Was ditching the headphone jack a good idea?

https://www.soundguys.com/was-ditching-the-headphone-jack-a-good-idea-13825/

by bunderbunder • 8 years ago

294 534 8 years ago

peapicker2• 8 years ago

I say no. I use my iPhone heavily as a synth or guitar processor etc. Bluetooth latency is too high to make it useable wirelessly so I require a hardwire into a mixer to perform. The iPhone has the lowest latency audio stack of smartphones when used with a wire. This is important and removing the headphone jack means dongles or latency. What makes this especially bad is that the iPhone camera connector dongle is already required when plugging in many MIDI controllers. This has prevented me from upgrading beyond my 6s as many of my apps are challenged without a real-time audio output that doesn’t also use my lightning connector which I need for the camera connector.

village-idiot6• 8 years ago

While that’s quite unfortunate for you, is this a use case that affects a lot of users? I imagine that people in your situation are far less common than those who think the bundled headphones are good enough.

exabrial3• 8 years ago

Hardly an edge case. Consider the revenue generated by the Line6 Helix or Headrush and their many clones; it's a substantial revenue generator for these companies. Most live music musicians also purchase custom molded IEMs to protect their hearing and listen to a click track. Digital wireless audio simply does not work here. Even major brands like Sennheiser forgo digital transmission on their monitoring wireless packs because 5ms of latency is enough to induce combfiltering and throw a performer off.

imtringued2• 8 years ago

Well, at a minimum, it affects all people that want to play video games.

wilsonfiifi• 8 years ago

Or you could just use an iPad or iPad mini?

martin-adams• 8 years ago

I feel your pain. I can’t use an external mic with my iPhone on a gimbal because the dongle causes a gap meaning it won’t balance.

These aren’t mainstream problems, but are problems nonetheless.

I don’t mind using a dongle, as long as it works. In my case, there is no solution. That Why I still use my old Samsung on the gimbal.

panic• 8 years ago

Maybe these aren't mainstream problems, but they do reflect a change in Apple's brand. Apple used to position themselves as the brand for artists, musicians, and other creative types. They even used to hide an optical audio port in the MacBook Pro headphone jack -- talk about a niche feature!

But around the same time iPhones lost their headphone jack, the laptops lost their optical port: https://appleinsider.com/articles/16/11/02/new-macbook-pro-d.... I'm sure it's ultimately because Tim doesn't care as much as Steve about this stuff, but it does feel like something is being lost.

swingline-7472• 8 years ago

I'm using the headphone jack right now connecting to wireless headphones with a failed Bluetooth section. The headphones will be sent back to the mfgr for warranty service.

TheSpiceIsLife• 8 years ago

All the current and past iPad models come with 3.5mm headphone jack.

So I suppose Apple would just want you to buy an iPad as well! for your music production.

cm21872• 8 years ago

All the rumors I heard point to apple ditching the headphone jack in the coming model.

avcdsuia• 8 years ago

Will Apple ditch Lightning and switch to USB Type-C solve your problem?

cptskippy2• 8 years ago

That would probably make it worse since USB-C audio is such a mess right now.

SSLy3• 8 years ago

Have you checked the Samsung Galaxy S8/Note8 line? It seems that these phones include a customized sound framework for very low processing delays, AND they include jacks. Google for Soundcamp.

fogetti• 8 years ago

That looks really cool. Thanks for recommending it here!

peapicker2• 8 years ago

The other problem with Android is due to sideloading and app hacking, the best pro level apps (which are expensive for apps) have mostly chosen to avoid Android rather than experience high levels of piracy the last time I researched it. (KORG Gadget for example doesn’t exist on Android)

delinka3• 8 years ago

This is the rub. With the removal of the jack, Apple is telling us that their phones are not [music/audio] creators' tools. Apparently it's their desire that creators use, what, iPad? Their ever-disappointing line of laptops? The outdated Mac Pro? I just don't know.

I do know that from the entire collection of screen sizes and hardware configuration options I'd like to choose my mode of creation, but Apple seems to think that telling me "iPhone is not a creation device" is Just Fine®.

tazjin• 8 years ago

Apparently it's their desire that creators use, what, iPad? Their ever-disappointing line of laptops? The outdated Mac Pro? I just don't know.

Or maybe ... none of the above? Content creators are probably a tiny fraction of Apple's user base at this point. I think they just don't care.

ummonk3• 8 years ago

It's the same thing as the Macbook Pro. Not to mention letting the Mac Pro stagnate. They seem to have abandoned power users and decided to focus on mass consumers.

pier25• 8 years ago

Not really. I you are a content creator you should probably use a dedicated AD box connected via lightning instead.

dplgk• 8 years ago

I'm with you but you can't say you would have used an iPhone if it had a jack yet a Mac pro or laptop won't cut it for processing power.

tlarkworthy2• 8 years ago

My wife dropped her phone down the toilet. It survived! So the no Jack was a big win for her.

The article is missing that very reasonable use case for no Jack.

pgo• 8 years ago

There is no correlation in being waterproof and not having a headphone jack. Several phones have both

tlarkworthy2• 8 years ago

It's one of of the quoted reasons at least: https://www.macrumors.com/2016/09/07/apple-explains-headphon...

inpdx• 8 years ago

Plenty of IP68 phones have headphone jacks.

exabrial3• 8 years ago

Samsung has had waterproof headphone jacks for years. My LG v35 has a quite nice "Quad DAC" and a waterproof headphone jack. It's absurd to think that Apple has eleventy billion dollars but can't design a waterproof headphone jack.

lake99• 8 years ago

I would wash my old Moto G under a tap whenever it looked a bit dirty. It had a jack. Plenty of phones that have jacks are waterproof.

village-idiot6• 8 years ago

Had mine in my short pockets while wet wading and the damn camera flooded and died. I’m less than thrilled with apples waterproofing, headphone jack or no.

hayksaakian• 8 years ago

Does anyone truly believe they removed the headphone jack for any reason other than to sell more dongles and more wireless headphones?

schrodinger2• 8 years ago

Yes, I do.

CoolGuySteve• 8 years ago

There is marginally more volume for the battery and camera/sensor array to take up. I'd rather have a thicker phone, especially one where the cameras don't protrude out the back, but I don't get to design these things.

village-idiot6• 8 years ago

I’d accept more thickness for a more durable phone, personally.

0xFACEFEED• 8 years ago

So I've tried using several bluetooth headphones before Airpods were around. They all sucked. Things like audio stuttering while inches away from the transmitter and short battery life is what made them suck. I gave up on bluetooth headphones for good; I hated them. Oh and the convenience of wireless wasn't even that important to me (or so I thought).

Now I have a pair of airpods and I love them. The improvement is marginal, but it's an improvement that touches many aspects of my life (commuting, cooking, sleeping, working). I love, love, love them.

Does anyone truly believe they removed the headphone jack for any reason other than to sell more dongles and more wireless headphones?

I think Apple believes that wireless headphones are the future and they decided to prove that it can be done right. IMO they succeeded with airpods.

Removing the headphone jack was a forcing function. It's only an issue if you don't buy into the Apple ecosystem. Obviously that's a risk, but it's a risk that Apple has taken before.

Assuming it's some kind of cockameme plan to sell more dongles doesn't really fit the profile of Apple as a company, IMO.

foepys• 8 years ago

Bluetooth headphones are only really good since Bluetooth 4 and its Low Energy standard. Everything before used too much power and connections were to fragile, as you noticed.

If you tried other Bluetooth headphones than the Airpods now, you would also notice the better battery life. My work headphones (over-ear) only need to be charged on the weekend after over 40h of use and they are very light, too.

pmlnr2• 8 years ago

I used a 15gbp bluetooth headphone 6 years ago without any problems on both linux and android; battery life was fine, even sound quality was acceptable. Colleagues have been using Bose ones for years. Apple didn't fix anything.

evil-olive• 8 years ago

Yes. I've worked on phones in the past (Amazon's ill-fated Fire Phone) and there was no pressure that I perceived to sell more third-party accessories. There was, however, a very tangible pressure to make the phone thinner and lighter, and at the same time to pack it full of more shiny-seeming software features.

It's entirely conceivable, based on my experience, that removal of the headphone jack is attributable to ignorance and not to malice.

baddox3• 8 years ago

Ignorance of what? I’m sure they knew some people would be upset about the decision, but they must have predicted that it would be worth it for their bottom line and aggregate customer satisfaction. And I have seen no data suggesting that their prediction was incorrect.

jimmaswell• 8 years ago

What reason is there to chase more thinness? Phones are thin and light enough as is. I'd rather my phone not blow away in the wind if I set it down outside.

smegger001• 8 years ago

Does anyone actually want it thinner and lighter or is that just an assumption we have had and never questioned? I mean most people end up putting their device in a case anyway to protect it already. They are to structurally flimsy and fragile. Hell otterbox is valued at 2.5 billion and all they sell are thick bulky phone cases. A inch thick phone would be fine and have more room for battery, storage, etc, etc, etc... and still have room to have a sturdy case and most people wouldn't care.

millstone• 8 years ago

I think they did it for the reason they gave: the headphone jack is a burden for small PCB layouts.

There's lots of reasons to believe that removing the jack is NOT meant to drive accessory revenue:

1. They included the dongles in the box for years, and still sell them at $9.

2. They include compatible headphones in every box.

3. iPhones are compatible with all wireless headphones.

baddox3• 8 years ago

Yes. I believe they did it for several reasons, and while selling more accessories is probably one reason, I suspect it’s a fairly insignificant one. I can’t imagine that dongle sales affect their bottom line much, and while AirPods are a big hit, that probably would have been the case regardless of the headphone jack removal.

I suspect the two most significant reasons were to reduce manufacturing cost/complexity and to improve reliability (one less physical port to get dirty and break, one less entry point for water damage).

threeseed8• 8 years ago

You missed the most significant reason of all: space.

Headphone jacks take up quite a bit of space that can be used to improve battery life.

jesseschalken• 8 years ago

The headphone jack is one of the last remaining analog connections in consumer electronics and its death is long overdue.

mnd999• 8 years ago

Planning on getting your ears replace with a digital implant as well?

imtringued2• 8 years ago

Speakers are purely analog devices. The work on digital speakers has begun a century ago in 1920 and still hasn't yielded any usable consumer products. Moving the digital to analog converter into the speaker doesn't change anything. We will have analog speakers for at least another century.

Now if you were talking purely about the connector itself. Whatever wireless technology was forced upon the population is not actually capable of replacing a wired connection.

* Bluetooth doesn't work in crowded environments. * Standard Bluetooth sound quality is inferior without proprietary extensions to the protocol. * Latency between device and headphone can be massive (500ms to 100ms), * You have to recharge it. * Devices have to be paired and sometimes "unpair" for no reason.

Bluetooth just sucks for audio. I'm sure there are hundreds of wireless technologies that are better than bluetooth, otherwise these proprietary extensions wouldn't exist.

You can in theory get <32ms latency with a special obscure subvariant of a proprietary standard of bluetooth (aka aptX LL) that no one has ever heard of for which you need a certain dongle and your headphone must support it. (hint your phone and headphones don't support it)

threeseed8• 8 years ago

Anyone who believes this needs to sit down and think it through.

