True , my scenario is not an average one , as I am into my music.
My frustration is Apple fragmenting thier own products . Some have 3.5 , other lightning etc.
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Lightning Headphones: Are They Better or Just an Inconvenience?
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True , my scenario is not an average one , as I am into my music.
My frustration is Apple fragmenting thier own products . Some have 3.5 , other lightning etc.
You do realize that whatever comes to the lightening port is coming from the SOC (or a specialized chip) inside the phone. This exactly signal is also available to the chip (DAC and amplifier) that creates audio for the 3.5mm jack. So, whatever lightening port has may be worse (but probably won't) than what's available "inside" the phone but it definitely can't be better.
This would truly be the stupidest thing Apple has ever done should it happen. The 3.5mm jack is a world wide cross platform standard. Buy a pair of headphones and it will pretty much work on every audio device made for the past 50 years or more. Lightning headphones won't even work across Apple's product range as no Mac has a lightning port.
Plus this will completely nuke using the iPhone as an in-car GPS as it's essential to have both audio out and power plugged in at the same time.
We'll end up in a world of adapters and dongles and general mess. It will be very ugly indeed.
Plus this will completely nuke using the iPhone as an in-car GPS as it's essential to have both audio out and power plugged in at the same time.
We'll end up in a world of adapters and dongles and general mess. It will be very ugly indeed.
To tell you the truth, I'm not sure what the reason is either. But I trust Apple will create a better user experience, even at the expense of legacy hardware. Furthermore, after Apple removes it, every company will remove their jacks. And we'll all be wondering what the fuss was about.
Maybe that's the idea. Extra lock in. You won't be tempted by that shiny new Samsung after you've spend £300 on a pair of lightning only headphones. Hopefully headphone manufactures will at least make the lightning cable detachable and allow a regular analogue headphone jack cable to work too.
Mindless market dont realize that they already have both options (lightening port and 3.5) available on current iphone and tend to think it has to be either or. They will only be satisfied when 3.5 is taken away from them. Look at your phone and you will realize that you already have both lightening port along with 3.5mm.
With the current build of the phone, when we prefer lightening port we can go with lightening, and other times when we only have 3.5 with us, we could continue to use it as is. But why would Apple takeaway 3.5? There must be some opportunity for Apple to generate income (sell new accessories) and shave off production cost (no more cost to build in head phone jack).
Greedy Apple and mindless market synergizes each other.
With the current build of the phone, when we prefer lightening port we can go with lightening, and other times when we only have 3.5 with us, we could continue to use it as is. But why would Apple takeaway 3.5? There must be some opportunity for Apple to generate income (sell new accessories) and shave off production cost (no more cost to build in head phone jack).
Greedy Apple and mindless market synergizes each other.
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That would make sense if 85% of all smart phones were not non-Apple smart phones. And the headphones (at least the good ones) last way longer than a phone, In fact, I am afraid Apple may change iPhone port many times during the life span of good head phones.
Not entirely sure other companies are going to remove something from their device that has been accepted worldwide.
All I want is the return of volume controls on the earphones.
In the beginning, most companies do put iDevice compatible volume controls on their earphones. Even cheap earbuds had them.
But the rise of Android makes everybody to make earphones with just the single answer-call-button since there's no standard on volume control for Android on wired headsets. So everybody follow the lowest common denominator and just put one single button on their earphones. Now there are less and less models out there with Apple-compatible volume control. Very annoying, especially for me that actually does not like Apple's stock earbud.
In the beginning, most companies do put iDevice compatible volume controls on their earphones. Even cheap earbuds had them.
But the rise of Android makes everybody to make earphones with just the single answer-call-button since there's no standard on volume control for Android on wired headsets. So everybody follow the lowest common denominator and just put one single button on their earphones. Now there are less and less models out there with Apple-compatible volume control. Very annoying, especially for me that actually does not like Apple's stock earbud.
It's hard to see how supposedly better sound quality matters unless you are using a lossless compression format for your music. I'd bet that a tiny fraction of customers are using lossless formats (whether streaming or via iTunes), and a great many are using their headphones/earphones while performing other activities that override sound quality anyway. But every single one of them will be inconvenienced by the overloading of a single port on the phone.
1) If Apple does this, Apple will immediately add Lightning ports to all Macs.
2) There will be a passthrough port on the headphone cable at a minimum to allow charging and listening at the same time. No ugly mess.
Does anybody take the time to think these things through before they start spouting off? Seriously, Apple hasn't thought of any of this before potentially making this decision? Ridiculous.
Or the difference in the DAC it accessed changed the volume. Could be either.
Or it forces BT to get better and we all win.
1) Most of the sound quality improvements will come from the external DAC and amp being custom matched to the equipment, rather than relying on Apple's compromised output to accommodate all possible gear plugged into it. It's much less about audiophile sound quality.
2) I'd like to see how the average iPhone user is going to overload a port that most only use for charging at the moment. A passthrough connector will remedy the situation easily for most things.
They are bulkier. I use in-ear buds while in bed. They don't feel uncomfortable when I turn on my side. Bulky bluetooth head phones would.
Good point. This shows how important the standards are. I read that Intel is proposing some digital audio standard for USB-C. While I am not sold on it but at least this have a chance to become a standard.
Apple already thought it through when they added lightening port on iPhone years ago. The current case is not of adding value, but removal of accessibilty.
No, it doesn't - the iPhone DAC is quite respectable. It shows that the amp in the iPhone isn't really powerful enough to drive low-sensitivity headphones without clipping. That doesn't mean the iPhone amp is bad either - it just means you shouldn't be pairing it with high-impedance headphones. I own many external DACs and amps and on higher-sensitivity headphones (e.g., Shure SE846) they still make a difference to the sound quality, but those differences are extremely marginal.
Offloading DAC and amp functions from the iPhone to the headphone simply makes no sense. Consumers will be paying more (for an extra DAC and amp, even though your iPhone already has one of each) and will be losing the ability to use their headphones in all their devices without dongles or adapters. Essentially, this is just turning the iPhone into nothing but a digital transport mechanism. And remember, iPhone is a device in which internal memory comes at a premium price and expandable storage is (and always will be) non-existent. If you want a more powerful DAC/amp combo, you'd be better off just buying something like a FiiO X7 or a QP1R.
I don't see how anybody can view the removal of the headphone socket as a feature. You can use an existing iPhone as a digital transport to an external DAC/amp, but you still have the choice to use it with any regular headphones for portable use on-the-go. The iPhone 7 is just going to remove that choice.
Well it's an inconvenience if I wanna use my Earpods with my 3DS, or any other device aside the iPhone.
The DAC inside any phone is not good... but it's not obvious, to me, why lightning would be any better. Is the DAC on the headphones' side? Or is it just the same thing (inside the phone), with a different connector?
[EDIT: Oops! Okay, hadn't actually watched the video... looks like the DAC is in the phones, so that would account for the difference in quality.]
And yet in hi-fi gear the DACs are never put inside the speakers and the amplifiers are rarely put there either. The chance that head phone manufacturers will use better DACs than the ones in iPhone are very low. Sure, the ones in expensive ($300+) head phones will probably be better but the vast majority of the head phones will use dirt chip DACs.
A very legitimate point and really the only valid issue I see going forward, though only if you are spending a decent amount on headphones. If your just using what Apple is giving you with the phone then I dont see a reason to complain. Also, I would be really surprised if going forward we dont start seeing adapters that would solve this issue. If it becomes such a large issue that people would want to use their lightning enabled headphones in a 3.5 jack, then someone, if not a lot of someone's will be pumping out lightning to 3.5 adapters