[thadk]

The area around the hinge on the 2011-2015 Era Macbook was plastic. It seems like they wanted to do away with that, a major mechanical break point, which meant removing travel distance from the keys so the screen could close more directly. (My 2011 MBP screen hinge was a bit wobbly a few years in.) You could look at the USB-C dongles in a similar way: older USB ports could fail eventually on that era MBP. The newer USB-C ports are probably "rated" for more insertions/removals.

[blackguardx]

You are correct. USB A ports are usually only rated to 1500 insertion cycles because that is what the standard specifies. Micro USB and USB C ports are specced at 10,000 insertion cycles.

[marksi]

I am stunned to hear micro USB is rated for that many insertions. The implementation must not live up to the standard. In my experience, anecdotal, I know, microUSB is the most unreliable of all the USB form factors I've experienced. Bad connectors on cables, and ports that regularly fail internally (not levered off the board.) I have considered replacing ports with miniusb, or a tethered B port because micro has been such an utter failure on so many of my devices.

[21]

MicroUSB is supposedly designed in such a way that the stress is placed on the cable connector which is easier to replace, not the device connector which is attached to an expensive device.

But yeah, I can't imagine Micro-USB being more reliable than regular USB-A.

[smsm42]

Yep, had several devices fail because of micro-usb going bad. And the worst part is that since it's how you charge it, there's no option not to use it daily (yeah there's wireless charging standards, but adoption is abysmal so far).

[xvf22]

Each of the USB-C ports needs a controller and if any of the four have an issue the computer will not charge.

[adrianN]

One of the USB-C ports on my work laptop recently failed but the machine still charged from the other one.

[xvf22]

Was going by this [1] which seems to show that if one of the charging ICs goes bad it can cause the rest not to work. This is probably one of many failure mechanisms.

[1] https://youtube.com/watch?v=MY8LlHfK9ZA

[saagarjha]

I believe MacBook Pro has two Thunderbolt controllers, one for each side.

[Jdam]

The USB controller is unrelated to USB power supply.

[dzhiurgis]

The way that usb-c wobbles and how easily it unplugs proves its not designed for proffesional use.

[matthewmacleod]

No, that proves literally nothing.

It’s hardly an industrial connector, but AFAIK it’s rated for 10k inserts which is more than enough.

[dzhiurgis]

Try unplugging XLR

[coldtea]

Then again, we don't use USB-C to connect on stage microphones to their cables in live shows...

Of any problem with USB-C it unplugging has never been an issue...

[mft_]

Not unplugging, but on my 2017 MBP it sometimes take a jiggle or even unplug/reinsert to get things to connect properly: monitor, dongle, etc.

[21]

Yeah, that's exactly what I need, XLR plugs on my phone :)