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Ummm, you mean 18 months ago? This is still a sour point for many consumers, as evidenced by this comment thread. A decision clearly made to push consumers to Apple's Beats/AirPods...

The only thing this comment thread proves is the vocal minority don’t speak for the entire smartphone world.

If they did iPhone sales should have tanked years ago and never recovered. Instead it was Samsung who tanked while Apple soared.
 
I got rid of my floppy discs years ago, and haven't looked back. I realize a lot of people like their jack security blanket. Start preparing yourselves now for life without it. Samsung will ditch it as well. Join the rest of us in the future. :)

Since everyone wants to compare the 3.5 mm audio jack to floppy disks, I will do just that.

Floppy disks were obsolete because the i/o was going obsolete, because of the space it took up on the machine, because the amount of memory on the format was too limited by the mid 90s. There wasn't a way that a floppy drive could accommodate storage in the hundreds of megabytes like Zip drives, or the gigabytes like CDR.

Had technology been mature enough so that storage on floppies could increase to gigabyte level, Apple would have not have been in the right to remove the port. The floppy drive went away because it had one conceivable structural purpose which had become obsolete. CDRs were better and stood to only get better. CDRs when mature were no more complicated than floppy drives were, became ultimately even cheaper to mass-manufacture, and provided a much improved medium on which to distribute content and software.

Floppy drives were not a port which could accept ANY storage medium. It could only accept a specific medium. That's key. Compare that to the 3.5mm jack.

The thing about 3.5mm headphone jack is that it accommodates my great 19.99 JVC headphones as well as high-end Bose or Sony noise-cancelling set of super-high fidelity earphones. The format has been around for a while, and the format will continue to accommodate massive leaps in audio fidelity yet to come. The technology advances rapidly. But the port does not ever change.

There is no argument to be made that bluetooth headphones are consistently better audio than 3.5mm simply because they are bluetooth. That is not a factor.

A random pair of bt may be better than a random pair of analog, but it's nothing to do with them being bluetooth, and in fact you're going to continue to pay more for bt no matter what, because of the complexity which is involved to just ditch the analog cables.

I have a pair of bluetooth headphones. In truth, I rarely use them, because even the tiny requirement of a battery makes them more prone to fall out of my ear. They also don't pair up immediately when I turn them on, and I am spoiled enough to not want to deal with turning one on on the receiver and the other on the transmitter, and waiting for the service, etc.

Leaving bluetooth service continually active on my iPad drains the battery faster, so I turn it off as much as I can. Which is another thing to think about.

I've also been on a long trip and realized, welp, I forgot to charge the headphones, so that's that until I get to a proper charger again. And this time hope there's room for both chargers when I get where I'm going.

And they're not as good or comfortable as my simple JVC headphones, which I never fear will fall into a toilet while I'm standing over it.

There's nothing wrong with Apple defaulting to bluetooth headphones. But even years later, I shake my head wondering why it's a feature. It definitely makes me less likely to purchase an iPhone.
 
Apple dropped the headphone jack to sell you their overpriced bluetooth headphones. Pretty obvious.
That and...

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/airpods-and-headache-ear-pain.2022765/

http://macintoshhowto.com/hardware/emf.html

http://macintoshhowto.com/hardware/extreme-emf-exposure-from-apple-airpods.html

Perhaps they are not as control freaks as Apple? At least they are not alienating their customers as much as possible.

Oh, and one more thing: I ditched my Airpods not only due to EMF radiation: I always thought their battery was s.hit. No way they lasted 5 hours in a single charge. I know it's quick to recharge them, but there were days I did that twice (and I don't even listen enough to justify that). They keep transmitting all the time when not inside that charger case, regardless if are in your ears or not.

In a couple of hours the battery is almost gone. If this is the future please, please please, allow me to live in the past. :rolleyes:
 
Since everyone wants to compare the 3.5 mm audio jack to floppy disks, I will do just that.

Floppy disks were obsolete because the i/o was going obsolete, because of the space it took up on the machine, because the amount of memory on the format was too limited by the mid 90s. There wasn't a way that a floppy drive could accommodate storage in the hundreds of megabytes like Zip drives, or the gigabytes like CDR.

Had technology been mature enough so that storage on floppies could increase to gigabyte level, Apple would have not have been in the right to remove the port. The floppy drive went away because it had one conceivable structural purpose which had become obsolete. CDRs were better and stood to only get better. CDRs when mature were no more complicated than floppy drives were, became ultimately even cheaper to mass-manufacture, and provided a much improved medium on which to distribute content and software.

Floppy drives were not a port which could accept ANY storage medium. It could only accept a specific medium. That's key. Compare that to the 3.5mm jack.

The thing about 3.5mm headphone jack is that it accommodates my great 19.99 JVC headphones as well as high-end Bose or Sony noise-cancelling set of super-high fidelity earphones. The format has been around for a while, and the format will continue to accommodate massive leaps in audio fidelity yet to come. The technology advances rapidly. But the port does not ever change.

There is no argument to be made that bluetooth headphones are consistently better audio than 3.5mm simply because they are bluetooth. That is not a factor.

