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While Apple is studying the idea of wireless charging, the fact wireless charge phones tend to be fairly thick and the issues raised by the Samsung Galaxy 7 debacle could force Apple to kibosh that idea.
Erm... my s6 edge has wireless charging and no one ever call it anything other than svelte.. plus, what galaxy 7 debacle are you referring to..
 
This ^

I do not understand why Apple think that an iPhone Plus should get all the funky features and leave those who have no interest in an oversized device (each to their own of course) to just the basics. It makes no sense to me at all.

Essentially they are saying if you don't go large you can't have the features....bizarre logic!

I doubt it's an intentional thing that Apple has just decided to do, but a technical limitation of their obsession with size / thinness

the larger iPhone provides more internal space for additional features that they apparently are unable to provide in the smaller model. Much of this is because of the old Apple joke of "thinness"

you can see that a lot of Android competitors have decided that thinness isn't the only key factor anymore, and 1 or 2mm of extra girth, to keep all functionality available is a trade off a lot of people are worried about.

Look at the transition from S6 to S7. Biggest complaints of the S6 was Battery life, lack of SD card and protruding camera bulge. So instead of doubling down on thin, they thickened the chassis a couple MM, increased battery size, put the SD card in, and made the buldge smaller for the camera. At the end of the day, nobody cared that the phone was 2mm thicker. They cared that they had improved battery life, an SD card and better looking phone without as much a bulge.

Eventually though, Even Apple is going to hit a point of time where their super thin goals are going to interfere with being able to provide things that people want in their phones.
 
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Wireless charging where you put the phone on a mat, rather than on a dock.... don't really see the benefit.

The benefit is that you can listen to music while it charges because of the stupid decision to make the headphone jack also the charging jack.
 
I doubt it's an intentional thing that Apple has just decided to do, but a technical limitation of their obsession with size / thinness

the larger iPhone provides more internal space for additional features that they apparently are unable to provide in the smaller model. Much of this is because of the old Apple joke of "thinness"

you can see that a lot of Android competitors have decided that thinness isn't the only key factor anymore, and 1 or 2mm of extra girth, to keep all functionality available is a trade off a lot of people are worried about.

Look at the transition from S6 to S7. Biggest complaints of the S6 was Battery life, lack of SD card and protruding camera bulge. So instead of doubling down on thin, they thickened the chassis a couple MM, increased battery size, put the SD card in, and made the buldge smaller for the camera. At the end of the day, nobody cared that the phone was 2mm thicker. They cared that they had improved battery life, an SD card and better looking phone without as much a bulge.

Eventually though, Even Apple is going to hit a point of time where their super thin goals are going to interfere with being able to provide things that people want in their phones.

I'm not sure I buy that argument, I mean it could be perfectly legitimate and I understand why that might be the case but I'm not totally convinced.
 
Wireless charging will improve. I'm not an expert, but wireless charging is a bit like a transformer which are all around us.
Also you have much bigger fish to fry. Wasting a small amount of energy is insignificant compared to just about any other device out there. (Fridge, air con, tumble drier, car, train, plane, lighting, washing machine, dish washer)

The power density of radiant energy falls off exponentially. Its a limitation of physics as we currently understand it. boiling a cup of water takes a negligible amount of energy on the stove top. If you want to carry the cup 15 feet from the fire while it boils, the energy expended at the source is no longer negligible.

Charging pucks are not as efficient as wires. As long as the device is within a few millimeters, its not the end of the world. But if you want to charge every wireless device in a room, it will be exponentially less efficient and very wasteful.
 
I'm not sure I buy that argument, I mean it could be perfectly legitimate and I understand why that might be the case but I'm not totally convinced.

I can only really think of two reasons that make a lot of sense:

the one i mentioned, or that Apple is purposely crippling the cheaper option hoping to upsell.

and I tend to lean to the old addage. Don't attribute to malice what incompetence can explain.

And in this case, I'd like to believe that it's their crippling adherance to "thin" that has made them incompetent at fitting all that stuff in, before the malicious attempt to up sell.

Problem is. With Apple, we've had both cases before.
 