Apple's success depends on the iPhone. Without it their services businesses become useless, their retail presence becomes an albatross, peripheral devices like Apple Watch, AppleTV start to look a lot less useful and forget about future growth in AR/VR. And so the idea that Apple would compromise all of that just to make a comparatively tiny hundred million or so is just crazy. And Tim Cook is anything but crazy.

The fact is that the market is moving towards wireless for everything. Audio included. And 99.999% of the world aren't audiophiles who can tell the difference (or even care if they can) between BT and non BT audio. So why waste valuable phone space for an insignificant number of people when you can improve battery life by say 5% ?

slededit• 8 years ago

Microsoft does it all the time. They risked their entire Office franchise during the mobile transition to try and push win mobile.

Most companies try to leverage their market position in this way. To not do it would be unusual.

s_dev2• 8 years ago

Anyone who has felt a tug at their head from headphones getting snagged by something accidently is quickly sold to the merits of wireless.

pritambaral3• 8 years ago

Then let them use wireless. Let those who want to use wired keep using wired. The question isn't "Should we keep wireless?".

hanief• 8 years ago

Apple is pursuing the wireless future, as simple as that. Be it audio, data transfer, or even power. In the case of headphone jack, they pursue that goal by fixing the bluetooth flaws not by content with what we have right now. Is it a worthy goal to pursue? Time will tell.

pieterk• 8 years ago

Exactly, this was a logical progression to that future. Want to make a completely wireless device? Take away the things that are easy to do wirelessly. First: audio, then power, next up is...?

StreamBright3• 8 years ago

I am not against the future but shouldn't we have the alternative ready before we kill the 'previous' version of something? For me the new wireless headphones are not an option because of lack of hi-fi options and because of the need of charging frequently. If we had the same exact experience (great sound quality for lossless and once a year charging) than I would be more inclined to buy it.

baddox3• 8 years ago

Caring about hi-fi headphone audio and needing to charge frequently while listening to audio is probably a combination of requirements that affects an extremely tiny portion of iPhone users. Also, there’s wireless charging.

threeseed8• 8 years ago

But you're part of an insignificant minority.

People charge their phone everyday so it isn't a massive deal to charge your AirPods as well. And the sound quality right now is more than good enough especially given that you're asking people to tradeoff their data usage.

ryanlol• 8 years ago

I’m not really familiar with the DACs in past iphones, but I’d be really surprised if you had any “hi-fi” options available via the 3.5mm jack.

jen729w• 8 years ago

They’re also striving for the future where your phone is measurably, obviously thinner than 3.5mm. As in thin-enough-to-wear-on-your-sleeve thin.

It’s a long game, but I think part of their rationale is that we had to get rid of that thing eventually — which is inarguable, IMHO — and so the earlier, the better. If you’re forced to make wireless headphones that don’t suck, you will.

blattimwind4• 8 years ago

It's like a car manufacturer removing the engine, because "they're striving for an EV future", they just don't know how to build an EV car yet, so now you get one with no engine at all. Shotgun gets a hand crank. Onwards, Mr. Flintstone.

brigade• 8 years ago

Unfortunately, low latency Bluetooth codecs are fragmented between AptX, which can achieve 32ms latency but isn’t supported by iOS, and AAC which isn’t generally supported by accessories, especially the low latency variant.

So you’re basically stuck with AirPods or new Beats if you want low latency Bluetooth headphones for an iPhone. And this seems unlikely to change.

pariahHN• 8 years ago

Wireless is a terrible thing to base the future on. With wired you don't have to worry about interference or the fact that anyone with the right antenna can send/receive wireless. Of course it isn't always practical to use wired, but I think the majority of connection use cases work perfectly fine with a cable, don't need to be made wireless, and are in fact made worse by the usage of wireless.

You're trusting/hoping that [0] will never happen, or (for WiFi) that [1] will never happen. At least with most Internet usage there are additional layers involved that have their own security which can protect your in flight data, but the firmware on BT/WiFi chipsets doesn't necessarily have that sort of layered security.

I'd call it a dangerous goal.

[0] https://www.theverge.com/2017/9/12/16294904/bluetooth-hack-e...

[1] https://www.krackattacks.com/

exabrial3• 8 years ago

Is there enough bandwidth available in a cubicle farm or 787 for everyone to use their airpods?

I doubt it. Headphone jack was a nice reliable piece of hardware. Thank goodness some other brands are rooted in reality.

newsbinator• 8 years ago

That's a good question.

What number of AirPods users would there have to be on a 787 for the interference to become a problem?

threeseed8• 8 years ago

Headphone jack is a nice reliable piece of hardware. But it comes at the expense of more space for batteries or features that more people will use.

Ethernet is more reliable than WiFi. Power is more reliable than batteries. But the world doesn't want wires so Apple has to listen.

e1ven• 8 years ago

A) They could make it thicker. It’s not an either/or.

B) No one was calling for the elimination of the headphone jack. Every poll shows broad support for it. Apple themselves said it took ‘courage’ which is not the adjective you’d use to describe an action that the world agrees with.

coupdejarnac• 8 years ago

The strange parts guy on youtube added a headphone jack to the iPhone 7. So, I think the stated reason for removing the headphone jack to make room for the battery is complete BS.

https://youtu.be/utfbE3_uAMA

Also, why are you responding to the question about limited RF spectrum? It's like you have an agenda in this thread.

NeedMoreTea3• 8 years ago

OnePlus did a poll that got the answer 88% of customers wanted them to keep the headphone jack. Which they then got rid of anyway. Presumably the poll was hoped or expected to reinforce a decision already made.

It's very clear consumers aren't clamouring for losing the jack. There are a lot more dollars selling wireless and they have an inherent limited life thanks to battery lifespan.

The SE, with a headphone jack, is roughly the same thickness as the new XS without. They both have bluetooth for those who might like wireless.

That's not Apple or whoever listening, that's them imposing.

reustle• 8 years ago

Comparing the headphone jack and Ethernet port is silly. A great majority of users use the jack for headphones which are always within 1 meter of the device. Ethernet is often much further away, meaning wireless adds more value / convenience.

po1nter• 8 years ago

But it comes at the expense of more space for batteries or features that more people will use.

Yet Samsung did fit a 4000 mAh battery, a headphone jack, wireless charging, expendable storage, fingerprint sensor, 512Gb of storage AND a PEN in their IP68 Note 9.

discordance• 8 years ago

Anyone that has walked through Shinjuku, Tokyo or Shinagawa station in peak hour with Bluetooth headphones will be able to confirm that there is not enough spectrum.

I get audio drop outs with airpods everytime I pass through one of the above stations.

bschwindHN• 8 years ago

Oh wow that's good to know, I pass through Shinjuku every day but I don't have bluetooth headphones.

raverbashing• 8 years ago

Good job Apple!

Funny how they really should have worried about this but apparently haven't.

But you can still use the lightning earphones that come together (or buy a dongle, since the newer model phones are dropping the adapter). 3rd party dongles are cheaper and some allow you to charge and listen to music at the same time.

pjmlp5• 8 years ago

Are they even allowed to use them on the 787?!

I fly regularly and have yet to be on a EU flight where Bluetooth is allowed.

And even for wlan only since one year we started to get planes where it is allowed at cruise altitude.

tachion• 8 years ago

Since a year or two in entire EU using any electronic devices is completely allowed (except for a takeoff and landing but that's for security reasons in case of emergency) so I'm not sure where are you flying. I've been using my Momentums' without a single issue for few years now and I fly a lot.

madeofpalk6• 8 years ago

I fly regularly and have yet to be on a EU flight where Bluetooth is allowed.

Really? Am I missing something? I've never been pulled up on using bluetooth headphones on a plane in the EU. The flight attendants have never said anything, and I've been in full view of them before...

cimmanom4• 8 years ago

Or a crowded subway car. Or a midtown NYC street at 8:45am. Argh.

Apple, not everyone lives in the suburbs and uses their phones primarily at home or in personal vehicles.

semitext• 8 years ago

I am amazed this issue isn't raised more often. The majority of my headphone usage is in downtown San Francisco. Any wireless headphones will break up like every other second. For my purposes they are useless.

jpalomaki2• 8 years ago

Some adaptive system for adjusting the transmission power might help. Now I can leave my phone on the desk and wonder to the other floor and other end of the apartment with my AirPods working just fine.

Or do they already have something like this?

jkabrg2• 8 years ago

Problem with non-wireless headphones is that they break. One side of the headphones stops playing sounds; you can sometimes spin the connector and get the sound back, but that gets annoying, and it stops working eventually. The less wires and connectors, the less things can break, no?

Casseres2• 8 years ago

The less wires and connectors

They probably require a wire to be charged.

They also lose charge when it's least convenient.

threeseed8• 8 years ago

It uses the same wire you use to charge your phone.

And so it isn't like you're carrying anything extra.

TheOtherHobbes3• 8 years ago

No. Bluetooth is far more hit and miss than a physical connection.

threeseed8• 8 years ago

Not with AirPods it isn't. Hence its popularity.

And as someone who has owned many IEMs over the long term those cables all end up breaking. And for IEMs with replaceable cables it's the connectors that break.

zokier2• 8 years ago

While it is true that headphone cables are prone to failure, from electronics point of view Bluetooth ones are massively more complex beasts, and almost certainly will have limited lifetime (batteries can last only so long). In comparison 40 year old headphones can work perfectly fine together with modern equipment, something I would not expect from wireless headphones of today.

Also repairing a cable is really easy task generally, and there is even easier solution available: make the cable replaceable, i.e. have it also be connectorized on the headphone end.

jkabrg2• 8 years ago

repairing a cable is really easy task generally

Highly subjective. Some people have other hobbies.

make the cable replaceable, i.e. have it also be connectorized on the headphone end.

I might try that.

gaspoweredcat6• 8 years ago

most half decent headphones these days have a standardised cable connection so replacing or upgrading the cable is very easy and can be cheap.

wireless however have other issues, what of the battery? over time it will wear like any battery does and their runtime will significantly decrease, changing the cable on a pair of wired phones will be a lot less hassle than cracking open your wireless phones to replace the battery

not to mention the fact that wireless devices have far more tech in them that could go wrong, a pair of wired headphones are fairly simple devices, theres a whole lot more tech inside a pair of bluetooth phones (battery, charging circuit, bluetooth components etc) and while theyre wireless theyll still have to be charged by way of a cable somehow so like a pair of wired phones they still have a wire, its just used for charging rather than sound but that doesnt mean it cant break just the same

toxik3• 8 years ago

AirPods, which I think is sort of a good reference here, charges wirelessly too. We’ll ser about the battery life though, I suspect you’re right about them eventually needing replacing. Likely a very difficult repair too!

pdkl952• 8 years ago

Cheaply made products that break easily are always a problem; there are certainly a lot of terrible headphones on the market, with or without wires.

However, the problem you are describing:

One side of the headphones stops playing sounds; you can sometimes spin the connector and get the sound back, [...] and it stops working eventually.

I suspect that might be terrible quality wires, not necessarily the headphones. The quality of patch cable at the usual big-box consumer stores has fallen dramatically over the last ~5-10 years. It can be really difficult to find a cable hasn't changed the outer protective wrapping from traditional softer rubber(?) to some sort of cheap plastic. The wrapping on the new cables can harden badly over as little as 2-3 months, leading to sharp kinks/bends forming over time that break the delicate wires inside.

