New style printer cables
 

Just curious about these new A-B USB printer cables that are not supplied when you buy a new printer. I notice that they are sold in stores for usually around $15-20 (probably something like a 1500% markup considering they are probably made for $1 each)

Anyway, I noticed that they are on sale at the dollar store as well. Should I be worried that the dollar store ones are going to cause a fire and burn my house down or are they a safe alternative to forking out a ridiculous amount of cash for a cable?

The dollar store ones are kind of flimsy (cheap solder joints, stiff copper, etc.), but work fine as long as you don't need to snake them around a bunch of corners.

The ones you buy from a retail store will be better quality, but have a lot of markup on them.

If you buy cables from NCIX, for example, you'll probably spend half the money ($5-$10) and get an equivalent quality cable.

500mA at 5VDC (Current & Voltage of a USB port) is not going to cause a fire EVER.

You could use the shittiest cables in the world and it's not going to be unsafe.

Yes dollar store cables would work fine.

Great! Thanks for the info guys, appreciate it.

new?? anyways yeah, just buy the cheap ones, since it's a printer I'm assuming once the cable is in place it won't be moving so you don't really have to worry about the lower quality connections breaking down.

if you're really that worried, buy a few at $1. if it dies, you have a backup or two...