Expect iPhone 7 w/ Similar design and removed headphone jack this fall, Major changes next year for the 10th year Anniversary

[Funtoink63]

With APPLEs new trend removing every useful ports, this is quite relevant:

 

[dalekphalm]

Alright so I'm going to highlight a few choice points to comment on.

 

1 hour ago, RedRound2 said:

1. I didn't compare, I was just saying that's what 90% of people use and wireless is better than that which is good enough for most people 

Never said it was an innovation. I see this exactly as the times when they ditched stuff before and I've seen the result of it. 

Oh my god!!!

2. I was talking about when you remove headphones from your head, or earbuds from you ear, which is useful when someone suddenly starts talking to you. 

Yes except you completely ignored all my reasoning and points and went on repeating the same thing. I OWN one. Many people own them too. Me and all those people dont seem to have these issues you're talking about. Maybe it's a stupid idea, but since there's literally no progression in our little conversation, we'll wait and see where this goes

3. Yes, it requires a very meticulous planning, otherwise your whole life would fall apart. /s

The extent you go to disapprove a point it just absurd

Just wow. Since your point just stupid, I'm pretty sure untangling cables is a bigger nightmare

Which is why I said my usage patterns. 5% on my phone and once a week charging for my buds. Practically nothing for me and most people. Just the fact that it's wireless and you can run or cycle with it reason enough to outweigh that point

4. Never had this issue, even in my kitchen, a place with my two diffrent wifi signals overlapping, cordless phone and a microwave oven

I find Bluetooth better from personal experience and that's probably the only reason why I stand with Apple here. You want me to disapprove some of Apple's methods, sure just ask.

And again you bring up the battery. Battery was just a suggestion.

 

You claim to know how small phone components are and for some reason you still say that 3.5mm depth and a centimeter long insignificant. *facepalm

 

So I figure you haven't even read my entire post before. I thought I made it clear with my bullet points but nope you still keep repeating the same thing

You have better alternatives, not everyone especially with internet caps

I don't understand how you manage to mix so many things up. When I saying some things I only mean it whatever sentence it was used in. It doesn't have a deeper meaning like poem. You were talking about options, so I proposed we should've kept optical drives as many people still do use them. I am not supporting the fact that we should bring back optical drives nor that the fact I'm not aware of the numerous advantages it brought after its departure, but I only brought it up for a superficial comparison where you brought up that option were good.

 

I'm really getting tired of this now

5. Yeah, because everybody knows how to rip software game CDs or DRM protected music and movies

Really, Expected someone like you to know the fact that it's Apple who were always the ones to get rid of legacy tech all this time and it's no different now

You can also see google search results here

 

I'm done, I honestly don't wish to waste my time having this meaningless argument with you

Oh and I will make sure I will return to this after a 2-3 years to discuss what happens.

 

I still remember our similar argument where you claimed with your own chart about how we needed 800+ ppi phones in order not see any pixelation on phones. Thankfully, like I said almost everyone agrees 1080p is more than enough and industry has settled one step higher for 1440p. Now the only reason to move forward is VR something which we both didn't see coming at the time

 

1. I didn't compare, I was just saying that's what 90% of people use and wireless is better than that which is good enough for most people 

You're making a false equivalent here. You're saying "90% of people use shitty $5 earbuds, and wireless is better then that". But that's correct. You're explicitly stating here that "Wireless" is somehow better. A $5 Bluetooth Earbud is going to sound the same or worse, then a $5 3.5mm Earbud. And the only reason it would sound the same, is if the Bluetooth earbud manufacturer decided to take a smaller cut of profits.

 

You're comparing $80-$200 Bluetooth Earbuds with $5 (Free included w/ phone) Earbuds. That doesn't make Bluetooth superior. But rather, it simply means that buying more expensive headphones/earbuds in general will give you better performance.

 

Compare your $80 Bluetooth buds with comparably priced $80 3.5mm Earbuds, and the 3.5mm ones will sound AT LEAST AS GOOD, if not better. There will be less BOM costs (No bluetooth modules, etc), so more of the base material cost can go into better/bigger/higher quality drivers.
 

2. I was talking about when you remove headphones from your head, or earbuds from you ear, which is useful when someone suddenly starts talking to you. 

You know features like this can be enabled over 3.5mm, right? Smartphones already support simple commands via the analog signal (pause/play, forward, reverse, volume up/down, etc). If this was a highly sought after feature, headphone manufacturers could simply put a contact sensor on the headphones/buds that when sensing no head present, will send the "stop" command. And when it senses a head, will send the "play" command. Or you could do it with a button on the buds/headphones themselves (Oh wait, many headphones already have this with inline controls? Yeah. It's literally the exact same principle). This works pretty well, and is pretty ubiquitous with Android and iOS already.

