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EU Gives Final Approval to Law That Will Force iPhone to Switch to USB-C

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Re: EU Gives Final Approval to Law That Will Force iPhone to Switch to USB-C

#61

Post by dwaite »

diebeforei485 wrote: post #28
EMIRELADERO wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This law does not carve the USB-C into stone. There is a review mechanism and a mechanism for monitoring the market and approving another port in the future when it's time to do so. This is done through the USB Implementers Forum. All this law really, truly does is force manufacturers to sit around a table and work out a single solution for the whole electronics market. EU doesn't really care about USB-C or USB-D or…

That's a bit strange. The USB Implementers Forum people are partly why we're in this mess. What if someone comes up with something just better, and doesn't want to deal with the cruft and backward compatibility requirements of USB?

> The USB Implementers Forum people are partly why we're in this mess.

IMHO it really is. For the first releases of power delivery, the IF decided to _not_ go with Apple's existing system that they developed to negotiate charging levels for iPods, iPhones and iPads. Instead they standardized another new, incompatible mechanism.

If you ever wondered why so many Apple devices and cables don't have USB logos, it is because they were left with little way to be compliant with PD 1.0 and still support literally a billion previously shipped devices and chargers at the time.

This caused a market with incompatibilities between Android and iDevice charging ecosystems, which (again IMHO) was what caused the last round of EU mandates in the first place. Qualcomm and others capitalized on various gaps with their own proprietary charging protocols, which then created a need for their chips in chargers as well.

Things really didn't even start to get fixed until rather recently, with Power Delivery 3.0 and PPS.

Re: EU Gives Final Approval to Law That Will Force iPhone to Switch to USB-C

#62

Post by dwaite »

rasz wrote: post #56
diebeforei485 wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a bit strange. The USB Implementers Forum people are partly why we're in this mess. What if someone comes up with something just better, and doesn't want to deal with the cruft and backward compatibility requirements of USB?

micro USB is 15 years old, mini 17. Just after introduction of mini everyone and their dog tried pushing their own slightly tweaked proprietary variant. There were at least 6 separate incompatible shapes. Sony had one (afair different shield bend on the mini connector), Nikon, Canon etc. It gets better, sometimes same connector had different pinouts depending on the brand https://connector.pinoutguide.com/8_pin_UC-E6…

micro and mini USB both had three variants - A, B, and A/B - as part of USB OTG (On the Go).

This is because they wanted you to be able to connect a computer to a camera, but also to be able to connect that camera to a printer.

Re: EU Gives Final Approval to Law That Will Force iPhone to Switch to USB-C

#63

Post by dwaite »

Dylan16807 wrote: post #26
arcticbull wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the other hand USB 2.0 is likely the maximum supported on the Lightning port.

They released a single device with 3.0 on the lightning port. Though I'm not sure if they had a suitable cable? It was weird.

Yes, the iPad Pro was capable of 5 Gbps over its lightning port. They had at least one accessory which used it (to give you a USB-A host port).

Considering the nightmare of USB-C cable specs, I don't really fault them for not releasing multiple USB-A to lightning cables with different max charging and data rates.

The USB-C to lightning cables support faster charging cables, but they did not improve data rates. This might be because this would add cost, and they weren't willing to have two tiers of cables. It might also be because only a very few devices would support the faster data rates.

The reality is that most people use the cables the phone came with, they only really use them to charge, and even android devices come with USB-C cables that only support USB 2.0 speeds for cost reasons. They aren't sending their files to their computer, they are sending them to the cloud - often over a wireless connection faster than the WIFI network any home computer would be on.

IMHO it is the pro devices and workflows which have really suffered there, since you have a rather nice camera - but with no fast way to get the content onto your workstation.

Re: EU Gives Final Approval to Law That Will Force iPhone to Switch to USB-C

#65

Post by frosted-flakes »

charliea0 wrote: post #8

I’m pretty skeptical lawmakers are the best ones to make technical decisions like this.

Compare it to electrical power socket regulations. Nobody thinks that should be a free-for-all the way it was in the early days of commercialized electricity, so why would standard power/data ports be any different?

Of course, power sockets differ country to country, but that's only because these things were cemented in place long before it mattered, and now it would be extremely difficult to change. But most countries have settled on a single plug/socket design, and that is due to government regulation.

Re: EU Gives Final Approval to Law That Will Force iPhone to Switch to USB-C

#66

Post by dwaite »

sneak wrote: post #5

I think Apple’s response will be to go port-free, like the Apple Watch. The eSIM move was one of the last steps.

I find a lot of people proposing this, like apple is just going to remove the ports in an immature act of spite.

In reality they will go for much more mature acts of spite, like ramp down data and power capabilities for "safety reasons" when not using an Apple-certified USB-C to C cable.

Re: EU Gives Final Approval to Law That Will Force iPhone to Switch to USB-C

#67

Post by 1123581321 »

josefx wrote: post #43
1123581321 wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That committee can easily hold the standard hostage unless the EU allows innovative manufacturers to prove new connectors in the real world.

Then lets hope that Apple doesn't get a vote, because they have been the only ones who have stubbornly kept fucking it up after the ultimatum was declared.

That’s a different problem. I also didn’t say Apple would be advancing a new connector. I could see Apple holding the standard back to their benefit as well as supporting an upstart manufacturer. It’ll probably depend on what MFI looks like from 2024 onward.

Re: EU Gives Final Approval to Law That Will Force iPhone to Switch to USB-C

#68

Post by rhaway84773 »

midoridensha wrote: post #58
josefx wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then lets hope that Apple doesn't get a vote, because they have been the only ones who have stubbornly kept fucking it up after the ultimatum was declared.

They can have a vote, just don't give them veto power like the way the UN Security Council works. Let's be real here: the only problematic manufacturer these days in this regard is Apple. Everyone else is happy to use USB these days and work with each other on further iterations of the USB spec. One vote from a bad actor out of many isn't going to affect anything.

Also, Apple is also happy to use USB-C for so many products.

Re: EU Gives Final Approval to Law That Will Force iPhone to Switch to USB-C

#69

Post by snehk »

midoridensha wrote: post #57
EMIRELADERO wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This law does not carve the USB-C into stone. There is a review mechanism and a mechanism for monitoring the market and approving another port in the future when it's time to do so. This is done through the USB Implementers Forum. All this law really, truly does is force manufacturers to sit around a table and work out a single solution for the whole electronics market. EU doesn't really care about USB-C or USB-D or…

>they just require industry to set aside pettiness and work out a solution.\ The problem isn't "the industry" being petty, it's Apple, and Apple alone. Everyone else got over their idiotic pettiness and attempts at proprietary connectors many, many years ago and jumped on the USB bandwagon.

To be fair, they all tried their own crappy adapters that were the same as everything else but simply incompatible due to the design of the thing.

Apple's lightning connector was simply better than what others offered. They had a data connector that worked upside down. They solved an annoyance users had, which is why the thing was so popular. It then took other cell phone manufacturers three years to implement that.

Re: EU Gives Final Approval to Law That Will Force iPhone to Switch to USB-C

#70

Post by kaba0 »

tiku wrote: post #21

I wonder how they will avoid it. Perhaps name their device a Personal Digital Assistent? It's easy to make a phone "virtual" inside the device nowadays.

Why would they want to avoid it in the first place?

My theory is that they just want to wait for the legislation so that this very minor change that may upset part of the userbase can be blamed on the EU squarely, and they are okay either way (nigh every other device they manufacture are using usb-c)

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