Apple Promises iPhone 5-Compatible HDMI and VGA Cables Coming Soon

[Darien Red Sox]

Analog is dead. I was reading a white paper on "Analog Twilight" on Extron's website a few months ago. VGA will become no longer a standard and will soon not be included on any products. Blu-Ray players are all ready forbid to have any analog HD out and will soon only be permitted to have HDMI out.

The dock connector was a long time standard that will be missed by many of us, but wasn't ADB, the Apple Geo port, a floppy drive, and SCSI a long time standard on every Mac? Many of the older video outputs that the dock connector supported were older than these standards.

And Apple can't be making that much more money by switching standards if they need to redesign everything, yes they will make money when someone needs to buy a new adapter, but they also make money when somebody leaves an adapter behind somewhere, breaks one by removing it incorrectly, or hands down the old iDevice to JR. And I am sure that Monoprice will have them soon enough.

 

[Markiie]

Does anyone know if AirPlay was going to play without a Internet connection? I read somewhere (maybe here) they were trying to do that?

 

[SteveJobs2.0]

Nobody has answered my question regarding how durable this lightning connector is. I can see it breaking very easy on speaker docks unless they also use the headphone plug. Without that, no matter how strong the actual plug is, putting any pressure on the phone will crack it or the dock. All of the force will be distributed on an extremely small area.

 

[damir00]

Any guess as to what each of those pins do?

You can do power and data with just 4 pins... what do the other 4 pins do?

MakeMoMoneyL+
MakeMoMoneyL-
MakeMoMoneyR+
MakeMoMoneyR-

 

[japanime]

Has anyone seriously ever hooked up their iPhone to a television??

In my home, we do all the time — ever since the iPhone 3G was released, in fact. It's the easiest way for my family to get US TV programs and movies onto our TV here in Japan.

Seriously.

 

[appleguy123]

To be fair, Steve Jobs was more about profits than he let on. If you read his bio, Woz wanted to give away a lot of things that Jobs decided were better to sell.

Cook's a good CEO. No one person can ever replace Steve Jobs, and no one person should try. Jobs was a once in a generation business leader. He's up there with Henry Ford, Andrew Carnegie, and Cornelius Vanderbilt. All had bad qualities, but all, on the whole, were very good.

I'm happy when Apple makes a profit, I'm a shareholder, afterall. Maybe it's just because Steve was an amazing salesman, but when he introduced products, I felt like he actually cared about making his customer's lives more fulfilled and easier.

Post-Steve Apple seems to be about doing as little as possible to get people to buy the next update. The iPhone 5 seriously didn't have a single new feature. This is the first time that that has happened. Even the 3GS allowed for video recording and had rotating maps.

 

[APlotdevice]

Jump to conclusions much? If they are going to offer an adapter later then the interface has to have those signals available but just not in a way that can be used by an adapter+HDMI dongle combination.

From my understanding, the new connector is all digital so it no longer supports analog video like the component/S-video output nor does it support left/right audio out.

From what I understand, the HDMI dongle actually used the same signals as the VGA adapter but had a Analogue to Digital converter to change the RGB signal into HDMI. The 30 pin connector, therefor did not have a true digital video signal although it might have had a digital audio signal.

Well how do you interpret an "adaptive interface that uses only the signals that each accessory requires"?

Also if they can produce a VGA cable for this then obviously analog video output is not impossible. Even if it just means going the reverse route from the HDMI dongle.

 

[afd]

With something new like the lighting connector apple shortage taken the time ti explain exactly what it does. It shouldn't be left to rumors sites ti try and work things out. A slide in the keynote and a web page going over the specs of it and the adapters is all it'd take.

 

[Alameda]

MHL phones have a standard 5-pin microUSB connection that supports simultaneous charging, 1080p video, surround-sound and remote control. And there are millions of TV's that can attach to these phones with a passive cable -- no dongle or external charger connection, the TV itself charges the phone while it plays video. Or you can buy an MHL-to-HDMI dongle for about $10. Almost all the other smartphones, such as Samsung, use it. So why did Apple pick an inferior technology that can't connect directly to a TV, which needs an expensive, non-standard connector?

 

[mmomega]

Did Apple or anyone ever mention if Lightning was USB 2 or 3? Because USB2 is not very Lightning like..

I really hope they don't get into the habit of giving every single thing cutesy little names like Microsoft has been doing.

 

[koruki]

Apple used to be a great company making great products. Now they just seem to be greedy greedy greedy. They are clearly willing to sacrifice user-friendliness for money. I won't be buying anything from them anymore. The system updates reduce functionality rather than expanding it, and design decisions like this one make it clear that they just want people to pay pay pay.

I have a 5 year old iPod classic which works great, and a refurbished 2011 MBP running Snow Leopard, and I think that's where I'll stop for now. No new stuff, no system updates. Apple, you're blowing it big time.

Since when did they ever sell cheap adapters?

 

[Michael Scrip]

While you aren't wrong, getting any speed out of your connection requires more than just one simple channel for in and one for out. theres a lot more to it i promise. maybe the cable is active, maybe its bidirectional, maybe it has hidden features....there will be sooner or later

Oh I'm sure there is a lot more to it.

At minimum USB has 4 pins... 2 for power and 2 for data.