Oh dear, do people think before they post stuff like this?

Reasons why that would be ridiculous...

There would be no way to transfer media to/from a device

Its would force people to use wireless headphones.

It would force people to use wireless charging, that however well implemented will almost certainly be less efficient than a wired connection and is much less convenient.

All of the lightning enable accessories on the market obsoleted, some of which would have no way of being replaced. Apple loses all of the licensing revenue from the MFI Program.

The port is required for diagnostic/development purposes.

There would be no way to perform an encrypted back up of your iPhone/iPad, unless there was an overhaul to allow this to work via iCloud, that makes a mockery of Apples stance on privacy.

Unless there were significant changes made to both iTunes and iCloud to allow user the same functionality as they have now it would significantly gimp the devices just for the sake of adding wireless charging.

Courage
 
Wireless charging where you put the phone on a mat, rather than on a dock.... don't really see the benefit.
  • Won't cause wear and tear on the Lightning port
  • Won't cause wear and tear on the cable
  • Can sit in a (charging) dock while portrait or landscape while still charging
  • Can use headphones and charge at the same time
  • Some cars now have charging mats built into the coin tray, so you can just drop your phone into the tray
  • Reduced cable mess
  • Possibility of eventually removing all "holes" from the phone (granted, many will see these as a negative):
    • Wireless charging
    • Wi-Fi sync
    • Bluetooth/Airplay audio and video
    • AirDrop file transfer
    • Apple SIM
 
Induction Wireless Charging now thats a new thing? And would explain why everybody is overreacting, right? Oh. It's not? Well what's all the fuss? Oh. Glass case. Now that's definitely new surely? Ok. OLED screens on mobiles a first? Yeah. It's the OLED screen. Surely!

These words don't make sense.
 
Hmmm, media is already being transferred wirelessly to / from iPhones and iPads to computers. I don't hardly connect my iPhone or iPad to my rMBP directly, unless I'm trying to get some battery power from it while traveling.

Wireless headphones is where things are headed. I made the switch a couple of years ago and would never go back. As BT has improved (and will continue to improve further) it will accelerate the change from wired to wireless.

Much like BT headphones, wireless charging will continue to improve and I'm pretty sure Apple's not working on the same induction charging that other competitors are using.

Yep, just like with the switch from 30 pin to Lightning, there will be a bunch of stuff that needs to be updated to Airplay or BT or wifi, which is actually a huge benefit to both Apple and manufacturers using MFI technologies, as they have new things to take to the market.

The diagnostic port issue will likely be handled similarly to the Apple Watch. Some hidden connection or maybe a way to plug into the sim card port when needed.

Data sent to and from iCloud servers from the iPhone / iPad are encrypted - 128bit AES.

Not really sure what you mean by data being transferred wirelessly to iPhones/iPad. There are still very basic data transfer and troubleshooting tasks that require the iOS to device to be connected to a computer/iTunes.

I'm glad that you enjoy using your wireless headphones but, and i mentioned this on another thread earlier, whenever somebody mentions that Apple might be making a decisions that might be a bit short sighted in terms of the broader market somebody cites some anecdotal evidence of how they love the new way of doing things. Thats fine but not everybody wants to use wireless headphone and they are far from ubiquitous. The market is not ready it is way to soon. You might be able to push the market forward in terms of computing i/o standards, USB C, for example but trying to force everybody to use wireless headphones when most of the other smartphones on the market still ship with a 3.5 mm audio jack is plain stupid and just has the potential to upset huge swathes of their customer base. Not a good idea when the product accounts for 75% or your revenue.

Data sent to iCloud is encrypted during transport but Apple hold the keys and will hand it over to many unscrupulous government body on request. Once you start backing your data up to cloud services it defeats the object of encryption as things stand.

One thing that is firmly in the cloud, the heads of people that think the next iPhone is going to ship without any ports. There is absolutely no chance. Quote me.
 
hasn't wireless charging been the rumor for the past 5 years?

