Removing the 3.5mm headphone socket

The problem is that Apple is an industry trendsetter. Any completely bonehead decision that starts in Cupertino quickly finds its way to other vendors because almost all of them would rather ride the waves than make their own. Hopefully in this case at least some of the other manufacturers choose to be different.

I hope for the sake of Apple customers that the iPhone doesn’t go completely port-less, considering how many of them need a DFU restore to unbrick them whenever a new iOS version is released. Case in point the iOS 9 “slide-to-upgrade” fiasco. A software restore wouldn’t be possible on a port-less device, the only solution would be paid out-of-warranty whole unit replacement. But that’s a discussion for another time.

I think I’d buy a waterproof, Lightning-only, iPhone. Wouldn’t you?

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If this were the reason for removing the 2.5mm socket, it would make much more sense than pursuing thinness for thinness’ sake. Otherwise I’d prefer longer battery life.

Depends on how “waterproof” it was.
This waterproof

Niche edge case. I’m talking about casual water insertions, protection from accidental spillages, could survive a swim or being dropped into the ocean type deals.

All well and good, until you realise that other manufacturers have made waterproof phones with 3.5mm ports.

Removing the 3.5mm headphone port is a lazy way to achieve thinness/to increase profit. Remove the port = lots of adaptor sales + lightning headphone sales (with a licensing fee). It would be a highly arrogant move and environmentally damaging.

If Bluetooth headphones were that good, everyone would have them. Wifi took off despite the ethernet port still being on Macs for a long time. The reality is Bluetooth headphones are annoying. They drain battery life, they need to be recharged themselves, they have latency issues, they’re expensive.

It would be worse if they go down the path of lightning headphones though. While that negates a lot of issues with Bluetooth, moving to a propriety headphone solution would just be plain stupid. The 3.5mm headphone port is ubiquitous, the beauty of it is you can move your headphones between any device.

Fuck you Tim Biggs, whoever you are, and the horse you rode in on.

Apple will do what it does, based on significant research — irrespective of who moans about X or Y, calls Z stupid or threatens to never buy their tech again.

As mentioned, just like having an (however Ill/informed) opinion we all have the ability to make a choice.

There are much more important and relevant things to get one’s ire up about…

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I want them to remove the 3.5mm plug. It gathers lint and I’m looking for an excuse to buy some decent bluetooth headphones. I’d like to see it removed from the next round of iPads as well; I never use the port on my iPad mini these days.

Plus, if people are getting this angry based on unconfirmed rumours, imagine the wonderful outrage when it actually happens. I cannot wait.

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From the article:

Since the decades-old 3.5mm standard is an analogue technology and the Lightning port is digital, the change will allow better quality audio.

Someone needs to remind Tim how sound works. The analog conversion needs to happen somewhere. Sure, Lightning moves the DAC outside the phone and further up the chain, but the Cirrus Logic DAC inside the iPhone as it stands is a rather capable chip. Attach a decent set of cans to a current generation iPhone and it does a fairly decent job.

Any improvements to sound quality won’t come from the switch to Lightning. It’ll come from manufacturers embedding their own DAC inside the headset and developing their own custom solutions.

He did raise one good point however.

Surely a much more effective way for the signatories of this petition to minimise e-waste would be to not commit themselves to buying every new iPhone.

Brilliant suggestion.

I should state that I and I’m sure many others are aware that discussing this in depth makes no difference to whether it comes to fruition or not. It’s a discussion based on a hypothetical situation in which the rumour turns out to be true and whether it’s a good or bad move. Neither opinion is ill informed and I resent the suggestion that anyone who disagrees must be. This is one specialist area I tend to research fairly regularly (as a hardware technician I don’t have much choice in the matter) and from that concluded that while a Lighting / wireless solution has some advantages, it has some fairly considerable drawbacks that shouldn’t be overlooked.

We’ll just have to wait and see how this one plays out.

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Nope, I need a 3.5mm port, I’d rather replace my 6 with a 6S if the 7 arrives without a 3.5mm port.

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“Need” ← well, there’s your issue, right there.

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Same. I use 3 different headphones (that i use between my phone, iPad and laptop amongst amplifiers etc), and I don’t feel like messing around with yet more expensive adaptors or the inconvenience of bluetooth headphones. If Apple wants to make the phone waterproof, they can do it without removing the headphone port, just as other manufacturers have.

