Comment on The way two of the usb's are one way while the other is another way
wreckedcarzz@lemmy.world 1 week agoI mean, so are multi-core cpus and anything above ddr2 ram, 7,200 rpm hard drives; you don’t need much for basic computing. Or 3G cellular data speeds, or DSL internet at home. Or over-the-air 480p broadcasting and movies on VHS. But we aren’t limiting ourselves to those ancient standards - why are we accepting any less here? If it was new, sure, cost-cutting blah blah… but it’s not 2010 anymore. USB3 is 17 years old, that’s an absolute eternity in the tech sphere.
skulblaka@sh.itjust.works 1 week ago
I feel like that’s a little disingenuous because all those things actually serve a purpose. You need that computing power to keep up with modern software. But in 99% of cases, plugging KB+M into a USB2 vs USB3 makes no difference whatsoever. Excluding edge cases where say, your keyboard has its own USB port that you’re then trying to put a splitter on, or charge your phone on, it otherwise just legitimately doesn’t need the extra power of USB3. The basic input processes of the keyboard and mouse haven’t changed in 40 years and that’s why such a comparatively ancient piece of tech is still usable. Even just USB2 already has enough power and bandwidth on a keyboard to run your RGB backlights while still taking input with no additional latency.
I think if the manufacturer cared more about their customers and their brand image, then yeah, they’d just go ahead and make all the ports USB3 regardless. But if you’re cranking out 10,000 shitty PCs a week that you want to sell for under $500, and you can save 3 cents a unit by making two USB ports USB2, that’s still a technically viable product that can be sold and used without issue (at least, without issue pertaining to these USB ports, anyway). It makes the manufacturer a bit skeezy, but it’s not like they’re selling you something you can’t use, the things work just fine. You just don’t want to be doing mass file transfer or power transfer through them because they’re bad at both, that’s what your 3.0 port is for, which you have been provided.
This is a Minimum Viable Product sort of thing, this isn’t going to win any awards or any glowing customer praise, but for the market it was intended for (likely business) it’s a cheap ass PC tower that works well enough.