It's been a rumor, but you have to understand, technology has to be researched, developed, implemented and then allowed to evolve. For example, it was rumored approximately five/six years ago, Tesla was working on a autonomous vehicle. Just because it's "Rumored", doesn't justify the technology will or will not debut. Likely due to the amount of testing taken into consideration.

And knowing how Apple is, they may not be the first to introduce every feature with technology, but they likely will introduce some crafty feature they do differently (Or better) than the other competitors.
 
Pointless would be arguing a supporting fact (distance dependence) while ignoring the context of the entire post. I never said the tech wasn't good. In fact I said it was exciting. I'm looking forward to what it might mean in future iterations. I suggested pumping the brakes on the hyperbole like far superior on the current consumer offerings; of which there are none. Regarding those multiple examples of distance charging... could you link one or two? Please don't use the Energous one though since it's less a demonstration and more of an ad.
I already told you it was WiTricity. Here's their video page, accessible from the Google.com search engine: http://witricity.com/news-category/videos/

Pointless can mean any number of things. Pointing out that wireless charging would be less effective at greater distances, is like pointing out that hard drives eventually run out of space. It's part of the nature of the beast and thus doesn't bear mentioning.
 
Wireless charging could be good, depends on how its done exactly, but i dunno about switching back to glass....

Although wireless may be better, I reckon Apple's just making a bad move here to excite new technology. We'll see an increase in repairs because of more people dropping their phones and shattering.

We'll see.
 
Multiply by million phones. All counts.
Put it into context of billions of heating and cooling devices.

iPhone power in minuscule that if you want to save the losses of all the wireless charging of every wireless phone on the market, just improve the efficiency of tvs by a fraction of a fraction of a percent.

Wireless charging will get more efficient as design improves
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The power density of radiant energy falls off exponentially. Its a limitation of physics as we currently understand it. boiling a cup of water takes a negligible amount of energy on the stove top. If you want to carry the cup 15 feet from the fire while it boils, the energy expended at the source is no longer negligible.

Charging pucks are not as efficient as wires. As long as the device is within a few millimeters, its not the end of the world. But if you want to charge every wireless device in a room, it will be exponentially less efficient and very wasteful.
That all sounds correct, but at present day we are only talking about devices that sit on pads.
 
No if you consider all million phones around. All counts.

But for every phone there is a car. It all scales up.

One thing that shocked me the other day - I downloaded a flight tracker app, and it displayed on a map of the world every civilian aeroplane in the air at any one time. You could hardly see the earth.

Point is, mobiles are small fry when you look at the big picture.
 
My car's got a wireless charging pad built in, so I could see this being nice to have. Then again, I'd probably still want to connect it through USB anyway for better quality sound and CarPlay support.
 
From my understanding they were rumors that they were working with Energous on an extended contactless wireless charging solution.

Basically, Energous has a solution that changes radio frequency (5.85 GHz) to DC (the receiving device needs a chip)... It's geared towards 10W or lower devices from a range of 15 feet (so there is no contact with a 'mat' just a RF transmitter within proximity is required).

The advantage is contactless charging of multiple devices in the room/car/area at the same time.
The transmitter turns on only when the receiving device needs/wants charging.

Now, how well it actually works in all types different real-life situations and environments around the world is a different story... I'm sure it has to go thru rigorous testing, etc and compliance.

Personally, I'll be happy if they manage to get it to 'trickle' charge my phone to say, within 8ft (roughly longer than some charging cables).

.
 
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Not really sure what you mean by data being transferred wirelessly to iPhones/iPad. There are still very basic data transfer and troubleshooting tasks that require the iOS to device to be connected to a computer/iTunes.

I'm glad that you enjoy using your wireless headphones but, and i mentioned this on another thread earlier, whenever somebody mentions that Apple might be making a decisions that might be a bit short sighted in terms of the broader market somebody cites some anecdotal evidence of how they love the new way of doing things. Thats fine but not everybody wants to use wireless headphone and they are far from ubiquitous. The market is not ready it is way to soon. You might be able to push the market forward in terms of computing i/o standards, USB C, for example but trying to force everybody to use wireless headphones when most of the other smartphones on the market still ship with a 3.5 mm audio jack is plain stupid and just has the potential to upset huge swathes of their customer base. Not a good idea when the product accounts for 75% or your revenue.

