“A new program designed to allow third-party manufacturers to build headphones that would connect to an iOS device via the Lightning port, rather than the legacy 3.5-millimeter headphone jack, could mean that the latter’s days in Apple’s supply chain are numbered,” Sam Oliver reports for Apple Insider.
“Apple executives have never been afraid to pull the trigger on controversial choices to break from legacy technologies,” Oliver reports. “The original iMac kickstarted the adoption of USB at the expense of ADB and the floppy drive; the MacBook Air made it acceptable to drop optical drives and, later, spinning hard disks.”
“Following their announcement of a new headphone module for the all-digital Lightning connector at WWDC, Apple could now be on the verge of killing perhaps the most legacy of legacy technologies: the analog audio jack,” Oliver reports. “It could make headphones smarter. A bidirectional digital link with Apple’s uber-powerful handheld computers could make for better noise cancellation, improved audio quality, and even turn them into biometric sensors.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Bring. It. On.
Mac users are never wedded to old tech when there’s progress to be made.
Also, another good reason for the Beats buy. If Apple and Beats both change to Lightning headphones, the rest of the world will have to follow.
Of interest: Apple Inc.’s U.S. Patent No. 8,655,004: “Sports monitoring system for headphones, earbuds and/or headsets.”
Apple’s patent abstract: A monitoring system that can be placed proximate to the head or ear of a user is disclosed. According to one embodiment, the monitoring system can be used with headphones, earbuds or headsets. The monitoring system can, for example, be used to monitor user activity, such as during exercise or sporting activities. The positioning of the monitoring system can also facilitate sensing of other user characteristics (e.g., biometric data), such as temperature, perspiration and heart rate. The monitoring system can also be used to control a an electronic device. In one embodiment, the monitoring system facilitates user control of the electronic device using head gestures. More info here.
From your ear to your wrist in the blink of an eye™.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Dan K.” for the heads up.]
Related articles:
Apple introduces MFi specs for Lightning cable headphones, iOS software update to deliver support – June 5, 2014
Apple preps HD audio for iOS 8 plus new Apple In-Ear Headphones and lightning cable – May 13, 2014
Apple patents biometric sensor-packed health monitoring earphones with ‘head gesture’ control – February 18, 2014
Apple paves way for more affordable iOS accessories with lower MFi and Lightning licensing fees – February 7, 2014
Adapters will appear if you happen to have a fortune in audiophile quality headphones.
Nothing like 4″ of plastic and steel attached to a 2mm wafer.
In iPhone (6) it is going to be about making more room for battery, rather than about making devices thinner.
iPod touch is about 5 mm thick, and it has audio connector. So it is not really issue of thickness.
Room for battery is not going to be issue for bigger versions of iPhone 6, but for normal-sized iPhone 6 it is critical. The increased capacity of battery in iPhone 5S is still not enough.
How much extra power will a button cell’s worth of more battery volume supply? 5 or 10 mAh? Insignificant.
The battery itself is very small, so volume that audio connector takes could add hundreds of mAh.
*”iPod touch is about 6 mm thick”
No worries… to be fair… 6mm could be considered “about 5mm”
Eventually it is about battery space, and I don’t just mean thickness of the phone. The headphone jack takes up space that could be used for additional battery. And rarely is the headphone jack and lightning jack in use at the same time. That means typically space is wasted.
I think this would make sense for a watch. But unless Apple introduces a method of wireless charging, you wouldn’t really be able to charge your phone and listen to it at the same time.
Creating headphones or other accessories that connect via the Lightning Port makes sense. I don’t think Apple would completely eliminate the 3.5 mm headphone jack, though, for most of their devices. They can still have both.
That’s not the Apple way. If Apple develops Lightning headphones, you better believe the 3.5mm jack is history. Apple will also sell 3.5mm-Lighning adapters, so you can keep using your old headphones until you upgrade, probably to Beats Lightning headphones.
Right, like how they eliminated USB after introducing FireWire.
FireWire wasn’t ever intended to replace USB, so your comparison isn’t really relevant or valid.
