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iPhone 15 USB-C Cables Again Said to Be Limited to USB 2.0 Transfer Speeds

tripsync said:
Who could have seen this EU-made disaster coming from a mile away? 🙋‍♂️ 🙋‍♂️ 🙋‍♂️ 🙋‍♂️

> EU mandates USB-C without specifying USB 3.0 minimum spec
> Apple ships billions of USB 2.0 cables with the box to keep costs down
> Users throw their USB-C 2.0 cables away when they realize these cables are slow, so instead of relying in AirDrop, they upgrade to an Anker USB3.0 cable
> Apple switches to portless phone several years later
> Users throw their USB3.0 cables away because portless iPhone is out and most of their other accessories are USB 4.1/5.0 with even better XYZ features
Click to expand...

The EU regulation was about charging, not about data transfer.

Virtually every cheap Belkin, Anker, Ugreen, whatever USB-C cable that you find on e.g. Amazon, whether it's a "regular" 60 W capable one, or a higher charge 100+ W version with an e-marker chip, only supports USB 2.0 transfer speeds.

All Android phone makers ship USB 2.0 cables with their phones.

It's a non-issue. 99% of people charge their phones with these cables, and USB 2.0 cables are easier to manufacture and much more bendable (a lot fewer wires).

And just FWIW, I think the EU regulation is dumb, because a) mandating a particular plug on the device side is potentially bad for future innovation, and b) cables break in people's purses or pockets or cars, not the chargers, so whether you buy a new lightning or a new USB-C cable after a few years makes no difference in terms of the total waste produced.
 
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JohnRckr said:
And people will still stand in line on these smh
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I get what you're saying but I have never once transferred anything to or from my iphone using a cable after 13 years of iPhone use. I have to imagine there are others like me.

Edit: Maybe back in the day I used iTunes to update with the cable I can't honestly remember.
 
Cool, I’ll be able to sync my brand new iPhone 15 with my iMac G4 at the same speeds as my MacBook Pro 14 inch. This is anti-consumer, if this turns out to be true I will be very disappointed in Apple.
 
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Although it wouldn’t surprise me this to be true, I find it also hard to believe. The current iPad Air has the following specs

  • USB-C port with support for:
    • Charging
    • DisplayPort
    • USB 3.1 Gen 2 (up to 10Gb/s)
if Apple wants to simplify fabrication and sourcing of parts, why would they rely on multiple usb c controllers of different specs to be produced for the iPhone? They already have other usb c modules being developed for the iPad Air and the iPad Pro. Basically, it would save them a step by using the modules similar to that of the iPad Air or iPad Pro (Accordingly per iPhone type). Sure, they could use 2.0 on non pro models, then use the faster usb c on the pro models but it still doesn’t make sense to me.
if Apple plans to innovate in future versions of iOS, they might as well go ahead and provide the usb controller that supports video out and high data transfer.
 
Folks, everyone is overthinking this. Apple has entered a new stage of customer engagement. Now Apple looks for “gasps” when they do something. The gasps in this thread show Apple has hit another home-run with the USB 2.0 speed cables!
 
Wired transfer speed is not really the issue, the Mac Photos App is just trash at this point.
  • Oh, you marked it as favourite on your phone? Haha, it's not a favourite on your Mac running the same Apple ID.
  • Checked "delete after import"? I'll delete them as I please, sometimes I'll leave them, sometimes I'll delete them when import fails.
  • Oh, you have stuff in your "hidden" album which only recently requires faceID on the Phone? I'll just import those along all your other pictures without any password protection.
  • Oh you want to re-encode some of your videos so they don't take up all your disk space? Haha, good luck finding them in the file system, we're just gonna garble the file name and remove the "reveal in Finder" function.
I'm actually air-dropping photos and videos to myself now, favourites first so I can tag them on the Mac again, process videos a bit before archiving, removing the Live Photo bits of pictures where it doesn't make sense...
 
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Yeah, I as much predicted this was going to happen.

iPad (Mini, Air, standard) USB-C cables are also USB 2.0. iPad PRO USB-C cables are 3.0.
You can easily check this on the mac.

However the iPads DO support USB-C 3.0 if you have a proper USB 3.0 cable, so this might still be the case on the iPhone (though I doubt that) (The Air and Pro iPads support Thunderbolt)

So it will be:
iPhone non-pro: USB-C 2.0
iPhone Pro: USB-C 3.2
iPad (mini): USB-C 3.0
iPad Pro: Thunderbolt (USB-C)
 
The_Privy_Life said:
Although it wouldn’t surprise me this to be true, I find it also hard to believe. The current iPad Air has the following specs

  • USB-C port with support for:
    • Charging
    • DisplayPort
    • USB 3.1 Gen 2 (up to 10Gb/s)
if Apple wants to simplify fabrication and sourcing of parts, why would they rely on multiple usb c controllers of different specs to be produced for the iPhone? They already have other usb c modules being developed for the iPad Air and the iPad Pro. Basically, it would save them a step by using the modules similar to that of the iPad Air or iPad Pro (Accordingly per iPhone type). Sure, they could use 2.0 on non pro models, then use the faster usb c on the pro models but it still doesn’t make sense to me.
if Apple plans to innovate in future versions of iOS, they might as well go ahead and provide the usb controller that supports video out and high data transfer.
Click to expand...
Unless the controller is built into the SoC. I don’t know if it is or not. The M1 and M2 clearly support Thunderbolt and USB 3, but the iPhone won’t be using those chips. What’s promising though is that the A14 iPad Air and A15 iPad mini both support USB 3 speeds over their USB-C ports.