 

3. Yes, it requires a very meticulous planning, otherwise your whole life would fall apart. /s

You making a sarcastic response rather than addressing the point logically, does not dismiss the point, or remove any merit from it.

 

People already have to schedule their lives around charging devices - eg: Charging your phone every night while asleep. Adding a set of bluetooth headphones to the mix is definitely going to cause issues with a lot of people - the convenience factor of always having your headphones/buds available at a moments notice is great.

 

For example, I keep my buds at work, and my headphones at home. I use the buds connected to the PC (Via the 3.5mm jack) all the time. Yet sometimes I will suddenly without warning need to bring my buds with me, if I'm taking a trip on short notice, etc. I don't need to worry about keeping this pair of buds charged. If I did, I might suddenly be unable to use the buds, because I just used them for 3 hours at work and they need a fresh charge.

 

4. Never had this issue, even in my kitchen, a place with my two diffrent wifi signals overlapping, cordless phone and a microwave oven

All of this is anecdotal evidence. The least we can do is acknowledge that. Try using your Bluetooth buds in a car in rush hour on a major highway. I often drive on the Highway 401 in Ontario (Busiest highway in the province, I believe), and I often encounter interference. Basically the music will just cut out for maybe 1/2 of a second, as Bluetooth hops frequencies to one without interference. But it can be pretty jarring if you're in the middle of your jam, and all of the sudden there's a 1/2 second skip. Now imagine Bluetooth being 10x as popular. It might not be an issue for you right now, but as more BT devices start to be used, it'll become a bigger issue.

 

5. Yeah, because everybody knows how to rip software game CDs or DRM protected music and movies

I'll give you that the average person doesn't know how to Rip Video Games or Movies, but music? C'mon. C'mmmmmmmmmmmooooooooon. Really? That is literally a feature of just about every major music player, including iTunes and WMP. Ripping CD's is literally one of the easiest tasks on a PC these days, especially if said software is pre-installed for the user.

 

But the point is that CD's and DVD's and optical media were replaced by a superior medium for most use-case scenarios: USB Drives. In most cases, when you used a physical disc, it was for one of several reasons:

1. You bought a product that came on CD: Most of those software were very small, several MB, often under 100MB. These can be downloaded very easily with minimal impact on Data Usage. Very seldom does a piece of software take up more then a few hundred MB. Those that do are the exception, not the rule.

2. You burned a CD to send/receive/move files: Obsolete in every way, since a USB drive can do this, and more, and they are re-usable. No more burning a one-off CD to hand in an assignment or to move some files to your laptop. No more messing with slow and error prone CD-RW discs. No more disc scratches rendering your data unreadable.

3. You bought a music CD: You can now download an entire CD Album for under 100MB off of iTunes or your music place of choice. Music streaming (Especially on YT, of all places) is also incredibly popular, so are online radio stations. CD sales have been going down for decades. This is a trend everyone saw coming.

4. You buy a Movie or Game: For the movie, in most cases, people still own Set-Top DVD or Blu-Ray players for their TV's. These players are cheap and offer additional functionality, such as simulating a "Smart TV" with apps, WIFI, etc. All of these devices are backwards compatible with the previous format (Eg: Blu-ray drives can read CD's and DVD's). For Desktop PC's, those who have bad internet will already have an Optical Drive, and will buy games in-store at places like GameStop.

 

The point being, the few that still buy optical media do so for niche reasons, and are by far the minority. This is non-equivalent to 3.5mm, because there are clear successor technologies in every case.

 

49 minutes ago, RedRound2 said:

Was talking about when you remove headphones from your head, or earbuds from your ear. Basically smart features

Incredibly useful when someone just starts talking to you suddenly

See above, this can be replicated using 3.5mm analog existing standards and technology. I assume it's not a very frequently asked for feature though, since I've rarely ever seen any implementation of it, even on BlueTooth (Aside from a pause/play button, which most Buds already have, just on the cable instead of at the ear).

43 minutes ago, ChineseChef said:

And how will the cheap $5 version of the new headphones offer this?  That is not "cheap" tech that they will throw in to the stock headphones that you get with your device.  So you are basically just listing expensive super fancy features, and claiming that they are normal on the cheap crap that the masses will use.