Data sent to iCloud is encrypted during transport but Apple hold the keys and will hand it over to many unscrupulous government body on request. Once you start backing your data up to cloud services it defeats the object of encryption as things stand.

One thing that is firmly in the cloud, the heads of people that think the next iPhone is going to ship without any ports. There is absolutely no chance. Quote me.

Doesn't all of this apply to the Watch? And yet, no user accessible ports.

I'd love to see your data on how many iPhone users do and don't want to use wireless headphones, and how many sales of iPhones not having a 3.5mm jack is going to cost Apple.

And who needs to backup to iCloud? My iPhone and iPad backup to my Mac via Wifi. I haven't plugged either into a Mac in years.
 
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But what kind of wireless charging...that is thee question. A charging mat for just 99 dollar extra? No thanks.
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I understand the importance of this tech for waterproofing devices, though It would scare me to think we could eventually have an iPhone with zero ports because everything is wireless. It makes sense on the watch, however, I am not interested in wireless charging of the phone itself.

Technology that radiates energy throughout the room to charge a phone. No thanks... o_O
I think this is the future, may it be next year or maximum one of the five years after that.
 
Apple going round 3 with the IPhone 6 kind of does that to you
these types of comments make me laugh..... because the shell of a phone doesn't change it means it's the same phone? Guess kinda like the Porsche 911.... that didn't change for years and years.... guess they just kept putting the same car out year after year... improvements be damned it's still the same car..... LoL what a joke.
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Every time I hear ALL GLASS I cringe. I was never a fan of the iPhone 4's mostly glass design. While I can tell you, we have one at home for our grandkids to use as an iPad and have watched them throw it across the room and land on a hardwood floor and not break, I still don't like it.
If your grand kids are throwing iPads maybe you need to teach them to be more respectful. I for one liked the design of the 4/4s and found it was just as durable as any other iPhone design... .but alas I don't throw my things around like your grand kids.
 
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Wireless charging. 0 ports. Good luck keeping devs on your platform!

Let's hope they still keep the ports! Who knows what captain dongle head will do, he has fragmented their product line and has one of the most uninspired product lineup ever!

To be honest, this strange direction apple has gone only makes sense in a wireless charging world. If everything had wireless charging (mouses, pens, keyboards), then users don't need to enter a dongle universe. Even losing the magsafe 2 dongle makes sense. but right now we are in this weird transition time, when Ipad pens have a ridiculously charging method, where Apple mouses need to be charged upside down, and were Apple's extra battery look like fugly humps.

It's like Tim doesn't screen products for common sense, or is just laughing at us and seeing how far he can make stupid products to see how we buy them up!
 
Wireless charging. 0 ports. Good luck keeping devs on your platform!

It isn't going to happen anytime soon. Definitely not a single developer or anybody with any kind of technical sense amongst those suggesting it.

Doesn't all of this apply to the Watch? And yet, no user accessible ports.

I'd love to see your data on how many iPhone users do and don't want to use wireless headphones, and how many sales of iPhones not having a 3.5mm jack is going to cost Apple.

And who needs to backup to iCloud? My iPhone and iPad backup to my Mac via Wifi. I haven't plugged either into a Mac in years.

No, The Watch does have a diagnostic port. It has a minuscule amount of storage which is limited to photos and music anyway.

Don't understand what you mean about backing up your phone to a Mac over wifi, do you mean Wifi Sync? If so it isn't the same thing. As for not plugging a your phone into a Mac for years, thats you, who is supposed to develop software for these mythical portless iOS devices? Should they be expected to do everything over Wifi?

Apple got away with the headphone jack removal because they provided wired headphones that worked over lightning and an adapter with the device. Why did they bother doing that if everybody is suddenly going to switch to wireless? That was an admission that plenty of people still want to use wired headphones. If they remove that option entirely people will not be so forgiving.

The funniest part of the whole suggestion of iOS devices without ports is that Apple would have people believe the iPad can replace your laptop. With no ports? :D

The iPad actually needs more i/o not less.
 
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