So with the Lightning connector there are now 4 extra pins.

Just trying to figure out what they do... as per my original question.

 

[lowlymarine]

Did Apple or anyone ever mention if Lightning was USB 2 or 3? Because USB2 is not very Lightning like..

I really hope they don't get into the habit of giving every single thing cutesy little names like Microsoft has been doing.

It's USB 2.0, according to the listing in the store (or was before the store went down, watch it say 3 after it comes back up just to make me look stupid).

----------

Oh I'm sure there is a lot more to it.

At minimum USB has 4 pins... 2 for power and 2 for data.

So with the Lightning connector there are now 4 extra pins.

Just trying to figure out what they do... as per my original question.

My guess? They make it so you can insert it either way.

 

[jkichline]

Apple used to be a great company making great products. Now they just seem to be greedy greedy greedy. They are clearly willing to sacrifice user-friendliness for money. I won't be buying anything from them anymore. The system updates reduce functionality rather than expanding it, and design decisions like this one make it clear that they just want people to pay pay pay.

I have a 5 year old iPod classic which works great, and a refurbished 2011 MBP running Snow Leopard, and I think that's where I'll stop for now. No new stuff, no system updates. Apple, you're blowing it big time.

It's called technological progress. If you don't want the state of the art to move forward, that's up to you, but technology is going to change and Apple is on the forefront of that. The 30-pin connector was getting very clunky and inelegant and I think this new adapter will allow smaller, wearable computing devices into the future.

 

[cheezehead]

I do when I am on trips and in a hotel with HDMI

Hotel and wish I could use it with HBO go when on the road.



All I know is if to work in a car with a USB port which has "ipod" connectivity if it doesn't work, I have a feeling it may go back.

 

[PrometheusGeek]

Yes if I not do it you can't.

LOL...touché.

Isn't that what an iPad is for?

Sometimes yes, sometimes no. There are several reasons to send video from my phone instead of iPad. Just depends on the particular circumstances. At any rate, leaving wired video-out completly off the iPhone 5 (or any "Lightning" equipped iDevice) would be a major deficiency. Good thing Apple is saying they'll have an adapter available soon.

 

[verniesgarden]

Cool.

Didn't think they'd actually attempt to force people to stream via Airplay.

well considering the new screen ratio, they are soon going to push the iphone and ipod touch to appleTV as a console gaming system.

 

[fblack]

Has anyone seriously ever hooked up their iPhone to a television??

Yep, since the first iPhone. Besides what other people have mentioned, I've also hooked it up to TVs when visiting family so everyone could see family photos on a big screen.

 

[intofx]

Nobody has answered my question regarding how durable this lightning connector is. I can see it breaking very easy on speaker docks unless they also use the headphone plug. Without that, no matter how strong the actual plug is, putting any pressure on the phone will crack it or the dock. All of the force will be distributed on an extremely small area.

Nobody here can answer that. Its not out yet! Check back in a couple of weeks

 

[Davieis]

More importantly where is the iPhone dock/universal dock?

 

[portishead]

Sometimes yes, sometimes no. There are several reasons to send video from my phone instead of iPad. Just depends on the particular circumstances. At any rate, leaving wired video-out completly off the iPhone 5 (or any "Lightning" equipped iDevice) would be a major deficiency. Good thing Apple is saying they'll have an adapter available soon.

Ok because I'm too lazy too google, what kind of video does the 4S play? Can I do a decent bit rate mp4 720p? How will it look on say a 40" TV? If the iPhone 5 is even faster maybe I could see myself doing this. Hdmi adapter and really short Hdmi cable would be nice and compact.

 

[smoking monkey]

Has anyone seriously ever hooked up their iPhone to a television??

ALL. THE. TIME.

I use it for watching movies when I'm in hotel rooms, when I travel home or, most importantly, I use it for work on TVs that still have old component in.

So yeah. the new Iphone is a deal breaker unless it has a connector that allows video/audio out on older TVs.

My iP4s will do fine for another year until they get this all sorted.

 

[Detrius]

The iPhone 5 seriously didn't have a single new feature. This is the first time that that has happened. Even the 3GS allowed for video recording and had rotating maps.

LTE doesn't count as a new feature? There are plenty of new features coming out in iOS 6. What's truly different is that Apple is allowing them to work on the iPhone 4S instead of forcing you to buy the iPhone 5 to get *software* updates.

 

[justperry]

Apple should provide 30pin to Lightning adapters for free with each new iDevice

Why???
So you can connect to a 3 th party device.
You bought a 3 th party device and it's you who should buy the adapter for it.
It is your responsibility to buy an adapter for it.
How many people actually use a 3 th party device, including an adapter to all iPhone 5 buyers would create a huge pile of unused adapters.
There will be 10s of millions of iPhone 5 sold, so lets say 50% use that adapter then half of them will not be used, wasted money on Apple's part.
And I am pretty sure 50% is much more than the actual number of people who will use a 3 th party device.
Get real, sell your 3 th party device and get a new one, and if it's a car, just deal with it.
Apple needed to change the old connector, it was outdated, occupied to much space, was inferior, good riddance.

 

[CrAkD]

This launch is very unorganized I don't usually say this but Steve would have never allowed this. No cases no adapters kinda crazy.