this post was submitted on 09 Oct 2023
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How many other plugs are reversible? HDMI and DisplayPort aren't. Older stuff like scsi, gameports, parallel and serial ports and the like weren't, and could even destroy your hardware if plugged into the wrong thing. Firewire and GameboyLink weren't. Barrel plugs are insertable every way you want, but only have two contacts. And 3.5mm jacks slide over all the pins, which might not be great if you plan on carrying power.
Lightning and USB Type-C are reversible, but that's the only one I can think of. And the inoffiziell rarely seen reversible USB Type-A (when were those first released?).
Biggest problem with USB Type-A is that it isn't keyed in an obvious way, so both directions of insertions look and feel plausible until the thing doesn't wanna fit.
PS: Another thing "wrong" with USB is that Type-B isn't a female Type-A, but a completely different thing, meaning a USB cable can't be used as extension cord and you need a different cord for that. As I understand it, this was done deliberately to avoid issues with cable length and voltagedrop and signal degradation (which you run into anyway when using USB extension cords). There is also the hermaphroditic connector, which keeps the sides the same, while still allows extension cord use. Don't know if anybody ever implemented that.
I think the big thing with Firewire and DisplayPort, though, is that the port isn't a rectangle. It's flush on one size and angled on the other so that you know which way it plugs in no matter what. It being non-reversible wasn't an issue because of that. USB, on the other hand, has the same shape whether it's right-side-up or upside-down.
Yeah, I don't think the complaints stem from the connector not being reversible but what you described in the last paragraph.
Yep. It's not that it isn't reversible, it's that it's non-reversible contacts inside a symmetrical connector.
Which boils down to: people want to be able to plug something in without thorough inspection.
An easy, cheap solution they could have popularized from the start would be to print something like an arrow on both the port and plug to line up visually.
Apparently manufacturers are only supposed to put the logo on the top. But since a lot of companies didn't print the logo, or only embossed the logo so you could barely see it, or put the ports on the parent device sideways, this was never much help.
Combine that with the fact that they never actually told anyone this, and it was basically useless.
Didn't have to be reversible. Just obvious. Both HDMI and DisplayPort go in only one way. It takes fiddling but there's no doubt. With USB it's always you fiddle, doesn't fit, then maybe it's the other way around, doesn't fit, oooh it was the original, doesn't fit... ffs. And they even made the plastic black.
IBM token link connectors were hermaphroditic
I must be dumb cause I still need 3 tries to plug in a HDMI/DP port.
USB B takes 6 tries: first three times in a RJ45 port, then 3 more after realizing I've been messing with the wrong port all this time.
I used to work in a call centre and a lot of headsets use that connected design.
Neat, never heard of that, guess it's not seeing much use outside the professional setting. It's called Plantronics QD.
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Plantronics QD
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So, thanks for the PTSD I don't think I've seen those ports in over a decade. Pluging in your headset into those ports was like submitting to torture.
But yeah that's them.
It's really interesting that they never became standardised outside of the call centre industry because really they would have been great in consumer electronics and I'm not sure why they never became popular.