USB 3.0 made Firewire irrelevant.
Yeah, almost 20 years after Firewire appeared. What’s you’re point?
Why kill off perfectly useful, more simple and less expensive technology if the returns are minimal? People tend to have more than one pair of headphones they can use with their iPhones. I’ve had iPhones since 2007 so I have a bunch, some expensive. Why would I want to carry around a dongle (powered by the iPhone most likely, so there goes the extra battery life) just to use my existing investment?
I have lots of old stuff laying around, too. To your point, I have perfectly good Firewire hard drives laying around that I can’t use with a new MacBook. Why? Because USB 3 essentially replaced FW for most applications.
Why would you want to carry around a dongle? We don’t know, yet! First, this story is based on a rumor so we’re just guessing anyway. Second, if Apple did decide to replace the traditional 3.5mm headphone jack, no doubt they’d have a damn good reason to do so, and whatever replaced it would likely be worth the hassle for most.
My personal opinion is that they’d damn well better, because the good old 3.5mm headphone jack works great, and as you say, works with numerous devices laying around. By the same token, I’m not going to sit and critique a decision that we don’t even know whether Apple’s made yet! That’s just stupid.
There is no “there goes my battery” argument with respect to this dongle because it would just be replicating functionality that already exists internally in an iPhone. To connect headphones to the Lightning connector, it would be a D/A converter and headphone amp. Those both exist and draw power currently, so there would be no explicit power drain difference as you imply.
Not to be picky, but if you lose analog out, the D/A (and A/D for the mic) adapter, whether it’s a dongle or built-in, will need power and will also require power for an audio amplifier. It will either require a battery or get it from the phone. Personally, I prefer my headphones to be simple passive devices.
Your passive mics and headphones… Those devices can be passive because they are driven (powered) by active devices inside the phone!
A/D, D/A, preamp, and amp… Those devices are simply built into the phone now, and powered by the battery. Moving those devices from inside the phone to outside the phone doesn’t suddenly make them draw more power.
Again, there would be no intrinsic difference from a power consumption standpoint.
I’m not 100% sure, but I’m under the impression that no analog signals pass through the lightning connector. I may be wrong, but why am I seeing lightning to 30 pin adapters with 3.5mm plugs incorporated into the design?
I think you’re correct – no analog on the Lightning connector. My guess is that any adapter like you’re talking about would have to have silicon in it to convert A/D or D/A if those lines were to be supported from the 30-pin dock connector. I’m not sure those dock connectors have that much functionality, though I haven’t really looked into it. I ditched all my 30-pin stuff when I got my iPhone 5 and iPad mini. 😉
Every docking music player of today can do exactly what you suggest: play music and charge the phone at the same time. That’s the advantage of the dedicated port (whether 32-pin connector, or the Lightning port — both can charge and play music at the same time).
Sure, but none of my headphones have that capability.
With that said, I’d be willing to switch to, say, Bluetooth headphones, but I’d really rather not take the hit to battery life.
I think that realistically we’re at least a year or two away from Apple dropping the headphone jack entirely. Maybe start with the iWatch this year, and roll that out progressively over the next year or two to the rest of their mobile products.
You could always go with Bluetooth, that was never related to the 3.5mm headphone jack (or lightning port).
Also, charging the phone from headphones makes little sense; those headphones would need to have some power source (battery), making them needlessly heavy.
This could get interesting. The irony is that as convenient as using iPhone 5s as one of my main listen devices, I was already in the process of looking at a dedicated digital music player. I want something that can play large and higher musical files than what available on iTunes. Hopefully they will make an adapter because I still like to stream radio stations from my iPhone.
i don’t think this has to do with battery. it has to do with finally getting the nerve to take the plunge and finally do away with this old tech.
I think it adds space for additional battery, but more importantly it simplifies manufacturing. Apple is simply eliminating a component from the production process. That saves money.
I can see Apple doing away with audio port and relying switching exclusively to the lightning port precisely at the same time EU adopts the law to require universal standard for data connection and charging on mobile devices (essentially mandating the micro-USB used by most Android devices)…
I don’t see the EU getting away with that. Apple will challenge in court, and I don’t think the European courts would go so far as to stomp on all innovations.