 

I am 100% certain that Apple will remove the 3.5 mm jack in the next few models of iPhone, but only because they want to force users to buy new Apple only headphones.  This has nothing to do with quality, only money.  It is business, that's all.  All the old tech you are using as examples were replaced by distinct advantages of the new method.  There is no distinct advantage any method has over the 3.5mm jack, without simply using a larger connector.  Wireless anything will never be better than wired, it isn't possible according to the laws of physics.  Any features you list, like pausing when you remove your ear buds, are a feature of that product, not a feature of the connection method.

I agree with just about everything being said here.

37 minutes ago, RedRound2 said:

I was talking about lightning headphones which are supposed to be more expensive as the person who buys it is going to buy it for its features and audio quality. Please read the context before you jump into conclusions

Arg, the same thing again just with different username. Read my last 4 posts

 

Yes but for audio there's a point where it becomes indistinguishable

So now you're basically saying "Well they will buy more expensive buds now". But why? You think the average person who spends $5 on replacement buds when they wreck their original iPod buds are going to spend $80+ on Bluetooth buds now? I don't think so. They'll buy the cheapest piece of shit they can. And it will sound worse over Bluetooth at the low-end of the price bracket.

 

If someone is looking for features and quality, they can get a BETTER DEAL on existing 3.5mm analog audio buds and headphones. Eg: My beyerdynamic MMX buds, which I got onsale for under $80, or my HD 598's, which no doubt blow away the Jaybird Bluebuds X, or whatever it's called.

18 minutes ago, RedRound2 said:

Because no one realizes it's good. Lawlz keep talking about interference when I don't have interference issue in my kitchen there are two wifi signals overlapping, cordless phone and a microwave oven.

3.5mm is so readily available that people don't explore other options. You want to force development, remove what is stopping it

3.5mm is not stopping Bluetooth development. It not being that useful to many people, plus the industry simply not caring, is what is stopping it.

 

If the only way to make the industry R&D more refined Bluetooth is to totally remove 3.5mm, then you have to question the benefit of Bluetooth to begin with.

 

As there are needs that 3.5mm cannot meet, manufacturers will find solutions. If that solution happens to be with Bluetooth, that's great! Artificially "killing" 3.5mm, because it's "analog and old", is 100% nonsensical. We've proved time and time again in this thread (And all the previous "get rid of 3.5mm" threads, that there are no actual benefits to removing the 3.5mm jack.

[79wjd]

3 hours ago, ChineseChef said:

And they still aren't ubiquitous.  What does that tell you?  That people obviously don't want them or don't need them, or enjoy what they are currently using.  Or maybe, just maybe, the 3.5mm jack is better in the opinion of most people.

That people are satisfied with whatever Apple/Samsung gives/sells them. The reason most people happily use Apple/Samsung earbuds is because they literally don't think more expensive headphones sound any better (because most have never tried them). Couple that with the fact that a lot of people buy the cheapest headphones they can because they manage to lose them constantly, and thirty pairs of SE215s/x2s every year becomes a bit pricey. 

 

 

To be clear, I'm not saying they should remove the 3.5mm jack. As much as I love my Bluetooth headphones I've become afraid to use them -- I can't help but think that having something transmitting hours of music on end pinned up against your head as being particularly heathy (at least for some people). Call me paranoid or crazy or whatever, but that's my personal feeling on the matter.

[Funtoink63]

8 minutes ago, djdwosk97 said:

That people are satisfied with whatever Apple/Samsung gives/sells them. The reason most people happily use Apple/Samsung earbuds is because they literally don't think more expensive headphones sound any better (because most have never tried them). Couple that with the fact that a lot of people buy the cheapest headphones they can because they manage to lose them constantly, and thirty pairs of SE215s/x2s every year becomes a bit pricey.

I personally don't use earbuds that comes with phones. Bought some cheap 10~20€ earbuds and they sound good enough for me.

[sof006]

Its obvious why Apple is doing this. They aren't doing it for any other reason than to make money. They'll deliberately release a special pair of headphones along side the phone or an adapter in order to use your own headphones at an extortionate price in order to make even more money. As Apple said themselves, all they care about is your money. 

 

 

[LAwLz]

1 hour ago, RedRound2 said:

I didn't compare, I was just saying that's what 90% of people use and wireless is better than that which is good enough for most people 

and a pair of wired earphones for the same price as your Bluetooth ones would be better than what 95% of people use. The reason why people use the crappy earphones they use is because they were free with their phone. Wanna know why they were free with the phone? Because they cost like 3 dollars to make. Manufacturers aren't going to start putting 100 dollar Bluetooth earphones in the box just because 3.5mm goes away. If anything they will try to make 3 dollar Bluetooth earphones, and at that price they will sound much worse than the wired ones.

