The thing is that the wires behave like a flex cable when you want them to fit through a narrow slot, but can be bunched together when you need them to go through a round hole. This eliminates the twisting of tape, and no more hard edges scratch one against another.
Not quite accurate. I am very familiar with stranded ribbon cables. They have their uses - and this isn't one of them. This little cable deserves it's engineering. Consider what it is expected to do.
1. Connect to a very low profile connector on the system board without transferring any torque to it..
2. Turn 90* inside of a few mm.
3. Run through a 2mm diameter barrel around 5 mm long.
4. Turn 90* inside of a few mm again.
5. Connect to a very low profile connector on the display board without transferring any torque to it.
6. Twist 170* on it's axis between the two 90* turns (#2 and #4) tens of thousands of times without breaking OR resulting in torque to the board connectors.
Your example cables flex in ONE direction, along the flat, poorly. They do not handle short radius turns well. They do not handle repeated mechanical movement on short radius turns hardly at all.
Yes, you can curl it up along the length to make it into a pencil shape so it can go through a hole. BUT - you cannot do that AND bend it over and over in a hinge while it's bent into a pencil shape.
So, that type of cable is NOT appropriate to send through a mechanical hinge pin. There IS a way to use it, but that would require a substantial redesign of the case plastics. IBM Thinkpads use those multistrand flat ribbon cables to connect the screen. They simply go flat through slots in the base & lid that have high clearances - sloppy fit, but a good thing in that case. They use your example type of cable, but they certainly don't stuff it through a hinge then bend it 90* on both sides of the hinge then mechanically twist it 170* over and over.
