this is awesome, I've also been looking for these kinds of cables more than the "braided" cables which are stiff and tend to eventually take some kind of shape and not straighten back
Pretty sure for anyone outside North America the shipping absolutely kills the value proposition nowadays.
Last time I checked to replace my deskmat both it and the cables were about as much for shipping as for the items themselves. And taxes on top of that.
That, for example, turns a 20 cad cable, already on the pricey side into a 40+ cad one.
I do not know if there are any officials redistributors in other continents, but I don't think there are.
You are right, they are only really useful for charging (though 240w - beasts) or keyboards. I’ve given up on trying to find silicone cables for data transfer and just buy thunderbolt which are typically rubber (Apple ones are braided these days, but it’s a very tight braid).
Just beware that an awful lot of "silicone" cabling coming from China is actually overplasticized PVC, particular cabling used in instrument probes. It feels like silicone until it starts getting stiff while at the same time outgassing plasticizer like crazy, or you touch it with a soldering iron or similar. I would expect most or even all of the cat-ran-across-the-keyboard Amazon brands to be overplasticized PVC, not silicone (hint: Use the Knockoff plugin for Chromefox, https://github.com/Shpigford/knockoff, which will warn you for stuff that's sold on Temu West, aka.Amazon, it's warning on almost all of the pseudo-brands listed in the article).
I've also run into way too much cabling that's CCA or even CCS. Garbage on the outside, garbage on the inside.
Despite the point in my comment about power cable extensions coverings becoming hard through the lack of plasticizers, I confirm your point about overplasticized PVC in instrument cables.
I have a lot of instrument leads that I thought were silicone only to find that after a year or so they've gone hard. So much so that new unpacked ones can no longer be easily straightened (the kinks remain unless one heats the cable up and then straightens them).
Despite availability issues,the problem is trying to determine what's real silicone and what's not.
"I picked the rubber ones; they somehow seemed both tougher and more flexible. No regrets. I've bought more examples over the years…"
Right, depends on the quality of the rubber I suppose. I've been suspicious of rubber because when it's old it often turns into a gooey mess or goes hard and cracks (as with VR [vulcanized rubber] used in house wiring in the days before PVC — and often a cause of fires.
At the moment that's a bit close to home. I'm in Australia where power is 240V and only two days ago I needed to test an old Advantest spectrum analyzer and I wasn't sure if it had been strapped for 240 or 110V but didn't have a 240/110V transformer to hand so I dug out an ancient variac/auto-transformer to do the job and its power lead was vulcanized rubber which had turned into a sticky mush (replacing the lead didn't help as the windings had a short to the laminations).
Similarly, the rubber insulation on my super flexible AVO multimeter leads with many, many strands of superfine Cu wire has disintegrated. It's similarly perished (but they're well over 30 years old).
My first experience of silicone comes from its use as the outer jacket/insulation in microphone cables used in an industrial environment (TV studio). It was wonderful, cables were super easy to roll up and keep orderly, and despite its so-called reputation for not being rugged enough heavy camera dollies would regularly run over it without damage. These cables would last for years (the only occasional issue with them was when an XLR connector would get ripped off when caught on something and someone pulled super hard to free it).
I've no issue with using VR for leads except I've not been able to get it (for example, I can no longer get a replacement for my AVO leads).
I consider any form of AI generated stuff a waste of my time. I do not wish to interact with LLM generated content more than absolutely necessary and I loathe being surprised with uncanny valley "tells".
And the plasticizers (DEHP primarily) are really nasty, easily slough off onto your skin where they are absorbed. Don't ever put plastic cable in your mouth, or that of a child
This article recommending scrabble letter brands seems sketchy.
Anker offers lovely soft silicone sheathed USB-C cables, in black or white and many lengths. They perform for data and do not get stiff or discolor. Our office specifies these unless TB4+ is required.
You purchase the ones labeled Anker?... They say Anker on the box and the cable... I don't think the supply chain is an issue as long as you get the intended product
If you purchase from the official seller on Amazon, you're highly unlikely to get a counterfeit unless someone committed return fraud. I think other platforms that destroy returns aren't susceptible though.
> This article recommending scrabble letter brands seems sketchy.
