What's wrong with the 4/6/8 pin plugs? I find them perfectly good. And they have a high power variant that would have worked much better here, rated for twice the current per pin.
They're the best of the bunch when it comes to PC parts, but think how far off they are in terms of usability compared to USB, or Ethernet, or HDMI, or Displayport, or those old VGA cables you had to screw in, or literally anything else. They only look good in comparison to the other power connectors.
> They're the best of the bunch when it comes to PC parts
Not really, the PSU side isn't standardized at all and it's not obvious at all because the cables will happily fit when you plug cables from PSU A into PSU B and fry your entire build.
Theres no benefit to not having standards on that side, and the other side is all standard so they are able to follow standards there, "It's just the way it's always been" so they keep doing it
USB, especially USB C, is very much designed to carry power. Not quite as much as high end graphics cards guzzle these days but it goes up to 240W. Ethernet, HDMI, DP and even VGA (with extensiosn) are also all used to carry power even if much smaller currents.
It's designed for 5 amps. In this context, that's close enough to "not carrying power".
If we're considering the bigger voltages that allow higher power on USB C, then the existing GPU plugs are fine because we can deliver 600W using the same current as a 150W 8 pin plug.