I really don’t think Apple are going to kill off the 3.5mm port overnight. If anything they’d introduce some new accessory in the next generation of phone, let people get used to that and phase out the 3.5mm port after a couple of years.

Keep in mind Apple Music is the big thing right now, and removing a physical feature used as part of that service is kinda dumb.

[quote=“iMic, post:71, topic:1523”]
Sure, Lightning moves the DAC outside the phone and further up the chain, but…
[/quote]…there’s actually a bit more to it than that - the Lightning audio standard allows for a 48kHz sampling rate, vs the 24kHz rate that current digital audio uses. No, I don’t think it will make a difference to most people, but increasing the sampling rate by an octave will definitely not make digital audio worse.

The Fairfax writer is correct when he says “the change will allow better quality audio.” Whatever any of us might believe about whether such a change will be audible or not, or whether new products will take advantage of the capacity is irrelevant. It will allow better quality audio.

I can’t for the life of me find any reference to it now, but a few years ago Apple was granted a patent for a magnetic headphone socket. It was sort of a scallop that held the regular 3.5mm jack in place with magnets, so it snapped in side ways, rather than being inserted.

Does anyone else recall something similar?

I’ll need a little more information on this one, because unless I’m mistaken (and I’ll admit I could well be) I wouldn’t think that the connection interface would be the bottleneck or even relevant in this instance. That is, the same 48kHz sampled digital feed that would be delivered over Lightning to the external DAC in the attached peripheral could just as easily be delivered to the internal DAC and fed out via the 3.5mm connector.

The main difference is in the length of the connection between the audio output stage and the speaker driver, which I’m aware can sometimes in itself be an audio quality variable, but at such a short distance already the difference would be slim to nil. An improvement but not a noticeable gain. Of course that is a moot point if manufacturers have their DAC inline on the cable, in which case the analog signal needs to travel the entire length of the cable like it currently does anyway.

So while the Lightning specification allows for a 48kHz sampling rate, I’m having a difficult time in understanding what is special about Lightning that makes it a necessity for offering a higher sampling rate compared to just improving the iPhone’s internal audio components as-is.

I think it just means that at the Lightning port you have anything up to 48kHz digital audio right there in all its glory, whereas at the headphone socket you have whatever the digital source might be, but it’s been through a tiny DAC and some audio circuitry. It’s not difficult to provide a better DAC and amp than what the iDevice has, whereas the audio is what it is.

I personally think if Apple go down this path they will probably offer both initially and then progressively phase it out as the market moves to digital audio, or if it moves. I think to have only lightning would not make sense but a phased out period might. That would allow people who buy now to buy newer technology and those who want to continue using older technology to continue doing so.

If removing the 3.5mm headphone jack means a thinner, lighter iPhone with more room for internals (battery, etc.), then I’m all for it. Although, I haven’t invested in any headphones whatsoever, so I only use the EarPods that came with my 6. I know this goes against the “Apple nerd” common opinion, but I want a thinner and lighter iPhone - but, I guess I want all of my devices to be as thin and light as possible.

I cannot see Apple going to USB-C for four main reasons:

  1. They just finished the transition to a Lightning-only lineup. Imagine them changing ports again. Do we remember the outcry when Apple shifted in 2012, and people were saying “oh Apple always changes ports just to get us to buy their expensive adapters, and to make our accessories obsolete, blah blah”?

  2. A USB-C port is significantly thicker than the existing Lightning port, meaning it kinda negates the reason why they’d want to get rid of it (to allow for a thinner iPhone/iPad body). (Source)

  3. Lightning works so well, and has been adopted as a charging standard for non-iOS products (and iOS accessories), such as Magic Keyboard, Magic Mouse 2, Magic Trackpad, Siri Remote, and Apple Pencil.

  4. Imagine the fragmentation if they were to only use USB-C for iPhone, and not iPad or iPod? Seeing as the latter two tend to get features years (and sometimes never) after iPhone, we would see significant accessory fragmentation. People would no longer be able to use their iPhone charger/dock/accessory for their iPad or iPod. It’s just too much hurt for such (relatively) little gain.

/rant

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