Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2020/07/07/the-evercable-is-the-steel-rei.html
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That is one sexist ad, and they’re not even able to spell their own brand name correctly in the Youtube title.
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Anchor Labs? I don’t suppose they’re intending to trade on Anker’s good rep. Nah, that would never happen.
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It doesn’t last because people can’t take care of cables. I’ve got several several year old official Apple lightning cables that are still just fine.
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This is great news! Could you please share your tips for cable care?
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I’m pretty sure that brand exists on Amazon. Along with a few other variations on that spelling…
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When moving house last week I found one Apple cable that is still in perfect shape, and I can tell you my secret: Buy an Anker cable and leave the Apple cable in the cardboard box the phone came in. 
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I can’t say I’ve never had problems with Apple cables, I had one where the insulation broke, but that’s one out of… I’m going to say a dozen over nineteen years (just counting iPod, iPad, and iPhone). I have one third-party lightning cable I got because I needed a 3m cable, but that’s it.
As for how I’ve kept them this long? Well, I don’t fold them, keeping the minimum radius of curvature at about 2 cm (so a one and a half inch to two inch diameter), coilign them loosely, and using velcro rather than elastic ties. Also, I keep them out of the heat and UV, which helps to keep them in good condition.
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What nobodez above me says basically. Coil them properly and don’t leave them in the sun.
I’ve got the same story, except with Monoprice Micro-USB, and Monoprice and Volutz USB-C cables. My teenage son and I have no problem keeping cables in good shape. My wife, on the other hand, would probably shred this cable in a couple of months, if she didn’t lose it first.
No need to buy titanium-reinforced carbon-fiber sheathed cables. Just don’t buy complete cheap shit, and take care of it. Same goes for any cable, network, AC, jumper, and what have you.
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Step one: don’t hold it wrong.
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About the only time I’ve had a problem with a lightning cable was when I was trying to do an update on my phone using itunes and what turned out to be a defective OEM cable that kept dropping the data connection halfway through the update, which soft-bricked the phone. I swapped it for a different cable and the problem went away. Said defective cable got cut in half and tossed.
I’ve been using ANKER cables for charge and sync for a while, and they’ve worked. I keep mine loosely coiled and velcro wrapped when they are not in use.
“…charging cord that won’t break within two weeks.”
It’ll take three weeks.
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Seems to me they’re fixing the wrong part. It’s rarely the cord that breaks, it’s the stupid micro-USB connector.
They almost had my money before they got exploitative.
Many micro USB connectors are just plain shit. If they aren’t reinforced properly they will snap right off the board when given any sort of vertical or axial stress.
That being said, the most common problem I’ve run into with Apple cables is shitty strain relief which is why so many cables break at the exact same spot. The stress of connecting/disconnecting (and the twisting motions that come with it) isn’t distributed well. What you end up with is the mesh ground layer starts to lose its shape and fray apart, and when this happens the sharp metal bits can short internal wires and/or cause the outer insulation to bulge and eventually break.
Sadly this is not a new thing. This goes back decades with Apple cables. Apple has brilliant hardware engineers and the failure cause is so obvious the only reason I can think of that this persists for so long is Steve Jobs saying he doesn’t like strain relief and demanding it be minimized/removed. (I don’t know if this is actually the case but knowing how hands on Jobs was with every minute bit of design this seems very plausible to me.)
In any event, you don’t need super high endurance titanium reinforced cables or anything – just get a decent third party cable and it’ll likely last you forever. Lots of people here mention Anker and I can concur with this. Anker cables are a great balance of value and durability and they have all the requisite certifications to work with Apple products.
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Mustn’t corrupt the Bauhaus purity with those gooey biomorphisms ya know. Having worked on stuff with some of those brilliant engineers this seems plausible to me too. I’ve seen ezamples of how everything they make (below the surface, current ratings etc.) is built well beyond the minimum requirements, but daft omissions like absent strain reliefs are the sorts of things that happen when marketing has the final say.
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So true. Maybe people who are too clumsy to handle wires shouldn’t be allowed to. Of course if they really are that bad then maybe they deserve to be parted with $16. I know that I’ve got charging cables, both OEM and aftermarket, that are used frequently and are at least ten years old. Or maybe it is time to demand that wireless charging be standard on all devices?
I just joined the wireless charging crowd last month when my new job gave me an iPhone SE as the work phone (put my personal number on there too since it does dual sim).
It is fantastic, but I like the wire being there as a fast and reliable option too.
I brought this up in a previous BlingBlingShop ad, but my preferred method is to wrap all of my charging cables in plastic lanyard. Cheap, easy, fun to customize, and the stitching at each end provides additional strain relief to prevent the most common failure.
