Honestly shameful to be considering USB2.0 speeds on any model, even a budget phone. It’s a decades old standard and you’d have to physically go out of your way to find USB-C manufacturing that supports a LOWER standard than the USB-C specification came out with, just to screw your consumers.
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Here's How Fast USB-C Ports Are on iPads and Macs Ahead of iPhone 15
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will happen.
i'm going to make an educated guess that far <1% of all iPhone customers has ever needed to transfer 300GB in one session.
And if EU is making the argument that switching to USB-C from lightning is good for the environment, they should ban wireless while they are at it. They have not.
People aren't that bright and don't realize wireless charging wastes electricity while charging. in simple terms
No. At worst, USB-C offers exactly the same USB 2.0 data speed as Lightning. But if you have the iPhone Pro, you'll be able transfer data at vastly faster speeds (up to 80X faster) using the right cable.
But you might be better off using wireless (eg: Wi-Fi sync, Airdrop, or iCloud photos) to transfer those photos anyhow?
By the time I’ve left it on charge every night on holiday the hotel WiFi has taken care of uploads at which point I can download it faster from my home broadband than I ever could over USB.
Not to mention, it isn't "wireless" because it still requires a proprietary cable that has a wire. "Portless" or "plug-less" is more accurate. Portless may be a convenience, but it isn't an environmental win.
Never say never. Wait till you try it on the iPhone 15 Pro with its 40 Gbps USB 4 port! There aren't many homes with 40 Gigabit broadband.
What units do you have on hand? Anything? Anything at all?
If you have no quantification for the power usage of wired vs wireless, then this is definitely not "Physics 101". As it stands, your pronouncement is Hand Waving 101.
...and how does that compare with the average energy consumption of an individual on a daily basis. "70% of [unquantifiable]" doesn't cut it.
I'd guess this comes in at around 1/10 of 1% -- or less -- of the average energy consumption of an individual. That's chipmunk-passing-gas-in-a-hurricane values. If you're going to pronounce this as "Going portless is against environment.", you actually have to provide hard numbers that support that point. This is an evidence-based discussion; if you have no numbers, you shouldn't make the assertion in the first place.
If you have a source for your "going against the environment" "Physics 101" claim, please provide it. If you can't provide a source, please retract the claim. Do one or the other now. Thanks.
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Sorry, but which part did you not understand?
90% efficiency compared to <70% efficiency. Do you need definition of the efficiency? It defines how much of the energy is wasted in the process. Copper wire is more efficient electricity conductor than electromagnetic induction. The amount of energy lost in heat is bigger in case of electromagnetic induction. That's Physics 101. But you already know that. You're smart enough.
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Oh you mean those. Even still, I know the speed of USB2 is snail today, yet Apple would use it on lower end devices regardless. I’m unwilling to defend Apple for anything. I just point out that perceived old tech still has its use (maybe easier to design? control Chips are cheaper?). Whether the applied tech is appropriate Or not is largely up to customer. if Customers are largely content with USB2, Apple would not go to USB3, period. Yes I know, we are the one to blame why Apple is so slow to move to USB3 and USB-C.
I hate Apple using USB2 just like you do, but that doesn’t mean anything to Apple.
Oh the good’old percentage, which can have drastic meaning depending on the base number it applies to.
A simple example would be if a bottle of 1L water cost $1 yesterday, today it costs $1.5. That’s a 50% increase, but only $.50 more. Compared to a packaged 1kg meat costing $20 yesterday. If the price goes up to $20.50 today, the price jump would only be 2.5%. Same 50c price bump, but drastically different percentage.
Not to mention people calculates multiple percentage increases wrong all the time. But I digress.
The point is, without a base number to compare, talking about percentage differences is completely pointless, no matter how you want to spin it.
The base here is your charger input power... Quite obviously. If you've got 20W charger with 70% efficiency only 70% electricity of that input gets delivered on the output. The rest is wasted in other forms of energy, namely heat in this case.
But I believe it's obvious and you already know that, so I don't get your point - why you have to argue over this with me.
