Supply Chain Rumors Reaffirm iPhone 7 Will Not Have Headphone Jack

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GoldenEye 007 said:
I don't get why people are celebrating this and using floppy disks or optical media as examples.

Both of those technologies had viable and competent alternatives such as solid state storage and later cloud storage, etc. that made dropping them that much easier.

There exists no competent and affordable technology that would meet the capabilities of the 3.5mm headphone jack. Bluetooth is meh, battery life is meh, charging is meh, expense is blah. And I'm not sure it is worth the 1mm or whatever savings likely to be seen in phone thickness either.
Click to expand...

This reminds me of a week ago I was trying to get some photos off my phone onto one of the photo printing kiosks at a drug store. I tried all the data transfer methods available on the kiosk but none of them worked. The primary method was connecting the phone to an adhoc wifi network set up by the kiosk, but that didn't work (probably some sort of additional security in newer versions of Android that restricts communication over this type of network).

Then I tried mounting the phone as a USB flash drive, but the kiosk didn't support MTP or PTP storage devices (only mass storage, which Android no longer supports). I tried getting the pictures from Facebook, but Facebook updated some security policies that prevented the kiosk from accessing my pictures.

I was struck by the sheer insanity that there's no longer a stable, universal standard to physically transfer a small amount of data from one device to another. The computing industry is seriously dropping the ball on this kind of standardization.

Apple getting rid of the 3.5mm port is just going to mean another port or wireless audio streaming protocol, probably patented up the ass and Apple-ecosystem only, more fragmentation of one of the few remaining places where you could count on plugging something in and having it work.
 
I've never been a fan of wireless headphones. Perhaps it's just the individual ones I've tried, but it has always been more of a hassle and resulted in a poorer listening experience.

I'm sure they'll talk about how this will push innovation and I'm fine with iphone owners being the ones to deal with it. I'll wait for something more reliable to hit the market and stick with a phone that has an aux jack. Plus my car has an aux jack and I'm awesome at losing adapters.
 
My only problem with wired headphones (Mainly ear buds) is the horrible tangling that happens if you don't have a case and take the time to properly put them back when done.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xm7jp5A9Vks

But I'd rather not have to charge my headphones. Unless Apple comes up with a brilliant solution. They'd probably charge in 15 seconds and plug into the Lightning port in a pinch and last 2 hours on that 15 second charge. I'd go for that.
 
GoldenEye 007 said:
I don't get why people are celebrating this and using floppy disks or optical media as examples.

Both of those technologies had viable and competent alternatives such as solid state storage and later cloud storage, etc. that made dropping them that much easier.

There exists no competent and affordable technology that would meet the capabilities of the 3.5mm headphone jack. Bluetooth is meh, battery life is meh, charging is meh, expense is blah. And I'm not sure it is worth the 1mm or whatever savings likely to be seen in phone thickness either.
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I don't disagree with you, but it could also be argued that the reason there's not a viable alternative is because everyone is resting on their laurels content to use what we have now. Why really bother pushing for better Bluetooth or battery life or charging and whatnot when you can just use the old wired way? If a major player such as Apple or Google came along and massively disrupted that market, then the advancements would happen and likely pretty fast. When a big company such as Apple does something like this everyone scrambles to get their shit together because the alternative is leaving money on the table from millions of customers and being left in the dust by those that follow the leader. If Apple ditched wired plugs and everyone started making better wireless headsets to get in on all the customers that are about to start buying them, wouldn't you push your company to adapt as well?

Again, not saying that this is necessarily a good or bad idea, but when something happens that forces change, then change tends to follow.
 
WordAssassin said:
I don't disagree with you, but it could also be argued that the reason there's not a viable alternative is because everyone is resting on their laurels content to use what we have now. Why really bother pushing for better Bluetooth or battery life or charging and whatnot when you can just use the old wired way?
Click to expand...

