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Comment by fuzzywalrus | Hacker News Reader

I'd like to see an interim conversion adopted for charging from USB3.1 to things like Magsafe on the MacBooks. In the dark days of laptops, stepping on the power cable could end your laptop, USB 3.1 looks like it'd be a return to that if used as a primary charging source.

Other than that, USB3.1 looks fantastic. Thunderbolt 1.0 speeds, big power, and much better connector.

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> to things like Magsafe on the MacBooks

Unfortunately, the owner of patents on magsafe is unlikely to allow that to happen.

The patent could probably be challenged. Magnetic power connectors existed prior to MagSafe (e.g. you don't want hot oil from your deep fryer to spill on you if you trip over the cord), so the patents seem more like those "X but on a computer"-type patents.

I fully agree with you that the MagSafe utility patent is a paper tiger, but unfortunately in this case Apple still hold a design patent on the general MagSafe connector shape[0]. So anyone is free to make their own magnetic power connectors, it just can't have five pins in a line that matches the exact sizes that Apple has chosen.

[0] http://www.patentlyapple.com/patently-apple/2012/12/apple-wi...

Oh I agree, the patents are ridiculous, but I think if any of the big manufacturers were willing to make a go of it, they'd have done it by now.

That said, I think the specific innovation they rest their patent on is that it can be inverted. Under current patent doctrine that might be enough, and I suspect people wouldn't be very happy with a non-invertable magsafe-like.

Make it a triangle that can be plugged in in any _three_ directions.

Oh yeah.... Make it a circle!

Also the makers of magsafe are possibly ditching it for usb 3.1 if the latest macbook air rumors are true.

http://9to5mac.com/2015/01/06/macbook-air-12-inch-redesign/

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