Amazon orders are banned from our lab supply list because you never actually get the same thing twice, and they vanish on first bad review.
Related, I've been buying the exact color, style, and brand of sock, from Amazon, for the past ~10 years. I have a sock drawer full of completely different socks.
If you don't know how to use a marketplace like Amazon, then by all means stay away.
I've had people in real life start to recommend some product, "oh you just buy it on Amazon" and that is a thought-terminating cliché, because that's like telling me to "go buy it in the shopping mall".
So many reputable vendors have established presence in the marketplace on Amazon now. But you must carefully inspect every item in your cart, because you will find lots of brand-items advertised from fly-by-night sellers with poor reputations. But once you see your reputable vendor name, and/or "Sold through Amazon, fulfilled by Amazon" then I've never needed to worry about the end result.
No, this doesn't work either, by the way Amazon operates. There's no "Anker" store. There's boxes near your house that "Anker" labelled stuff gets thrown into and sold as Anker products. I've had several counterfeits from official stores, and avoid Amazon for easily counterfeit goods, like cables. I even had a counterfeit controller from the official Sony store that I took it apart, posted all the silly nonsense contained inside, and was banned from ever posting reviews on Amazon again.
Anker has steps to prove the product is genuine, and only guarantee non-counterfeit from offline stores: https://www.anker.com/eu-en/verify
Almost seems like it’d be easier to spend a couple weeks in Shenzhen getting cables made to your specifications rather than testing everything on the market.
I cannot understand why silicone rubber is not more commonly available for cable insulation. It is so much better than much of the badly plasticized PVC and other plastics that are now used.
What's made this situation worse is that it seems that worry over plasticizers and health etc. has lead to a reduction in the amount being used in cables. I have some power extenstion cables whose jackets have gone so hard that I can no longer coil them effectively — even though I take care the coiled cable still ends up a tangled mess.
Even if silicone jacketing is more expensive it's so good I'd pay extra. Trouble is it's not normally available on products found at the local hardware shop.
Unless you're running cables inside an oven just buy SOOW aka EPDM cables. They are the recognized standard for flexible, rugged cable assemblies resistant to just about everything. Silicone rubber is only used in very special cases because it's not as UV resistant or mechanically resilient.
> I cannot understand why silicone rubber is not more commonly available for cable insulation
Silicone is more flexible and high-temperature resistant, but it does have a major downside of being very easy to cut and strip. That's not great either, especially for power applications where short circuits are a concern.
I bought silicon 2-line cable to replace plastic insulated cable that came with my trafo-soldering-iron originally about 30 years ago. And how easy it is to cut, is what surprised me. It's still a good tradeof for this use case because dents in the plastic from accidentally touching the original cable with hot soldering loop were getting a little scary.
> I cannot understand why silicone rubber is not more commonly available for cable insulation. It is so much better than much of the badly plasticized PVC and other plastics that are now used.
PVC, XLPE, and rubber insulation is more durable than silicone. THHN uses PVC, XHHW uses XLPE, SOOW cord uses EPDM rubber.
Doesn't suit OPs demands as power only, but moved most my USB-C power cables to Anker Nano recently. They sound like described, lovely. Super flexible, don't tangle, nice weight to them - very well built. Nicest cables I've ever owned and an upgrade from prior Anker ones.
Didn't see your comment before I posted pretty much the same thing. I wish I could replace all my cables with the Anker Nano ones but they aren't cheap and most places I don't need a "great feeling" cable so I've settled for just a few strategic places around the house for now to put them.
I've had Anker braided cables before but the Nano is in a whole other league. I have one by my bed and every time I touch it I smile a little, it sparks joy (no pun intended).
My CPU load goes through the roof after a minute on that page. Chrome 154.0.8037.0 on Linux. WTF does a cable review need to do that works my CPU so hard?
I bought some of the official Pinecil silicone cables but haven't tried burning them yet. Has anyone tried that? I think they're USB2 but rated (well, advertised) for 100W so they're great for the Pinecil.
I like the Ikea SITTBRUNN cable series, they feel great, are inexpensive and actually come with a technical specification.