A poor fit for the Floppy analogy still, since new vastly superior formats came out and coexisted with it for years before people started dumping the former. Even then, there was still some utility that floppies had that CD roms did not, and it wasn't until maybe the early 2000s when USB drives (8mb = 2001) came along that you could say that their full use case had been replaced by other superior formats (i.e. arbitrarily and conveniently rewriteable storage you can take with you easily).

3.5mm jacks aren't this giant port that destroys phone usability and provides no utility. Yeah you could shave another 1mm off your phone by getting rid of it, but that's a really small benefit compared to say, the 150x increase in storage capacity that a CD rom came with over a 1.44mb floppy. Even if BT headphones worked 100% of the time and had perfect audio quality (i.e. some kind of idealized BT headphone caused by companies being forced to make awesome new products), the 3.5mm port would still have the advantage of not needing a battery or charging. The support for every damn thing on the planet that exists already is just icing on the cake. Not only is the 3.5mm port not broken, the benefits of switching away from it are marginal and the inconvenience high. This would be more like if they abandoned floppy drives in '98 only to replace it with a slightly slimmer drive of identical capacity that was more convenient to carry around but needed an external battery for disks.

I'd be more sympathetic to dumping the 3.5mm standard if they were adding a new port to the top, perhaps USB-C (slightly slimmer than 3.5mm already), which would then become a new standard interface for headphones and we would get the benefit of an extra port on the device that is multi-use. There would still be an inconvenience in the changeover period, but what we would eventually end up with would replicate all use cases and be an overall device improvement.
 
WordAssassin said:
I don't disagree with you, but it could also be argued that the reason there's not a viable alternative is because everyone is resting on their laurels content to use what we have now. Why really bother pushing for better Bluetooth or battery life or charging and whatnot when you can just use the old wired way? If a major player such as Apple or Google came along and massively disrupted that market, then the advancements would happen and likely pretty fast. When a big company such as Apple does something like this everyone scrambles to get their shit together because the alternative is leaving money on the table from millions of customers and being left in the dust by those that follow the leader. If Apple ditched wired plugs and everyone started making better wireless headsets to get in on all the customers that are about to start buying them, wouldn't you push your company to adapt as well?

Again, not saying that this is necessarily a good or bad idea, but when something happens that forces change, then change tends to follow.
Click to expand...
Yep. They'll bundle cheap wireless earbuds instead of wired ones, and everyone will follow their lead.
 
I think that since these rumors are never 100% accurate, the smaller 4 inch iPhone 6C model will ship without the AUX (and small HD space) where the 7 will have it still with larger space options.

It's too early for the flagship to remove something as crucial as AUX. At least until Bluetooth sounds as good sound quality wise.
 
If this is actually true then Apple better have a damn good reason that's not in order to make it thinner. 3.5mm headphone ports aren't like some outdated tech, it's not like this is a switch from the old Apple cables to the lightning cable. I don't want to deal with Bluetooth and batteries nor do I want to worry about having some adapter with me.

I've always been an iPhone user but if this is true I'm seriously going to consider switching when my 6+ is ready for replacement.
 
icespide said:
kudos to WordAssassin for being one of the most reasonable and logical posters in this thread
Click to expand...
Aw, thank you

ThoseDeafMutes said:
A poor fit for the Floppy analogy still, since new vastly superior formats came out and coexisted with it for years before people started dumping the former. Even then, there was still some utility that floppies had that CD roms did not, and it wasn't until maybe the early 2000s when USB drives (8mb = 2001) came along that you could say that their full use case had been replaced by other superior formats (i.e. arbitrarily and conveniently rewriteable storage you can take with you easily).

3.5mm jacks aren't this giant port that destroys phone usability and provides no utility. Yeah you could shave another 1mm off your phone by getting rid of it, but that's a really small benefit compared to say, the 150x increase in storage capacity that a CD rom came with over a 1.44mb floppy. Even if BT headphones worked 100% of the time and had perfect audio quality (i.e. some kind of idealized BT headphone caused by companies being forced to make awesome new products), the 3.5mm port would still have the advantage of not needing a battery or charging. The support for every damn thing on the planet that exists already is just icing on the cake. Not only is the 3.5mm port not broken, the benefits of switching away from it are marginal and the inconvenience high. This would be more like if they abandoned floppy drives in '98 only to replace it with a slightly slimmer drive of identical capacity that was more convenient to carry around but needed an external battery for disks.