I suspect that all of the iPhone 15 models will indeed support USB 3 speeds, just that the charging cables won’t. That’s annoying for those who want to use the cables to transfer data but it is also in line with much of the industry.
 
Should I dig up all the comments in the past 8 years which said USB-C has to come with faster speed and there is no way Apple will use USB-C with USB 2.0 speed?

ROFL.
 
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Not to worry, a normal fast speed will be available with iPhone 16. A great reason to upgrade again:)
 
I guess my Backbone controller for iPhone will be useless for new iPhones soon. What a PITA, that thing was not cheap and has no wireless function or power, relies entirely on Lightning port.
 
Does anyone actually sync their iPhone to their computer any more? Just curious. I haven't done it in years.
 
nova motum said:
I don't understand the excitement about the USB-C cable question, whether USB 2.0 or USB-C Thunderbolt 3 data speed: How many iPhone users today do their data transmission via cable at all? And for the charging: How many do charging wirelessly? And even if you charge power by cable, I expect it will also be faster using a standard Thunderbolt 3 cable rather than the slower USB-C 2.0, as the former mentioned one already contains an MFI chip to make use of iPhone's higher performance...
Click to expand...
Hello everyone. I have been a lurker on this website for years and finally decided to register in order to express my thoughts on fast cable transfer speeds. I’m all for it.

There is alot of people using their iPhone’s for their personal music library storage.

I have 1,212 music CD’s that I ripped to ALAC. I then transfer them from my MacBook Pro to my iPhone 14 Pro via Lighting cable. Sure its a one time transfer but it takes hours. I want Lossless audio on my iPhone so I can stream my music to my KEF LS60 Wireless speakers and when I’m using my Shure 846 earphones with AudioQuest Cobalt Dragonfly DAC. I also still buy all my music on CD. It would be so nice to transfer the stuff real fast.

Also many people need the speed for photos and video’s. Yes there is AirDrop and the cloud but for me, I want my stuff on my device. Just my thoughts on the subject.

Thanks for reading.
 
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tripsync said:
Who could have seen this EU-made disaster coming from a mile away? 🙋‍♂️ 🙋‍♂️ 🙋‍♂️ 🙋‍♂️

> EU mandates USB-C without specifying USB 3.0 minimum spec
> Apple ships billions of USB 2.0 cables with the box to keep costs down
> Users throw their USB-C 2.0 cables away when they realize these cables are slow, so instead of relying in AirDrop, they upgrade to an Anker USB3.0 cable
> Apple switches to portless phone several years later
> Users throw their USB3.0 cables away because portless iPhone is out and most of their other accessories are USB 4.1/5.0 with even better XYZ features

Meanwhile lightning hasn't changed one bit since ten years ago, did one thing really well: charge your iPhone, and there are billions of good functioning cables out there that didn't need to be thrown away before the portless iPhone.

Tell me again how this is a great idea for the environment.

As I predicted, big brain 5-head EU has absolutely no clue what they're doing. Thank them for the awfully annoying cookie popup on every single website too.
Click to expand...
If you want something screwed up, involve any government agency on the planet.
 
headlessmike said:
I can’t even count how many device I have that came with USB cables that cannot carry any data and are only wired for power. Apple shipping USB 2.0 speed cables is not the end of the world if the device still supports faster speeds. The actual percentage of iPhone users that use their cables for data transfer must be very small.
Click to expand...
Yes!

People are conflating cable with port, as usual. This story is about what the cable can support. The phone itself might support faster.

I don't think people realize that 99% of cheapo USB-C cables on Amazon are also limited to USB2 speeds. You can have to specifically seek out fast data cables if that is what you want.
 
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oneMadRssn said:
Yes!

People are conflating cable with port, as usual. This story is about what the cable can support. The phone itself might support faster.

I don't think people realize that 99% of cheapo USB-C cables on Amazon are also limited to USB2 speeds. You can have to specifically seek out fast data cables if that is what you want.
Click to expand...
This is very common. You generally have to specifically buy USB4 cables if you want full compatibility with everything. Most other cables are USB 2.0 only (including the shipped that are sold with Macs), with the exception of the cables that are usually packaged with certain devices such as external SSD enclosures which usually do package USB3 capable cables.
 
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The cables themselves that come with the 15 limited to USB 2.0 speeds, not just the port on the phone? So if someone uses a cable for one on the Pro, upgraded later or borrowed, it would be limited again?

Gee good thing Apple waited so long to avoid the USB C mess eh.
 
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