In fact, this move by Apple could be done to show additionally that a charging port like Lightning can do far more than just charge and/or sync. It could also get Apple around the EU’s change, because the EU would effectively be banning headphone jacks on iPhones if its rule is permitted to stand.
The EU is not like the US. Politics and not courts have the final say.
Battery space might be one consideration but a couple other equally important things come to mind:
1. Multi-function heaphones–i.e. they also check your heart rate, blood pressure and/or glucose levels.
2. Power can flow both ways in the spec, i.e. the phones can charge your device or vice-versa.
3. New remote control options would be possible
Just thinking out loud about this from the perspective of a DJ. Right now, it’s really easy to hook up an iPod / iPhone / iPad to a powered speaker for impromptu parties or cocktail music. A cable with an 1/8″ jack to 1/4″ or XLR and away you go, no audio interface needed. With every output routed through Lightning you’d need an external sound card (Apogee Duet or NI Audio 2 or the like) just for something that’s quick & dirty with the headphone out. Granted, some company could come up with a simple Lightning – 1/4″ or XLR cable but just giving a different perspective.
Well, 3.5mm jack is not exactly professional connector. In other words, you still need some cable adapter to hook it up to a 6.3mm line input (or XLR) on a house PA board. So, whether it is 3.5mm adapter (analogue) or Lightning (digital), makes little difference. In fact, since lightning is a digital port, presumably, you could use some 24/96 D-A interface for much higher audio quality (assuming you have 24-bit audio files on your phone…).
I already have 3.5mm – XLR and 3.5mm – 1/4″ cables that were custom made specifically to hook up my iPhone (etc.) to either a powered speaker or my main mixing board, no audio interface needed. Great time saver for remote locations when my main DJ rig is set up in a different room. Pop the cable into the iPhone, plug into the speaker, and hide the iPhone on top of the speaker while I do other things at the gig.
For my main rig I can hook up my iPad Air via Lightning and use Traktor DJ or Algoriddim djay and play my AIFF/ALAC files through the Duet with A/D and D/A conversion up to 24-bit/192kHz, though very few pop/club tracks are available in 24-bit. Then balanced line outs from the Duet go into a stereo channel on mixing board which feeds my KV2 PA.
Anyway, I’m just thinking that sometimes it’s quicker and easier just to use the headphone jack and not bother with an interface.
Not that Apple really cares about the pro audio market anymore. I’m still on Snow Leopard for my main DJ MBP as it’s rock solid, unlike the trainwreck that is pro audio on Mavericks – pops, clicks, crashes, etc. Here’s hoping for good things from Yosemite.
Cool. I can understand your thinking, although one could argue, when you have to plug in an adapter, does it really matter what kind is it (3.5mm -> XLR, or Lightning -> XLR)? I guess about the only advantage of 3.5mm is that it is currently more ubiquitous, so in a pinch, you could pop into a 99c store and get one of those “Trisonic” 3.5mm -> RCA (or 3.5mm -> 6.5mm) adapters and you’re good to go, while the lightning interface you’d have to get in advance.
The iPod line has reached its max thinness.
They can’t slim it down any further without removing the audio jack.
The audio jack is an old tech. It only makes sense to get rid of that as soon as possible.
Um, no.
Not even Apple has the power to drop the legacy 3.5-millimeter headphone jack. Maybe for the iWatch, but not for the iPod and iPhone. At least not for the foreseeable future.
I’m sure someone said something similar when some company decided to go with the 3.5mm jack instead of the legacy 1/4″ stereo jacks that were the standard.
Things change, and we all know that Apple isn’t afraid to make changes quicker than a lot us think are feasible at the time.
I guess we’ll see…
The industry started standardizing on 2.5mm headphones for cell phones. How long did that last? Apple may have gotten away with this if they switched to lightning connectors 4-5 years ago when companies were climbing over each other to come out with new speaker docks, but now, with the popularity and dimensional differences of Android phones, we’re seeing more and more bluetooth docks and dedicated lightning docks are few and far between, AND more expensive.
