographic shows.
Why would you need them on a MacBook? They’re always* Thunderbolt.
Edit: Better explained by GamingChairModel below. I entirely forgot one series of MacBook, and also forgot when the older ones did have the Thunderbolt symbol on them.
No they aren’t. Only some are.
The only devices that don’t have at least Thunderbolt 3 on all ports do use the Thunderbolt logo on the ones that support it, except the short-lived 12-inch MacBook (non-Pro, non-Air). Basically, for data transfer:
- If it’s a 12-inch MacBook, the single USB-C port doesn’t support Thunderbolt, and only supports USB 3.1 Gen 1.
- In all other devices, if the ports are unmarked, they all support Thunderbolt 3 or higher
- If the ports are marked with Thunderbolt symbols, those ports support Thunderbolt but the unmarked ports on the same computer don’t.
For power delivery, every USB-C port in every Apple laptop supports at least first generation USB-PD.
For display, every USB-C port in every Apple laptop (and maybe even the desktops) supports DisplayPort alt mode.
It’s annoying but not actually that hard to remember in the wild.
It gets even better, each function of the port also needs proper support from the cable. Often cables do not support the full spec of usb to cut costs.
While the symbols in the post are often put on computers, for usb cables this is seldom done (only a few brands do).
Source: had to find a cable that supports both DP and PD to connect a portable external monitor after I lost the original cable. (1/9 cables worked)
Yes, this is incredibly annoying and it’s also the reason why some USB cables cost more than others, even they may look the same superficially.
One of those cables that don’t work is rated for like 120W, with gigabit transfer speed… But it refuses to transmit display… Like bruh
That sounds like a dedicated charging cable. So yeah, they will (if at all) only transfer data slowly and not support any extras features like displayport.
Yeah, it’s gotten so bad I eventually ordered a USB cable checker to figure out what any given USB cable is capable of (and to see if the cable has gone flaky, which seems to happen a lot). I haven’t received it yet so I don’t know if I can recommend this item, but … gosh darn you sure need something like this.
For that portable monitor, you should just need a cable with USB-C plugs on both ends which supports USB 3.0+ (could be branded as SuperSpeed, 5Gbps, etc). Nothing more complicated than that.
The baseline for a cable with USB-C on both ends should be PD up to 60W (3A) and data transfers at USB 2.0 (480Mbps) speeds.
Most cables stick with that baseline because it’s enough to charge phones and most people won’t use USB-C cables for anything else. Omitting the extra capabilities lets cables be not only cheaper but also longer and thinner.
DisplayPort support uses the same extra data pins that are needed for USB 3.0 data transfers, so in terms of cable support they should be equivalent. There also exist higher-power cables rated for 100W or 240W but there’s no way a portable monitor would need that.
Sometimes people want to charge their phone in an outlet 10 feet from their airport seat.
Sometimes people want to transmit 8k video.
It’s not physically possible to do both tasks with the same cable.
But because USB is a flexible standard, we don’t have two incompatible specs to do the same thing. So when you get out of the airport and to your meeting, you can actually plug your phone into the meeting room projector for your business presentation. That’s a win.
What is the difference between USA and USB?
One connects to all your devices and accesses your data, the other is a hardware standard.
exept when manufacturer don’t give a fuck and print whatever or nothing next to the port. like always
TL;DR: The USB Implementers Forum is ridiculously bad at naming, symbols and communication in general. (And they don’t seriously enforce any of this anyway, so don’t even bother learning it.)
This is the correct answer; after the whole USB 3.2 Gen 2 2x2 (hands of blue) bullshit, I wouldn’t trust that team to name a park bench in the middle of the desert. Let alone something important and universally used.
We could have gone for already proven and tested conventions like the resistor color codes and have a unique distinguishable icon for each features to attach when needed (like thunder icon for high power). But nope, we got this USB 3.2 Gen 4 2x2 Hyper Turbocharged World Champions and Knuckles Platinum Edition bs instead.
the whole USB 3.2 Gen 2 2x2 (hands of blue) bullshit
If you’re not trying to wire your own USB port you can just use the recommended names “USB SuperSpeed 20 Gbps” or “USB 20 Gbps”. You don’t have to be confused by technical names if you don’t want to be.
The real bullshit is between your ears–you and only you can fix it.
They are not bad at this. You are bad at understanding it.
Don’t get mad when you could instead learn something.
Yes it gets complex. It’s a 25-year old protocol that does almost everything. Of course it will be.
But the names are not hard if you bother to learn them.
They are not bad at this. You are bad at understanding it.
I work with this stuff, and I do understand it. Some of my colleagues are actively participating in USB-IF workgroups, although not the ones responsible for naming end user facing things. They come to me for advice when those other workgroups changed some names retroactively again and we need to make sure we are still backwards compatible with things that rely on those names and that we are not confusing our customers more than necessary.
That is why I am very confident in claiming those naming schemes are bad.
“don’t even bother learning it” is my advice for normal end users, and I do stand by it.
But the names are not hard if you bother to learn them.
Never said it is hard.
It is more complex than it needs to be.
It is internally inconsistent.
Names get changed retroactively with new spec releases.
None of that is hard to learn, just not worth the effort.
They’re bad because manufacturers want to pass their usb 2.0 gear as “usb 3.0 compliant”, which it technically is, and their usb 3.0 gear as “usb 3.2” because 3.2 Gen 1x1 is also 5gbps.
Also the whole alternate mode is awesome, but cheap hub chips don’t bother trying to support it and the only people who do are the laptop ports so they can save $.40 on a separate hdmi port.
And don’t get me started on all the USB-c chargers that only put out 1.5a because it’s just a normal 7805 on the back end.
There is some stuff to be learned, but especially with USB-C I’d say the vast majority are not labeled. There’s even some devices charged with USB C that can’t be charged with a PD charger and need an A to C cable. Phones are a great example where you have to look up the specs to know data transfer capabilities. Additionally they renamed the USB 3.0 standard which has been established for over a decade to USB 3.1 Gen 1 which is completely unnecessary and just serves to confuse. The standard was largely understandable with USB 3.0 generally being blue or at least a color other than black and on decently modern devices USB 2.0 would be black. With USB-C indication has just about gone out the window and what used to be a very simple to understand standard has now become nearly impossible to understand without having researched every device and cable you interact with.
There’s even some devices charged with USB C that can’t be charged with a PD charger and need an A to C cable
Phones with qualcomm chips briefly had their own proprietary fast charging standards that were not a USB standard. You are unlikely to be using those devices in 2024. But is it USB-IF’s fault manufacturers tried to create proprietary standards to collect royalties?
Additionally they renamed the USB 3.0 standard which has been established for over a decade to USB 3.1 Gen 1 which is completely unnecessary and just serves to confuse
No they didn’t?
The 5Gbps transfer rate introduced in 2008 is called “Superspeed” and it always has been.
USB X.X is not a port or a transfer speed. It’s the standard (ie a technical whitepaper). The standard is updated as time marches on and new features are added.
The standard was largely understandable with USB 3.0 generally being blue or at least a color other than black and on decently modern devices USB 2.0 would be black.
This was never a requirement, but it was nice to know which Type-A ports had 8 pins vs 4-pins.
With USB-C indication has just about gone out the window and what used to be a very simple to understand standard has now become nearly impossible to understand without having researched every device and cable you interact with.
For the most part you just plug it in and it works. If you need something specific like an external GPU connection, you can’t use your phone charging cable, sure. Is that really that big of a deal?