 

1 hour ago, RedRound2 said:

I was talking about when you remove headphones from your head, or earbuds from you ear, which is useful when someone suddenly starts talking to you. 

Sorry, misunderstood you. This is possible with analog headphones as well. All the headphones needs to do is have a proximity sensor and then send the pause command (same as the command sent when you single click the control button on the cable) once it stops detecting your head. This would require a battery in the headphones, but since you are arguing for Bluetooth you obviously don't think that's a problem. It also sounds really gimmicky to me, but I understand that it was something you just though of and there are probably other things you could do with a digital connector. I listed new features as a benefit earlier in the thread.

 

1 hour ago, RedRound2 said:

Yes except you completely ignored all my reasoning and points and went on repeating the same thing. I OWN one. Many people own them too. Me and all those people dont seem to have these issues you're talking about. Maybe it's a stupid idea, but since there's literally no progression in our little conversation, we'll wait and see where this goes

But you do have all the issues I am talking about. It's just that you say you don't mind them. Not minding them is not the same as not having them.

I think there has been some progress in our conversation. You seem to have learned quite a bit about audio from it. The only way to win this battle (again the removal of the 3.5mm jack) is to educate people who think it is a good idea.

 

1 hour ago, RedRound2 said:

Yes, it requires a very meticulous planning, otherwise your whole life would fall apart. /s

The extent you go to disapprove a point it just absurd

I gave you a real world example of my use case, and why having battery powered earphones would not be as flexible as non-battery powered ones. So you don't even agree that you need to charge your battery powered earphones, and charging them requires at least a bit of planning? You have never had any situation where one of your battery powered devices had not been charged when you needed it? I have several times.

 

1 hour ago, RedRound2 said:

Just wow. Since your point just stupid, I'm pretty sure untangling cables is a bigger nightmare

Damn you got me. That is one benefit wireless earphones has over wired ones.

 

2 hours ago, RedRound2 said:

Which is why I said my usage patterns. 5% on my phone and once a week charging for my buds. Practically nothing for me and most people. Just the fact that it's wireless and you can run or cycle with it reason enough to outweigh that point

"Practically nothing" is still more than "nothing".

You can not run or cycle with wired headphones? I am not much of a cyclist but I run several times a week, and I use wired earphones without any issues.

 

2 hours ago, RedRound2 said:

Never had this issue, even in my kitchen, a place with my two diffrent wifi signals overlapping, cordless phone and a microwave oven

Well it is an issue for lots of people. If it wasn't then companies wouldn't make guides on how to avoid it, including Apple, right? No point in making a guide for how to potentially avoid an issue if nobody has the issue to begin with.

 

2 hours ago, RedRound2 said:

I find Bluetooth better from personal experience and that's probably the only reason why I stand with Apple here. You want me to disapprove some of Apple's methods, sure just ask.

Find it better in what way? Of course your 130 dollar Jaybird X2 will be better than 20 dollar earphones. It would be pathetic if they weren't. Now compare your Jaybirds to similarly priced wired earphones. What are the benefits/drawbacks then?

 

2 hours ago, RedRound2 said:

You claim to know how small phone components are and for some reason you still say that 3.5mm depth and a centimeter long insignificant. *facepalm

Yes and I also posted a picture of it showing how small it really is. People who tell you that 1cm long and 3.5mm thick is "big" are just being nice.

 

2 hours ago, RedRound2 said:

You have better alternatives, not everyone especially with internet caps

Like I said, you could rip it and put it on your HDD. If you have such a big CD collection that you can not fit all of it on your computer then it is most likely too big to carry with you anyway, in which case you can use an external optical drive.

But the difference is that we saved a tremendous amount of space by removing the optical drive. We are not saving anywhere near that amount by removing the 3.5mm jack.

 

3 hours ago, RedRound2 said:

I don't understand how you manage to mix so many things up. When I saying some things I only mean it whatever sentence it was used in. It doesn't have a deeper meaning like poem. You were talking about options, so I proposed we should've kept optical drives as many people still do use them. I am not supporting the fact that we should bring back optical drives nor that the fact I'm not aware of the numerous advantages it brought after its departure, but I only brought it up for a superficial comparison where you brought up that option were good.

So when you brought up optical drives you were not making an analogy? You were just bringing that up for no reason? The removal of the optical drive and the removal of the 3.5mm jack are completely different scenarios so it doesn't really make any sense to bring it up at all. Either you think the situations are similar and you brought it up to show a success story, or you don't think they are similar and you brought it up for no apparent reason. Which one is it? If it's the former then you're wrong, and if it's the latter then you are not making any sense with your posts.