A random pair of bt may be better than a random pair of analog, but it's nothing to do with them being bluetooth, and in fact you're going to continue to pay more for bt no matter what, because of the complexity which is involved to just ditch the analog cables.

I have a pair of bluetooth headphones. In truth, I rarely use them, because even the tiny requirement of a battery makes them more prone to fall out of my ear. They also don't pair up immediately when I turn them on, and I am spoiled enough to not want to deal with turning one on on the receiver and the other on the transmitter, and waiting for the service, etc.

Leaving bluetooth service continually active on my iPad drains the battery faster, so I turn it off as much as I can. Which is another thing to think about.

I've also been on a long trip and realized, welp, I forgot to charge the headphones, so that's that until I get to a proper charger again. And this time hope there's room for both chargers when I get where I'm going.

And they're not as good or comfortable as my simple JVC headphones, which I never fear will fall into a toilet while I'm standing over it.

There's nothing wrong with Apple defaulting to bluetooth headphones. But even years later, I shake my head wondering why it's a feature. It definitely makes me less likely to purchase an iPhone.
I wasn't comparing. I was making a joke about how technology evolves and us with it.

I knew the jack was out the door before Apple said anything. And I accept Apple's path.

I don't expect an audiophile experience with the iPhone. If one has such a setup at home, I can understand appreciating wired headphones for many reasons. I don't belittle that aspect as I did the same in the past, with my home equipment.

With a mobile device, my expectations and needs are different than many other people here. I don't want to be wired down trying to ascertain every subtle nuance of the music, much less having to worry about wire maintenance while doing activities etc.

There are some here that need to stop beating the dead horse, get over the jack grief, and move on with life, whether it be with Apple or Samsung.
 
Because it's a nice and essential option for many users who don't want to be forced into bluetooth heaphobes or deal with awkward and annoying adapters.
Also Many people have high quality wired headphones that no bluetooth headphone can match.
 
If Samsung is a "do what the customer is asking for" company, they wouldn't have removed the social features from my now 4 year TV with a firmware update. This customer didn't ask for that.
 
Dropping the headphone jack infuriated me as I have several expensive headphones and I hate dongles. So, I am keeping my 6s for now and putting a battery in it. I've been with the iPhone since the first generation, but dropping the headphone jack really bothered me. I'm becoming less enamored with the iPhone, especially the ancient looking iOS. If iOS 12 continues to look the same as it did in 2007, I will be switching to a Pixel. I can barely stand to look at an iOS screen any more, especially looking at the customization that Android provides. Yeah, I know switching will mean losing the headphone jack... dammit!
 
Samsung was able to keep the headphone jack still provide water resistance. Allowing the customer to use both wired and non-wired solutions is a big plus for me. If you could get a new iPhone with the headphone jack I think it would be better, even if it was a fraction of a millimeter thicker.
Sony did that YEARS ago with the Xperia Z(IP55/IP57)
 
I use my iPad a lot and the headphone jack has saved me countless of times from dead AirPods batteries. It feels very satisfying plugging them in as backup. You can't charge and plug lightning headphones at the same time. If you're falling asleep with AirPods you have to take them out and meticulously place them in the charging case. It's annoying. I still find the headphone jack missing in my life.
 
I think it's more accurate to say that Samsung will do whatever they believe gives them an advantage over Apple. This means copying Apple if necessary or one-upping them where possible. Samsung will keep the headphone jack around for as long as they think it gives their product a meaningful edge over Apple, and I fully expect them to drop it when they realise that the majority of consumers simply don't care.
 
Apple arguably has an advantage in this space thanks to its custom W1 chip
Do we actually know anything about the W1 chip aside from its name? I hear people ooh and aah about it, and how it makes everything amazing, but to the best of my knowledge we've been told nothing about what's inside.

We know that connecting and time syncing are challenges and Apple has done well at addressing them, but do we know it has anything to do with the W1? I'd love to see a link with evidence that there's anything fancier in there than Bluetooth and some firmware.
 
Ignorance at best. I don’t miss it at all. My Jaybird X3s sound amazing.


Good for you. Part of the reason that I dictated iPhone is because of headphone jack, while other part is iOS. I will not buy any phone without headphone jack. I think vast majority of people will agree, headphone jack is still popular and used my most people.
 
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Apple dropped the headphone jack so that they can sell Beats, Airpods as Apple users might be inclined to get Apple headphones.
 
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Why are PC makers still selling laptops with C.D. drives? Because some people want them and that company wants to squeeze every last drop of money from a dying market.
 
But I LIKE my headphones and earphones with a plug-in. I don't worry about maintaining a battery's charge, and they are always at the ready.

Sammy will copy the dropped jack, too. Just give them enough time.
 
They haven't abandoned the headphone jack because it's still useful to most people who don't want to go all in on Apple's proprietary jacks or use an adapter.
What do you mean most people? Way more people buy iPhones than flagship Samsung phones.

Actually, most people don’t care about a headphone jack at all...at least that’s what the numbers say.

If they did, the Galaxy line would sell 220M phones/yr instead of Apple.
 
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Happy that Apple refuses to stay stuck in the past.

For those that want headphone jacks and USB-A connectors, get a spine, open your wallet and support a manufacture that provides them. Jeeez, is it really that tough?
 
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