How do bluetooth docks affect the topic at hand?
Apple tried to make a skinny headphone jack. Remember the original iPhone? They lost, and Apple learned their lesson.
You can already get audio out through the lightning port, just like the 30 pin port.
They make amps that work that way.
This is a nonstory by someone who does not understand tech.
Bose noise canceling headphones have a detachable cord so you can replace a damaged cord or by their cord with a built in mic like the one on Apple EarPods.
Good luck finding one with a D/A comforter built in.
that was “converter”
MFi-ever heard of it? Bose has I’m sure.
Meh, so do Beats ‘phones.
And before I get jumped on about Beats being crap, I agree, the sound quality out of the box is crap, ‘wooly’ and muffled sounding.
However, and it’s a BIG however, anyone with an iDevice can quickly and easily clean the sound up, making a pair of Beats ‘phones sound as good as any other comparable make.
(I’m talking about the better quality Solo HD ‘phones, BTW)
All you need is one app, EQu.
This app allows you to draw a curve across the frequency range, dropping and lifting frequencies to suit the device/your ears.
I bought a pair of Solo HD’s from eBay, saving around £100, purely on the strength of this app, and it makes an enormous difference, lifting the bass downwards from 256Hz, then lifting the frequencies above 256 in a gentle curve, especially around1-2kHz, which is where vocals, particularly female vocals tend to reside, although they start around 750Hz.
I’ve been listening to everything from the Carpenters through Emmylou a Harris, Patty Griffin, Dire Straits, Fairport Convention, Faith No More, Tool, Hybrid, The Knife, and a load more through my Beats, and I’m very, very impressed, they can sound as good as Shure SE215 or Ultimate Ears SuperFi earphones, they just need a bit of a tweak.
And the Beats Solo 2 ‘phones appear to have been given exactly that.
3.5mm audio jack may be the standard for phones and portable audio devices but there is a standard 2.5mm audio jack same format just a little smaller that would work fine and allow thinner phones. I have a set with the smaller connector and they are fine.
I’ve put up with Apple going from DB9 to ADB to USB for the mouse connector, SCSI to USB, Firewire & Thunderbolt for drives (Losing SCSI hurt!), losing the modem, losing the floppy, losing Ethernet, losing optical drives, but losing the 3.5mm audio plug? No way! I use the same headphones with my iPhone, stereo, shortwave radios and laptops and I’ll be seriously pissed if apple is so fixated on saving ½ CC of internal room in a device that’t already thin enough, to force people to start buying D/A converters just so they can use their expensive headphones with a skinny phone!
Apple used a funky audio plug in the 7100. What happened when I upgraded that model? I was left with an expensive pair of Apple speakers that didn’t work with anything else.
It’ll go over like a lead balloon. Don’t do it Apple!!
Oh noes! Three different mouse interfaces in 30 years! A handful of different drive interfaces in the same amount of time? OMG! Losing SCSI hurt? Seriously? I said, “Good riddance” when SCSI finally started going away and I didn’t have to worry about device IDs, terminators, giant, heavy cables, and “SCSI voodoo” anymore.
Technology doesn’t just change on Macs you know, right? If you had used a PC, you had to “put up” with going from VGA to DVI-I to DVI-D to DisplayPort and HDMI, from parallel and serial to USB, and with keyboard, you went from 5-pin DIN to PS/2, and finally USB.
Then there’s AV… You’ve had to “put up” with going from RF to composite to component to DVI and finally to HDMI. I won’t even mention the different types of component, DVI, and HDMI.
Technology marches on. Usually there’s a good time to move along with it. Otherwise, you can continue to use what you have. My Apple Cinema HD Display is now more than 10 years old, but I use it every day with 2012 MacBook Pro with an adapter.
A Syquest drive, a Zip drive, a Magneto-Optical drive, tape drive and 2x CD-ROM. Granted, the CD-ROM was no great loss, but suddenly a couple thousand dollars of drives and media were useless.
