181–190 of 350 posts
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The dongle: probably has a poor quality DAC, gets lost easily, and prevents the phone from being charged or tethered to a computer.
Does it actually have a DAC, or does it just provide a physical interface to one of the Lightning pins which gets connected to a DAC inside the phone?
The headphone jack is still there, it just has to be accessed via the dongle. It's gone from being physically on the device, but the capability is not gone.
I think a post like this undermines EFF's credibility. Steve Jobs has railed against DRM for music and finally was able to get it. iTunes music has been DRM-free for years now. Why would Apple back out on DRM-free music?
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Apple has been very good at predicting (or perhaps directly causing) the demise of certain technologies: the disk drive, the CD drive, the ethernet port. They removed them much to the chagrin of many a loyal customer, and a few years later they nearly ceased to exist across the entire industry (we're still waiting on the ethernet port to go away but give it time). How many times will it take you forgetting your dongl…
Floppy disks, optical disks, ethernet were all replaced by unencumbered standards and they all lead to a superior experience (well, maybe not ethernet, but there are definitly advantages to wireless). If you're old enough to have used a floppy disk drive you do not miss them. Any time you introduce two way communication, you introduce the possibility of DRM, but that does not guarantee it. I can still use my HDMI wit…
I am, and I do. Floppies were ubiquitous, durable, reusable, and cheap enough to give away. There's no replacement today - flash drives are the closest thing but when was the last time someone handed you one with no expectation of getting it back? Or bought a box of 50?
Sneakernet became much less vibrant with the death of the floppy.
The lack of a headphone jack is simply yet another excellent reason not to buy an iPhone. What confuses me is why so many people continue to buy Apple products when they're overpriced, locked-down and treat developers like crap.
Apple seems to provide confidentiality, if you buy their marketing, and Google is much more open/free. These should be, IMO, fundamentals of IT, but it's not even a realistic option.
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>> "3) Removing the 3.5mm pretty much means Apple is exiting professional audio because it's now incompatible with 100% of everything." They removed it from the phone, nothing else. In what scenario are you using an iPhone with custom IEM's in a professional audio setting?
I think Apple seriously underestimates its appeal towards creatives. I've been buying Apple products for 10 years because of their ease-of-use with creative software. As they slowly move away from PC's and professional media standards I see their market share diminishing. They are heading down the path of lowest common denominator just like Microsoft in the early 2000's. I expect the same fate awaits them as someone…
HeadphoneJackGate is really a damning indictment of the tech industry. The usability of Apple products for ordinary people has been sliding downhill for years due to trendy-but-idiotic features like hidden UI, flat UI, and gestures (and various abominations combining the three). But the lack of a headphone jack (a total non-issue thanks to the included adapter) is what the tech press gets worked up over...
If apple honestly wanted digital audio they would have used the universal USB-C standard for the future. Apple wants customer lock-in to their platform and using lightning will prevent customers from leaving because these customers have invested a lot in their ecosystem. Ditching the lightning and moving to USB-C was the right thing to do, converting everything to lightning isn't.
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> If you are recording stuff from your iPhone using the 3.5mm jack you are already suboptimal perhaps even to the bluetooth. This isn't true at all, unless your hardware is legitimately bad. All but the worst cables and amplifier chains can carry a 20 kHz signal (again, we're talking audio here -- that's basically D/C to modern electronics) at better than the ~45dB signal/noise ratio needed by the ADC on the other si…
Interesting, the reverse is true in my car, which probably says more about the stock head unit than anything.
> When you plug an audio cable into a smartphone, it just works. No, hardware-wise you're still going through a DAC, and the complex audio subsystem of the OS is still deciding, upon receiving the connection signal, to re-route the application audio through that headphone DAC. Or not. Jack or Lightning doesn't change this. > Apple can choose which manufacturers get to create Lightning-compatible audio devices. Sure.…
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So exclusive releases for specific hardware IDs are feasible. A not so far fetched Scenario extending on the exclusive iTunes release practice: Popular new Artist - New Album: Listen before everyone else exclusively on beats
Hasn't Apple for a decade fought against DRM the music companies insists on?