I'd be more sympathetic to dumping the 3.5mm standard if they were adding a new port to the top, perhaps USB-C (slightly slimmer than 3.5mm already), which would then become a new standard interface for headphones and we would get the benefit of an extra port on the device that is multi-use. There would still be an inconvenience in the changeover period, but what we would eventually end up with would replicate all use cases and be an overall device improvement.
Click to expand...
I actually agree with most/all of what you're saying. Though I don't personally notice a difference between wireless and wired headphones, I know that there are people who do, and I know that currently and for a long while still, wired will be superior because as you said you don't need batteries for it and it's something that is quite literally universal.

Apple ditching the headphone jack, to me, is both a typical Apple move, and a really weird move. I understand them wanting to get rid of it for form factor, and I understand them wanting to push their own Lightning-enabled products. But unlike leading the way by ditching floppy disks and CDs, which were not then replaced by their own proprietary solution but universal ones (CDs replaced floppys, everyone uses CDs. digital replaces CDs, every computer has a hard drive in it) this is them making a change that I can't imagine becoming universal. Android phones aren't gonna start using Lightning cables for headphones. Computers from all manufacturers aren't gonna start using Lightning cables instead of headphone jacks. The home theater system you buy in three years isn't gonna replace their 3.5mm jacks with Lightning jacks (maybe they'll add them, or include their own adaptor, but not replace).

Yeah they're gonna make an adapter to go from 3.5mm to Lightning, but to me this doesn't seem like a universal move for a "better tomorrow" like ditching physical media can be spun as, because they're not ditching one universal thing for another, they're ditching a universal thing for their own thing.

I agree with you about USB-C, and I personally would LOVE to have it at the top because, even though I prefer wireless headphones, I fucking hate having the headphone jack on the bottom. I hate it for when I stick my phone in my pocket (I always put it in there top-up so if I need to glance at the screen it's not up-side-down) and I hate it when I connect the AUX wire in my car and drop my iPhone in the cup holder. But on top of all that, it'd be ditching a universal thing (3.5mm) for another [new but eventual] universal thing (USB-C) which would then as you point out be a better comparison to what they've done before and waaaaaay more likely to become a new universal standard going forward.

That's why I'm so interested in seeing how they spin this, and am preferring to try and take a wait-and-see attitude about it rather than jump to one side or the other. Yeah I like wireless better and yeah I truly think that the future of tech is gonna be a Tesla-inspired world where everything charges and runs without cables, but Apple isn't going from standard to standard this time. The other changes that they made were met with resistance and then begrudging acceptance and eventually universal acceptance (look at all these laptops and mini computers coming out without any kind of physical media drives these days) but in this particular scenario since they're going with their own cable instead of a universal one, the result won't (even can't) be the same. Hence my partial skepticism at the rumors being true and my interest in seeing what happens if they are.

Liu Kang Baking A Pie said:
Yep. They'll bundle cheap wireless earbuds instead of wired ones, and everyone will follow their lead.
Click to expand...

Yep. Everyone is moaning and going "oh great I'm gonna have to buy new headphones, oh great I'm gonna have to buy an adaptor" but as far as Apple is concerned, no you don't! Everything you're gonna need is right there in the box already. And to the majority of people that's gonna be fine for them, because obviously someone is using and buying their crappy Ear Buds and Ear Pods. And it's that majority that Apple cares about. There's either gonna be an adaptor in the box or, more likely, they're gonna push their own Lighting Enabled Ear Buds which are Good Enough For Most, and sell you the adaptor separately for the rest. Apple wants your money, duh. If you're not gonna give it to them by buying their headphones then they're gonna try and get it from you by selling you an adaptor so you can use your own.

