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USB-C Power Meter Helps You Spot Counterfeit Accessories Before They Fry Your Gadgets (gizmodo.com)
USB Type-C cables are not all created equally. In fact, some USB Type-C cables fail so badly that they will permanently damage your hardware. Benson Leung, an engineer on Google's Pixel team, discovered early last year that there's even more risk to your electronics when you've got a cheap USB-C cable with an older USB connector on the other end that doesn't properly regulate power draw. In an effort to weed out the bad cables from the good, a company called Satechi has released a "Type-C Power Meter" that makes it easy to tell if your USB-C gadgets are at risk of getting fried, or under-powered, by a sketchy accessory. Gizmodo reports: The simple pass-through adapter connects between a USB-C cable and a USB-C device, providing real-time data about the power draw, in either direction, including details about voltage, amps, and the amount of energy that's been transferred since it was first plugged in. The monitor can let you know if an external battery pack is providing the proper amount of power to a smartphone that it claims to, or if your MacBook or Chromebook is receiving sufficient power from a charging cable connected to its USB-C port to actually charge the battery. What the monitor can't do, however, is protect a device if there's a detected problem in the power flow. It's not a surge protector, nor does it have any built-in alarms or warnings because it has no idea what the power requirements are for whatever device you're using it with. You'll have to make sure you're aware of how much power a device is supposed to be drawing, and confirm that it matches what the Type-C Power Meter is reporting, as soon as you plug it in.
And put fuses in everything.
I use only the spun-gold Monster Type-C cables. I know, they cost quite a bit at a little over $600 a foot, but the power is so smooth, and a certified genuine Yogi meditated over them. If you really care about the performance of your equipment, you buys these and do without food.
If you want news from today, you have to come back tomorrow.
How do I detect a counterfeit Type-C Power Meter?
Now your telling me to add another $$$ to get a cable and thingie to measure current.
:(
My current phone sucks beans, but I can hold off another 6 months
Now that I have started selling cheap Type-C Power Meters on ebay.
Or you can buy a cheapo multimeter, which is far more versatile, for less than $10....
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Digita...
Granted, not as cool, compact and easy to use.
Stop being cheap and buy known certified products from official channels in the first place, instead of cheaping out with items from Alibaba.
WELCOME OUR NEW ad OVERLOADs
I lag
If there is even a REMOTE chance that something should be able to burn out your USB-C ports...
Why the fuck don't the USB-C ports have protection against that kind of shit?
I have never once lost or damaged a device using USB 1.0, 1.1, 2.0, or 3.0. Sure, I've seen ports break (mechanically), and I've seen ports fail for other reasons (flakey USB controllers, etc). As far as I know, that's never occurred because of a faulty cable. Occasionally I've gotten "over current" warnings from my computers when plugging in a defective device, but the port was no worse for wear afterwards.
So why is it that this is such a problem for USB-C?
Is the spec just that horribly designed that nobody is implementing any kind of protection against this whatsoever?
Or is it just so insanely complicated that it's borderline impossible to protect against shoddy devices?
Either way, I don't want or need that rubbish on my hardware. I'll stick with what I know works. I'm starting to think that things like USB-C are just more "innovations" from our corporate overlords to ensure that your PC breaks somehow after the warranty has expired (even if it breaks under the warranty and is repaired, I'm guessing that costs them less than the profit they'll get from you when it inevitably breaks again after the warranty is up).
What bugs me about USB power is that the negotation for more than a tenth-amp (half-watt) takes place partly on the data lines. That means they need to be connected between the peripheral and the source.
So any charger device for a power-hungry gadget (such as a smartphone) will have a full four-wire connection and have the opportunity to attempt to exploit any USB port vulnerabilities of the device. Making a "condom" adapter to only connect the +5 and ground wires will normally provide reduce performance (if it works at all). Vetting one that does connect to the data lines on both sides is difficult - both to insure that it does what's intended and doesn't have a backdoor, and that it, itself, isn't such an attacking device.
Given that Russian intelligence was already caught handing out phone-cracking "USB chargers" to many countries' high officials at an international conference, the threat not just a hypothetical.
(Note that some powered hubs just tie +5 and ground to the supply, rather than try to negotiate and enforce per-port power limits, too.)
