I could not find many Lemmy posts about USB or video cable recommendations, please let me know if there are!
I will be moving soon, and I want get some good, quality cables that are certified by their respective thing (e.g. USB-IF for USB cables, VESA for DP cables I think) and compliant with relevant standards, since the drawer of unlabelled mystery cables is not a solution that I want to continue with. I would rather that the cables be compliant with relevant standards and preferably have clear labeling/indication of spec (but most unfortunately don’t have that).
What are the best:
- USB-C 240W charging cables?
- USB-C 40Gbps data transfer cables? (USB4 or TB3/4)
- DisplayPort cables?
- HDMI cables?
On Reddit, I see hundreds of posts gushing over Anker as the holy grail of USB cables, but then there are conflicting reports of people unhappy with Anker (bad customer service, they broke the cable, sub-brand Eufy leaking security cam footage, etc.) and preferring other brands instead. For DisplayPort cables, lots of people seem to like Club3D and Cable Matters, the latter is also recommended for HDMI cables. Many random Amazon brands are also thrown around, but those look like they’re from bots.
It’s hard to tell whether any one if made by a person or a not. Anker bots are definitely out there, I found a thread talking about how good quality the, as far as I can tell, nonexistent Anker magsafe 3 (as in the one used in macbooks, not the wireless charging puck!) to USB-C cables are. I’m also sure that other companies use bots, like Ugreen, but Anker’s are the most obvious.
For the cables that I have bought myself, Anker’s “Powerline Flow” series of cables are really nice, they don’t tangle and are made of super soft silicone. Pretty expensive for a cable that only does charging though. I have also previously bought a 2m Baseus charging cable (which does have a 240W label, which is nice!), it seem durable enough, just a little stiff, and it works fine for my laptop at 65W.
Apple users won’t know the difference - I know a lot of the time data and power transfer numbers don’t matter to the average user, but I feel it’s goddamn criminal to use USB C but artificially restrict (for their non Pro phones ofc) to 2.0 speeds, while charging the same for their products as other, far better equipped phones. I have similar beef with Samsung (not their data transfer, that’s good) and their incessant restrictions on any cable that’s not Samsung, offering like 60W of charging speed max. Meanwhile many other Androids are living it up with USB3.2, max 10Gbps, and >100W since 2024
I recently bought a keychain for about $6 that’s basically a 6 inch USB4 cable with 240W PD and 80gbps transfer speed. I can’t imagine making low-speed cables makes any sense nowadays.