The USB-C connector has this tab in the middle that's liable to get damaged if it's just done cheaply enough. It's also an amazing design to collect all sorts of crud (relevant for mobile devices) that will stuff up the contacts and make the connector fail in various, strange ways. (If your phone doesn't charge properly, try cleaning the connector, there's a good chance that'll solve your problem if it suddenly stopped fast charging) It's also really difficult to clean without again, not damaging it. It's a good design in a vacuum where you want to get as much contact surface on as small as possible an area. They didn't consider things like robustness. Buy the new one next year! I'm not even touching the various ways this port gets wrongly implemented or I'll still be writing next december.
I'm sort of obsessed with small, low power computing devices and I absolutely hate how they're all these flat slabs nowadays that'll break in two if you look at them funny. I have a Q616 2-in-1 tablet that is one of the few devices that gives me the vibe of retro computer robustness, connectors behind little dust-proofing flaps and everything.
Browse their 2-in-1 devices, they have a really fun, 80s blade-runnery kind of design, for the lack of a better word. Sadly their stats are not very impressive, especially for the price. Of course I took the Q616 apart and it's just as robust on the inside. Stark contrast to the similar vintage Thinkpad 2-in-1 I have that's functionally better but not nearly as nicely built. Of course they're both antiques but I doubt the newer Thinkpads are any better re: robustness. I'm not going to find out if the Q7312 is as that thing is priced at 3k. I don't think anyone outside of businesses with contracts actually owns one. That said they also have a nice Pentium Silver one I'm gonna pick up if I ever see it at a reasonable price and condition.