IMHO: A USB device that depends on its power source to limit its input current, and can be damaged by a host that is willing to deliver more current that it requested, is defective by design. The negotiation and enforcement is for the benefit of the power source (for instance, a laptop trying to protect its battery life).
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
Sometimes I wonder... Why did Apple make lightning connectors and thunderbird or bolt or whatever connectors..
Other days I know exactly why. I switched from Android from day 1 to an iPhone 7. I personally don't use the headphone so haven't noticed it. The battery is awesome. The UI reminds me of Windows 3.1. Far from perfect, hoping to switch back soon (battery life is killer for me, plus phone durability). Then I see more issues with Pixel or USB-C and it makes me want to be a luddite.
IMHO: A USB device that depends on its power source to limit its input current, and can be damaged by a host that is willing to deliver more current that it requested, is defective by design.
Ditto any supply (such as a laptop's USB port) that can be damaged by an excessive load - all the way down to a short to ground. Current limiters are not that costly, and one smart enough to negotiate higher limits involves enough custom silicon that it can also be designed to enforce the higher limits in a self-protecting manner, as well.
Protecting itself from being driven by an out-of-range voltage is another issue. But any USB host port at any level of the spec SHOULD be able to handle any voltage between zero and +5 on any of the non-ground pins, and any resistance - down to zero - to the ground pin. Perhaps not according to the standard, but certainly according to reasonable engineering practice.
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
Comment removed based on user account deletion
I would think that any specification for consumer grade hardware that could end up damaging the devices they are built into is the root cause of the problem.
Products like this (which are repurposed development tools normally used to check USB Operation - I have several in my office) strengthen my resolve to not purchase USB-C equipped systems.
Mimetics Inc. Twitter
The simple pass-through adapter connects between a USB-C cable and a USB-C device, providing real-time data about the power draw, in either direction, ...What the monitor can't do, however, is protect a device if there's a detected problem in the power flow. It's not a surge protector, nor does it have any built-in alarms or warnings because it has no idea what the power requirements are for whatever device you're using it with.
It can't measure the power flow unless it's put in-line with the device you're charging and the charger.
It has no automatic warnings or alarms. You have to sit there and watch it while your device is charging.
Didn't Benson lose some equipment as soon as he plugged it in? If this device can't really test anything on it's own, how is it going to "help me prevent my gadgets from being fried"? Once I've hooked it to my device if something goes wrong it's too late.
Buy the official product from the original maker only. Have a Samsung device? Buy a Samsung accessory. That way the only one at fault will be the vendor.
This device seems totally unsuited to detecting 'fry your gadgets' failure modes. If you hit one of the corner cases where USB power delivery goes for overkill; it'll be over in moments; so having a few numbers displayed during the frying won't help you much.
These sorts of widgets can come in quite handy(nothing you couldn't do with a decent multimeter and some socket bodging; but socket bodging is annoying and tedious): I used to use them a lot when dealing with 'Smartboards' that used a (vendor supplied) overlength USB cable; but depended on bus power, and could be increasingly glitchy if they weren't getting enough of it. Having an easy way to know which computers used the 'meh, connect USB power to the 5v rail, maybe with some kind of fuse' method, and were good for plenty more than 500ma; which ones took a '500ma is by the book; if you don't like it, go cry to the USB SIG' stance; and which ones(mostly laptops) were spotty about being able to provide as much bus power as standards demanded.
Also handy for getting a look at whether your cheapo portable battery pack droops atrociously under load; testing the various devices that use a min-USB connector for power to see how much the really draw, etc. but not a piece of safety equipment.
It is really off-putting to see this sort of mislabeling. The functions this thing is actually capable of(assuming the vendor didn't screw it up) are quite handy to have in your tech-widget drawer; but it's blatantly dishonest to imply that it has much chance of saving your expensive gadget in the event of a nasty power delivery failure.
Just too bad that they don't have it regulate and limit the current. So, you plug in your device to this device and into your PC. It immediately exceeds limits beyond your imagination and POOF, you're device is fried. The device tells you how much over it was but does nothing to prevent the external device from drawing too much current and such.
It needs to have a bit more than tell me that a long-term problem may exist. While that is nice to know it doesn't prevent your PC from being fried.
You could buy cables and not have to worry about this?
I'm not seeing any benefits to USB-C that outweight the inconveniences introduced. I've already gone back to a microUSB phone and do not plan to buy another USB-C.