The newer cables also tend to lack protective stiffeners at the ends for protection against damaging the wires if the cables is pulled at a right angle to the connector.

Once the wire has started to break, you might be able to get it working again for a while by turning the connector (if the break is at or near the connector) or otherwise moving the cable until the broken ends of the conductor touch.

On the other hand, most of the cables that I bought in the late-80s/early-90s still work fine. (they never formed permanent kinds) The problem is race-to-the-bottom we're seeing everywhere as businesses try to squeeze every last cent out their products. This will happen to wireless headphones eventually, but for now they are in a honeymoon period where they are still a "new(-ish) tech" that is experimenting with new designs. Eventually the value engineers and must-meet-growth-targets management will get around to "optimizing" their quality and longevity too.

stordoff• 8 years ago

The wrapping on the new cables can harden badly over as little as 2-3 months

Exactly what happened to my headphones. I end up replacing the cable every 6-12 months. Fortunately user-replaceable cables make it almost a non-issue.

blattimwind4• 8 years ago

traditional softer rubber(?)

FWIW audio cables in consumer stores were pretty much always PVC, though, as you like many other people discovered, there are quality plastics and cheap plastics. The former will last quite a number of years before turning hard and brittle, the latter won't, smells badly and probably gives you cancer for free, too.

Speaker, microphone and guitar cables for studio / stage use often have rubber sheathing (~neoprene), though many are just higher quality PVC.

The newer cables also tend to lack protective stiffeners at the ends for protection against damaging the wires if the cables is pulled at a right angle to the connector.

Using the tiniest of ferrules seems to be a conscious design choice, though incorrect material and manufacture are commonly seen as well. In any case, a bad design that's poorly manufactured is not going to work.

As usual, non-consumer products don't have the problem, at all.

The problem is race-to-the-bottom we're seeing everywhere as businesses try to squeeze every last cent out their products.

While that's certainly true, the ali/bangood-mentality also has to do with it. "Oh look, I can get $thisThing for 2.5 $ delivered from China, which normally costs 10 $". A compounding problem is of course, that the 10 $ store item is the same as the 2.5 $ Ali item, so you actually need to turn to the proper online store to get the quality matching price point.

tobyhinloopen• 8 years ago

Was using light text on a bright background a good idea?

No.

jwilk• 8 years ago

I added this to my Firefox's userContent.css:

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mrob• 8 years ago

I use Firefox's Reader View to fix low contrast text. You need to edit userContent.css to get the full contrast:

    @-moz-document url-prefix("about:reader") {
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If Reader View doesn't work, it's usually easy to find the font color CSS in the Web Developer tools.

gaspoweredcat6• 8 years ago

no it was not, some of us still like our high quality wired headphones. with that said im also a great believer in having a dedicated device, while ill occasionally use my phone for convenience i generally use a separate device for music as it can provide much better sound quality and not hammer my phones already under capable battery but im a little more serious about my audio than most people.

it does however highlight an interesting point, most portable devices make a consideration for air travel in their design, the dell xps15 for example has a 97wh battery because 99wh is the limit for taking into an airplane cabin, yet turn on airplane mode on your phone and it disables all wireless connections, bluetooth included so if you were relying on your airpods to provide your in flight music youre out of luck

beojan2• 8 years ago

You can turn on airplane mode, then turn Bluetooth on specifically.

gaspoweredcat6• 8 years ago

is that an iphone specific feature? (im an android user so not that familiar with ios) if not ive just not noticed it before

i guess it highlights how stupid the ban on wireless connectivity on planes is (not like it wasnt blatantly obvious that theyd never let a vehicle carrying hundreds of lives into the sky with unsheilded components that could be brought down by anyone with a ten quid nokia)

pjmlp5• 8 years ago

Bluetooth is not allowed in EU flights, at least I am yet to board on a plane where it was explicitly allowed.

nopacience• 8 years ago

I like wires. Every time i can, i choose to use a wire. Be it for internet or headphones.

The reason for my wired preference is security. I trust cables more than i trust wireless.

Bluetooth is insecure. I dont think it is secure to walk around in a mall with your bluetooth turned on. (correct me if i am wrong)

Wifi WPA2 is probably secure. However wifi WEP is completely insecure. For many years WEP has been widely used. Another problem with wifi are fake networks that use the same name as a public network.

Another interesting fact with wired headphones is they wont fall down directly on the floor, because of the wires. The same goes with the computer mouse.. sometimes it moves to the edge of the table and might want to fall.. the wire will hold it.

Wireless keyboards is definitively a no go since teorically its possible to passively listen for pressed keys just like a keylogger.

Wireless technology sure looks better without all the wires, however when people choose convenience(wireless), they lose some security.

So when i can, i choose wires.

IshKebab• 8 years ago

I dont think it is secure to walk around in a mall with your bluetooth turned on. (correct me if i am wrong)

You are wrong. I don't recall any Bluetooth security issues from just having Bluetooth on or from having an established connection. Those things are pretty well solved in all vaguely modern wireless standards.

The issues are always around the initial connection and key exchange. PIN-based pairing has various flaws in Bluetooth, but Bluetooth headphones use "Just Works" pairing, which I don't think has had any issues, other than the design compromise that it is vulnerable to MitM. That is vanishingly unlikely to happen with Bluetooth headphones though.

WPA2 is secure if you use a very strong password. WEP is basically extinct.

tsxxst• 8 years ago

Just a year ago, a remote execution vulnerability was discovered in bluetooth stacks across major OSes: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2017/09/12/bluetooth_bugs_bede...

"Just having Bluetooth on puts you at risk," said Izrael.

pritambaral3• 8 years ago

Wifi WPA2 is probably secure.

The WPA2 standard is not secure against key reinstallation attacks, which can be used to decrypt packets in an MitM position. Most implementations of WPA2, though, have patched themselves in a backwards-compatible manner since discovery of this vulnerability.

The IEEE has put out WPA3 which fixes this vulnerability (among other changes).

See: https://www.krackattacks.com/

blattimwind4• 8 years ago

Wer Funk kennt, nimmt Kabel.

Well that and I have some very nice headphones that I am obviously not going to ditch because some smartphone removes the single world-wide standard socket in existence...

walterbell2• 8 years ago

Yes, the iPad Smart Connector offers a secure (wired) mobile keyboard, unlike Bluetooth.

You can also use wired Ethernet with iPad, the performance is unreal.

mnm1• 8 years ago

I've never met a Bluetooth device that connected and worked 100% of the time like wired headphones do. $10 headphones these days sound like $100 headphones from ten years ago. The technology has already peaked. There's no reason to spend more or to settle for a technology like Bluetooth that fails to work on a consistent basis. None whatsoever. I will never choose to buy a phone without a headphone jack because of that. It's that simple. Not to mention the low audio quality of Bluetooth. This is definitely an example of an inferior technology being pushed out simply for profits to replace a superior one.

megakwood• 8 years ago

To paraphrase Doc Brown, "Where we're going, we don't need headphone jacks"

Airpods are awesome, and they'll only get better. A cord running to your pocket is seriously a thing of the past, and all these posts will age terribly. Just like the serial port ones, the floppy ones, the cd rom ones...

And for all this noise, what I can't for the life of my understand is why these people can't just use a god damn adapter. They make high quality DAC ones, too. Just leave it attached to your headphones. What's the damn problem? The rest of us get a better, thinner phone.

KozmoNau74• 8 years ago

Great, so now I've got a dongle attached to my earphones. How about the PA or stereo I need to plug in to, in order to stream music?

Should I just always carry a spare dongle in my pocket? Or rely on everyone having the appropriate Lightning/USB-C dongle already? Or maybe just use the industry standard 3.5mm jack, because it always Just Works.

bambax• 8 years ago

Did you read peapicker's comment before posting your own? (It's older by an hour). Some people need wired headphones and if the port is used for something else then they can't.

Also it's completely untrue that the iPhone is "thinner" without a headphone jack; this guy added a jack to an iPhone 7 without external modification:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=utfbE3_uAMA

The video has over 6M views.

Apple doesn't care much about their users -- but it's hard to blame them, since said users are apparently happy with it.

AnthonBerg2• 8 years ago

Is the modified phone as waterproof as before?

speedplane• 8 years ago

The annoying thing about wireless headphones is that it’s yet another thing you need to charge. We need truly easy wireless charging to make it effortless.

lifeformed• 8 years ago

It's not thinner. Maybe by a few microns?

blattimwind4• 8 years ago

What's the damn problem? The rest of us get a better, thinner phone.

If you bothered to look at the specs, you'd have noticed this not to be true.

KozmoNau74• 8 years ago

It was an absolutely terrible idea. I use the headphone jack on my phone every single day, either for my high-quality earphones that I'm not in a hurry to replace, or for plugging in to a PA or stereo at a party, to stream music.

I don't want to carry a single around, and the 3.5mm jack is the standard for analog stereo audio.

lemiffe• 8 years ago

Not only audio, but now my selfie stick is irrelevant!

KozmoNau74• 8 years ago

Dongle, not single. Silly autocorrect.

swingline-7472• 8 years ago

It's possible to make an iPhone 6S 16 GiB into 256 GiB with a chip programmer and swapping BGA chips. Cost for the chip is around $50 USD.

peterbraden• 8 years ago

I'm more angry at google for removing them from the pixel than for apple.

I want to vote with my dollars, but at the moment the options for phones with headphone jacks and no crapware preinstalled are exceedingly limited.

heavenlyhash• 8 years ago

the options for phones with headphone jacks and no crapware preinstalled are exceedingly limited.

A thousand times this. The current market for phones is absolute crap. We need more competition. (And we also need at least some of that competition to quit playing "follow the leader" when the "leader" is an imagined title, and the "leader" is clearly blind and thrashing...)

cycrutchfield• 8 years ago

Blind and thrashing its way to record profits and share price. Apparently plenty of people do not share your opinion about Apple phones.

zouhair3• 8 years ago

Well Samsung phones with LineageOS[0] are more than decent.

[0] https://wiki.lineageos.org/devices/

walterbell2• 8 years ago

Nokia 6.1 (Android ONE)

Blackberry KEY2 / KEY2 LE

Both have headphone jack, dual SIM (or SIM + micro SD) and monthly updates.

BB even has a keyboard!

imandride• 8 years ago

I have found OnePlus does the trick for me. I actually prefer if it to any of the mainstream phones.

marcolussetti• 8 years ago

I gather OnePlus is removing the jack in the 6T though.

opencl3• 8 years ago

Android One has at least helped expand the options for phones with no crapware and a reasonable update policy. A decent number of them still have jacks.

LG G7 One

Xiaomi A1/A2 Lite

Moto X4

Nokia 6.1/6.1+/7+

petra2• 8 years ago

Ids update policy still an issue, after "project Treble"?

kart232• 8 years ago

Yeah, they made a bunch of jokes/roasts about apple removing the headphone jack, and still having one on the pixel, and then just removed it on the pixel 2. Tech hypocrisy at its finest.

FireBeyond• 8 years ago

Kinda like Jobs on the iPad? "If you see a stylus, someone did something wrong"?