 

4 hours ago, RedRound2 said:

Yeah, because everybody knows how to rip software game CDs or DRM protected music and movies

That's like saying we should not use Bluetooth headphones because not everyone knows how to pair their devices. Ripping is easy, and even if it wasn't it would only be the person's ignorance preventing him/her from doing it. Not like in this case where no matter how knowledgeable you are, you will be stuck with all the drawbacks. My knowledge of the Bluetooth protocol won't help me with the cost, or battery life, or sound quality disadvantages.

 

5 hours ago, RedRound2 said:

Really, Expected someone like you to know the fact that it's Apple who were always the ones to get rid of legacy tech all this time and it's no different now

You can also see google search results here

I don't think you understood what I was saying. I wasn't saying Apple were the first manufacturer to r move the optical drive. I was saying consumers had already started to buy less optical media.

Like that article points out, Apple did it near the end of 2012.

Here is a market statistic showing that optical media was starting to die as early as 2006. 6 years before Apple decided to remove it.

From 2006 to 2010 the sales of DVDs dropped by over 30%. Here are more statistics if you want to see it.

 

Killing off a dying technology when we have alternative with next to no drawbacks and huge benefits = totally fine.

Killing of a technology which is getting more and more popular, and replacing it with something that has next to no benefits but lots of drawbacks = not okay.

 

See the difference?

 

 

5 hours ago, RedRound2 said:

I still remember our similar argument where you claimed with your own chart about how we needed 800+ ppi phones in order not see any pixelation on phones. Thankfully, like I said almost everyone agrees 1080p is more than enough and industry has settled one step higher for 1440p. Now the only reason to move forward is VR something which we both didn't see coming at the time

Yes and that chart is still correct. Just because you did not understand it does not mean it was wrong. If you remember I also said that diminishing returns becomes greater and greater, and I thought that we should stop at 2560x1440 until battery and GPU technology catches up (which it seems like the rest of the industry agreed with).

The same graph also showed that if you were holding your phone 30 cm away from your face then we only needed 291 PPI with 20/20 vision, which is in line with what Apple claims too. For those of you who are interested, this is the post he is referring to.

 

 

4 hours ago, ChineseChef said:

Perhaps they do realize that wireless headphones are good.  Many of us have them.  I have some.  But you know what is great about the 3.5 mm jack?  It just works, 100% of the time.  No charging, no pairing, a billion different devices already have 3.5mm jacks on them.  All of the old devices that people already have, like cars, or home stereos, or headphones that people have already invested in, all of these things just work.  No firmware issues, no compatibility issues, cables and devices are cheap and reliable.

 

The argument for wireless devices is about the convenience of having no cables, that's it.  That is the only advantage of wireless over wired.  Because every other feature that wireless devices have, can be put on wired headphones.  Those extra features are simply a cost issue, not a wired vs wireless issue.  And wireless have numerous disadvantages compared to wired, charging/pairing/software or firmware version issues/device compatibility/potential interference in noisy RF environments/considerably more power usage.

It's not even about wired vs wireless, because phones being sold today has the option to use both.

The entire argument boils down to RedRound2 wanting 3.5mm gone so that:

1) We save a tiny bit of space inside the phone. I don't know what he wants to fill it with though.

2) He thinks that Bluetooth technology will get a huge boost and become better if we are forced to use it.

 

Those are the only two arguments for why we should throw 3.5mm under the bus. Tiny space savings (see my picture here if you are wondering how much space it takes up), and a wild assumption which doesn't address any of the technical limitations which can't be solved (higher cost, not backwards compatible, interference, higher power usage, issues with future codecs, sound quality, the list goes on).

 

At this point it feels like the conversation can be summed up like this:

One side: This is bad because X Y and Z. This is because A B and C.

Other side: I don't think so, and I like it so therefore it must be better.

[dalekphalm]

2 hours ago, LAwLz said:

and a pair of wired earphones for the same price as your Bluetooth ones would be better than what 95% of people use. The reason why people use the crappy earphones they use is because they were free with their phone. Wanna know why they were free with the phone? Because they cost like 3 dollars to make. Manufacturers aren't going to start putting 100 dollar Bluetooth earphones in the box just because 3.5mm goes away. If anything they will try to make 3 dollar Bluetooth earphones, and at that price they will sound much worse than the wired ones.