This Gizmodo article has for a title "USB-C Power Meter Helps You Spot Counterfeit Accessories Before They Fry Your Gadgets"
but..... FTA
"What the monitor canâ(TM)t do, however, is protect a device if thereâ(TM)s a detected problem in the power flow. Itâ(TM)s not a surge protector, nor does it have any built-in alarms or warnings because it has no idea what the power requirements are for whatever device youâ(TM)re using it with."
So, really, it does nothing, and by the time you see 40V hitting your phone when it's expecting 12, I think it's going to be too little too late before the magic smoke escapes, and really, who knows what the charging spec on their devices is, really?
The amount of cables that Nathan-K and Bensen Leung test that don't match the spec, don't work to spec, do work to spec with exceptions, melt or any of the above combination is nuts.
Nathan-K has a page up on G+ with more details:
https://plus.google.com/collec...
They've a spreadsheet of tested cables:
https://docs.google.com/spread...
Personally, my favourite comment regarding USB-C comes from the register:
https://forums.theregister.co....
"it's a design error
An electrical specification which allows multiple, software-controlled supply voltages, but does not require connected devices to tolerate the highest available voltage.
What could possibly go wrong?"
Curiosity was framed; ignorance killed the cat. -- Author unknown
Just got to say, what the hell is going on with consumer electronics? Too many different connectors, no standards, expensive chargers. Who can blame the consumer for spending £5 on a charger from the market, rather than £25 for the official one? A wire is a wire right? They probably have a garage full of old chargers that don't fit anything anymore as well!
There are people who will buy the cheapest accessory because they don't know better.
There are people who buy the premium/OEM accessory because they do know better.
The former group are not going to shell out coin for a power meter they likely won't even understand the meaning of. Feel free to argue that it's about education, but look how prevalent email and phone scams are some 10 years after they arrived. Don't know about you folks, but I'm kind of over getting told I'm a paranoid freak because people don't like to hear they're wrong.
The latter group will never need it because they know to avoid cheap Chinese crap to begin with. Nevermind I can find USB2 equivalents with a quick google search. This is not some ground breaking product.
Who is this device for, why are we discussing it, and why did we not discuss the USB 2 versions when they came out 18 months ago? This all reeks of product shilling IMO.
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It's happened before. The FireWire ports of Macs can actually supply max FireWire voltage (48V). Guess what? A certain Firewire hub couldn't take that, so it was well know if you bought one of those, it wouldn't work in your Mac. In fact, your Mac would let the magic smoke out.
The reason for this was a Firewire card in a PC, due to PC limitations, would only ever supply up to 12V (PC power supply rails only max out at 12V). So the hub assumed it only needed to tolerate 12V, even though the spec said you ahve to handle 48V. Naturally, the QA was done on PCs instead of the platform most likely to use them
I went to the site, and while looking around, was interested in the Bluetooth headphones.
Click on the specifications, and you'll understand why I would not trust them. http://www.satechi.net/index.php/aluminum-wireless-headphones-silver
The description promises Bluetooth 4.0, but the specifications say 3.0. Apparently the headphones are also weightless. "Weight: No"
Lastly, it was missing the one spec I really needed to see. Frequency Response.
I have no reason to trust that their $30 gadget will deliver when they have so many errors and ommissions on this product.
"Featuring advanced Bluetooth 4.0 technology, a luxurious design, and premium sound, the Satechi Aluminum Wireless Headphones allow you to listen to your music effortlessly and in style. "
From Specifications
SHORT NAME:
Satechi Aluminum Wireless Headphones (Silver)
SKU:
B019PJRCQ6
UPC:
879961005795
WARRANTY:
1 Year
CONNECTIVITY:
Bluetooth 3.0 HID
COMPATIBILITY:
iPhone 6/5S/5C/5/4S/4/3GS, iPad Air/Mini/3/2/1, iPod Touch 4G/3G, MacBook Pro/Air, iMac, Mac Mini, and all other Bluetooth-enabled Apple products, Bluetooth-enabled computers
PRODUCT DIMENSIONS:
No
PRODUCT WEIGHT:
No
One more thing, the dimensions for the meter seem whack.
PRODUCT DIMENSIONS:
6.3 x 2 x 0.8 mm
It looks a lot thicker than 0.8 mm.