BurritoAlPastor2• 8 years ago

I'm pretty disgruntled about losing the 3.5mm jack, but I don't buy this idea that Apple did it to sell wireless Beats, for one reason: the product lineup sucks.

Apple knows how to make truly great audio hardware; the AirPods really are extraordinary. But the Beats lineup clearly hasn't received any serious attention, as evidenced by two things:

1) they still sell wireless hardware that doesn't have the W1 chip, two years after it was first released

2) for God's sake, all their devices charge over micro-USB!

robin_reala• 8 years ago

Re 2), the Beats X charge over Lightning.

user59944613• 8 years ago

>> but I don't buy this idea that Apple did it to sell wireless Beats, for one reason: the product lineup sucks.

Counter argument. The product lineup sucks so they had to help the sales in any way possible.

theonemind2• 8 years ago

Well, the article shows that Beats still has a plurality in the bluetooth market in sales dollars and units sold. Beats quality aside, I think that still makes a highly plausible (partial) motivation to push people toward bluetooth.

teknico• 8 years ago

Nope. Nor is grey text.

VintageCool• 8 years ago

Reading these threads, I feel like I am the only person in the world who has had problems with headphones jacks.

There's a big scuzzy pop when you plug in or remove the jack while speakers are on.

I've had several devices get crud in the jack, so that you have to rotate and push and position the jack just right to get sound.

Still, I appreciate having the wire and I wish that USB-C headphones had done better. I would have liked to get phones with two USB-C ports.

CodeWriter232• 8 years ago

You’re not the only one. But now I feel like I’m the only one who has the exact same issues with Lightning connections.

I get the same pop when jacking in using the Lightning-to-3.5 dongle. And I mean, making the 3.5 connection first, Lightning second.

Also, Lighting (and I suspect USB C) female connectors are dust, lint, and particulate magnets. What happens when those get fouled, the gold plating on the Lightning cable is scraped off one or more of the pins. So then you have either a broken cable or one that will charge but only if oriented correctly. So same issue, rotate the connector and maybe it works.

AND the thing that pisses me off the most...I have to carry around some old earbuds with the 3.5 in case I want to watch some Netflix on my MacBook Pro because I can’t plug my new EarPids into it. There’s no Lightning jack on any Mac. And there’s not even a dongle for that use case. All the USB M to Lightning F are for charging only.

toxik3• 8 years ago

Huh, I got 3.5mm earphones and an adapter with my phone. Also, get AirPods. Unless you call for several hours uninterrupted every day, like somebody up thread claimed.

helpfulTroll• 8 years ago

There are a few reasons it was a terrible idea:

  - You can't take lightning headphones 
    and use them as headphones in all 
    lightning ports.

  - You can't take lightning headphones
    and use them on any other Apple 
    product other then modern, premium 
    iPhones.

  - It doesn't enable compatibility with 
    other new Apple products. In fact, it
    hinders compatibility with USB-C ports
    in newer Apple laptops. *What?*

  - If Apple went all-in on USB-C with 
    laptops, the lightning port on new
    iPhones feels like either an anachronism
    or accentuates the lock-in attempt.

  - Bluetooth really isn't very good, not
    at a level that guarantees perfect,
    continuous audio streams. It's not 
    an ideal step up from a good, durable wire.

  - Air pods and  other headphone upgrades
    are double disposable, in that, not only
    are they particularly expensive options,
    but easily lost, stolen or destroyed.
    Laundry and drop hazards, above and beyond 
    theft, basically add constant anxiety to 
    the total cost of ownership for air pods 
    in particular.

  - General inconvenience of replacement 
    forces odd work-around strategies for 
    times when you can't find your headphones.
    If you're running late, and you lost them
    in the couch cushions or under the bed, 
    what are your options?

I can think of a number of additional diminishingly valuable what-ifs, but you get the point. Life always turns out better with the widely adopted standardized options, since headphones take on the primary expendable accessory, and the alternatives are hemmed in, such that they're always worse.

But now what? It's just going to be this irritating thing, until an excuse lets Apple back down while saving face.

Whatever.

DanielBMarkham• 8 years ago

I'll never forget when I realized people were paying for ringtones. Why the heck would you do that? I just downloaded some and stuck them on my phone.

Then I bought Star Wars and watched it at home. VHS for the win! Then the same frickin' movie came out on DVD. I decided to buy it. Why would I do that? Because I was sold on the feature combination of DVDs. Then BluRay. I bought again. Why? The movie had new features, and BluRay was more cool.

I had become those people I was laughing at with the ringtones, spending money for stuff that either should be free or was basically worthless. I love movies. I have a lot of movies in various formats. But re-mixes of the same stupid movie? I'm being taken for a ride.

Now they keep the same movie, the same plot, the same hardware -- but re-make it with currently-popular actors. Why would people pay for this....I asked myself as I sat in the movie theater a couple of months ago.

There's less and less "new people creating new things that enriches society" and more and more "You bought X, you'll really love X1!"

Anybody that doesn't know where headphoneless-phones is going hasn't been paying attention. Ten years from now, when they've finally locked down DRM audio from the seller to the actual device you listen to it on? They'll be charging you multiple times to listen to the same sound.

Plus they make money on the hardware. Double bonus points for getting you on a hardware upgrade gravy train also locked in by vendor.

talltimtom• 8 years ago

What the people who keep complaining about this don’t realize and will never realize is that there are tons of users who prefer the new Jack and will never have any issues with it at all. You keep arguing about this “fiasco” but in reality Apple is fine, the majority of users are happy and this is all just an imagined issue like when they introduced the iPhone which would fail because it was just an iPod with a phone in it, or the touchscreen that would never be able to compete with tactile keyboards or the tablet that didn’t even run a proper desktop operating system.

xte• 8 years ago

No. Simply because it have many use, from music play with external stereo to mobile-POS (credit card payment via audio/dummy modem) etc.

dabbledash• 8 years ago

I was not irritated by the thickness or weight of my iPhone 6 and its headphone jack. I am regularly irritated by the fact that I can’t charge my iPhone and plug in headphones at the same time.

Obviously I can plan around this, but it’s gone from something I don’t have to think about to something I have to think about.

annamargot2• 8 years ago

Agreed. Wireless charging would be helpful.

anonu• 8 years ago

Does wireless charging meet the same performance levels of wired charging? Doesn't it take much longer to do an induction charge? It's like a lose lose here. Poorer audio quality with bluetooth, slower charging with wireless....

cimmanom4• 8 years ago

Won’t do you much good, though when you’re trying to charge and listen while waking or in a moving vehicle. Unless what you mean is contactless charging - which would be ... interesting ... in public spaces (street or transit).

mauvehaus• 8 years ago

This was originally going to read "Phenomenally stupid question, but why hasn't somebody brought out an adapter cable that provides both charging and a 3.5mm jack?"

But I figured I should google first. Does anybody have any firsthand experience with Belkin's adapter that lets you do both simultaneously? Asking since my wife's work phone just got "upgraded" and we found ourselves unable to listen to a podcast on our last road trip.

Big_crimpin• 8 years ago

You may find this helpful

https://www.theverge.com/circuitbreaker/2018/5/18/17369236/a...

If you're on Android the answer is no, there's no way to do it.

sprite• 8 years ago

I use the belkin adapter in my car and it works well.

mortenjorck• 8 years ago

Somewhat ironically, iPhones have only gotten thicker since the abandonment of the headphone jack. The iPhone X/XS, XS Max, and XR are all thicker than the 6/6S.

https://www.apple.com/iphone/compare/

ianai2• 8 years ago

Wow makes me think it’s more for water sealing than form.

jseliger• 8 years ago

I just bought one of these: https://www.belkin.com/us/p/P-F8J198/. Yes, it's yet another annoying dongle, but there are options out there.

WillPostForFood5• 8 years ago

The photo at you link sums up the modern confused apple ecosystem for many of us, a big mess of wires, dongles, adapters, and chargers.

https://www.belkin.com/resources/img/overview/f8j198/belkin-...

philjohn14• 8 years ago

It wasn't about thickness - the taptic engine takes up the space that would have otherwise been used for the headphone jack. I would also wager that it makes waterproofing to IP68 somewhat harder (not impossible).

fouc• 8 years ago

I wonder if anyone with a jackless iPhone compensates by carrying an iPod nano for listening to music with?

grvdrm• 8 years ago

Absolutely. I’ve kept my nano for years.

tomduncalf• 8 years ago

Ended up attaching my dongle to my headphones with a Velcro cable tie after forgetting it one too many times (I need to take it on and off all the time to connect it to my Mac, as it doesn’t have a Lightning port - the fact that that situation exists feels like an omen that Apple aren’t quite firing on all cylinders). It sucks and looks stupid but it kind of solves the problem.

I wish they’d not removed the port, it’s a real pain and I’m not willing to go wireless until there’s a way to do it with zero latency. I’ll be really disappointed if the new iPad removes the headphone socket as it’s pretty essential for music making on the go.

Feeble• 8 years ago

I use a dongle too. I got it permanently attached on my headphones.

i think he makes a false dichotomy in his article. He is not bringing up a dongle at all and makes the choice to either a phone with a 3.5mm output or bluetooth. I would give this more credibility if this was discussed as well.

philjohn14• 8 years ago

It was called out in the comments, and a link provided to the product page on Apple.com with nothing more than a "nuh-uh" to accompany it.

pornel• 8 years ago

I've got AirPods and I'm sold. I'm not going back to wired headphones.

Apple has got proximity-based pairing nailed so well, it's easier than plugging a jack in. I can connect to other iPhones as easily as mine. Macs logged in to my iCloud don't need pairing at all. It works like it should, not like a typical Bluetooth crap.

The charging case is more convenient to carry than a bundle of wires. And of course I can walk around, zip my jacket, etc. without minding the wire.

It's more expensive, proprietary, it doesn't work well for some people. But I can definitely see why having AirPods Apple thought wired headphones are the next floppy drive.

p0la• 8 years ago

On point

insickness• 8 years ago

I loved everything about the AirPods except that they have no noise reduction. The New York City subway is loud as hell. Street noise is loud as hell. Even when not wearing headphones I wear earplugs to block out all the noise.

naravara• 8 years ago

The BeatsX are earplug type headphones that do decent sound isolation. They’re not as snazzy as the AirPods and they have some minor UX frustrations, but for the most part have been pretty good.

drngdds• 8 years ago

I don't understand the appeal at all of headphones with no noise reduction. How does anyone use them in a noisy environment without setting the volume uncomfortably high?

kgwxd• 8 years ago

None of that requires there to be no jack. Im on the phone for hours at a time, need my hands and speaker isn't an option. Batteries are a real concern and getting a backup pair would be expensive.

douglaswlance2• 8 years ago

AirPods warn you when they're low (it requires a considerable amount of time in-ear to get them low, about 4+ hours), then if you pop them in the case for 5 minutes, you get 45 minutes of play time.

Battery life is rarely a concern for me, and I wear my AirPods almost constantly. I even sometimes sleep with them.

onedognight• 8 years ago

The trick for the AirPods is duty cycling such that there is no down time. You put one in the case when the tone sounds, put it pack in your ear a few minutes later, and then charge the other one. You can be on a single call all day.

softwaredoug2• 8 years ago

I find AirPods to be a disappointing product.