The others I just added for effect, but the loss of SCSI, not to mention the years of tinkering it took get everything working together, well, that was painful.
Never had to deal w/PCs. Apple //c -> IIgs (all peripherals worked except the mouse) -> PowerMac 7100 (all peripherals worked except the monitor and 5.25 floppy) -> iMac, no peripherals worked).
I realize technology marches on and became a staunch fan of Firewire and USB (especially 3.0) but switching from an analog 3.5mm audio plug will only make headphones more complex, more expensive and for what gain?
Hard to say what gain because this is all hypothetical at this point.
I’ve always been Apple, too – only using PCs when necessary, and very rarely owning them.
Here’s my progression: Old man’s Apple II, II+, IIgs, original Mac and Mac Plus, to my own Mac SE/20 for college, then a IIsi, a IIci, an 8500, a 9500, a 9600, B/W G3, graphite G4, MDD G4, then switched to MacBooks after the intel transition, and haven’t had a desktop since (other than a Mac mini server for serving media and home automation).
I guess I was never that annoyed by the transitions because I always upgraded peripherals and such before I upgraded my machine. So, when I dropped SCSI going to the blue/white G3, I already had Firewire drives with a FireWire card in the 9600. I had a USB PCI card and USB peripherals on the 9600 before I bought the USB-based blue/white machine, too.
Or whatever – can’t keep track of all that crap anymore. Don’t care – I just use whatever tools I need to keep working and getting stuff done, and do it as intelligently as possible to save my wallet.
That rotten IIgs lasted me 9 years. It had the annoying habit of getting faster every time I upgraded the accelerator card. The Syquest and Tape drives migrated to the Mac from there.
If I ever kept track of the money I’ve spent on Apple and Apple compatible stuff I’d become a luddite.
Does this mean I will have to choose between charging and using my headphones. I often find myself doing both at my desk.
I use better headphones than Beats. I use the Parrot ZIK headphones. They’re bluetooth so headphone jack is rarely used on my iPhone anyway. If you’ve never tried Parrot ZIK, go to an apple store and try them.
Thin is hard to hold. They should make an iPhone sized like the Motorola DynaTAC 8000X–it would take two and a half months to charge it initially, then you’d never need to charge it again till the battery wore out like three years later. And, we could plug whatever we wanted into it, and possibly store a snack inside.
All Apple needs to do is build a 3.5-to-lightning adaptor with a pass-through lightning port, and include it “free” with every iOS device that needs it for say, the first year. I think that would mitigate a great deal of the negativity associated with the transition.
I wouldn’t mind having far shorter 3.5mm connectors on headphones (50-60cm) then a lightning connector extension with a remote and whatever additional functions, then you could use any headphones you want and not have to worry about the shitty controls they have.
If they omit the headphone jack, they lose the water immersion indicator.
All that’s needle is for headphone manufacturers to adopt replaceable cables, (something that more earphone manufacturers need to do, btw), and have a cable with a 3.5mm jack on the headphone end, and a lightning on the other, and a separate cable with 3.5>3.5, thereby enabling the ‘phones to be used with multiple devices, or maybe even a Lightning port on the ‘phones, with Lightning>Lightning and Lightning>3.5 cables for use on other devices, systems.
As I’ve pointed out above, Beats ‘phones already have replaceable cables, something other manufacturers ought to adopt, as B&W have on their P3, P5 and P7 headphones.
It makes life so much easier when a cable breaks internally, being able to get a cheap replacement and just plug it in.
It would be nice if it were that simple, but replaceable cables wouldn’t work because 3.5mm is analog and Lightning is digital.
i dont care if the headphone jack is an old tech is a very useful and important feature on any phone. if apple really does that i really see samsung and any other company really beating their market and i really see apple going out of bussiness for what? for extra storage? in my opinion. maybe you guys dont think the same as me, but the audio jack is a great feature because is a seperate component and you can’t listen to music and charge the phone at the same time
i prefer a million times the headphone jack then extra space bigger battery that lightning port feature didn’t convince me at all. if its going to be like that, i’ll stay with my 5S and have both features of the lightning port and audio jack or go with android.