 

Sorry, misunderstood you. This is possible with analog headphones as well. All the headphones needs to do is have a proximity sensor and then send the pause command (same as the command sent when you single click the control button on the cable) once it stops detecting your head. This would require a battery in the headphones, but since you are arguing for Bluetooth you obviously don't think that's a problem. It also sounds really gimmicky to me, but I understand that it was something you just though of and there are probably other things you could do with a digital connector. I listed new features as a benefit earlier in the thread.

 

But you do have all the issues I am talking about. It's just that you say you don't mind them. Not minding them is not the same as not having them.

I think there has been some progress in our conversation. You seem to have learned quite a bit about audio from it. The only way to win this battle (again the removal of the 3.5mm jack) is to educate people who think it is a good idea.

 

I gave you a real world example of my use case, and why having battery powered earphones would not be as flexible as non-battery powered ones. So you don't even agree that you need to charge your battery powered earphones, and charging them requires at least a bit of planning? You have never had any situation where one of your battery powered devices had not been charged when you needed it? I have several times.

 

Damn you got me. That is one benefit wireless earphones has over wired ones.

 

"Practically nothing" is still more than "nothing".

You can not run or cycle with wired headphones? I am not much of a cyclist but I run several times a week, and I use wired earphones without any issues.

 

Well it is an issue for lots of people. If it wasn't then companies wouldn't make guides on how to avoid it, including Apple, right? No point in making a guide for how to potentially avoid an issue if nobody has the issue to begin with.

 

Find it better in what way? Of course your 130 dollar Jaybird X2 will be better than 20 dollar earphones. It would be pathetic if they weren't. Now compare your Jaybirds to similarly priced wired earphones. What are the benefits/drawbacks then?

 

Yes and I also posted a picture of it showing how small it really is. People who tell you that 1cm long and 3.5mm thick is "big" are just being nice.

 

Like I said, you could rip it and put it on your HDD. If you have such a big CD collection that you can not fit all of it on your computer then it is most likely too big to carry with you anyway, in which case you can use an external optical drive.

But the difference is that we saved a tremendous amount of space by removing the optical drive. We are not saving anywhere near that amount by removing the 3.5mm jack.

 

So when you brought up optical drives you were not making an analogy? You were just bringing that up for no reason? The removal of the optical drive and the removal of the 3.5mm jack are completely different scenarios so it doesn't really make any sense to bring it up at all. Either you think the situations are similar and you brought it up to show a success story, or you don't think they are similar and you brought it up for no apparent reason. Which one is it? If it's the former then you're wrong, and if it's the latter then you are not making any sense with your posts.

 

 

That's like saying we should not use Bluetooth headphones because not everyone knows how to pair their devices. Ripping is easy, and even if it wasn't it would only be the person's ignorance preventing him/her from doing it. Not like in this case where no matter how knowledgeable you are, you will be stuck with all the drawbacks. My knowledge of the Bluetooth protocol won't help me with the cost, or battery life, or sound quality disadvantages.

 

 

I don't think you understood what I was saying. I wasn't saying Apple were the first manufacturer to r move the optical drive. I was saying consumers had already started to buy less optical media.

Like that article points out, Apple did it near the end of 2012.

Here is a market statistic showing that optical media was starting to die as early as 2006. 6 years before Apple decided to remove it.

From 2006 to 2010 the sales of DVDs dropped by over 30%. Here are more statistics if you want to see it.

 

Killing off a dying technology when we have alternative with next to no drawbacks and huge benefits = totally fine.

Killing of a technology which is getting more and more popular, and replacing it with something that has next to no benefits but lots of drawbacks = not okay.

 

See the difference?

 

 

 

 

Yes and that chart is still correct. Just because you did not understand it does not mean it was wrong. If you remember I also said that diminishing returns becomes greater and greater, and I thought that we should stop at 2560x1440 until battery and GPU technology catches up (which it seems like the rest of the industry agreed with).

The same graph also showed that if you were holding your phone 30 cm away from your face then we only needed 291 PPI with 20/20 vision, which is in line with what Apple claims too. For those of you who are interested, this is the post he is referring to.

 

 

 

It's not even about wired vs wireless, because phones being sold today has the option to use both.

The entire argument boils down to RedRound2 wanting 3.5mm gone so that:

1) We save a tiny bit of space inside the phone. I don't know what he wants to fill it with though.

2) He thinks that Bluetooth technology will get a huge boost and become better if we are forced to use it.

 

Those are the only two arguments for why we should throw 3.5mm under the bus. Tiny space savings (see my picture here if you are wondering how much space it takes up), and a wild assumption which doesn't address any of the technical limitations which can't be solved (higher cost, not backwards compatible, interference, higher power usage, issues with future codecs, sound quality, the list goes on).

