Microsoft's 'Replacement' Surface Pro Charger Cable Is an Off-Brand, and Short (theinquirer.net)

Carly Page writes with a story from The Inquirer, where: As part of its Surface Pro charger recall, Microsoft has chosen to replace the sleek, shapely matt[e] plastic original with a cable approximately half the length and ordered from an off-brand manufacturer, in our case China's I-Sheng Electric Wire and Cable Company. Writer Peter Gothard points out a plausible reason for the length, though: "The extraordinarily short length of the cord is presumably to discourage behaviour that resulted in the "tightly wrapped" or "repeatedly bent" cables catching fire in at least 56 separate incidents."

Comments

Re:And, it cheaper

[Maxwell]

SP3 owner here. They could have made the power adapter a wall wart - it isn't that big. Wallwart---cable--connector. Simple Instead they went wall--cable--brick---cable---connector. This just begs to have both cables wrapped around the brick when travelling. It's that first cable that breaks open. The second cable is much more robust, has the flexy thing at the joint and is permanently attached to the brick. the first cable is a standard type used in electric razors, old toshiba laptops etc. Very common part. And from the pic the replacement does not look anymore robust than the original...so will have exactly same issue....people will wrap it around the brick..and it will fail.