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Comment by kalleboo | Hacker News Reader

I'm mostly fine with how USB has turned out - USB-A ports on computers and chargers, microUSB on devices, and slowly everything is being replaced with USB-C. (and we can all forget about those wide microUSB superspeed plugs)

What really chafes me is MiniUSB. It was superseded by microUSB 12 years ago, but it STILL turns up in brand-new devices. I recently bought an action cam, a dashcam, and a retro input device converter that all had MiniUSB. I only had a single MiniUSB cable for my PS3 controller so I had to go out and buy a bunch of obsolete cables.

Reading threads where the independent maker of the retro converter was defending his choice, "I find MiniUSB is more sturdy". So now everyone buying his thing needs to stock another kind of cable for a device where the socket isn't even going to see much wear and tear. (and MiniUSB being more sturdy is debatable - the socket is designed for much fewer insert/remove cycles).

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Mini is more sturdy. I've destroyed a lot of micro devices over the years, never a single mini. Most of my workbench devices (serial converters, logic analyzers, etc) are mini, so they see a lot of use and abuse, but they just keep going. Micro is incredibly fragile in comparison.

Also, a lot of devices like the Gopro and Tomtom came out when Mini was current, and kept compatibility for years to respect their customers who had invested in accessories and stuff, and didn't want all that to become useless if they upgraded to the new unit. I appreciate that.

The problem is that Mini USB tends to fail on the device side, while Micro USB is designed to fail on the cable side.

That may indeed be the design intent, but it's completely at odds with my experience across hundreds of devices and cables over the years.

Micro has rendered numerous devices irreparable, or not-economical-to-repair, because the device-side connector fails. Thermal cameras, audio adapters, countless cellphones. Thankfully my daily-driver phones tend to be Samsungs which keep their USB connector on an easy-to-replace sub-board, but I can't say so much for FLIR's finest. I've thrown out my share of flaky micro cables, too, but those are cheap to replace. It's the device-side failures that have rained on my parade for years.

Mini, on the other hand, has been bulletproof. Countless Beaglebone Black boards, FTDI adapters, logic analyzers strewn about my bench, my TomTom, my GoPro, even my old Blackberry was mini. And not a single one of them ever died because of a USB connector problem. (The magic smoke has escaped from more than a few, but that's another story entirely!) I've thrown out plenty of mini cables, sure, but the device-side connectors simply don't fail like their supposed design would suggest.

Regardless of their intent, I consider inclusion of a micro port to simply be a design flaw at this point. Mini or C is the way to go.

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