The pairing isn’t great IMO. So many calls take a minute to figure out AirPod connectivity issues. It’s frustrating switching airpods between a Mac and iPhone. Much of the time only left or right pair, and the only way to fix it is to put them back in the case and re-pair them. Sadly it doesn’t “just work”

Another common problem is the mics tend to rust out after about a year of usage, eventually breaking down. This happens if you use them for any exercise (which apple advertises them for) with sweat rusting the mesh on the bottom.

Eventually I switched back to a manual headphone cable with a mic built in. It always works...

11235813213• 8 years ago

The switching between iOS and Mac is indeed buggy. macOS also lacks system-wide support for airplay 2. I think they must be dealing with legacy code and/or support that needs modernized. Switching between iOS and iPad with AirPods doesn’t give people issues, so I don’t think it’s a problem with AirPod hardware or iOS.

Rhe sweat problem is interesting! I haven’t experienced this degradation, but I think my head’s sweat mostly runs off my nose. Is it because of how your hair is styled?

madeofpalk6• 8 years ago

I love my AirPods. I find them fairly comfortable and the audio quality is fine, perfect for podcasts (theory: the rise of AirPods and rise of podcasts are related).

However, AirPods don't require the removal of the headphone jack! The removal of the headphone jack is still so consumer hostile: it serves zero benefit to anyone apart from bluetooth accessory makers. If Apple really was serious about advancing bluetooth headphones, they would at least license the W1 for the pairing magic to other manufacturers.

Good Bluetooth headphones AND headphone jacks can exist at the same time! Anyone arguing for the removal of headphone jacks aren't grounded in any sort of reality tbh.

tjoff2• 8 years ago

Agree, I love wireless audio and I've used decent bluetooth headphones on and off for a decade now. But that still makes the removal of the headphone jack a disaster and I miss it every day.

Apples user might have become accustomed to the dongle life but it is unbearable. Also, my non-standard dongle have started to glitch and buying a new one costs about 100x more than it is worth. Go figure.

It might have felt better if there was a reason for it. But no, there is absolutely no sane reason to ditch it other than forcing people to buy wireless peripherals. And that is just unacceptable. Too bad alternatives are running out.

This is all also under the assumption that bluetooth is good enough. It isn't.

This is also under the assumption that bluetooth is secure. It isn't.

wilsonnb33• 8 years ago

Anyone arguing for the removal of headphone jacks aren't grounded in any sort of reality tbh.

The problem is that there isn’t really a good argument to keep the headphone jack. It’s a redundant port because lightning/usbC and Bluetooth both handle audio. You would need a strong justification to keep it when you could use that space for other stuff in the phone.

imcoconut• 8 years ago

However, AirPods don't require the removal of the headphone jack! The removal of the headphone jack is still so consumer hostile

This is key. When they removed the disc drive in the macbooks there was a decent argument to be made about more space for other ports (or reduced thickness). But the 3.5 mm headphone jack is literally... 3.5 mm, right? Another commentor even pointed out that the new iphones are thicker than the 6 line. I just dont ubderstand the argument here.

sfifs2• 8 years ago

Well Airpods work perfectly well with my Galaxy S8. You don't need Apple phones to use them.

And my S8 also has 3.5mm jack for when my 2 hour calls exhaust the airpods battery or when I want to push a drum track from my phone synth to a speaker :-)

rocqua• 8 years ago

I considered airpods with my s9. In the end, lightning charging was why I didn't. I dont want 3 kinds of chargers.

tokyodude• 8 years ago

this is not my experience. my MacBook often refuses to connect to my airpods. rebooting usually fixes it. sometimes I have to re-pair. then I also can't use them with other devices.

they also cut out quite often probably because I live in a crowded downtown area.

when they work I mostly like them but sadly for me they don't always work.

karmajunkie• 8 years ago

Man, I really find myself on the opposite end of the spectrum here. The only thing I love about my airports is the charging case. Size wise it's great.

However, airpods are uncomfortable, always feel like they're going to fall out. I've already had to replace one of them because they're easily lost. The sound quality is so-so. I have to crank the volume way up because there isn't any kind of noise isolation, much less noise cancellation.

All around they're a very very average product offering.

woutr_be2• 8 years ago

Same experience here, don't think I'll ever be able to go back to wired headphones. Especially in the gym / when running, the AirPods are amazing, they fit perfectly (unlike a lot of other headphones), never run out of battery and connect instantly to my devices.

I believe Apple made the right move, many other manufacturers are already following, bluetooth headphones are getting cheaper and quality is getting better.

glittery• 8 years ago

Not sure I understand - wired headphones are much cheaper to manufacture, are inherently higher quality (they'll always have less loss and less latency), can fit just as well, don't have batteries to begin with, and are much easier to connect to devices. The only point that makes any sense to me is that wireless headphones are better for exercise, but why would Apple remove the audio jack just to indirectly improve the state of wireless audio for when people exercise?

cannonedhamster• 8 years ago

Can you replace the battery in your airpods? No? So you mean you're literally buying something to throw away every 5 years or so? How environmentally friendly, but I'm sure Apple is glad you've decided to make paying them a regular part of your life. Nothing about removing the headphone jacks had a point other than to increase profits. The phones are thicker, waterproof phones have headphone jacks, they parts are cheap, the next big thing isn't really a drop in replacement or better yet.

einrealist2• 8 years ago

I am still pissed at Apple for removing the jack and I held on to my iPhone 6s, until now. I ordered myself an iPhone Xs Max, but only because Shure now offers a Lightning cable for their IEMs. I use the SE846. The biggest issue with the Xs is still, that I cant charge and listen at the same time without using a dongle. And since I travel a lot, this could make me reconsider to buy Apple in the future.

Apple really lost points for removing the jack.

komeijist2• 8 years ago

Not pissed enough to reconsider the heavy iphone xs max investment apparently, which, in the end, might have made a difference compared to continuously feeding them money.

einrealist2• 8 years ago

That's true. For me, the advantages of a stable Apple ecosystem outweigh the issue with the missing headphone jack. The fact that I can still use and upgrade my iPhone 6s is validation. With Android, I always fear that I don't get updates anymore after just two years. And I never liked Google's app store. There too many malicious apps in the store.

I probably use the new iPhone at least as long as I used the old one. The update cycles are getting longer as these phones get more powerful.

pbhjpbhj• 8 years ago

It's like "honey you need to do something about your weight; here I made you a burger on a doughnut bun with triple cheese and fudge sauce".

You only really have one way to communicate with a large corporation - give money, or withhold money.

coldtea4• 8 years ago

With the new iPhones coming out today, I wanted to revisit the whole Apple vs. headphone jack fiasco.

You keep using that word, fiasco. I don't think it means what you think it means. It doesn't mean "hoopla". It means "disaster/failure".

With the phones selling more than any model before them, I'd hardly call that decision a fiasco for Apple.

sidstling2• 8 years ago

This, I see people calling the removal of the headphone jack a colossal failure, but if phones are selling, then how can it be a failure?

People have a natural resistance to change, 20 years ago my city saw major protests when it wanted to close a road and open up to the river underneath it. It would be a colossal failure, naturally it wasn’t and today no one can imagine the town without the nice nature stuff.

I think the headphone jacks are in that category. They weren’t really great, and now that they are gone, only niches really miss them.

The AirPods are such a nice product. I mean, Apple basically made Bluetooth not suck. They are locked to the Apple ecosystem, but they connect seamlessly across your devices, and Apple has frankly once again embarrassed the rest of the tech sector by making age old technology actually useable for people who don’t want to fiddle around.

Now, if removing the headphone jack had been a failure, it would probably have come back, and everyone else, the one-plus included, probably wouldn’t be removing it.

I’m not for or against it by the way. The AirPods would’ve worked with the headphone jack. I just think calling it a failure or a fiasco is silly when it’s so obviously working out great.

silverbax885• 8 years ago

But Apple isn't the top selling phone any more. It's the Galaxy models. The only time new Apple phones retake the top spot is when they first release a new model.

coldtea4• 8 years ago

But Apple isn't the top selling phone any more. It's the Galaxy models.

The iPhone rarely was the top selling phone and never had the majority of the market (though it was of course a single company against 4-5 other companies anyway).

It was the phone that caught most of the top end (pricy) market and almost all of the profits, and it remains that.

That said, not sure what's this "isn't the top selling phone any more" is supposed to mean. The headphone-jack-less iPhone X killed it in the market:

https://www.cnet.com/news/iphone-x-was-best-selling-smartpho...

sidstling2• 8 years ago

Do the galaxy models have headphone jacks?

thx4allthestuff2• 8 years ago

As with most decisions that Apple makes lately, you are correct, it is not a disaster for them. Just like when you stick your middle finger up at another person, usually you won’t personally feel offended by your own finger. And if you don’t care if that person comes back to speak to you again or not, then I guess you’ve “won”.

coldtea4• 8 years ago

You missed the whole part where the person that was supposed to have been offended (by all those armchair pundits) in fact not only keeps talking to you, but goes out and buys your product in even larger quantities...

https://www.cnet.com/news/iphone-x-was-best-selling-smartpho...

chiph• 8 years ago

So Apple did it to fatten the bottom line of their Beats subsidiary, which currently owns about half the Bluetooth headphone market. So why is everyone else dropping the jack on their phones? They don't have a similar profitable arrangement. It seems like they're just pissing-off potential customers, but without an income stream to compensate.

geerlingguy• 8 years ago

It also reduces the bill of materials (cheaper and easier manufacturing), saves a decent chunk of space inside a very compact electronics device, and greatly improves ease of maintaining water resistance.

Not saying I like the trend, just that it does make sense even if you don’t sell wireless headphones too.

albertgoeswoof2• 8 years ago

I use the headphones for phone calls, I often work remotely / travel and have maybe 3-4 hours on the phone a day on average. Wireless headphones don’t have a mic I can hold close to my mouth, and headsets look doorky, especially if I’m travelling. Not to mention that if the battery runs out I’m stuck holding the phone to my ear (no ability to mute) or on speakerphone (can’t work in an open office or public environment).

Not being able to charge the phone and be on the phone at the same time is incredibly annoying. Sometimes I take video calls on my laptop and I can’t plug the lightning headphones into my laptop without an adapter.

I didn’t think it would annoy me so much but there are times when I need to get work done and this gets in the way, and the alternatives just aren’t reliable enough.

Having a thinner phone is irrelevant because I have to put a case around it anyway.

It’s frustrating that we have so many different connectors (lightning, 3.5mm, Bluetooth, hdmi, mini usb, usb C, usb A, MagSafe, ...). I wish apple would pick one and go for it (usb C maybe?)

aembleton• 8 years ago

Why do you need to hold the microphone close to your mouth?

I often answer calls whilst wearing these cheap Mpow earphones. Even with background traffic noise people can still hear me http://amzn.eu/d/8zNp1kz

silverbax885• 8 years ago

I'll bet they can't hear you as well as you think. I've gotten many calls from people who fade in/out no matter how many times I tell them I'm having trouble hearing them. It's because they can hear themselves and think it's fine.

albertgoeswoof2• 8 years ago

People can’t hear in some cases, especially as I work with people from all over the world and English is often a second language. You need to be 100% clear, consistently without failure.

Also, it looks weird if I don’t pull the mic closer. With your headphones people can’t tell you’re on the phone.