 

At this point it feels like the conversation can be summed up like this:

One side: This is bad because X Y and Z. This is because A B and C.

Other side: I don't think so, and I like it so therefore it must be better.

i 100% agree with your post...

 

But can we just note here that in 2005 - 2005! VHS movies were still making around ~$2.5Bn USD a year? Two point five. Billion. The same amount that Blu-Ray was bringing in by 2010?

 

That's insane.

 

Of course, people like my Dad are one of the reasons why. He kept buying VHS tapes well into the 2000's, and he still has a VHS player. And my sister continued to record TV shows onto VHS tape to watch at a later date until, well, a not very long ago time that is too embarrassing to state.

 

Back on topic: Unfortunately, this argument is going nowhere, because the other side does not appear to be willing to have a rational and logical discussion, and will not acknowledge it when evidence contradicts their statements.

 

I still think it's ridiculous, since there's literally no good reason to remove the 3.5mm jack.

[Dabombinable]

5 minutes ago, dalekphalm said:

i 100% agree with your post...

 

But can we just note here that in 2005 - 2005! VHS movies were still making around ~$2.5Bn USD a year? Two point five. Billion. The same amount that Blu-Ray was bringing in by 2010?

 

That's insane.

 

Of course, people like my Dad are one of the reasons why. He kept buying VHS tapes well into the 2000's, and he still has a VHS player. And my sister continued to record TV shows onto VHS tape to watch at a later date until, well, a not very long ago time that is too embarrassing to state.

 

Back on topic: Unfortunately, this argument is going nowhere, because the other side does not appear to be willing to have a rational and logical discussion, and will not acknowledge it when evidence contradicts their statements.

 

I still think it's ridiculous, since there's literally no good reason to remove the 3.5mm jack.

I'm one of the people who tried converting VHS to DVD...and had 2x combo DVD/VHS player/recorder die within 3 years with little use.....

[dalekphalm]

2 minutes ago, Dabombinable said:

I'm one of the people who tried converting VHS to DVD...and had 2x combo DVD/VHS player/recorder die within 3 years with little use.....

I found that most VHS/DVD recorder combo devices were pretty shoddy in terms of build quality.

 

Not to mention that the conversion process was of incredibly low quality. When you get right down to it, VHS just had a terrible video quality, and the audio wasn't much better either. They looked alright if played on an SD CRT TV, but once you played it back on an actual HDTV, you could see the difference between a VHS ripped DVD and the actual retail DVD, like night and day.

[Dabombinable]

2 minutes ago, dalekphalm said:

I found that most VHS/DVD recorder combo devices were pretty shoddy in terms of build quality.

 

Not to mention that the conversion process was of incredibly low quality. When you get right down to it, VHS just had a terrible video quality, and the audio wasn't much better either. They looked alright if played on an SD CRT TV, but once you played it back on an actual HDTV, you could see the difference between a VHS ripped DVD and the actual retail DVD, like night and day.

Yeah...the last combo player/recorder apparently did some sort of upscaling. Damn shame that the DVD drive-which had little use and made the discs get really hot after half an hours use-died turning into a VHS only player.

[Belgarathian]

I can summarise this entire thread in a sentence: When Apple removes something it must be for financial gain, rather than progress. 

[Dabombinable]

1 minute ago, Belgarathian said:

I can summarise this entire thread in a sentence: When Apple removes something it must be for financial gain, rather than progress. 

It is. As myself and others have said-there is no replacement for the 3.5mm audio jack. At all. Bluetooth is only an alternative that only has 1 advantage-no cables. And the lightning connector, or indeed a USB C connector has no advantage at all.

[Belgarathian]

9 minutes ago, Dabombinable said:

It is. As myself and others have said-there is no replacement for the 3.5mm audio jack. At all. Bluetooth is only an alternative that only has 1 advantage-no cables. And the lightning connector, or indeed a USB C connector has no advantage at all.

Bluetooth (particularly with 5.0 and Aptx) has the advantage of sending the audio over a digital signal meaning that the DAC in the headphone is handling the conversion. If you spend good money on a bluetooth headphone, the DAC/AMP is likely to be better than the one in the phone. 

 

I'll agree with you when you can provide evidence that removing the DVD drive from the Macbook line was a financial decision, rather than an aesthetic one. 

 

I agree... The USB-C and Lightning connector to my knowledge isn't capable of delivering an analogue signal to an external audio device, and will instead require a 3rd device to convert the signal. However, moving forward there is a raft of ways this can be handled and I'm looking forward to it as the restriction on the 3.5mm is the inbuild DAC in the phone restricting audio quality.