----

Realistically, let's say Apple drops the 3.5mm jack. I've seen and responded to people saying "ok well what if I leave my earphones at home or lose them, I can't just go out and buy a cheap replacement pair." How long do you really honestly think that will be the case. How long is it gonna take companies to shit out all kinds of different Lightning-equipped headphones one the phone is announced, or just start packing in adaptors to their current headphones while they develop new ones? They're going to be fucking everywhere in no time at all, and then you will be able to go buy a cheap pair when you lose/forget/break your old ones. As I suggested earlier, once a big company like Apple makes that change, headphone manufacturers are gonna follow. It would be bogus not to because they'd literally be leaving money on the table.

Edit:
jaxapollo said:
I think that since these rumors are never 100% accurate, the smaller 4 inch iPhone 6C model will ship without the AUX (and small HD space) where the 7 will have it still with larger space options.

It's too early for the flagship to remove something as crucial as AUX. At least until Bluetooth sounds as good sound quality wise.
Click to expand...

They would never, ever give the "lesser" phone a "feature" over their flagship device. I get where you're coming from but that just will not happen. People would simply not buy that phone then, and Apple wouldn't be able to move forward with their Lightning Cable Domination.
 
lednerg said:
Apple's already got problems with people not upgrading, and this isn't going to help.
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I wouldn't read too much into production orders, these reports come out nearly every year and usually don't amount to anything. Classic stock manipulation:

July 2015; Apple's iPhone sales, weak forecast rock investor confidence ; http://www.cnet.com/news/apples-iphone-sales-weak-forecast-rock-investor-confidence/

Jan 2014; Apple iPhone Sales, Outlook Come Up Short; http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052702304007504579346930941243534

Jan 2013; Apple shares slide as iPhone misses Christmas sales forecast; http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2013/jan/24/apple-results-iphone-sales

Dec 2012; Analyst: iPad, iPhone, Apple to feel squeeze in 2013; http://www.cnet.com/news/analyst-ipad-iphone-apple-to-feel-squeeze-in-2013/
 
icespide said:
I wouldn't read too much into production orders, these reports come out nearly every year and usually don't amount to anything. Classic stock manipulation:

July 2015; Apple's iPhone sales, weak forecast rock investor confidence ; http://www.cnet.com/news/apples-iphone-sales-weak-forecast-rock-investor-confidence/

Jan 2014; Apple iPhone Sales, Outlook Come Up Short; http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052702304007504579346930941243534

Jan 2013; Apple shares slide as iPhone misses Christmas sales forecast; http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2013/jan/24/apple-results-iphone-sales

Dec 2012; Analyst: iPad, iPhone, Apple to feel squeeze in 2013; http://www.cnet.com/news/analyst-ipad-iphone-apple-to-feel-squeeze-in-2013/
Click to expand...

Has Apple done a 30% cut before? To me, that sounds like market saturation and an unwillingness to upgrade. Now's not the time to be giving people a reason to hold onto their old devices. Namely, those who have bought decent headphones.
 
lednerg said:
Is there just as much of a thirst for a super-thin iPhone? Because that seems to be the only reason this is happening. (if true)
Click to expand...

that's a pretty reductive way of looking at it IMO. apples MO is basically to always be refining their products by removing things that aren't absolutely necessary. if they could remove all buttons and ports they would
 
WordAssassin said:
In general people seem to want the thinnest phone with the largest screen, and that's not just for iPhones.
Click to expand...

I would argue that for the most part thinness is the least of their desires.

Everyone I know wants a phone that is usable first. One of the common complaints I hear is that their phone is great for the first year or so and after that they get more and more unusable. People don't care about specs or features they care about compatability most of all.
 
hermit7 said:
I would argue that for the most part thinness is the least of their desires.

Everyone I know wants a phone that is usable first. One of the common complaints I hear is that their phone is great for the first year or so and after that they get more and more unusable. People don't care about specs or features they care about compatability most of all.
Click to expand...

Well, I agree that above all everyone wants a phone that actually works, but the only reason the 6 and 6+ exist in their form factors is because of the market trend of people wanting bigger phones.