We’ve had telephones for over 100 years so I don’t think it’s too much to ask.

0xakhil• 8 years ago

Some 3rd party accessories used 3.5mm jack to transfer data without MFI chip. Maybe Apple didnt like that for some reason. Just a thought.

obviously1999• 8 years ago

try the iphone 5 or SE

b3b0p• 8 years ago

Removing the headphone jack, but allowing the option to use a dongle, I can live with. What really drives me nuts is all these (expensive) wireless headphones and earbuds, but the batteries are not replaceable. After a year or few they basically become useless because the batteries end up degrading and lasting only a fraction of when they were new.

amaccuish• 8 years ago

I think this is a false comparison. If USB-C had been better defined and chosen by all manufacturers, we wouldn't have had a problem with replacing the headphone jack I feel.

jjuhl• 8 years ago

I recently needed a new phone and ended up buying a Nokia 8. The fact that it had a headphone jack was one of my main reasons for selecting it. I'm not going to ditch my collection of high quality functioning headphones just to spend more money buying new ones and getting worse audio quality.

abakker2• 8 years ago

As someone about to board a plane with my SO, one problem that would be nice is if apple devices could do simultaneous devices connected. My iPad plus headphone splitter is ok, but, I’m mostly on Bluetooth only headphones. If you want to share a listen, you need wired ones. Seems like they could fix this audio stack to allow this, or maybe we need a big upgrade to Bluetooth hardware to allow it.

floo• 8 years ago

Not saying that this is a proper solution for everyone, but Bose does support listening to the same phone with two pairs of headphones. You would just have to pair them.

I agree that this would be useful to have at the OS level though!

cimmanom4• 8 years ago

How much of this is due to media companies trying to eliminate analog audio and video outputs so as to better enforce DRM?

justtopost3• 8 years ago

I suspect this is the primary motivator, and oddly far down in the discussion.

johnchristopher• 8 years ago

The headphone jack of every portable devices I ever owned have all broken at some points.

I'd rather have Bluetooth everywhere with USB as a backup now.

delinka3• 8 years ago

"...Some people can only afford $20 headphones"

Have you seen the prices on Apple devices?

sparkie• 8 years ago

The main complaint is that manufacturers of budget phones are following suit, but damaging themselves in the process because they're misguided about what their users really want. Having android phones with 3.5/2.5mm jacks would keep the analogue headphone industry alive, but if the whole industry moves to bluetooth only headphones, we're worse off for it overall.

ummonk3• 8 years ago

The iPhone SE has a headphone jack, and is affordable. A great little phone.

Now Apple is killing it.

what-the-grump• 8 years ago

Oh man, I’ve been using my 6s all this time and forgot. Just when I was thinking about upgrading to the Xs, this thread is a reminder of why I’ve been holding off.

May do another year with the 6s.

Jgrubb• 8 years ago

The day I was sold on ditching the headphone jack was actually last week when a giant wave surprised us and nearly washed my wife's (brand new) phone away at the beach. We took it back to the house, rinsed all the sand and salt water off under the tap and it never had a single issue.

cm21872• 8 years ago

I believe Samsung phones are as much water-resistant while having preserved the headphone jack.

totallymike• 8 years ago

While I’m definitely not a fan of losing the headphone jack, and don’t love not being able to use my headphones and charge my phone, I do see one positive side effect, and I wonder if Apple is doing it on purpose.

You can now buy $20 bluetooth earbuds from Anker that are pretty decent. Apple saying “guess what, everybody: you love bluetooth” has forced the market to respond, and that whole price-down-quality-up thing is really starting to happen.

This, of course, is of no use to people who depend on minimal latency. It will be a very long time, if ever, before bluetooth can match hardwired latency.

What we really need next from Apple is for them to replace lightning with USB-C. I’d love to see the ability to choose to externalize the DAC+amplifier without buying either a lightning-only accessory or a camera adapter. Oh, and also be able to charge the phone while we’re at it.

snaky3• 8 years ago

It will be a very long time, if ever, before bluetooth can match hardwired latency

It happened long ago, with Apt-X, especially Apt-X HD and Apt-X LL.

The latency of the aptX-HD codec can be scaled to as low as 1 ms for 48 kHz sampled audio

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AptX#aptX-HD

oliveshell• 8 years ago

apt-X is neat; it’s a bummer that, as it’s Qualcomm proprietary technology, only a smallish subset of wireless headsets support it.

Not to mention Apple’s beef with Qualcomm means we’ll probably never see apt-X support in an iPhone.

nojvek• 8 years ago

Yes! goddamnit Apple. What’s with lighthning ports in iPhones when you make all this huzzy wuzzy talk that MacBooks are all usb-c because usb-c is the future.

Please be consistent. USB-C everywhere in all your devices. You’re a trillion dollar company now, get your shit together!

tozeur• 8 years ago

You see that’s why it’s hard, _because_ they’re a trillion dollar company. Big change takes time to percolate.

rdl• 8 years ago

I wish there could be a transition period of, say, 3 product cycles on the phones where they had BOTH lightning and USB-C ports. It would be a little ugly and take up space (presumably side by side), but would make the transition a lot less painful. No real chance of Apple doing this, though.

pohl• 8 years ago

Regarding latency: although I love my AirPods and I do not miss the headphone jack, there’s one real application that I doubt will ever be adequate over Bluetooth: monitoring the audio while you’re playing electric guitar through an amp simulator on your phone. The tiniest amount of latency really stands out while you’re playing.

chillingeffect• 8 years ago

similarly: wireless microphones for blogging.

zrobotics• 8 years ago

Haven't found a set of BT headphones that have acceptable latency for gaming, so I thing the latency a problem for any audio application that requires low-latency.

archagon3• 8 years ago

That, and playing rhythm games. No more Tap Tap Revenge.

Terretta• 8 years ago

Apple saying “guess what, everybody: you love bluetooth”

I'd think Apple's trick isn't really Bluetooth which remains often “not great”. It's the W1 chip:

“As well as making pairing and switching devices a lot easier, the W1 chip also increases the range of the Bluetooth connection and gives headphones a better battery life. For example, the Beats Solo3 has a battery life that lasts 40 hours and a range of up to 150 feet. Those numbers are just insane for Bluetooth.”[1]

1. https://www.howtogeek.com/340290/what-is-apple’s-w1-chip/

atomical• 8 years ago

I use USB + Dragonfly. The obsession with the headphone jack is strange because the audio isn't very good.

taylodl• 8 years ago

Actually it worked out to the best for me. There’s two occasions where I use headphones: mowing the grass and working out. In both cases the headphone wire gets in the way and causes problems yet I was too cheap to buy a Bluetooth headphone set. By forcing me to buy Bluetooth headphones (I didn’t buy iBuds - I’m way too cheap for that!) Apple actually improved the quality of my life. Even if only a somewhat minor aspect.

_emacsomancer_3• 8 years ago

I agree about those two specific circumstances. But just because you need no headphone port to be motivated to buy bluetooth headphones isn't justification. I have a long public transport commute where I don't want to use bluetooth headphones for many reasons. When I'm mowing or working out, I can use my bluetooth headphones. I get the choice.

joshvm• 8 years ago

Audiophiles probably aren’t too keen on being unable to listen to high-bitrate files.

Ignoring issues of latency and connection robustness, is this a bandwidth limitation of Bluetooth or is it that the driver/codec support isn't there? Or is it audiophile hyperbole?

There's no technical reason why you couldn't stream lossless digital audio to a pair of headphones, which might well have a better DAC chipset than the phone.

analog31• 8 years ago

I suspect the issue is battery life in the headphones, due to hauling more data over the wireless link. Now, with headphones, you could put in a bigger battery and none's the wiser, except maybe the cost accountants. But it might be more tricky with earbuds.

zanny• 8 years ago

Bluetooth radios generally operate at an order of magnitude lower power than wifi or cellular radios, especially in LE mode.

Really the Bluetooth protocol is mostly just a ultra low power 802.11. It has more channels but they are thinner bands are only 1-2 Mbit (depending on classic or LE mode).

That being said its not really a bandwidth limitation. One device can use multiple channels and thus you can easily get, say, the 6 Mbit that DVD quality PCM takes up.

It is more that being so low power means bluetooth gets pummeled with a lot of inference. This isn't much of a problem if you are using one channel and alternating to avoid hot regions but the 2.4 band is super congested. Trying to drive constant 6+ Mbit through Bluetooth losslessly would take way more power than most Bluetooth devices are capable of or willing to spend to accomplish it.

superseeplus2• 8 years ago

There are codecs which make Bluetooth audio suck less, but they are a fragmented mess. The two really popular ones are AAC and AptX. iPhones support only AAC while Android phones might either not support either or support only AptX. Sony has its own proprietary codec LDAC which only works with their headphones. To make matters worse, not all headphones support both AptX and AAC.

paul7986• 8 years ago

Not for me as wireless headphones are quickly lost and cost more then wired which were less then 10 bucks. If you lose/lost them not a huge deal you'll can easily afford another pair.

kaneua2• 8 years ago

I see another reason for Apple to exclude headphone jack from iPhone. Now third-party accessories makers can't bypass Apple's Lightning certification by using headphone jack for data transfer. For example, Square used headphone jack for their card reader.

reddit_clone• 8 years ago

You may be on to something here. It might just have been a control/money issue. Not a technical issue at all :-(

It may also be related to water proofing , eliminating another source of water risk.

kaneua2• 8 years ago

It's definitely not a waterproofing issue. They have waterproof lightning socket with exposed contacts, therefore they can make 3.5mm one. Apple's rivals — Samsung and Sony both have examples of waterproof phones with 3.5mm jack.

SSLy3• 8 years ago

It may also be related to water proofing , eliminating another source of water risk.

Some of the android flagships have both the jack and a IP68 rating.

_emacsomancer_3• 8 years ago

No, my Samsung S5 for instance is waterproof and has a headphone port.

protomyth• 8 years ago

No, it is not a good idea. It actually is a massive pain in the butt for iPad labs where we issue headphones to keep the students from getting distracted with each other. Now, the new iPads are rumored to not include the headphone jack. That is just going to be wonderful buying a bunch of adapters that can get lost or stolen.

Also, how the heck many things do I need a charger for now? Its bad enough they created a mouse that cannot be used during charging because of the poor placement of the charging port. If I was to go Bluetooth with the headphones, I need to buy a new cart with additional chargers for each headphone. Never mind loosing the damn things or their cost.

From an accessibility point of view, I take it Apple's design team has never heard of Talking ATM[1].

1) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talking_ATM

mcculley• 8 years ago

I hope to never use wired headphones ever again and I appreciate my phone being waterproof. I know that some people like wired headphones, but that is no reason to think Apple ditched that connector only for profit reasons.

crazygringo• 8 years ago

I was totally on the hate train with how ridiculous it was to remove the headphone jack, and how unnecessary Bluetooth headphones were...

...but once I got my first pair of Bluetooth headphones and realized I never need to deal with tangled/frayed/broken/caught wires again, I'm never looking back. Charging turned out to be, surprisingly, a non-issue.

I'm totally convinced Bluetooth headphones are the way forwards, and it's silly to have a jack for old tech. And for the small x% of the time or x% of the users where things like latency or line-out are needed... there's a dongle, it works perfectly, and it's fine. And if you need to charge at the same time, get a dongle that charges at the same time.

