I cringe every time I see an ad for “high-speed” this-or-that cabling, such as USB(1) cables. I cringe because undoubtedly many people now believe that “speed” has something to do with the cabling.
Trust me: it’s a piece of wire with some plastic wrapped around it. Properly crafted(2)(3) it has nothing what so ever to say about “speed.” Nothing.
Nada. It’s wire. It’s metal with some plastic wrapped around it.(4)
Don’t let the advertising weenies continue to mislead you. If you stop buying inferior junk — that means you have to do some research and gain enough knowledge to recognize junk when it’s put before you — then they’ll have to stop making junk. Won’t they?
The downward spiral our society has been on for at least all of my lifetime is in part due to the advancing failure of public education, which mostly leaves folks with the message that learning is hard, when in fact, the Human Brain is set to learn, wants to learn, can’t wait to learn… until public education gets in there and twists things around.
Some folks do escape the system with their love of learning intact, but not enough.
God gave you a brain and a mind (not the same thing, by the way) and a built-in love of learning. Ask any neurologist or neuropsychologist about “the learning center and the endorphin hit” and you’ll get a most interesting bit of knowledge to chew one.
Just don’t try chewing on some of these crappy, crappy cables. They’ll come apart.
Buy quality; pass over the junk. It saves you tons of money in the long run, and the weenies will eventually have to stop making the planet-wasting junk. Consumers vote with their money; but as in politics, your vote has been subverted, manipulated and programmed. Don’t be Pavlov’s perfect consumer.
(Short version: if you really are looking to buy a cable, get the ones that are structurally reinforced, often with a fabric-like weave as the outer covering, and that are data cables, and don’t worry about it’s being “too long” for your current need; that ensures it’s useful against possible future needs. For Pete’s sake, also don’t worry about what color it is; it’s not a fashion accessory. Look for the quality first, then you can add on the things that don’t technically matter after that. Shorter-version: always buy the best quality you can possibly afford, no matter what it is — of course, “possibly afford” is a complicated topic in itself and not even remotely related to what comes to mind for most people. We aren’t taught to invest in the future; we aren’t taught that concept at all, at all(5))
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(1) “USB” means Universal Serial Bus. If it’s “universal” then why are there now so very many variations on it? USB-A, USB-B, USB-C, Mini-USB, Micro-USB, USB-A-to-USB-B, USB-A-to-USB-C, USB-A-to-Micro-USB (aka, the “android cable”) and on and on. Hardly universal then, is it? There’s an old joke, barely funny, but amazingly true: the computer industry loves standards: that’s why they come up with a new one every week.
(2) Properly crafted… well, some of them are, but this is another area where the consumer’s ignorance is crucial to the bottom line profits. Far, far too many cables made are just pieces of junk that will barely serve, that break at the first stress or — thanks to trendy marketing are simply the wrong color this week. How many billion miles of wire do you think we can actually make? Be happy with a high quality cable that lasts and don’t fret over what color it is. It isn’t “cool” — it’s wire. Getting your gadget to charge up, or moving your pictures around, that’s cool.
(3) Cables can be badly crafted. A supposed USB cable might have only two wires in it, making it a charging-only cable not a data cable. You can plug it into a USB port or charging adapter and get power, but you can’t use it to plug in to your computer and transfer data. Oh no… that’s another type of cable… No, it really isn’t. It’s one that meets the specs, is all.
(4) Ok… for the technologists out there, yes, I admit to palming that card. A cable can in fact have a maximum “bandwidth” to it (aka, “speed” though speed and bandwidth really are not the same thing), due the some basic physics around pulsed signals in wiring (meaning you have to make it right, go figure). Cables are even grouped into subclasses by their potential bandwidth. I maintain this is bull… If we can build a cable that can 2 trillion doo-hickey’s a second, why in the world would you ever make one that can only do 1 trillion doo-hickey’s a second? Why? There is no reason (in the consumer market, at least). When we can make 8 gigabyte memory chips, why would we ever again make 2 gigabyte chips? [Answer: to support older equipment which still runs fine, but never ever again for new equipment!] Certain of the Intel processor chips should never have been brought to market — the only purpose they serve is to further confuse the consumer and to accomplish what the marketeers call “market positioning.” This is built-in obsolescence, it’s built-in marketing BS. It complicates consumer perceptions and magnifies consumer ignorance. In fact, it leverages consumer ignorance. Which, of course, is what the marketing / manufacturing weenies want. My point? Stop playing the “there isn’t enough to go around” game that this kind of marketing is driven off of. If we can make a billion miles of crappy cable a year [estimated] and the people who buy these cables buy 3 or 4 such a year [estimated] where one good cable would have lasted 2 or 3 or 4 years… well, you can do that math on that one. Obviously there is more than enough to go around, it’s just being badly abused on its way to market. Ethics and Corporate Mentality don’t seem very closely related at times, do they?
(5) Invest in the future… actually we are taught a concept under that phrase: investments in stocks, bonds, start-ups, 401K, etc. That also is NOT what I mean. Investing in the future is a thing you do every day, every moment, and has nothing to do with brokerages, and other fancy things the majority of folks on this planet (7.6 billion now) can’t even get near financially. When I say “invest in your future” I mean something everyone can do, no matter your circumstances. It’s a way of always improving your life and the lives around you, rather than feeding off each other. More another time.