I mean look at the pitiful stop-gap screen size that was the iPhone 5. Apple tried to resist and then, boink, massive jump with iPhone 6 and 6+ and HUGE sales as a result.
 
WordAssassin said:
Well, I agree that above all everyone wants a phone that actually works, but the only reason the 6 and 6+ exist in their form factors is because of the market trend of people wanting bigger phones.

I mean look at the pitiful stop-gap screen size that was the iPhone 5. Apple tried to resist and then, boink, massive jump with iPhone 6 and 6+ and HUGE sales as a result.
Click to expand...

I definitely agree that they succumbed to market pressure and people really do tend to want larger phones but I don't think thinness is a motivator to a significant degree.

The headphone jack is the complete opposite in terms of what people want. People don't want to go and invest in new products because their current ones don't work.

Considering the slowness of the adoption rate of technology it seems silly to replace something that works well already.
 
I have altered the ports. Pray I don't take away the charging port.

lando-vader-boba.png-300x202.jpg
 
WordAssassin said:
Wait, so, you have two sets of Bluetooth headphones, making the inclusion of a headphone jack a non issue for you, and you do almost all of your music listening with them, but if they do wind up removing it from the phone, something that won't actually affect you at all, you'll see that as a reason to not buy the phone?

Do you not like the Bluetooth headsets you have? Something seems missing from your post because it sounds like a headphone jack shouldn't actually matter to you one way or the other?
Click to expand...

The 5% of cases are that important. Running, lifting, etc. Travel. Foreign Country emergencies. Batteries ran out. etc etc.
 
andythinkpad said:
I have altered the ports. Pray I don't take away the charging port.

lando-vader-boba.png-300x202.jpg
Click to expand...

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

"This deal is getting worse all the time!!!!!!!!!"
"Furthermore, there are now no ports on the phone at all. You will charge the phone wirelessly using this wireless charging pad. It is sold separately."
"F*** YOU MAN, I'M NOT GOING TO BUY A SEPARATE CHARG-"
"I have altered the phone. Pray I don't alter it any further.
"THIS DEAL....is very fair, and I'm happy to be a part of it."
 
This is a good thing. I love thin and wireless. Aux is crazy old and people only like it because it's common. Guess how better things get common?
 
TIL enjoying a universal standard audio connection with no compression whatsoever and that doesn't have the power requirements of radio transmission makes me a luddite. The industry shift favoring convenience features over technically superior solutions is such bullshit. I can imagine the Gizmodo headline now: "Apple is killing the 3.5mm connector and that's a good thing." Thanks for telling me why making shit sound worse is "good for me."
 
DOWN said:
This is a good thing. I love thin and wireless. Aux is crazy old and people only like it because it's common. Guess how better things get common?
Click to expand...

This is a bad thing. I love thin and wireless. My current phone is thin, < 7mm, and it HAS 3.5mm input, oh and it let's me connect wireless headphones. How about that?
 
I mean good, headphone aux things are super ugly, should not be used in 2016.

Hell it's 2016, everything should be wireless by now, with like eons long batteries, what are scientists doing? Slackers.
 
thuGG_pl said:
This is a bad thing. I love thin and wireless. My current phone is thin, < 7mm, and it HAS 3.5mm input, oh and it let's me connect wireless headphones. How about that?
Click to expand...

What's bad about it? Wireless is the way, and this allows thinner
 
DOWN said:
What's bad about it? Wireless is the way, and this allows thinner
Click to expand...

Funky Papa said:
Wired headphones

Pros:
  • Plug and play
  • Universally accepted
  • A veritable mountain of high quality headphones available at all price ranges
  • Huge variety of accesories, from dirty cheap to crazy expensive
  • Connector can power external speakers
  • Don't require batteries
  • A good set of headphones will last forever
  • A crummy set of headphones for an emergency can be obtained for literally nothing

Cons:

  • Have wires
  • Circuitry takes some space

Wireless audio

Pros:
  • No wires
  • More space may simplify engineering or allow for thinner devices

Cons:
  • Not exactly plug and play
  • Not universally accepted
  • Legacy devices will need adaptors in the form of dongles, making them even less convenient and adding costs
  • Audio quality is compromised
  • Smaller variety of accesories and at higher prices
  • No connector to power external speakers
  • Require batteries, charging
  • Battery degradation ensures you'll have to buy new headphones over time
  • No such thing such as "free wireless headphones" at trains, planes etc.

