How often has your micro usb cable fail?

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CHANG3D

Supreme [H]ardness
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Ever since they made the move from mini usb and other proprietary data charging cable to micro usb, I find myself replace my cables like twice a year (one for the car, the other for the nightstand). I just happen to have both cables fail on me around the same time; I tried different devices.)

Are lightning cables for iDevices more resilient? (As I understand it, lightning cables shouldn't ever fail as the controller is in the iDevices or chargers. Correct me if I'm wrong)

Which microUSB cable would you like to recommend? The angled cable I have at the office seems to be the longer lasting of the bunch. But I can't seem to find it on amazon.
 
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I just had an official lightning cable fail after 13 months. It wasn't the connector part that failed that worked fine. it was the part where the cable meets the connecter it got worn from the angle that I had it at. Just went into the apple store with the cable they took it and grabbed me a new one off the shelf. In and out in 30 seconds.
 
I've never had a microUSB cable or charger fail on me. In fact, I'm still using the car charger and wall charger that came with my Droid 3 on my Nexus 5 today.
 
I replace them frequently, but I don't treat them with respect or buy "expensive" ones...so I expect cable failure. I also do not use "approved" chargers, so that may be part of it as well.
 
Still using my usb xenos chargers.

Since mini usb (not micro, I have a ton of failed cables) I have yet to have one go bad, and that's with a two year old who chews on everything.
 
I don't think any of mine ever failed. The good thing is you probably have a lot of spares laying around since they are used for a lot of other stuff. I've been using the cable from my TI84(I think it's from that) to charge my PS3 controllers :p
 
Micro USB cables have been a total crap shoot for me.

I have the cables that came with my wife and I's OG Droids (4+ years old now) that still work perfectly to this day and are used daily.

Then I have cables that I've bought off of Amazon and Monoprice that last anywhere from a few days to a few months.

The Lightning cable for iDevices definitely seems like a simpler and more reliable connector, but not significantly enough over micro USB to make me wish it was the new standard.
 
Haven't had a Samsung cable fail yet in three years. On the other hand, the HTC provided cable died early and it's a little thicker.
 
T4rd said:
Micro USB cables have been a total crap shoot for me.

I have the cables that came with my wife and I's OG Droids (4+ years old now) that still work perfectly to this day and are used daily.

Then I have cables that I've bought off of Amazon and Monoprice that last anywhere from a few days to a few months.

The Lightning cable for iDevices definitely seems like a simpler and more reliable connector, but not significantly enough over micro USB to make me wish it was the new standard.
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Ahhh monoprice, I have a sack of failed hdmi cables from them that have failed over the years. Will still buy from them though, love getting them for only a few dollars.
 
I ordered a few from monoprice, a nice thick gold plated one that is very reliable, and the cheaper shorter ones, well some never worked out of the box lol. The ones that came with my droids still work as well years later.
 
I've never had a micro USB cable fail, and this is after tripping over them when the device is plugged into them, having small children suck on the ends, etc.

I still have some that are at least 5 years old.

The lighting cable ends are total crap though when it comes to children putting them in their mouth. The contacts corrode very easily and then they will no longer work.
 
cyclone3d said:
The lighting cable ends are total crap though when it comes to children putting them in their mouth. The contacts corrode very easily and then they will no longer work.
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What makes microUSB's more corrosion resilient?
 
On my Note 3, I have more issues with the USB 3.0 cable than the mini USB cables (which, incidentally, I have never had fail). The USB 3.0 cable often has a hard time keeping the connection snug for whatever reason, case or no case.
 
Lumia 920 came with a wireless charging plate (Qi wireless charging standard)

I think I've only ever physically plugged it in once or twice, and that was to load it up with media. Almost no reason to use the MicroUSB port at all... I highly doubt it'll ever break during the service life of the phone, unless severely mishandled.
 
cyclone3d said:
The lighting cable ends are total crap though when it comes to children putting them in their mouth. The contacts corrode very easily and then they will no longer work.
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That's more of a parenting issue though.
 
xIronCrossx said:
That's more of a parenting issue though.
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Haha I thought that as well, I really hate when parents blame their own bad parenting on others. No wonder the U.S. is so fucked up right now, no one takes responsibility.

Sorry for getting off topic
 
I bought a phone used that came with a really janky looking MicroUSB cable that was fraying around the edges. I no longer have that phone, but the cable is still working, despite its appearance.
 
I've never had a microusb cable fail. Then again, maybe I'm just not as rough with it as some others may or may not be.
 
Hmm never had a micro usb cable fail. The only cables that ever fail on me are earphone cables, and my Macbook pro charger.
 
of course there are other factors that can lead to failure but the plug is pretty durable according to wikipedia

The Micro plug design is rated for at least 10,000 connect-disconnect cycles—significantly more than the Mini plug design.[49] It is also designed to reduce the mechanical wear on the device; instead the easier-to-replace cable is designed to bear the mechanical wear of connection and disconnection.
 
I've only had one fail and it was because the cable was slightly too short so it was always getting pulled really tight. Ended up replacing it with a longer cable and all is well now :)
 
I've had a few fail. Usually from the the plastic part of the connector splitting. So, now I try to buy ones that the connector is more like rubber. On the other hand, I have had micro USB jacks fail, like on my old Droid4. It would only work with a couple cables, yet all the other cables worked with every other device I've got.
 
