when you build something foolproof...

Lennart Sorensen lsorense-1wCw9BSqJbv44Nm34jS7GywD8/FfD2ys at public.gmane.org
Mon Apr 21 22:01:16 UTC 2014


On Mon, Apr 21, 2014 at 05:45:44PM -0400, D. Hugh Redelmeier wrote:
> ... they invent a better fool.
> 
> (I'm behind the times, I know.)
> 
> I got a slap-bracelet / USB flash memory as swag a while back.
> 
> We just tried it for transporting pictures.  I plugged it into my 
> computer's USB port, and nothing happened.  It turns out that the usb plug 
> had no housing, only a tongue, and so could be plugged in backwards (and 
> not work).
> 
> One of the few things USB got half right was that you could not plug it in 
> backwards.  But we've now had innovation.
> 
> (I say "half right" because the obviously right approach would be to have 
> it work whichever way it is plugged in.  The *next* USB connector is 
> supposed to do that.)
> 
> (My Lenovo ThinkPads, like most notebooks, have barrel plugs, with 
> complete rotational symmetry.  My latest Lenovo (IdeaPad) has a 
> rectangular plug with 180-degree symmetry, like the new USB.  This doesn't 
> seem like progress.)

My Thinkpad W530 has the 180 degree symetry on the power connector.
It is NOT the same power connector as my wife's Thinkpad T430.  hers fits
in mine, but the BIOS screen will nicely tell you that you can NOT run
the W530 from that power supply and that you can only charge the battery
if the machine is off with that power supply, and mine simply does not
fit in hers.  Hers is 90W, mine is 170W, so they are not the same thing.
Same voltage of course.

-- 
Len Sorensen
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