Apple ONLY cares about profit and shareholder value. Trust me, if they can get away with USB 1.1 spec, they would do so, without any doubt. Also, USB 3 is backwards compatible with USB 2. Customer doesn’t need to go out of their way to find the “proper cable”. Any properly built (which is a big ask, I know) USB-C cable will do.
I love my wireless chargers. I don't care if it cost me a possible extra $3 a month in lost energy.
Well, the other guy who replied to you earlier did ask you for units or quantification to prove your points.
Regardless, at least for current day, wireless charging wins in convenience, and wired charging wins in high efficiency, and phone charging generally doesn’t draw as much power compared to, say, a fridge would do in the same hour, meaning large efficiency difference might not be as significant when we are talking about power bills, meaning some are ok with the sacrifice of speed in exchange for convenience.
Now, if we bump the number of phones charging from 3 to 30 million, then suddenly The conversion waste adds up. This is why quantification is critical when discussing this kind of efficiency stuff.
And that's my point. Quantification does matter of course. But does not change technical aspect of this topic. Efficiency of the electricity transfer is still the same no matter the quantification...
So I still stand behind my initial "physics 101 point". Because it's true.
And I agree that the severity of this efficiency difference is matter of view. In case of individual electricity bill, it definitely does not matter. In the view of global energy wasted it definitely matters.
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Ok. But energy company care, when every user is willing to pay $3 more if the grid becomes less stable and less power efficient. Maybe wireless charger for phone doesn't have as significant impact to the grid.
Wireless charging would be at the bottom of priority concerning more energy usage.
We are not just talking about phone wireless charging btw. And in case you don't know, if the power factor drops below a certain point because of load, or if frequency fluctuates too much, the energy company can start taking action. Wireless charging, by design, can affect the power factor.
Well the way energy works from plant to user is above my pay grade.
But for larger devices than phones, wireless charging can be engineered to become more energy efficient numerous ways.
Maybe, but cost has to be a factor.
My point is, wireless charging has exactly one advantage (sort of) compared to wire: convenience, that wire can have a hard time to overcome.
If these cables are intended primarily for charging and not for data transmission, then they are probably USB-PD (Power Delivery) cables. That is a type of USB-C that is optimized for charging. It is specified to support USB 2.0 data speeds. This is typically what other devices using USB-C for charging are using including many other phones. It is not a substandard cable that you would need to go out of your way to find. PD cables are quite common and are just one of multiple types of USB-C cable.
Of course, Apple could include a different kind of USB-C cable with a higher data limit but it seems that they are assuming that most users will only be using these for charging so the data speed is not important. We many or may not agree with that assessment but it doesn’t seem like they just want to screw customers.
Well, current efficient wireless charging method (Magsafe) depends on perfect alignment and very low distance between receiver and transmitter. And I believe this will always be the case. Can't imagine efficient wireless charger with less then perfect alignment or on high distance.
With that said - it may be quite easy to do physical connection (which we can do efficiently already right now - and for cheap) which will connect automatically. Imagine connector on the bottom or side of the car where automatic motorized arm (with electricity source) would connect charging by itself. It would plug into the charger in few seconds without your interaction. Completely imaginable and possible just today. Self alignment has been already solved and is available on today's product (for instance Roomba vacuum cleaner). Yes, it's more complex compared to two coils, but it is using today's technology and it's got perfect efficiency (I mean the efficiency of physical electric connector - which is best we can do today, for detachable devices).
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Inductive wireless charging by design requires perfect alignment and electromagnetic field isn’t too far from each other For the induction to work. Nothing much can be helped here unfortunately. Higher efficiency require major breakthrough in room-temperature superconductor material to drastically lower the amount of energy waste happening while the conductor is working. There has been some news articles talking about it, tho peer review is still ongoing.
(some editing to not repeat myself)
We will see how material science can change in terms of both wired and wireless energy transmission. Maybe scientists one day can figure out a brand new way to transfer energy over the air across great distances with minimal side effects.
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