Support

Cable Detective is a single-purpose Mac utility. There is no server, no account, no service status — everything runs on your Mac.

Contact

[email protected]

Replies are best-effort and not guaranteed — see the Terms of Use.

System requirements

Apple Silicon Mac (M-series) running macOS 26 (Tahoe) or later. The optional AI explanations require Apple Intelligence to be enabled in System Settings → Apple Intelligence & Siri. Intel Macs are not supported.

Common questions

The AI tab says “Apple Intelligence not available”.: Open System Settings → Apple Intelligence & Siri and turn Apple Intelligence on. Cable Detective also requires an Apple Silicon Mac running macOS 26 or later.
A port shows “Nothing connected” even though I plugged a cable in.: Click the refresh icon in the toolbar. Cable Detective reads the I/O Kit registry on connect events and on a 5-second heartbeat; some adapters take a moment to enumerate. If the port stays empty, try the cable in a different port to localise the fault.
The verdict says “Charge only” but I expected display output.: The cable's e-marker may not advertise DisplayPort Alt Mode, or the host port is not running DP-Alt right now. The Per-Transport state section shows the live lane state.
The negotiated wattage looks lower than the charger's label.: The label is the charger's capability. Cable Detective reports the negotiated contract, which is laptop request × charger offer × cable rating. A lower number is normal.
The AI explanation is wrong.: Apple's on-device language model is small and occasionally produces inaccurate paragraphs. Treat the deterministic verdict and the structured fields as the source of truth — the AI text is an explanatory layer.
Does it phone home?: No. The signed bundle has no network entitlement. Even if the code tried to open a socket, the macOS sandbox would refuse.

Bug reports and feature requests

Email the address above. Include macOS build (e.g. 26.3.1), Mac model, and a description of the cable / charger / dock involved. A redacted “Copy all” export from the affected port helps a lot.

Known issues