Google announced Friday that the latest Chromebook update includes a feature that tells you if your USB-C cable has limited functionality. Because USB-C cables can have widely varying capabilities, such as different charging and data transfer speeds on a cable-by-cable basis, this new Chromebook feature appears to be a useful tool for troubleshooting.
“Eligible Chromebooks will notify you if the USB-C cable you’re using does not support displays or is not performing optimally for your laptop,” Google writes in a blog post. “You’ll also receive an alert if the cable you’re using does not support the high-performance USB4 / Thunderbolt 3 standards that your Chromebook does.” According to the blog, the new feature will be available first on Chromebooks with 11th or 12th Gen Intel Core CPUs that support USB4 or Thunderbolt, “with more devices to follow.”