The only drawbacks I've found are:
* It's 480 Mbps cables, so for charging and occasional transferrers.
* They don't have a huge selection of lengths and colors.
These aren't "brands". You can't trust that the random character "brands" on Amazon like SNOALK, TOOALQ, lipr or whatever are even the same from shipment to shipment. Model names and numbers are meaningless here. It's all just a random lottery.
I went on the exact same quest. The answer is Belkin BoostCharge Flex. They have one version that’s flexible silicone and one that’s wrapped in braid. Do not get the braided version.
The description on Amazon was this: Belkin BoostCharge Flex Silicone USB-C to USB-C Charging Cable (1M/3.3FT) for iPhone 16, iPhone 16 Pro, Galaxy S25, S24, Pixel 9 & 8, Nintendo Switch 2 & More with Cable Clip - Black
It's not silicon but the _best_ (charging only) cables I've used by far are the Anker Nano [0] cables. they are so flexible, feel amazing, and I wish I could replace all my cables with them (but can't due to cost). It's USB 2.0 speeds so I only use them for charging but that's one of the reasons they can be so flexible/enjoyable to use (they don't have to be as thick to support USB 3+/TB speeds). I own many other Anker braided cables and none of them are like this one.
Aside: has anyone found a good "fancy color" TB4 cable? I'd like to (eventually) have a distinctive color for my needed ~3-4 TB4 cables, but they're mostly black/white/grey. I found KondorBlue in my travels but they're sold out/limited availability.
I'd like to know at a glance if I'm using the right "MacBook TB4 Monitor Cable" (or "guaranteed high-ish wattage") as opposed to "random usb-c which may/may-not work".
58 comments
[ 1.9 ms ] story [ 8.3 ms ] threadNot saying that's easy considering their stock issues. Maybe it's better now.
Annyways; I like the LTT TrueSpec cables although I think the thickness of the connector is slightly too small.
It feels loose in multiple of my devices, e.g. S22 Ultra & S23 Ultra. No other connector feels this loose.
So no, it appears that "chubby cables" aren't the best.
I've also run into way too much cabling that's CCA or even CCS. Garbage on the outside, garbage on the inside.
Despite the point in my comment about power cable extensions coverings becoming hard through the lack of plasticizers, I confirm your point about overplasticized PVC in instrument cables.
I have a lot of instrument leads that I thought were silicone only to find that after a year or so they've gone hard. So much so that new unpacked ones can no longer be easily straightened (the kinks remain unless one heats the cable up and then straightens them).
Despite availability issues,the problem is trying to determine what's real silicone and what's not.
Right, depends on the quality of the rubber I suppose. I've been suspicious of rubber because when it's old it often turns into a gooey mess or goes hard and cracks (as with VR [vulcanized rubber] used in house wiring in the days before PVC — and often a cause of fires.
At the moment that's a bit close to home. I'm in Australia where power is 240V and only two days ago I needed to test an old Advantest spectrum analyzer and I wasn't sure if it had been strapped for 240 or 110V but didn't have a 240/110V transformer to hand so I dug out an ancient variac/auto-transformer to do the job and its power lead was vulcanized rubber which had turned into a sticky mush (replacing the lead didn't help as the windings had a short to the laminations).
Similarly, the rubber insulation on my super flexible AVO multimeter leads with many, many strands of superfine Cu wire has disintegrated. It's similarly perished (but they're well over 30 years old).
My first experience of silicone comes from its use as the outer jacket/insulation in microphone cables used in an industrial environment (TV studio). It was wonderful, cables were super easy to roll up and keep orderly, and despite its so-called reputation for not being rugged enough heavy camera dollies would regularly run over it without damage. These cables would last for years (the only occasional issue with them was when an XLR connector would get ripped off when caught on something and someone pulled super hard to free it).
I've no issue with using VR for leads except I've not been able to get it (for example, I can no longer get a replacement for my AVO leads).
le me: see README, spot slop tells, scroll to the files, see CLAUDE.md
Yeah I'd love to see a stopslop extension for Github, warning me if the usual suspects of slop bullshit are present.
