Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Evidence of no headphone jack in iOS 9 code!
- Thread starter techguy9
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
I'm not sure most people would be that bothered, the internet will be indignant as usual but I doubt it will be the deciding factor on someone not buying an iPhone. Q. What do people use headphones for? A. Listening to their personal music device, which in almost all cases these days is their mobile phone of which they own just one.
Then what was the point of commenting at all, he said he doesn't think all manufacturers will follow suit. They haven't all followed suit with those changes either. Also fwiw nexus phones have never had an SD card slot, it was always a feature reserved for other manufacturers.
I also don't think that many manufacturers are going to be following apple on this one either. Unlike the other things where apple was first like the floppy for instance, there was another standard that was better, and already adopted out there. Lightning isn't a standard at all and bluetooth isn't a replacement. Unless the next iPhone has USB Type C, and even then it isn't a good solution because you can't get around the fact that sound is an analog medium, not digital, so having an analog port just makes more sense.
Wow, just wow. I considered spending time writing a post on why this is sooo wrong but will leave it to someone else. Or better yet try using Google.
We all know Apple designs things for looks and then purpose. Their cables are sleek, simple and thin. Will they break/wear out under extreme use/abuse? Yup. Third party cables are thicker and less sleek/thin. Do they last longer? Yes but not much under the same conditions.
I have ZERO scientific facts here but I do have lots of experience. I work at a school and we have charging centers for the students mobile devices all over the campus. I have put in place Apple cables, Amazon Basic cables, Anker cables and another brand I can't remember. All the cables fail in the same way. Some quicker than others.
1 - Apple - Always fails first as it is thinner and less durable in this environment. Fraying, kinks, exposed wires, discoloration.
2 - Amazon - Usually fails a few months after the Apple and Anker cables. Sheathing comes out of the hole that houses the lightning connector. Lightning connector gets loose/breaks off. Fraying and even had a burnt cable.
3 - Anker - Fails similarly to the Apple cables. They are thin, colorful and "cute". They sometimes fail before the Apple cables. Kinks, frays, sheathing slips out and exposed wires.
Of all the cables that hold up the best, Amazon basics seem to be the best bang/buck for durability in this setting. I personally don't use Apple's lightning cable except for in my car. I use the Amazon basics mainly for the fact that I can get a 3 foot long cable. Apple doesn't have this. However, they did release a thicker/sturdier cable used with the IPP. I have attached a pic of them. I did not have an iPhone lightning cable nearby to throw in.
Let me call - hogwash
...based on lots of experience Have had many cables, dissected some to see why the are so fragile, even my local Apple Store admits the stock cables are junk (you can get them replaced for free in most cases). Below is a cross-section of some cables. You can pick out the stock one. In hand it is shoddily made. My preference at the moment are the Allreli cables. Tried Amazon however the wide ends do not work well, especially with some cases. btw: the stock cables are some of the most expensive out there.
Just needed a cable to charge somewhere yesterday and came across the Amazon Basics one, only to realize it doesn't fit with the bumper on my phone. That's one of the downsides of at least some third party cables, the connector can be larger and can have issues fitting with some cases/bumpers.
My experience of adapters is they can easily _damage_ the internals on the devise if knocked.
Also the old iphone to lightening adapter was/is £25.00!
With so many 3.5mm headphones in the world this is a brave step by apple. Not one I personally approve of.
Also I have about 5 lightening cables dotted around the house, car etc will they still work?
[doublepost=1453498121][/doublepost]
Have you tried the 2 metre syncwire braided lightening cable?
I swear by them (tried most of them), these are genuine made for apple, life time guarantee:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B015PD9HEQ?psc=1&redirect=true&ref_=oh_aui_search_detailpage
you wont go wrong with those babies we bought about 7 when they were 20% off around Black Friday.
Also the old iphone to lightening adapter was/is £25.00!
With so many 3.5mm headphones in the world this is a brave step by apple. Not one I personally approve of.
Also I have about 5 lightening cables dotted around the house, car etc will they still work?
[doublepost=1453498121][/doublepost]
Have you tried the 2 metre syncwire braided lightening cable?
I swear by them (tried most of them), these are genuine made for apple, life time guarantee:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B015PD9HEQ?psc=1&redirect=true&ref_=oh_aui_search_detailpage
you wont go wrong with those babies we bought about 7 when they were 20% off around Black Friday.
Last edited:
But wouldn't it be better to test new hardware with a stable OS and not an Alpha version?
An iOS 10 Alpha would pretty much just be a modified iOS 9 to include support for the new hardware and early stages of new features. They are probably by this time fairly far along into Alpha and have fairly stable versions of iOS 10 though with the announcement/preview for iOS 10 just a couple/few months away and then straight into Developer Preview/beta usually same day as the announcement.
Don't forget they've pretty much have had a team working on iOS 10 for 4-6 months already, so it's more than likely much further along as most would think.
