- Joined
- Sep 13, 2019
- Messages
- 119
- Reaction score
- 34
Oh 'nought', not another 'one'!
I was reading some the stuff describing the virtues of high end USB cables and it amazes me, engineers can make signal transmission half way around, through conversions to from digital electrical to optical, (e.g. under sea fibre right down to FTTH) to radio/micro wave (e.g. satellite, DAB) and back, but when it gets to a simple USB cable 1m long somehow we can't get it right unless you pay a fortune? There are MD5 (and other) forms of check sums to ensure the data stream is EXACTLY right. But somehow we can't make a USB cable the reliably transmits data. These same binary transmissions are used for banking and a multitude of other things and we confidently use internet banking believing every cent in our account will be right, but somehow a USB cable can get it wrong when all the thing has to do is get a 1 or 0, yes or no (there is no maybe in digital) 1m
And all those transmissions around the world were made without gold plated connectors and through the most cost effective cables that are suitable meet the requirements.
I'm talking the digital domain specifically - analogue signals is another story
What have I missed apart from the snake oil?
I was reading some the stuff describing the virtues of high end USB cables and it amazes me, engineers can make signal transmission half way around, through conversions to from digital electrical to optical, (e.g. under sea fibre right down to FTTH) to radio/micro wave (e.g. satellite, DAB) and back, but when it gets to a simple USB cable 1m long somehow we can't get it right unless you pay a fortune? There are MD5 (and other) forms of check sums to ensure the data stream is EXACTLY right. But somehow we can't make a USB cable the reliably transmits data. These same binary transmissions are used for banking and a multitude of other things and we confidently use internet banking believing every cent in our account will be right, but somehow a USB cable can get it wrong when all the thing has to do is get a 1 or 0, yes or no (there is no maybe in digital) 1m
And all those transmissions around the world were made without gold plated connectors and through the most cost effective cables that are suitable meet the requirements.
I'm talking the digital domain specifically - analogue signals is another story
What have I missed apart from the snake oil?