 

I completely agree that there is no real reason to remove this other than they want to make the phone thinner, or need a smaller PCB by removing the DAC as they already have Lightning and USB-C so there is no reason the phone can't have both. 

 

 

[79wjd]

11 minutes ago, Belgarathian said:

Bluetooth (particularly with 5.0 and Aptx) has the advantage of sending the audio over a digital signal meaning that the DAC in the headphone is handling the conversion. If you spend good money on a bluetooth headphone, the DAC/AMP is likely to be better than the one in the phone.  

 

I agree... The USB-C and Lightning connector to my knowledge isn't capable of delivering an analogue signal to an external audio device, and will instead require a 3rd device to convert the signal. However, moving forward there is a raft of ways this can be handled and I'm looking forward to it as the restriction on the 3.5mm is the inbuild DAC in the phone restricting audio quality.

 

You can also buy headphones with a DAC/AMP and run off of lightning/USB-C. As of right now, no bluetooth headphones even come close to a decent pair of IEMs, and even as they do get better, then wired will always be superior (or at worst equivalent) and cheaper.

 

USB-C has an analog pinout (I don't remember which article had mentioned that, but one of them said it back when the rumors first started to surface). 

 

The onboard DAC isn't exactly restricting audio quality (unless of course you're using a very high end pair of headphones), but rather the fact that speaker technology is quite mature at this point and as a result doesn't see much if any real advancements. 

[Dabombinable]

20 minutes ago, Belgarathian said:

Bluetooth (particularly with 5.0 and Aptx) has the advantage of sending the audio over a digital signal meaning that the DAC in the headphone is handling the conversion. If you spend good money on a bluetooth headphone, the DAC/AMP is likely to be better than the one in the phone. 

 

I'll agree with you when you can provide evidence that removing the DVD drive from the Macbook line was a financial decision, rather than an aesthetic one. 

 

I agree... The USB-C and Lightning connector to my knowledge isn't capable of delivering an analogue signal to an external audio device, and will instead require a 3rd device to convert the signal. However, moving forward there is a raft of ways this can be handled and I'm looking forward to it as the restriction on the 3.5mm is the inbuild DAC in the phone restricting audio quality.

 

I completely agree that there is no real reason to remove this other than they want to make the phone thinner, or need a smaller PCB by removing the DAC as they already have Lightning and USB-C so there is no reason the phone can't have both. 

 

 

With Bluetooth headsets you pay more for less.....which is why despite Bluetooth audio being an option for over a decade it still isn't popular.

[Belgarathian]

39 minutes ago, Dabombinable said:

With Bluetooth headsets you pay more for less.....which is why despite Bluetooth audio being an option for over a decade it still isn't popular.

* excluding battery, DAC, and Bluetooth wireless receiver

 

Jokes aside, you definitely pay a premium for Bluetooth headphones. 

[Trixanity]

7 hours ago, Belgarathian said:

Bluetooth (particularly with 5.0 and Aptx) has the advantage of sending the audio over a digital signal meaning that the DAC in the headphone is handling the conversion. If you spend good money on a bluetooth headphone, the DAC/AMP is likely to be better than the one in the phone. 

 

I'll agree with you when you can provide evidence that removing the DVD drive from the Macbook line was a financial decision, rather than an aesthetic one. 

 

I agree... The USB-C and Lightning connector to my knowledge isn't capable of delivering an analogue signal to an external audio device, and will instead require a 3rd device to convert the signal. However, moving forward there is a raft of ways this can be handled and I'm looking forward to it as the restriction on the 3.5mm is the inbuild DAC in the phone restricting audio quality.

 

I completely agree that there is no real reason to remove this other than they want to make the phone thinner, or need a smaller PCB by removing the DAC as they already have Lightning and USB-C so there is no reason the phone can't have both. 

 

 

The whole DAC argument is ridiculous. You need a DAC regardless of what connector or technology you use. It all comes down to how good it is. If the external one surpasses the internal one, then any headphone will sound better. Some Smartphone vendors actually include very good DACs, so external isn't necessary. Apple just got complacent on that. 

 

Sure, it was aesthetic but I have two words for you: App Store. 

 

Bluetooth is the same story as USB/Lightning: digital. They will all need external DACs. And will have it. So it's the same argument again. 

 

Oh and not all devices support aptx and aptx is basically an attempt to make Bluetooth audio somewhat reasonable. Cable is still preferable.