I'm all for a wireless future, but call me back when we have a proper, more convenient alternative to wired headphones like we did when we transitioned from physical media to digital one.
Click to expand...

Not to mention that "thinner" also means "smaller battery". Removing a few milimetres usually comes at a cost, and it's not like the iPhone has a stellar battery life. Also, ultrathin phones are not very comfortable to hold, as evidenced by some crazy slim Chinese devices. There needs to be a balance.

The current obsession with thinner phones and bezels is one of the silliest technological trends right now. There's "whoa, that's thin" and there's "this is so thin for the fuck of it".
 
I don't really get excited for a millimeter of extra thinness anymore. The iPhone 6 is amazingly thin, feels solid and luxurious.

Certainly doesn't weigh up to the downsides.

As I said, if there port is going to be removed, i'm betting apple has something up their sleeve to make the change palatable. Just thinner really isn't going to go over well.

It might be that the iPhone 7 is completely waterproof, comes with wireless buds, beams audio directly into your brains, that kind of stuff.
 
There is something admirable in apples unwavering push to get rid of ports. I'm not sure what it is but there's something. The endless push for thinner devices without real innovation is boring as hell.
 
LOL at everyone who keeps talking about thinness. You're being shortsighted. Wireless is better than wired. Apple is removing the port to move the world to wireless, not to shave thickness.
 
Bboy AJ said:
LOL at everyone who keeps talking about thinness. You're being shortsighted. Wireless is better than wired. Apple is removing the port to move the world to wireless, not to shave thickness.
Click to expand...

Yeah, I actually believed that when they introduced the Macbook with nothing but a USB-C connector. Look at us now in this glorious post-USB1/2/3 world.

Adapter sales will be through the roof and it might actually boost sales of wireless headsets, but I think you are being quite presumptuous if you actually think it'll radically alter the widespread usage of the 3.5mm jack anytime soon.
 
I was talking to my friends not to long ago about this. I said the day companies try to go full wireless with headphones and chargers people aren't going to like it because they're so used to the medium. I welcome this as if anyone doesn't start the trend we will never have anyone evolve the tech and make it better. I await the day wires are gone from chargers to headsets.
 
I would be completely okay with this if they dropped licensing costs on the Lightning, or made it USB 3.1 Type-D or something.

Otherwise, I'm with others in that thank god we're finally killing off the 3.5mm jack. But if you're going to kill off an old standard, you have to offer a new standard as a replacement. People are assuming that will be Bluetooth or proprietary Lightning, and that it will still be Bluetooth or proprietary Lightning two years from now.

The only thing that Apple has removed that I still miss from my MacBook Pro is the Ethernet port. Mostly because I never have the adapter on the rare occasions when I need it. And we're still pretending that wireless performance is as reliable as wired. Can't wait until we all ditch wired Internet and solely rely on cellular! /s
 
Hoo-doo said:
Yeah, I actually believed that when they introduced the Macbook with nothing but a USB-C connector. Look at us now in this glorious post-USB1/2/3 world.

Adapter sales will be through the roof and it might actually boost sales of wireless headsets, but I think you are being quite presumptuous if you actually think it'll radically alter the widespread usage of the 3.5mm jack anytime soon.
Click to expand...
The Macbook isn't the iPhone. The Macbook is the OG Macbook Air. You know, the laptop everyone panned but is now the standard for laptops today.
 
Bboy AJ said:
The Macbook isn't the iPhone. The Macbook is the OG Macbook Air. You know, the laptop everyone panned but is now the standard for laptops today.
Click to expand...
Panned? What? The main criticism against the air was that the initial release was slightly underpowered for the price and cautious people would want to hold off for the second gen.
 
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