Basically, nothing from this site looks like you could trust it.
Voltage regulation and current-limit are solely the task of the USB port. The cable does not come into it at all. The only thing the cable does is tell the device about itself, and of course that information can be wrong. However if that fries the device, the device is at fault for incompetent protection circuitry design and not the cable.
I do not see how this gadget helps at all. IT seems to be a simple USB power meter, vastly over-priced.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
So USB-C is supposed to be an improvement on regular USB? Doesn't look like it has much of an advantage. I'll stick with ol' fashioned USB until they can come up with something better.
The lesson I'm taking home from this is to avoid USB-C until they get the kinks worked out.
i cant tellthe difference.
The reason for this was a Firewire card in a PC, due to PC limitations, would only ever supply up to 12V (PC power supply rails only max out at 12V).
The reason for this is not the 12V power supply. It's not hard or very expensive to put the required circuitry on the card to boost that to higher voltages. The real reason is the card manufacturer being cheap.
THIS!!
Holy shit - how incompetent can you be as an engineer to design an electrical connector interface which is specifically intended to negotiate a power delivery rate and not put in a way to prevent the remote device from exceeding your power supply capabilities? AFAIK, there has never been a sink device* that has failed, only the supply devices (Apple and Google/Chrome), which is exactly the side that should be controlling the maximum capacity of the connection.
*if someone has a link to a confirmed case of a charged device failing due to this, I would love to see it as I have been unable to find one.
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
They put optocouplers in most CNC controllers, and perhaps they should put them in computers as well. Perhaps something can be done about the power leads as well.
https://www.youtube.com/c/BrendaEM
The summary of this article makes no sense. A USB cable is just a cable with connectors, there's nothing in it to 'regulate' anything, and the connectors have nothing to do with that. A poorly made cable, that shorts out internally? That's a different matter entirely, that's a quality issue, but the connectors and the cable itself have nothing to do with regulating current draw. You plug a USB cable into your computer and leave the other end unconnected, it draws ZERO power -- assuming the cable isn't shorted internally.
This is a retraction for the above comment.
Wasn't actually aware that USB-C cables differed from other USB cables in that there is in fact active electronics embedded in the cable assembly. Apologies for any confusion or consternation this may have caused.
The cable needs to be able to pass the current without overheating itself, so it does come into it.
If a spec results in lots of poor quality implementations, there is something wrong with the spec design itself.
Perhaps data and power should not go together. Any spec design should consider mass manufacturing conditions.
These devices have been readily available in China for ages, slapping on a c connector didn't make it novel
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to 45 2F 6E 40 3C DF 10 71 4E 41 DF AA 25 7D 31 3F
If you are going to have power adapters that can provide 100 watts, in the form of 20v 5a that are on the same setup as devices that might draw 5v 100ma you have to have some kind of communication.
It isn't the current draw that is the only issue, it is the voltage. New USB specs allow for higher voltages. That's a problem if the receiving device can't tell it what to set it at. The charger I have for my phone can do 5v, 9v or 12v. My phone wants 9v. Somehow, the phone has to tell it what to send.
In terms of current, that has to be communicated but not with the device, with the wire. USB-C cables that can do high current have to have chips in them to communicate that they have that capability. The reason is easy to see: Look at a standard USB2 cable. Do those wires look like they can handle 5a? Ya.
So the only way to make a standard that remains compatible with the ports and devices we already have and can provide high voltage and current is to use communication.
Otherwise, you need a clean break to a new standard that requires higher gauge cables and uses a higher voltage.
I mean one option is just to stick with old chargers. Your phone will work fine, it'll just charge slow. If you want a fast charger, just get a good one that is certified to work with it. Anker is a great choice, their chargers are well built and Qualcom certified for quick charging. Likewise get a good cable that is rated to handle the voltage/current. Being a phone it isn't going to be a ton so it really won't be an issue.
Tell me again how a dodgy usb cable is going to ruin my device? Sagging voltage might cause it to malfunction, but it won't ruin it. I suppose an overloaded usb cable could possibly catch the house on fire and that might damage the device.
Voltage regulation and current-limit are solely the task of the USB port. The cable does not come into it at all.
You would think that, wouldn't you? Unfortunately the braniacs who came up with this ridiculous-in-so-many-ways standard decided that a cable isn't just a cable anymore.