The Apple Discussion Thread

[NaTionS]

Unless wireless earphones can last ~24 hours per charge, the convenience would not be worth the extra hassle.

 

[Jr Mouse]



Way overblown. Wireless earbuds are the future. Yes, they kinda suck now, but I'm confident we'll have great earbuds in the next 2-3 years. This is just the painful first step.

Why do you think removing the headphone jack is a "first step" towards great wireless earbuds? Nothing related to a hardware port is holding wireless back right now. Wireless headphones will or will not show great improvements over the next few years regardless if phones keep a hardware headphone jack or not.

So why not just leave the port in and give the user options?

Hell, all the latest rumors are the phone they are releasing this year won't be any thinner then the current one. So they can't even that as an excuse as to why they are removing it. Like he said it's user hostile and stupid.

 

[GreenFrog]

They won't become standard until everyone rallies behind it. What's the incentive to develop great wireless earbuds if you always have the backup option of the aux jack?

Everyone's just bitching and moaning. That's how I feel. Get over it.

 

[Jr Mouse]



They won't become standard until everyone rallies behind it. What's the incentive to develop great wireless earbuds if you always have the backup option of the aux jack?

Are you kidding? They are separate markets man. Always have been. Both coexist and fill different needs. If you honestly think there is a lack of incentive to to improve wireless technologies because there is a wired headphone option available then I have a nice bridge to sell you.

 

[Jr Mouse]

Got that nice pair of $200 wired headphones you want to use? Great, here's a dongle. Want to charge your phone while using those same $200 wired headphones? Here's a second dongle to attach to your first dongle.

Ugh. Gross to even think about.

 

[GreenFrog]



Are you kidding? They are separate markets man. Always have been. Both coexist and fill different needs. If you honestly think there is a lack of incentive to to improve wireless technologies because there is a wired headphone option available then I have a nice bridge to sell you.

The wired headphone market will always trump wireless. But with BT 5.0 announced and Apple pushing for wireless technology, this is the natural evolution. Think about tech products as a whole -- we're all moving towards wireless technology. Wireless charging, even.

I get that you'd be inconvenienced with this upon initial launch. A lot of folks will, if not most. But it's the price to pay to move forward. Initially I was just like you where I thought the move was completely stupid and consumer unfriendly, but after reading all the arguments and thinking about this, it makes sense.

I can't count the number of times I've had to untangle my ******* headphone cables, or have them get violently yanked out of my ears because they got caught on something. I envision a future in the next 2-3 years where you can charge your watch, phone, and ear buds wirelessly on some mat or what have you.

I suggest you vote with your wallet and not buy the phone. It's okay.

 

[Jr Mouse]



The wired headphone market will always trump wireless. But with BT 5.0 announced and Apple pushing for wireless technology, this is the natural evolution. Think about tech products as a whole -- we're all moving towards wireless technology. Wireless charging, even.

Sure, things are moving towards wireless. Why not leave the headphone jack in? Wireless charging phones still have a way to charge wired if the user wants to.

Also BT has a long history of making big promises on updates that never match what they said it would. I hope 5.0 is great but it's hard to have confidence in it being as good as they claim it will be.

I get that you'd be inconvenienced with this upon initial launch. A lot of folks will, if not most. But it's the price to pay to move forward. Initially I was just like you where I thought the move was completely stupid and consumer unfriendly, but after reading all the arguments and thinking about this, it makes sense.

I can't count the number of times I've had to untangle my ******* headphone cables, or have them get violently yanked out of my ears because they got caught on something. I envision a future in the next 2-3 years where you can charge your watch, phone, and ear buds wirelessly on some mat or what have you.

You don't want to deal with tangled cords that's cool. No one is stopping you from using bluetooth headphones right now. It's an option. Options are great. People are upset here because if the rumors are true it means Apple is taking away an option for NO REASON AT ALL.

That last part cannot be said enough. There is no reason to remove the headphone jack if the rumors of the design of the iPhone coming out this fall are true. It's basically supposed to be the same design, shape and size of the 6 and 6s. Both of which have headphone jacks and work just fine.