I already use tons of 3.5mm headphones. The only thing I could use to get around the lack of headphone jack would be a cheap pair of wireless or wired headphones I have but they sound like absolute garbage over Bluetooth. They sound pretty good over wired. I also DO NOT want to bother with keeping track of yet another device and its battery life... At all. I'm never going to have headphones because they will always be dead because that's not something I would always think to plug in every night. And would they make it through the day? I have some long Netflix/YouTube etc sessions with headphones on my off days, I don't want to worry about battery life...
If I could have wireless headphones that are decently affordable, *quality* sounding with outstanding battery life (several several days of use, and good indicators of current battery level, like a colored LED) then I would be fine. But I'm fairly sure nothing exists like that, especially because of my batte life desire for headphones.
[doublepost=1453519377][/doublepost]Also Bluetooth tends to be more temperamental and connecting via Bluetooth tends to be more annoying/time consuming than just plugging in headphones. Also I always have a fear that my headphones will die while watching something and then the audio will then just start obnoxiously going through my iPhone or iPad's speakers... Maybe there are measures that prevent this like wired headphones, when they are unplugged, the content will usually pause by itself. Hopefully this is the case when wireless headphones suddenly disconnect but still I have that anxiety there.
I'm sorry but he is correct. Sound is an analog signal. Perhaps it's the incorrect use of the word "medium" that threw you, but sound is an analog mechanical signal interpreted by our ears. High end audio equipment always has an analog component. (Ehhh.. I suppose there's fully digital stuff out there now that I think about that. But something has to convert that to analog at some point)
My concern with the digital out of headphones is how that signal is converted to sound. I use Shure in-ear monitors with three hd sound drivers per ear. I'm curious how those would work, even with an adapter. Is the adapter itself doing the conversion? It would have to, my headphones do not contain an D/A converter that I'm aware of.
The Lightning to headphone dongle will have the DAC in it. It would have to because the DAC would no longer be inside the iPhone itself once/if the headphone jack was removed.
It forces people to pay at least $100 more for a DAC/amp rather than $100 less for a quality headphone. Then again, I bet people would be more interested in buying bluetooth headphones than a really expensive headphone due to the additional DAC/amp. Also, say goodbye to wired IEMs since I haven't seen a wired IEM with built-in DAC/amp yet.
The DAC that's currently in iPhones would simply just move to being inside the Lightning to Headphone adapter instead of being inside the phone. Nothing changes except needing the adapter. And I doubt it would cost $100+
AFAIK lightning is digital. I don't know how would a lightning connection be digital or analog. Maybe it's smart enough to detect that an analog device like an amplifier or a headphone is connected rather than a DAC or a lightning to optical/mDP/HDMI etc. Maybe a lightning to headphone port adapter (it must have a DAC/amp inside) will show up (like mDP to VGA adapter)? They probably have some fancy circuitry that bypasses the built-in DAC/amp if the signal to be passed is digital if Apple decides to hardwire the DAC/amp to the lightning port.
I will like it if they will put a Find my Headphones locator
With Bluetooth or WiFi Direct, it's possible
Anker is probably the most reliable and durable from my experience, and they keep getting better. Out of the 10 or so I have purchased, I've only had one succumb to the wrath of normal wear and tear and that was one of their earlier models. Unless you're swinging your lightning cable around like a helicopter blade or constantly have it bent in obscure angle, no reason it should wear as fast as a traditional Apple lightning cable. I recommend that brand to everyone.
The thing that gets me wondering is why this is in iOS 9 code, if this is indeed evidence of no headphone jack. Does that mean the iPhone 7 will be running iOS 9? Or will the iPhone 5SE be the real device with no headphone jack and we all are just horribly mistaken that the iPhone 7 won't have it? I doubt all of that but just some food for thought.
Let's not forget how iOS 5 had code for Panoramas, when that feature was introduced with the iPhone 5.
(http://gizmodo.com/5810399/ios-5-code-hints-at-built-in-iphone-panoramic-camera). I think this would mean the device is being used on a modified version of 9.3 internally, while also being on Alpha versions of 10. OR this 9.3 was a 10 alpha build based on 9.2 (with extra features they decided not to hold on to for 10) and Apple forgot to clean up the code before putting it out to developers.
Why would code for "no headphone jack" be in the ipsw files for the current public devices? My take on it is that it is checking for something plugged into the jack, like maybe to turn the internal speaker off when something is plugged in the headphone jack?
I wonder if anyone has scoured iOS 8 for similar or did this just come up because of the rumors of the iPhone 7 not having a jack.
The variable seems to be: Headphones.have.sinput which I'm interpreting to mean if the headphones have a mic (sound input). What does this have anything to do with not having a headphone jack? There's no mention of a jack at all in this variable. I would think all iOS version have a variable checking if your headphones have a mic or not.
Am I missing something here?
Am I missing something here?