Skip to main content

Exploring MFish USB Charging Cables and Related Equipment

We will be taking a look cables, a charger, and power station provided to me by a company called MFish. I'll primarily be focusing on their USB cables, but obviously, the power source you use to drive these cables is just as important. I have links to everything at the bottom of this article. 




Collaboration disclaimer: I give companies terms before I allow them to send me products. They have no say in the content of my videos, live streams, or articles. They are also not allowed to preview anything. The only time afterward where I'll edit something is if I made a technical mistake. These companies have no control over my opinions. 

The various products from Mfish.


The Power Source: MFish Etank 240 Power Station

This is the MFish Etank power station. It is capable of doing 240 watts maximum over 4 USB-C ports combined. 

The Etank Power Station from Mfish.

The first port is capable of a 140 watts maximum output. I don't have anything remotely that much power draw, but I'd imagine something like a high performance laptop might come close. If you are going to use all four ports at once, the first port goes down to 100 watts maximum. The second port stays at 100 watts, and the remaining two ports will output a maximum of 20 watts each. If you only use the first port then it is capable of 140 watts. 

The Etank's touch sensitive power button.

On the top of the device, there are three standard wall outlets. The station features a touch button on the side that allows you to change the current color of the glowing rings around the outlets. 

USB Power Delivery (PD) 3.1 is a specification that allows USB-C cables and chargers to deliver up to 240W (48V at 5A), a significant increase from the previous 100W limit of PD 3.0. This makes it possible to charge high-power devices like gaming laptops and large docking stations directly over USB-C. 
Disclaimer: This support information was generated by Gemini Pro.


Novelty Charging: Mad Pixel Lab 01 Duck Charger

The Mad Pixel Lab 01 Duck 20W GaN charger.

First off for the chargers, we have a really cute little device: the Mad Pixel Lab 01. This is a 20-watt charger in the theme of a pixelated duck. The red "legs" of the duck are actually a removable silicone cover for the wall outlet plugs. 

It does support power delivery. It's compact and it appears to work well. At the time of posting this article, I've been using my phone with this charger and the 10ft Gemini 1 cable without issue. 


MFish Armored Dragon 8 Coiled Cable

Next is the Armored Dragon 8 charging line. This is a 4-in-1 cable featuring a coiled section wrapped in "liquid silicone." The cable itself is quite thick at 6mm, making it noticeably thicker than standard USB cables.

The coiled portion is coated in "liquid silicon" according to Mfish.

The coiled cable plugged into a camera, showing the illuminated charging indicator on the connector housing.

It includes a standard USB-A adapter and a Lightning connection for older Apple devices. The core cable is capable of up to 240 watts when you do USB-C to USB-C. However, you would need a heavy-duty power station to utilize that full 240 watts on a single cable. The Etank power station tops out at 140w on a single port. 

The adapters are removable. There two notches on the edge of the connector that have a curve to it, going from a low point to a high point. This design allows the adapter to be detached and reattached over the main USB-C connection point. The metal housing ensures that if anything bends slightly, you can bend it back into shape.

Because it is a coiled cable, I think this might be more interesting to use as a keyboard cable where flexibility and aesthetics matter more than long reach.


MFish Armored Dragon 1 (10ft Cable)

The instruction booklet for the Armored Dragon 1 detailing the 240W maximum output and various connection (adapter) type limits.

The Armored Dragon 1 is a 10-foot silicone coated cable. The documentation mentions it features a PD 3.1 spec component and an E-marker chip inside.

An E-marker (Electronically Marked Cable) chip is a tiny integrated circuit placed inside USB-C cables. It communicates with the connected devices and the charger to safely negotiate power delivery, ensuring the cable can handle high currents (like 5 Amps for 240W charging) without overheating or causing damage.
Disclaimer: This support information was generated by Gemini Pro.

If you are using it as a pure USB-C to USB-C connection, it will handle up to 240 watts (5 amps). However, if you use the attached adapters, the maximum power output lowers. 

A major point of consideration for all of these MFish cables is data transfer. These are primarily designed as power and charging cables. The maximum data transfer speed is limited to the USB 2.0 specification, which is 480 megabits per second. 

Testing the connector clearance of the Armored Dragon 1 cable on a phone with a thick Otterbox case. This brand of case tends to have a port area with a good amount of room, so I wasn't surprised that it worked fine.

Clearance is also a factor. The manual notes that thick or rugged cases might interfere with the connection. I tested it on a phone with an Otterbox case. I could tell it fully clicked in and worked without issue. 


MFish Armored Dragon 3 (6.6ft Cable)

Trying the side folding adapters on the Dragon 3.

The Armored Dragon 3 is a slightly shorter 6.6-foot option. The main physical difference between this and the pink Dragon 1 is how the adapters work. Instead of swinging up and down, the adapters go to the sides. 

