Am I the only person who feels that the variety of USB-C cables in the market of western countries are very lacking? Sure I go to a shopping mall, visiting mainstream tech store and will find USB-C cables there, but always with limited options. For example, most cables would be either 1 or 1.2 metres. Trying to find short USB-C cable (50cm) from reputable is really hard; finding certain combination of cable ends (like USB-C to micro-USB) feels like hunting for treasure.

I checked eBay and can find a lot of listings there selling more or less the same 3-4 variants of product. Most of them are either non-branded, or some shady Chinese brand. After shocking experience with my wall charger turned black with burnt smoke several years ago, I decided to never consider getting cheap charger or cables from non-trusted brands.

When I went to Japan few months ago, I visited some tech stores with very low expectations. Surprisingly, I returned to my hotel room with some very interesting products. Got myself USB-C to micro-USB cable from Sony, lightning to USB-C cables with unique lengths (0.5 m and 1.5 m), and an orange USB-C to USB-A cable with smiley face on it. The lightning cables are from the brands that I know have been around in Japan for quite some time with reasonable reputation. Plus, they are MFi certified. Sony is one of my trusted brands for many years.

Yet this brought me to my next questions, why wouldn’t these Japanese brands make more efforts to make their products available internationally? Why wouldn’t Sony sell their USB-C to micro-USB cables in Australia?

Anyway, this is just a random rant that I had at the back of my mind for quite some time. Finally had time to write it up today.