Anker offers lovely soft silicone sheathed USB-C cables, in black or white and many lengths. They perform for data and do not get stiff or discolor. Our office specifies these unless TB4+ is required.
https://www.anker.com/eu-en/verify
https://cairovolt.com/en/blog/how-to-identify-original-anker
https://www.cablematters.com/pc-1640-180-intel-certified-80g...
aka: https://www.amazon.com/Cable-Matters-Thunderbolt-Black-3-3ft...
But we prefer such be braided, so with CalDigit we use this:
https://www.caldigit.com/thunderbolt-5-pro-cable/
https://www.amazon.com/CalDigit-Thunderbolt-5-Pro-Cable/dp/B...
Or with Anker we use this:
https://www.amazon.com/Anker-Thunderbolt-Charging-Bandwidth-...
That said, we mostly use Apple TB5 for fixed work stations where cables don't get lost.
https://www.apple.com/shop/product/mdw94am/a/thunderbolt-5-u...
We avoid gaming brand TB cables and the scrabble letter brands.
What do people mean by scrabble letter brands? and I assume TB on the bottom there is just short for Thunderbolt?
Amazon orders are banned from our lab supply list because you never actually get the same thing twice, and they vanish on first bad review.
Related, I've been buying the exact color, style, and brand of sock, from Amazon, for the past ~10 years. I have a sock drawer full of completely different socks.
I've had people in real life start to recommend some product, "oh you just buy it on Amazon" and that is a thought-terminating cliché, because that's like telling me to "go buy it in the shopping mall".
Anker has an official store on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/stores/page/47CF0F10-7C80-4CCA-A398-A...
I personally love Belkin, also with an official store: https://www.amazon.com/stores/page/C59F9C55-1122-462C-863E-D...
My Ethernet cables are Tripp Lite, so try their USB: https://www.amazon.com/stores/page/D85D7CDC-7E0F-4C9A-8829-2...
So many reputable vendors have established presence in the marketplace on Amazon now. But you must carefully inspect every item in your cart, because you will find lots of brand-items advertised from fly-by-night sellers with poor reputations. But once you see your reputable vendor name, and/or "Sold through Amazon, fulfilled by Amazon" then I've never needed to worry about the end result.
Anker has steps to prove the product is genuine, and only guarantee non-counterfeit from offline stores: https://www.anker.com/eu-en/verify
What's made this situation worse is that it seems that worry over plasticizers and health etc. has lead to a reduction in the amount being used in cables. I have some power extenstion cables whose jackets have gone so hard that I can no longer coil them effectively — even though I take care the coiled cable still ends up a tangled mess.
Even if silicone jacketing is more expensive it's so good I'd pay extra. Trouble is it's not normally available on products found at the local hardware shop.
AFAIK there's nothing about the SOOW spec that requires EPDM.
Silicone is more flexible and high-temperature resistant, but it does have a major downside of being very easy to cut and strip. That's not great either, especially for power applications where short circuits are a concern.
PVC, XLPE, and rubber insulation is more durable than silicone. THHN uses PVC, XHHW uses XLPE, SOOW cord uses EPDM rubber.
I've had Anker braided cables before but the Nano is in a whole other league. I have one by my bed and every time I touch it I smile a little, it sparks joy (no pun intended).
Luckily my soldering iron did.
I bought some of the official Pinecil silicone cables but haven't tried burning them yet. Has anyone tried that? I think they're USB2 but rated (well, advertised) for 100W so they're great for the Pinecil.
The only drawbacks I've found are: * It's 480 Mbps cables, so for charging and occasional transferrers. * They don't have a huge selection of lengths and colors.
The description on Amazon was this: Belkin BoostCharge Flex Silicone USB-C to USB-C Charging Cable (1M/3.3FT) for iPhone 16, iPhone 16 Pro, Galaxy S25, S24, Pixel 9 & 8, Nintendo Switch 2 & More with Cable Clip - Black
[0] https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0CZ43567W
I need to buy 10 32GB, but every somewhat affordable bulk option is very suspicious and throttles or fails.
Sandisk is reputable but costs a premium.
I'd like to know at a glance if I'm using the right "MacBook TB4 Monitor Cable" (or "guaranteed high-ish wattage") as opposed to "random usb-c which may/may-not work".