How I Organize My USB Cables
I was cleaning off my computer desk and realized that I have a lot of cables for different things. Many of them are specific shapes for cell phones etc. but many of my cables have a USB connector on the end so it makes them a little bit difficult to identify when they are jumbled up.
When you add in the fact that many of these cables are black you come up with the problem that people who have a lot of electronics face. What cable goes with what?
I pulled out just a few of my cables to illustrate but I know that true technology people will have a lot more than this.
I decided to organize my USB cables in a way that would make sense to me and would make it easier to find what I need. I wanted to find a way to organize that would be the cheapest I could find since I am always looking for ways to save money.
I did not want to have to go out and buy items to help me organize if I could reuse something that I already had on hand.
Labels to the rescue!
I get a lot of labels from various organizations who want me to donate money (how do they get my address) so I decided to use those. I lined up all the cables and put an address label on the USB end of the cable. I then wrote what device the cable belonged to on it. I realized that I have some cables that can go to multiple items so I drew a line under the main device and wrote secondary devices under the main one.
Now whenever I pick up a cable and look on the USB side I can tell that it goes to the
* cell phone
*MP3 player
* GPS
* camera
or any other device by reading the tag. I can also tell for example that the cell phone charger will also work for the GPS so if for some reason I am stuck without one I can use the other charger to charge from my computer.
After I finished putting labels on all the rest of the cables (you didn’t think I only had to do three did you?) I hung them all through a loop on the side of my computer desk, with the USB part facing up.
As I add more and more cables I can quickly fan through the labels to find exactly what I am looking for or I can look at the other end to see what it looks like. The nice thing is that if I have two ends that look the same, the label tells me what device the cable is meant for.
I had to black out some of the labels because they had identifying information on them….and I don’t want all of you coming to my place begging me to make you some USB labels!!!!!
This is my first time messing with editing photos so please excuse the somewhat messy blacking out of information.
How do you organize your cables?
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6 Responses to “How I Organize My USB Cables”
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You could also use twist ties to hold them together and then use tape for the labels. That’s what I do, but I also throw them all in a specific drawer that has nothing but cables and other tech. type things.
Arg, you totally stole my next post idea! lol
Good idea though, to label cables if you can’t remember what goes with what.
I recently redid my computer work area and reorganized everything. I’ll have the blog post up soon
Shawn Knight’s last blog post..Dinner at Crescent City
Hurry up and post it then so I can have a look!!!
I do understand that you want to save money. But, getting a cheap usb hub will allow you to keep all of your usb devices plugged in saving on wear and tear of constantly plugging and unplugging your cables. Your monitor may already have extra usb ports that you can use as a hub.
Wonderful post, and I was heading for a similar article which I will probably still write, but from a slightly different angle. Thanks for sharing this with your readers…I’m sure I’m not the only one who appreciates it.