I wasn't able to remove the adapters on this cable. Because the sides are thicker so it locks in very tightly. If you really want the side-to-side adapter feature, just be aware that detaching them completely would probably take some effort. 


MFish Gemini Dragon 1 Dual Display Cable

The Gemini Dragon 1 dual display cable coiled up, showing the metal connector housings.

Finally, we have the Gemini Dragon 1. This is a 140-watt maximum 5-foot "liquid silicone" cable. It features a single USB-C input (with a USB-A adapter) that splits into two USB-C outputs.

Both output connectors feature a built-in display screen showing the active wattage and a light indicating if Power Delivery (PD) is active. The splitter further down the cable has an LED as well.

The splitter of the Gemini 1.

When testing the data transfer capabilities, I found you can only transfer data with one output at a time. If you try to connect two devices for data, it disconnects the other one.

Looking at my wall outlet power meter to compare to the Gemini cable.

I tested the accuracy of the display against a wall meter. The device drew about 23 watts at the wall, while the cable display reported 18 watts. This discrepancy is likely because something in the cable chain is consuming power. I noticed the splitter block gets a little warm during use, meaning power is being lost as heat in the process of splitting the connection and running the displays.

Overall, they do a great job charging multiple devices at once. Even when connecting a device that doesn't support PD alongside one that does, the displays accurately report the different wattage pulls independently and whether power delivery was being used or not. 

Loading up the Etank power station.

The build quality on these cables is seems good, and the silicone coating prevents them from tangling easily. Overall the worked as I was expecting. Some of my devices that don't appear to support power delivery properly would sometimes have issues with the combination of the Etank and these cables, so keep that in mind. But overall when the device properly supports power delivery then it works well. 

Check out their cables on Amazon: 

As an Amazon Affiliate, I earn from qualifying purchases! Usually anything within 24 hours of the visit. It doesn't have to be the product I linked. 

Or visit their website: imfish.com (not affiliated): 

imfish.com coupon code: TECHsuppose, 10% off per use. Valid until June 30, 2026. I'm not affiliated with their website so I make no commissions, but asked them to make a code for you all if you want to use their website instead of my affiliates. The use of this code tells Mfish that my videos and other media are able to reach all of you. 


Popular posts from this blog

Reviewing the Thermalright TL-G12 and TL-C14 Fans

I recently picked up a bunch of Thermalright fans for a new PC build, specifically the TL-G12 (120mm) and the TL-C14 (140mm). At the time, they were pretty inexpensive, and the promise of fluid dynamic bearings (FDB) along with PWM control sounded like a great deal on paper, so I bought quite a few of each. In this article and related video I go into detail about their installation and use.  Check out the video on YouTube for a lot more information:  Boxes for the Thermalright TL-G12 and TL-C14 fans. Specifications listed on the TL-G12 fan box. Specifications for the 120mm TL-G12: Speed: 1500 RPM (+/- 10%) Noise: Rated 23.6 dBA or greater. Airflow: Up to 62.6 CFM Connector: 4-pin PWM with a daisy-chain feature. Extras: Includes rubber pads on the corners for vibration dampening and standard case screws. One thing I noticed on the G12 frame is the lack of an airflow direction indicator, but it's a standard fan design, so it's easy enough to figure out. Specifications shown on ...

Working on a second GPU review.

 I might as well start things off here!  I'm working on a second GPU video because I had ended up swapping out the cheap Amazon Warehouse Deals RTX 4060 one for a larger quieter one. I also was able to do 4k tests without a 4k monitor by using the Atomos Ninja V. Starting to look through the results. Here is one in Google Sheets on Affinity Photo 2 using their built-in benchmark.  The ASUS Proart RTX 4060 has a performance and quiet mode which is what the PM and SM data lines mean. So far from what I've seen of the data these two modes don't mean much from a performance standpoint, at least on my old i7-6700 based PC build. It feels like a marketing based feature and I'm probably going to leave the card in quiet mode.  I'm not sure how much of a difference these scores mean in practice between the GTX 1060 and RTX 4060, but the number is larger! haha

Upgrading from GTX 1060 to RTX 4060: Performance Gains in an Older System

(I used Claude AI to generate this article based on my video's transcript, so keep that in mind it might not be perfect even though I've gone through it to correct any issues I see. Also keep in mind that I've done further testing with an ASUS Proart 4060 compared to the MSI 1060 on my old PC and noticed a few situations where the CPU was limiting performance such as FFXIV minimum framerates.) https://youtu.be/yR6XPvt-F0A I recently decided to take a look at the GIGABYTE RTX 4060 low profile version. This was the cheapest RTX 4060 card I could find as an Amazon Warehouse Deal, and I was curious to see if my old computer would benefit from upgrading from a GTX 1060 6GB to this new card. Low profile! My current system is built around an Intel i7-6700 CPU, which is likely to be the main limitation in this comparison. I was particularly interested in the sound profile of this card given its tiny size. I don't take a look in the video, but potential benefits of AV1 encode/d...