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Posted by Brajeshwar 1 day ago

Don't let anyone take away your big box of cables(blog.jim-nielsen.com)
727 points | 433 commentspage 14
ErroneousBosh 21 hours ago|
"Why yes I do have E1 twisted pair to E1 coax baluns, and 50 ohm BNC to 75 ohm BNC with matching stubs, and VGA to SCART cables, right here in my big box of cables!" <gestures at shed with bulging walls>

I need to get this under control.

christkv 21 hours ago||
Yesterday I found I still have a dozen firewire cables of different types but no devices to use them with. I put them in the possible recycle box.
platevoltage 21 hours ago||
Oh never. I have 2 giant boxes of them. The absolute worst thing ever is when you need something like a USB or HDMI cable, and you're forced to spend like 40 bucks at Best Buy because you're in a pinch.
jauntywundrkind 1 day ago||
I still have quite a number of packing cubes with silicone-tie'ed and zip tie'ed cables.

I do want to mention though, a huge amount of cables can be replaced by usb-c cables + an adapter. You don't need a bus to HDMI cable: just get an adapter that has usb-c female, that your cable plugs into, that changes it to HDMI. Ditto for displayport, USB micro, USB b, USB a.

And for power VFLEX has a quite reasonably priced adapter to DC barrel jacks. I still have I dunno 70 power supplies, for laptops, gadgets and whatever. But at this point almost all my devices actually run on high efficiency gan usb-c power supplies. These once again follow the pattern: a usb-c female, then a pigtail (yay, better than fixed, like the HDMI), then the barrel jack.

mvanbaak 1 day ago||
> a huge amount of cables can be replaced by usb-c cables + an adapter.

And now you have a bunch of boxes with adapters ;P

bityard 1 day ago||
You're not wrong, but many times I've gone looking for a specific adapter (because I already had a similar cable) and found out that the adapters _usually_ cost as much or more than just buying the cable.
jauntywundrkind 18 hours ago||
Usually it's a bit cheaper, from what I see. Especially if you buy 3-5.

Cost or no, like it because it means much much much less space. Instead of packing for a trip and wondering what set of cables I need, I have cables, and I have adapters. A couple short cheap cables and two longer good ones work for almost any purpose.

wileydragonfly 17 hours ago||
Throwing all that shit in a box and spending half an hour digging through it is half the fun. Your organization systems distress me.
martinpw 16 hours ago|
This post inspired me to go through my box of cables and I actually found a full HTC Vive headset with controllers in there buried several layers deep that I had completely forgotten about. I think it ended up there because it came with about a dozen cables so the cable box seemed like the natural place to dump it all.

Now I need to go through that box in detail to see what else might be lurking.

groby_b 19 hours ago||
Flip side? I have, in almost half a century of tech dabbling, never once needed a cable from that box that I couldn't have bought again.

I still keep _some_. A basic supply of standard cables "just in case", and clearly labeled things for "who the fuck needed to invent another connector" cases. (Looking at you, printer manufactures and WD hard drive enclosures)

But I strongly suggest tossing most of it. You need the space more than you need more cables.

YavenTeam 1 hour ago||
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LandlordLedger 20 hours ago||
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mailonce 20 hours ago||
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0utcast 1 day ago|
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