It's user hostile to remove it from the phone coming out this fall. Pure and simple. Stop trying to rationalize this as a possibly good thing when removing it this year will provide zero benefit to the user.

I suggest you vote with your wallet and not buy the phone. It's okay.

You do realize this was Nilay's whole point, don't you? He ends the article by telling people to vote with their wallets.

 

[GreenFrog]

The reason is to accelerate and push everyone towards wireless earbuds.. the pace of adoption and investment in that area will not proceed as fast as it could (should?) if users will always have the fall back option of an aux jack.

Apple is pushing for progress and throwing their weight behind this.

Otherwise, when is the "right" time to get rid of it? Next year? The following year? What if wireless ear buds aren't where we quite want them to be at that point because we ALWAYS can default to 3.5 mm jacks? Sometimes having a backup option impedes progress. Apple is forcing this on us and if you don't want it, you still have a plethora of options to choose from. It doesn't hurt you in any way other than the fact that you won't have the latest and greatest because you won't want to use wireless ear buds.

My 2 cents. It's clear we won't agree beyond this. Apple knows this. They've done a **** ton of research on this and people like you. It's clear that they're making a trade off. It's unfortunate that you're in the camp of people who weren't prioritized by Apple.

 

[GreenFrog]

Also, I'm all for a waterproof iPhone with dual speakers. Sign me up.

 

[Jr Mouse]

Again, nothing has been holding back advancements in wireless. You yourself said BT 5.0 is coming out soon. That was in development waaaaay before any rumors of Apple removing the headphone jack ever started to circulate. As I said in a prior post, they are different markets. The companies who produce wireless technology have every incentive to make improvements regardless of what Apple does here. This will accelerate nothing unless Apple decides to directly compete with Bluetooth and release their own low power wireless standard.

Personally I don't think it will ever be the "right" time to get rid of it because I am tired of the relentless march towards ever thinner phones that hold back progress in key areas such as battery life. Having said that Apple would at least have a case to be made if the phone was going to be noticeably thinner. Then they could get on stage and say the only way they could make the design work was to get rid of the headphone jack. I wouldn't like it as many others wouldn't either, but at least they could present a reason. An argument for it being removed. Right now it's being removed for no reason at all. It's absurd.

 

[otc]

How about get rid of it never? The headphone jack has been a standard for decades (and it is a miniature version of a connector that has been use since the late 1800s).

You are never going to have wireless earbuds with the convenience of my cheapo wired earbuds.

I can coil them up and scrunch them in the tight ass pocket of my jeans. I can toss them in a bag. I can forget about them for a month and then pull them out and use them immediately. I don't have to be careful with them...they cost $12. I can plug them into anything, I can share them with a friend. There is no syncing or charging required.

For non-earbuds, there are some really sweet wireless setups out there , but they don't fit in a pocket and aren't indestructible (and only a few bucks to replace if you do destroy them). They are actually pretty nice--last a decent amount of time for something like subway commuter use, not overly bulky, sound decent, etc.

But earbuds aren't there. They need batteries and electronics to make sound if they aren't taking all of that in analog form from the phone. You can't make this pocket size and dirt cheap right now.

The fact that the headphones I linked to exist is proof enough for me that Apple doesn't need to kill the headphone jack in order to spur development of quality bluetooth headphones.

 

[Jr Mouse]

OTC brings up a good point on durability. The headphone jack is just about bullet proof. Compare that to lightning. It's prone to lint problems in the female end and the male end is prone to getting scratched up and will stop working. Who wants to invest any sum of money into wired lightning headphones if their lifespan is anything even close to that of lightning charging/sync cables?

I've yet to have one last past 6 months. Most crap out closer to 4.

Consider that then think about how absurdly expensive some high quality wired headphones get.

 

[the shah]

electronic interface for headphones = potential to limit access behind more DRM garbage. i don't want to have to jailbreak my headphones too, now ...

 

[Jr Mouse]

I'm not sure how much I agree with the DRM angle. Most music sold these days is DRM free. Is recording songs from services like Spotify that big of a problem?

 

[the shah]

i don't know but youtube has already developed a paid service. i don't have any songs on my phone so i stream everything. this is a slippery slope argument, but a move like this is only a move away from complete freedom with the aux.