That's the whole point of dongles -- a smaller/simpler device for 90-99% of people, at the cost of a tiny bit more expensive/complex solution for the remaining 1-10%.

Feels like the right tradeoff to me.

chewz• 8 years ago

I own really good bluetooth headphone and they work great. But at the same time I own really expensive jack phones which are tiny and I can keep them in my pocket. And I have always string of various 10$ headphones (Philips mostly) that I loose when jogging and destroy when biking.

My point is - bluetooth getting better and more accessible - there is a place for compact and cheap headphones that do not require charging. And getting rid od headphone jack takes that away.

jonknee• 8 years ago

And getting rid od headphone jack takes that away.

Why? You can use your wired headphones just fine...

reversecs• 8 years ago

I haven't used one myself but I've heard the dongles are horrific. They overheat, and sound quality fades as temperature rises. This was a couple weeks ago my friends were telling me they couldn't get anything decent for their pixel2 on Amazon everything is cheap and produces the same result.

salutonmundo• 8 years ago

Definitely true. I don't have one, because I'm not an idiot, but I know someone who does -- the dongle outright stops working when it gets too hot.

briandear• 8 years ago

..and when those Bluetooth headphones are AirPods, it’s very easy to never look back.

I do a fair bit of work with Logic and Ableton and consider myself reasonably advanced when it comes to audio production. When I am doing recording or mixing on my Mac, the built-in headphone jack is never used: it’s always a fairly high end audio interface. Since AirPods, I can’t remember the last time I actually plugged into the Mac’s headphone jack: it’s either using “pro” headphones via the audio interface or AirPods.

While I can appreciate the headphone-jack vitriol on iPhone, I can’t help but drawing parallels with the ditching of the DVD drive. At the time that happened, people were losing their minds for a variety of similar reasons. I used to own mixers that only took 1/4inch plugs and remember to have a 1/8inch adaptor was a real pain, however it just became commonplace. My point is that having a lightning to 1/8th adaptor is no bigger of a deal than having a 1/8->1/4 inch adaptor.

gonehome• 8 years ago

I must be in the small % of people with ears that don’t work for AirPods. My right ear doesn’t hold it and if I’m moving at all (walking) it’ll fall out.

I wish they made in ear phones like the shure style ear phones - even Apple’s old design was better for me.

TheJoYo3• 8 years ago

the latency will bone you if you do live sampling.

amluto• 8 years ago

..and when those Bluetooth headphones are AirPods, it’s very easy to never look back.

Indeed. Because if your ears aren’t the same shape as the prototypical Apple ears, and you look back, or anywhere else, the earphones fall out.

tomc198512• 8 years ago

Ugh, no. Those considerations are fine for people who are like you.

Some of us have different considerations and we're sick of being run over by these convenience freaks

To all the downvoters, these are some reasons:

* Low latency applications

* Existing high-end hardware one may own (old Sennheisers mop the floor with a pair of "high end" Beats)

* same port in use everywhere for past 50 years, there are a ridiculous amount of products for it

* Ability to connect a non-USB headphone amp

* Everybody understands it

* No need to charge your headphones(!)

* No stupidly expensive tech to license to make something as simple and dumb as headphones

* No stupidly complicated tech to master to make something as simple and dumb as headphones

* WHY would you put logic and circuitry in a simple mechanical device?? Do manufacturers just LOVE skyrocketing costs?

* Do any of these guys value simplicity in design any more? Or is tech charging full-steam into unnecessary complexity?

And on the subject of wireless standards:

* Other 2.4ghz wireless standards have way better range. (I used to work in a large factory-type building with literally thousands of consumer printers all turned and broadcasting their individualized ad-hoc 802.11 signals. We would have chronic issues with the Wi-Fi (on account of thousands of networks) and I could be on the other side of the building with my headphones and still get clear audio. (Oftentimes it would cut out depending on location but the range I saw was a good 3x what I could get with bluetooth)

* * *

C'mon this is like 100-year-old tech that everyone understands and loves, EXCEPT for the cable. Way for the technology makers to throw out the baby with the bathwater, so that they can sell you their crap all over again.

TheJoYo3• 8 years ago

I have high end sennheisers and airbuds. The only time I pull out my sennheisers is when im doing recording or live sampling. Bluetooth is opensource, it's not overly complicated it's just new to you. This technology was already being used in live performances with no one complaining.

codethief2• 8 years ago

Add to this the fact that, in practice, you can't really listen to high-res audio over Bluetooth.

(I am aware that audio quality has gotten better over time but you still rely on the specs of the Bluetooth chip on both sides which, in practice, usually means that you're still far away from lossless transmission.)

simonh• 8 years ago

And for the small percentage of people who care about these things, use the included adapter.

As for me, I’ve had the earphone jacks in two if my iPhones go wonky on me. I fully realise few other people have this problem and it’s almost certainly down to me being a bit careless inserting and remove the jack, but still it happens. So I just got a set of lighting earbuds. Never had a problem since. It seems to be a much more robust and reliable connector. So on two of my phones with headphone sockets, I ended up not using them anyway.

philjohn14• 8 years ago

Then use the dongle ... it was free on the iPhone 7 and is $9 to buy another one if it gives out over a year after purchase.

pishpash• 8 years ago

The trend is not so much driven by wanting unnecessary complexity (but that is the result), as by the desire to remove physical interfaces to machines. Optimistically this is just some haughty designer's prematurely executed ideal of human-machine symbiosis; pessimistically this is the transfer of means of user control over machines to the corporation, allowing external control over machines and thereby users.

whalesalad• 8 years ago

You’re on your high horse about the sennheisers but the commodity hardware we are talking about isn’t capable of properly powering those types of devices.

I feel like you’re kinda grumpy here for no reason? You clearly care about sound and want the best experience so why would you attach a non-usb amp to a crappy aux port on commodity hardware? You’d actually want a usb dac/amp in that situation. (Which you claim is a negative)

“Sick of being run over by convenience freaks” sorry to say it bud... but you’re the “freak” here (in the sense that you are the extreme of the extreme, don’t mean that in a derogatory way)

You can’t get grumpy about mainstream devices following the mainstream. You are not mainstream.

hannasanarion2• 8 years ago

So you're totally fine with carrying around an external hardware amp, but a dongle for it is intolerably inconvenient?

agitator2• 8 years ago

I mean if you prefer old technology, that's all good. No one is stopping you from using your old headphones with your old phone.

The convenience of not having to untangle headphones, not accidentally yanking them out of a device when walking away, or being able to exercise with a device sitting somewhere else in the room is a welcome innovation IMO.

Yes, apple forced people's hand with removing the port (They aren't making these products for fun) to make money, but when has a business made bold moves if it didn't mean making money in the long run? When apple started removing ports, I bought stock, which payed for my new headphones.

kminehart• 8 years ago

Another thing that is really obnoxious is how there is now an inconsistency with how it's implemented.

Some phones use a pass-through system so USB-C headphones connect directly to the phone's amplifier / DAC (digital-to-analog converter); other cables might contain a DAC / amp themselves, while the last small percentage just transfer a digital signal.

Phones with speakers already have a dedicated DAC and amp. The headphone jack was just a way to interface with the amplifier. Manufacturers turned a small size issue into a giant consistency problem that didn't need to exist.

gambiting• 8 years ago

I work in a games studio, where I have dozens of PCs, consoles and their controllers running all the time around me in close proximity - my bluetooth headphones(rather expensive pair of Sony over-ear headphones) constantly loses signal. If I as much as wave my hand in between the headphones and the phone, the signal is gone, they start stuttering like crazy. Bluetooth is absolute trash for audio transmission, I have no idea who though it would be a good idea to share the same frequency with other 2.4GHz devices for something so sensitive as audio.

Insanity• 8 years ago

I entirely agree with you.

Plus, I don't feel like the cable is all that inconvenient anyway. I got high-end headphones (And low-end earphones for when working out) and the cable has never been an issue to me.

Yes, maybe the wires tangle on the earphones, and then you untangle them.

Plus, for high-end gear I find that I don't move about with it a lot, so the wires are pretty much always in a similar position on my desk and don't create any problems either.

stochastic_monk3• 8 years ago

When I used plug-in headphones, they’d all break within weeks and start automatically skipping and enabling Voice Control, when I have all voice command options disabled.

Bluetooth headphones come with a headache, but mine haven’t broken in a month. I call it a clear improvement.

codethief2• 8 years ago

What plug-in headphones were you using? Honest question because I've never had any trouble.

4ad• 8 years ago

That's because you buy shitty headphones. My Stax SR-3 headphones are 50 years old.

shkkmo2• 8 years ago

That's the whole point of dongles -- a smaller/simpler device for 90-99% of people, at the cost of a tiny bit more expensive/complex solution for the remaining 1-10%.

I like your completely made up numbers. Basing of the sales numbers from the article, this is the argument you are making:

A smaller/simpler device for 17% of people and a solution that is up to 2x more expensive and far less convenient and functional for the remaining 83%.

tastyface• 8 years ago

It still makes me mad that I can't use my Apogee JAM in any practical way with new iPhones. Bluetooth is way too laggy and there doesn't exist an adaptor that lets you use data and analog-out at the same time. The only option is to use the built-in speakers.

jpalomaki2• 8 years ago

After getting new fairly expensive Bose Bluetooth headset I started wondering about the lousy sound quality when making VoIP calls on PC (Windows/Lenovo). Turns out others have similar complaints [1].

Vendors seem to claim that the problem is the low bandwidth available. I suspect the real reason is that they don't want to standardize on more modern (complicated) codecs for this purpose as it would make the headset more complicated and increase cost.

[1] https://www.howtogeek.com/354321/why-bluetooth-headsets-are-...

vonseel• 8 years ago

Again, like the other guy below, ugh - no.

I’m a musician and have thousands of voice memos from writing tapes over the years. Those effing dongles disappear on me. I actually prefer the dongle + old iPod headphones to newer Lightning headphones, because I can plug them into EVERYTHING ELSE. Bluetooth headphones don’t play voice memos (built-in iOS application) back at a normal (acceptable) nitrate. It’s been that way for years and Apple refuses to fix it.

I’m sure there are plenty of other arguments for including headphone jack. I mean, I have probably 10 sets of nice headphones in my studio that all use a standard connector. It’s real frustrating to have to consider going Android just to get a headphone jack on my device.

bigtunacan• 8 years ago

Bluetooth is alright for audio only like listening to music. For games though (a huge percentage of users) Bluetooth is trash on the iPhone. The latency is a huge issue; something will occur in game and then there are noticeable delays before you here the accompanying sound. This ruins the immersion of games when it happens.

screye2• 8 years ago

a smaller/simpler device for 90-99% of people,

This is exactly my complaint.

The device is just the same with zero improvements to show for this change.

The proportions are also closer to 60-40 than 90-10.

wilsonnb33• 8 years ago

Terrible article that, like most comments and articles about the headphone jack, completely ignores Lightning and USB C adapters.

It’s much easier to make the case that removing the headphone jack is a huge money grab and inconvenience if you ignore the fact that a $9 dongle included with your phone lets you listen with any pair of headphones you want.