Micro-USB is garbage IMO. I've had numerous cables fail myself (actually just threw 2 out recently as they stopped working) as well as friends/family. I'm not sure why it become a standard thing since, as others have said, I've NEVER had a mini-USB fail ever.


As for lightning, I've had better luck with it but they're also sort of crappy (similar to the old 30 pin). I'm still on my original iPhone 5 lightning cable but it's showing its age. I reinforced the part where the cable meets the connector with tape so it should be good for a little while more. I did have a 3rd party belkin lightning cable for my car, that was perfect looking, fail just a few weeks ago though (short in the wire).

I think the Lightning cables, like micro USB, should only be used when you're not using said device. IMO that's what causes them to wear out prematurely
 
I like the Apple 30 pin, but I use an Amazon Basics cable, which has a much better strain relief setup.
 
Pylon said:
Now I use these and they seem to be holding up.
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I ordered a bunch of those monoprice premium cables about 15 months back because I always go through USB cables, use my phone as my gps and so plug/unplug it a lot, plus the landscape orientation means the cable comes out and hangs at a 90 degree angle.

I haven't had to open up any of my spares yet! Pretty awesome for me.

Most other cables last 3-6 months max. Had an HP touchpad charger cable that survived over a year, but then one day I raged and threw my phone across the car while it was plugged in and broke the touchpad cable. That cable was still in good shape (and quite heavy), not sure how long it might've lasted under normal conditions.
 
I've used Samsung's and HTC's and Sony's and now find that Nook's cable seems fine.

(Nook -> eReader)

HTC's cable is fragile, Sony's not better than that and Samsung's just feel extremely thin...
 
I have a micro usb cable (forgot which brand) that charges the phone really slowly, about 1/10th the speed of a regular cable. Have no idea how that can happen, since it works just fine for data connections etc.

My next phone I want to use wireless charging only, but I think that will have an adverse impact on battery longevity, right?
 
yeah ive personally never had a usb cord fail on me, broken cables are another story.
 
Ever since my HTC Aria brought along my first micro-USB cable, many years ago, I've never had one fail. I don't baby my stuff, but I don't treat it like shit, either.
 
I've never had a cable fail on me, but the ports in the phones themselves have on every phone I've owned since they've started coming with mini or micro-USB ports. In fact, my SGN2 is starting to disconnect briefly if I move it while plugged in. Last week, I also had to replace the port in my neighbor's SGS2, and it's already been replaced once before.


As for the part about controllers being in the iDevices/chargers, micro USB charged devices are the same. The cable is just a bundle of wires connected to a power source, and the devices themselves actually handle the charging functions. You can even use the Apple's chargers to charge non-Apple devices, and vice versa. It happens quite regularly at our house since someone's always losing their charger and they'll grab the first thing they can find with a USB port on it. Hell I've even charged a PS3 controller from an iPad charger.
 
ryan_975 said:
I've never had a cable fail on me, but the ports in the phones themselves have on every phone I've owned since they've started coming with mini or micro-USB ports. In fact, my SGN2 is starting to disconnect briefly if I move it while plugged in. Last week, I also had to replace the port in my neighbor's SGS2, and it's already been replaced once before.


As for the part about controllers being in the iDevices/chargers, micro USB charged devices are the same. The cable is just a bundle of wires connected to a power source, and the devices themselves actually handle the charging functions. You can even use the Apple's chargers to charge non-Apple devices, and vice versa. It happens quite regularly at our house since someone's always losing their charger and they'll grab the first thing they can find with a USB port on it. Hell I've even charged a PS3 controller from an iPad charger.
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That's crazy since I've never had a MicroUSB port fail on anything I've had, just the cables.

It's odd that you can charge your PS3 controller from a wall adapter though; I can't get the damn things to charge from anything besides the PS3 (while it's on, which is useless), my TV, or my laptop. I have several other wall adapters I've tried to charge them with and they just don't recognize being plugged into any of them. It's like it has to have a data connection with the charger in order to charge, so it will only charge at USB/550 mA speeds.
 
T4rd said:
That's crazy since I've never had a MicroUSB port fail on anything I've had, just the cables.

It's odd that you can charge your PS3 controller from a wall adapter though; I can't get the damn things to charge from anything besides the PS3 (while it's on, which is useless), my TV, or my laptop. I have several other wall adapters I've tried to charge them with and they just don't recognize being plugged into any of them. It's like it has to have a data connection with the charger in order to charge, so it will only charge at USB/550 mA speeds.
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I don't exactly remember how I did it or for sure which charger I used), but I do remember doing it because we couldn't find a mini-USB cord, and the only thing I had was a phone charger with a fixed cord that happened to have a mini-USB connector (which isn't the description of an iPad charger, not sure why I said that was what I used). It's been several years and that was the only time I can remember doing it. Anymore, the PS3 gets played so little that if the controller is dead and we can't find the cable, someone else will get attention until we come across one again.
 
I have some that last forever, we still use the cable that came with our OG droid. I also have some that fail. Only one has failed completely, just stopped working. One got a split cable insulator, but still worked, I tossed it anyways. Then there are the ones that get the prongs worn out and wont stay in a device unless it is taped in there or the device is sitting propped up - upside down, this is the most common failure for me.
 
Never had a cable fail, but the micro USB port on my Gnote 1 did give out at one point during it's relevant lifetime.

My only real experience with micro USB cables are the ones that come with Samsung, Sony, and Motorola phones/tablets, and Logitech cordless mice/keyboards. Only after market chargers I have ever purchased were car chargers. The cables are outlasting the phones.
 
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