New AirPods Pro Charging Case's Lanyard Loop Potentially Doubles as Antenna

[MacRumors]

Lumafield today shared CT scan images of the second-generation AirPods Pro charging case, providing a look at internal changes to the case.

While the basic layout of the case appears to be similar to the original, Lumafield discovered that the newly added "lanyard loop" is internally connected to the Lightning connector, which interfaces with the logic board, leading the company to speculate that the metal insert might double as an antenna for the U1 chip or serve some other additional purpose.

There's a new metal eyelet on the side of the case. Apple says it's for a lanyard, but it seems to serve an additional purpose: it's 4 mm deep and 18 mm long, with a hidden tail that's connected to a metal pad around the Lightning port. Perhaps it's an antenna to support improved "Find My" tracking.

The U1 chip enables Find My support, allowing users to track the location of the charging case in the Find My app on their iPhone or on iCloud.com. The case features a new built-in speaker that can emit a chime to help with finding it.

Other improvements to the charging case include water resistance, support for the Apple Watch's magnetic charging puck, and longer battery life.

The new AirPods Pro launched last Friday and are priced at $249 in the United States.

Article Link: New AirPods Pro Charging Case's Lanyard Loop Potentially Doubles as Antenna

 

[MayaUser]

Very smart

 

[Costino1]

Form meets function? You can tell Jony isnt there anymore.

 

[sw1tcher]

Form meets function? You can tell Jony isnt there anymore.

What are you talking about? Just look at how thin that connector that connects lanyard loop to Lightning port is.

 

[TinyMito]

Very smart

Good design!

 

[I7guy]

Very cool engineering.

 

[midkay]

So many cool little engineering feats in this latest round of products. Quite impressive.

 

[NT1440]

Form meets function? You can tell Jony isnt there anymore.

Wasn’t he there for the Apple logo serving as an antenna point on some of the iMacs?

I know people like to hate on him, but he has a very elegant view on engineering. The world’s capacity of CNC machines was almost doubled from the introduction of the aluminum unibody chassis and now that’s standard building from most high end machines.

He contributed a lot beyond the look of products, mostly in the actual manufacturing space. The problem was without Steve there to say No to certain things he overreached.

 

[jimbobb24]

Isn’t it possible it’s just a way for the case to know if the lanyard is attached?

 

[MacWorld78]

I just wish that "AirPods Pro" would replace profoundly digital hearing aids.

 

[1557750]

They so crafty!

 

[EvanGrill]

At a cursory glance this is to ground the exposed metal to prevent damage from electrostatic discharge (ESD).

 

[Wolfson]

It's grounding..

 

[urbanslaughter1997]

That's definitely a motion sensor for fitness tracking!

 

[sw1tcher]

Isn’t it possible it’s just a way for the case to know if the lanyard is attached?

And not just any lanyard but an MFi certified lanyard. At some point, if you connect a non-MFi certified lanyard to it you'll get an audio prompt through the case's speaker that it "cannot verify lanyard"

 

[MayaUser]

Wasn’t he there for the Apple logo serving as an antenna point on some of the iMacs?

I know people like to hate on him, but he has a very elegant view on engineering. The world’s capacity of CNC machines was almost doubled from the introduction of the aluminum unibody chassis and now that’s standard building from most high end machines.

He contributed a lot beyond the look of products, mostly in the actual manufacturing space. The problem was without Steve there to say No to certain things he overreached.

im sorry to disappoint you..but that design as many others were made under Steve and Jony Ive...steve was with those ideas not Ive
We saw what Apple did after Steve was gone...remember built in speakers and the apple logo to be also light up and as antena for the macbooks was Steve ideas, not Jonnys....Jonny were to go thin thin, butterfly thin, touchbar thin and so on..
Without Steve, Jonny had no ideas where the form meets function

 

[bmustaf]

I think it is much more credible that it is grounding given that it's connected to the Lightning port rather than antenna which would require routing to the actual radio/baseband, and the size/shape of the lanyard loop isn't an incredibly useful RF design in terms of shape or materials most likely (esp for the frequencies used by Find My).

When I get home I'll grab my APP2 and run some conductivity tests, should be pretty easy to figure that out.

 

[nutmac]

The new AirPods Pro 2 case is very intriguing. It effectively doubles as a rechargeable AirTags. And with a lanyard, you can attach a keyring and use it as a keychain.

 

[Eldaerenth Faexidor]

It seems that Apple is back in the “Awesomeness Game”! I’m enjoying my APP2’s to the Ultra Max!

 

[NT1440]

im sorry to disappoint you..but that design as many others were made under Steve and Jony Ive...steve was with those ideas not Ive
We saw what Apple did after Steve was gone...remember built in speakers and the apple logo to be also light up and as antena for the macbooks was Steve ideas, not Jonnys....Jonny were to go thin thin, butterfly thin, touchbar thin and so on..
Without Steve, Jonny had no ideas where the form meets function

Weird, I specifically talked about his contributions to manufacturing and you seem to be skipping over the fact that his team pioneered entirely new (at manufacturing scale) ways to achieve those new levels of detail, form, and function.

Almost like you didn’t care about my post and just wanted another “Ive does thin” post.

Yes there have been BIG missteps, but people fail to realize that nobody had the *ability* to manufacture some of these things until Apple, specifically Ive’s team, did these things in the Design Studio *and brought them to scale* where it was even viable to do in the first place.

Apple’s massive capital investments in manufacturing processes literally bent the cost curve on this equipment to the point where just a few years later what was previously prohibitively expensive is now old hat. The Ultrabook era PCs that use a machined unibody have Apple directly to thank for even making that economically viable to do so.

In other words, you’re missing the forest from the trees on Ive.

 

[diego.caraballo]

I read yesterday about users complaining over the new hinge, and the original article explains why:

 

[Analog Kid]

It's grounding..

This.

It's just making sure all metal parts are grounded so they don't affect the real antennas in unexpected ways...

 

[joeblough]

yeah, as someone who has layed out a few boards, it's likely to be for grounding. random pieces of metal can inadvertently become antennas unless they are grounded. these devices need to pass FCC emissions/receptivity (EMC/EMI testing) and stray antennas can mess that all up.

 

[Ilde]

Hi everyone,

Yes, I also guess it is a grounding system for a metal part that may be in contact with a person when the case is on charge by AC adapter. In electricity and electronics is common and mandatory grounding all metal parts for people electrical safety. It would be also interesting in order to confirm this theory, to know if the hinge is also electrically connected to the lightning port metal chassis, if the hinge is made from metal. In case of being plastic, obviously no grounding is needed.

 

[Ilde]

I have just measured continuity, with a Fluke multimeter, between chassis of lightning port inlet and lanyard hole ant it marks roughly 25 Ohm, so it may not be grounding, since if it were, the continuity should be full, I mean 0.0 Ohm. Only Tim knows!!!