USB-C adoption mostly went fine, though. Or as fine as could be expected.
I think the past five years can be more easily explained with — ironically — a Steve Jobs quote:
> When we were an agrarian nation, all cars were trucks, because that's what you needed on the farm. But as vehicles started to be used in the urban centers, cars got more popular … PCs are going to be like trucks. They're still going to be around, they're still going to have a lot of value, but they're going to be used by one out of X people.
And that's what the Mac team lost sight of; they tried to make Pro Macs that were sports cars. Maybe the Macbook Air is an affordable sports car of sorts (do they still make Mazda Miatas?), but the Macbook Pro is and should be a truck.
They're called MX-5s here in the UK and I see them everywhere, unsurprisingly because it's in the spirit of an old British two seater but unlike the Triumph Spitfire or MG Midget it doesn't break down all the time and isn't essentially hygroscopic.
I don't get the dongle people. You can just buy USB-C to USB-B cords. They cost about the same as dongles. I replaced the cords on all my devices years ago and never looked back.
It would be really nice if that was the case. However when you pick up a USB C cable, you can't tell if it is suitable for a particular purpose because there are so many optional features in the spec. Data transfer speed, PD, Display Port, HDMI, Thunderbolt 3/4, and probably others that I'm not remembering.
I can understand not requiring a heavy gauge wire for a cable that is just transferring data and a bit of power, but it would be really nice if the standard required cables to label the cable ends with symbols representing that cable's capabilities.
Oh, and if you have a cable with USB C on both ends, you still can't charge an i-phone since apparently USB C isn't good enough for the phones yet. That's something I really don't understand is even after all these years Apple still hasn't fully standardized on the USB C connector across their devices.
I agree that the cases of power and displays were very badly handled, but how often does this happen in practice? Your laptop came with a power cord, and if you pick up the wrong one, most retailers are really good about returns. And who needs a collection of display cords?
For 90% of use cases any old cord will work. The edge cases sting for sure but overall the design of the plug is a huge win.
The big thing with power for me is phones and other similar devices. I have one phone that supports a quick charge capability, but I need not only their power brick but also their USB cable (something about a pull up resistor that signals the charger / phone combo to go into fast charging mode). Same thing with a tablet, it has its own fast charging standard.
I gave my Pixel C to my Mom, and the charger that came with it seemed to work well on her original Pixel phone. But after a week of using it, the phone went out and had to be replaced. And look up reviews of almost any USB C power delivery hub, they are filled with accounts of Mac's getting fried from using them.
this has been true of USB basically since its 1.0 release. I have micro and mini usb cables, some can charge phones and some cannot. Some can charge my ps3 controllers and some cannot. I bought a usb-a male to usb-a male at some point. Never got it working with anything.
Sounds like you have a problem with USB and are just noticing it now with usb-c.
Or they could have just put both on the laptop like Lenovo has been doing for years. Maybe that tech is too futuristic though, Apple's liable to leave it for the groundbreaking 2026 Macbook Pro that brings back pro ports like USB-A and good old RJ-45.
I think the past five years can be more easily explained with — ironically — a Steve Jobs quote:
> When we were an agrarian nation, all cars were trucks, because that's what you needed on the farm. But as vehicles started to be used in the urban centers, cars got more popular … PCs are going to be like trucks. They're still going to be around, they're still going to have a lot of value, but they're going to be used by one out of X people.
And that's what the Mac team lost sight of; they tried to make Pro Macs that were sports cars. Maybe the Macbook Air is an affordable sports car of sorts (do they still make Mazda Miatas?), but the Macbook Pro is and should be a truck.