why haven't ethernet connectors changed?

Thu Dec 20 18:41:28 UTC 2012

On 12/20/2012 10:28 AM, Michael Loftis wrote:
> It's not all about density.  You *Must* have positive retention and alignment.  None of the USB nor firewire standards provide for positive retention.  eSATA does sort of in some variants but the connectors for USB are especially delicate and easy to break off and destroy.  There's the size of the Cat5/5e/6 cable to be considered too.
>
> Then you must consider that the standard must allow for local termination, the RJ45 (And it's relatives) are pretty good at this.  Fast, reliable, repeatable termination with a single simple tool that requires only a little bit of mechanical input from the user of the tool.

If you look at the Raspberry Pi though, it takes a substantial piece of real estate
though. Not everything needs to be industrial strength connectors as witnessed
by USB and HDMI -- if they fail I'm just as unhappy as if ethernet fails. Surely we
want keep shrinking these cute little purpose built controller-like things and not
*have* to rely on wireless as the only other space-saving means?

Mike