Eric_WVGG• 8 years ago

Possibly more annoying is that he ignores the Lightning to 3.5mm cables that are available. Those nice expensive headphones all have replaceable cables, you don’t even need a dongle.

https://www.amazon.com/Belkin-Audio-Cable-Lightning-Connecto...

jmull• 8 years ago

I get why some people are annoyed, but it’s not like the 3.5mm jack was so great.

If you forget the massive number of compatible headphones in existence, the 3.5mm jack isn’t that great. If we were designing the ideal audio interface today, it would not be the 3.5mm jack.

For an audiophile experience, you’d better love the DAC built into your phone. You also probably need to live with whatever audio processing parameters the phone manufacturer chose because probably few, if any, are exposed. You’re largely shut out of control over audio processing details.

Meanwhile, for mobile use you, need to thether your head to your phone and manage the cord. Not a great fit for mobile uses because you don’t want to move around too freely. It gets worse in the oft-mentioned scenario of charging while listening, because now you’re generally tethering your head to a wall or at least a battery pack. Not great.

The 3.5mm jack also doesn’t have a decent protocol for on-device listening controls. There are workarounds so maybe you can play/pause or skip tracks, but then again maybe not. There are wide compatibility problems. Forget about anything advanced.

It’s not like lightning connector is perfect, and neither is Bluetooth. I’m just pointing out that the 3.5mm jack isn’t a no-brainer by any stretch and it makes sense to look for something better, whether or no you think Apple or other OEMs succeeded.

nikofeyn• 8 years ago

For an audiophile experience, you’d better love the DAC built into your phone.

that's why i use lg's v series of phones that include a high-end audio dac.

Meanwhile, for mobile use you, need to tether your head to your phone and manage the cord. Not a great fit for mobile uses because you don’t want to move around too freely.

that's a false argument because the inclusion of an audio jack does not prevent the use of bluetooth. i use high-end headphones at work, home, and in certain travel situations like a plane and use bluetooth everywhere else like with my car and wireless bluetooth speakers.

you said the 3.5mm jack would not be the interface designed today, but yet, you didn't come up with an alternative. the sound with a proper dac and headphones and a physical audio jack is incomparable to bluetooth and bluetooth headphones. and having the physical audio jack makes it much easier to do what i want with the audio when i want. whether it's attaching to a bose bluetooth speaker or outputting audio to sample on my op-1, it's the best of both worlds.

the problem i have with apple is that they have never given a compelling and logical reason for removing the audio jack. my lg v35 has the audio jack plus a high-end audio dac and yet the design is every bit as sleek and compact as the iphone x phones, in fact, maybe even more so because the camera doesn't protrude.

so all of this is pointless arguing simply because apple can't even answer the question of "why", as in why even remove it in the first place.

err4nt• 8 years ago

These jacks come from, not the 20th century, but the 19th century! It boggles my mind how something we've have had since the 1880s is suddenly obsolete. There's a plethora of devices in existence manufactured over a span of decades that all interchangeably work together, and we toss it now out for what? Do we really believe that all devices for the next 130 years will work on the same bluetooth protocol?

brian-armstrong• 8 years ago

It is painfully obvious that Apple removed the jack not because it was the right choice but because it lets them sell more accessories. Discussions about this choice should be framed in that perspective. It was a user hostile decision.

cmiles74• 8 years ago

The case made by the article strikes me as surprisingly clear: 50% of dollars spent on wireless headphones we're going to Apple and they wanted that percentage to grow larger. Forcing their customers to buy wireless headphones directly increased the amount of money Apple makes and has allowed them to dominate another product segment.

This argument about the quality of the headphones seems very much beside the point. For those purchasing these newer smart phones, there is only one type of headphones that work. Clearly that is the one they will buy.

microtherion3• 8 years ago

Author must have been heartbroken when cell phones started removing VGA ports.

shmerl• 8 years ago

It surely was a bad idea. A good idea is to ditch handsets which ditched a headphone jack.

lawry• 8 years ago

I do not have experience with the iPhone and Apple's Bluetooth headphones, but I've tried a bunch of 3rd party brands with moto g and oneplus smartphones. Sadly at home we only have 2.4Ghz for Wifi, which means it's absolutely less than ideal to stream something over wifi and listen to it on wireless headphones.

I'm surprised this is not a problem for the iPhone, or I've never read anything about it yet.

skywhopper• 8 years ago

I agree... mostly. Till the end when the author portrays the lack of a headphone jack as a complete block to using TRS connectors. iPhones do come with working wired headphones and at least used to include a Lightning-TRS adapter (it can be had for $9 if not). Not ideal, no. Offensive, maybe. But it’s a ridiculous overstatement to say that this requires users to spend hundreds of dollars on Bluetooth replacements.

sedachv• 8 years ago

I put a mid-range Kenwood head unit in my road trip car last year. So far only one person has been able to figure out how to pair their phone to it over Bluetooth (the instruction manual is in the glove compartment; doesn't help). The Bluetooth audio skips. The audio jack requires no set-up, works 100% of the time, and never skips.

bootlooped• 8 years ago

Maybe that is more the fault of the head unit than anything else. Several years ago I bought and installed an aftermarket stereo which could play mp3s from a usb stick. I think it was a Kenwood in the $150 - $200 range. I recall being stunned by how horrible and behind-the-times the UI and menus were. I thought "all they had to do was copy the iPod menu layout" (or any other decent mp3 player).

That and other experiences with car infotainment systems have lead me to believe that any electronics that go in a car are at least 5 years behind their non-automobile equivalents.

zwkrt• 8 years ago

This move to Bluetooth very much seems like planned obsolescence. In sure in a few years all the issues people have with Bluetooth will be "solved" by a whole incompatible spec.

The only problem with the 3.5m jack is that it's too cheap, unobtrusive, and reliable. You can't brand it, market it, or upsell it.

bnastic• 8 years ago

It’s a big red herring when someone tells you “I have high end headphones and need hp output”, or “I record my guitar into iPhone and need a jack”.

- if you are really an audiophile you will have at least a Dragonfly or similar feeding your expensive cans off of USB. You would not use iPhone’s (previous) tiny dac/amp. Also note that iPads still have a builtin DAC/amp and that they are, in fact, really really good.

- Same for music making on iPhone. You will have one of many audio interfaces for iOS. I mean, come on, you are not recording guitars into your pc over a builtin audio input, surely?

I don’t believe this whole “cornering the market” argument. I do believe removing unnecessary hardware and making way for bigger battery/thinner phones or whatever other benefit may come out of it.

konart• 8 years ago

I'm still waiting for a decent pair of bt earplugs that wouldn't cost me a fortune. Still have to use Sony SBH50 + Marshall Mode EQ as a half-way solution.

Wired wirelessness.

woolvalley• 8 years ago

I like bluetooth headphones, but even the airpods have trouble connecting to my iphone at times, and UI to connect the headphones is a complicated 5+ tap process. And if they aren't airpods, then I have to go into the settings app specifically and add 3 more taps for even more annoyance.

And when I tap to connect a specific bluetooth headphone, it may or may not connect. If it doesn't, its an even more annoying process of turning bluetooth on and off and the headphones on and off to get a connection.

It's this part of bluetooth alone that is the most annoying part of them. On top of apple not giving a good dedicated UI to managing your bluetooth headphones. Burying it 3-5 screens deep is not a good user experience.

Too bad android is a security and privacy mess.

qwerty456127• 8 years ago

Absolutely no. The idea of introducing one universal connector standard itself sounds reasonable but it still is a way ahead of time. Nothing should be "ditched" before the new standard and its ecosystem matures (do you remember for how long did USB co-exist with COM&LPT and for how long did ISA slots co-exist with PCI? - that was good!). Also one port is not enough, I want to connect my wired headphones and a power bank to my cellphone at the same time without using any additional dongles! And at last but not at least there are things tat are so good (with simplicity of their technology nature contributing to this) even while being a very old invention that inventing reasons to ditch them is either hypocrisy (aren't big corporations pushing digital audio transfer technologies just to facilitate vendor lock-ins and DRMs?) or onanism. Do we really need to reinvent a wheel just because it is not patented?

rad_gruchalski3• 8 years ago

I’m using an iphone 8 for the last 9 months. Not missing the jack at all.

rad_gruchalski3• 8 years ago

Thanks for downvotes. Explain.

rad_gruchalski3• 8 years ago

Oh yeah, someone got really upset now. Explain instead of clicking this stupid downvote button.

screye2• 8 years ago

Not for me. (Addressing the general industry trend)

The way I see it, taking a feature away needs to be justified with some proportional advantage.

The parts themselves are pretty cheap, so the only argument against the port is space. Apple did not use the space for anything useful (same battery , same features , more expensive). I have heard water proofing as an argument, but many manufacturers can do both & the jack is more useful than water proofing to me.

As I see it, manufacturers took a away a relatively useful feature for nothing in return.

The decision was very much guided by greed, and that very much irks me.

CosmicShadow• 8 years ago

No.

8bitsrule• 8 years ago

It's even dumber than when Apple ditched the serial port, dooming a whole generation of fine hardware to obsolescence.

Just another marketing win, engineering loss.

ryandrake• 8 years ago

It was a great idea because the removal of the headphone jack serves a lightning rod for everything anti-Apple, and drowns out other, more serious and valid issues with their HW and SW quality. There are a lot of real problems with their products to complain about, but all those valid complaints are drowned out by the rage over the stupid headphone jack. It's been two years, and people still can't get over it, and the press can't stop mentioning it. Great for Apple, because that's the only problem that gets air time.

tomcooks• 8 years ago

Most outdoor people (7+ days charging on solar or limited electrical outlet access) hate the idea of having to charge an extra device, when they could use a pair of cheap headphones. Hard pass for me too, I'll stick to my cheap, outdated tech.

pasbesoin• 8 years ago

With the universal disappearance of the jack, I can't help thinking that there are behind-the-scenes pressures and incentives driving it.

As in television (and so, movies on television), all analog links in the chain of delivery are being driven out.

Even if you agree with that (and I don't), this means that simultaneously, any and all other use cases for these analog channels are simply fucked. Too bad, screw you.

Big entertainment, and its big dollars, monopolizing the platform for its own benefit.

I don't know this. I just can't help suspecting it -- not just out of thin air, though, but rather based upon what I've read about how these industries work and advocate, in general and in other specific cases.

chairmanmow• 8 years ago

I think so. 3.5mm wasn't always a standard, it used to be 1/4". 3.5mm is a consumer standard, replacing it with Bluetooth makes more sense. I say this as someone who does Pro Audio stuff, I just don't use bluetooth for that. I've usually had to hook up a 3.5mm to 1/4" adapter for some headphones anyways. I have a 48 channel patch bay everything's wired into. Why would I complain about having to use a dongle to get non-latent audio for pro-purposes on my Phone seems a little absurd given the way most other pro-equipment behaves. And there's a dongle if people really care, and it came for free with my phone. I'd rather use bluetooth headphones anyways for most stuff, for convenience.

If you need pro-gear, there's usually a pro-option. Sometimes form factors change and you need to swap out some of your gear, it happens. Anyways, 3.5mm wasn't ever the 'pro' standard. It's a consumer level adaptation, and so is Bluetooth. I have no problem with it.

Was ditching the headphone jack a good idea?

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