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iPod Mini Design Flaw?
terradyn writes "Over at iPodlounge they've discovered that the iPod mini's have a major issue with their headphone jacks. It looks like the jacks connection to the main system board is extremely poorly engineered and so normal use will wear it out and cause lots of static after around 35-40 days... If any pressure on your iPod Mini results in crackling and static, you should return your iPod immediately to an Apple store for a free replacement. They're also theorizing over in the forums that the iPod Mini shortage may be a cover for this problem..." Update: 04/12 01:08 GMT by T : billybob writes "Someone in the forum thread originally linked to has posted pictures of the iPod taken apart, demonstrating the problem."
When I was at the Apple store 2 weeks back getting a new iBook battery, I remember some guy came in having trouble with the headphones b/c of static. I am betting that was related.
new iPods have this problem I wonder?
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In my opinion, Apple was in too much of a hurry to release the Mini. The regular iPod is a significantly better value. This is just another reason not to buy the Mini.
On iPodLounge, someone took apart their Mini unit, and basically all it was is a small LCD screen, a 4GB compact flash card of some kind (which can't be formatted, people have tried), and the parts to make the scroll wheel work.
Barely worth $250.
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I can't think of a single portable music player that I have owned in the last 20 years that did not suffer from this problem. Indeed, it is the fear of such a problem that has kept me from buying any MP3 player.
Everything from an original Sony Walkman, to discount store AM/FM radios, to expensive Sony and Phillips CD players have suffered from this annoying loose headphone jack disease. Some may suffer earlier than others, but none have survived without a little home soldering work more than a year.
I was in the Apple Store at The Grove a few weeks ago and I tried out a mini and it sounded just terrible with so much static. I'm guessing that's what happened to it. Looks pretty bad on them to have a broken demo heheh.
My impression is that the engineers at Apple that work on the iPod are rarely stopped on the street and mistaken for Steve Wozniak.
The battery-life meters on the 3rd-generation iPods are nothing short of random, and now this. For what they're charging for these things, why doesn't the battery indicator work as well as the one on my two-year-old $49 cell phone?
Apple can be good about that sort of thing.
I had an Airport base station die on me last summer because of a design flaw in the power supply. The thing was almost three years out of warranty. Called Apple, and they Airborne Expressed me a refurb'd replacement the next day, and told me to use the box it came in to ship the old one back to them, at no cost to me. Way cool.
Mod down posts with a "Free Mac Mini/iPod" sig, they're spam!
Also, how does an issue like this get addressed for international customers? I'm guessing Apple has the policy of free shipping, etc only for US-based customers.
Unfortunately this iPod Mini problem seems more severe. Due to the design too much stress is put on the connection and if you fixed it I'm sure it'd break again soon enough. Plus eventually something that you couldn't fix easily might break, either from the disassembling and re-assembling or from the stress at that point. Hopefully there is some way to take stress off that connection.
I have this EXACT problem with my 1st generation iPod. There is a hard plastic collar around the jack, and after three months of pocket-related stress, the jack began to hiss and the left channel began to fade in and out. I KNOW Apple did not forsee this design flaw in the first gereation. I have not had the pleasure of usiong the second or third generations to compare. I simply mess with the plug until the music returns. Too bad there is not a Firewire headphone. That would be kick ass!
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It sounds as though the jack socket is prone to dry joints where it solders to the board. Either that, or the contacts are losing their springiness after a few insertion cycles.
Dry joints can be repaired "while-U-wait" in any suitably-equipped workshop -- or at home, but it's fiddly and I'd be reluctant to open up such an expensive precision instrument {and anyway, 30-40 days is well within the 12 month statutory guarantee period}.
I'm guessing that the PCB would be double-side surface mounted, reflow soldering both sides. The long-term solution is going to require a PCB redesign and new solder paste masks -- either too much solder or too little solder can cause poor joints; and maybe they should spec a socket with a plastic lug on the underside passing through a hole in the board, which would give it a bit more stability. Using a traditional socket with through-hole pins would be even more secure, especially if dummy pins were added for mechanical support, but would require an additional operation to hand-solder it in place.
It's understandable that Apple is using delaying tactics, as it will probably require a long round of accelerated testing to determine exactly what the problem is and how best to fix it. {I used to work in the R&D department of a company which designed and made electronic control modules, by the way}.
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Actually the reason why I bought my iPod mini was for its size and weight. The color choice was just an extra for me. I was a bit unsure what my green mini would look like, but it turned out to look much better than what I expected it to look like by just looking at the photos on the web. I've had my mini freeze on me the first day after some crazy recharge/plugin/update/upload action, but this was quickly fixed by resetting the mini by pressing down the top button and the middle button for a few secs.
So far I am a *very* satisfied mini customer. It works fine, it's a beut, and I haven't had the headphone problem yet (if I do I'll just get replacement).
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I think this is true of a lot of companies actually. I'm wary of Sony the most. Their first generation PS1 and PS2 had their share of new hardware problems.
-]Phreak Out[-
My brother has a first generation iPod (not a mini) that has the same problem. It was out of warranty, so I attempeted to fix for him.
The only thing holding the surface mount jack onto the board was the solder connections, and it seemed to me that the solder was unusually soft. You could push it around pretty easily with a pair of sharp tweezers.
I can't say that I was impressed with the design and execution.
I have a question. Is it possible to have just a flat surface magnet to magnet connection in lieu of these banana-type jacks? If so, that might be a better way to do these attachments. I just don't know if you can get the signal through, or if the magnetic field would distort it too much, or whatever. Ya, I know, maybe hard to make it stereo even if possible. Just wondering is all. I've seen these wimpy things go screwy before too on other gadgets.
there was a comment up a few that said to desolder the jack, put epoxy between the jack and the board, then resolder the jack. flux wouldn't hurt either, so long as you clean it off when done. wd40 would only work because it's a cleaning agent. have you tried cleaning the jack/plugs?
Thats exactly what they were saying. However it could be that they have been having to replace so many that THAT is creating the shortage.
"It is not how things are in the world that is mystical, but that it exists." -Ludwig Wittgenstein
The Creative Nomad Jukebox Xtra's seem to have the same flaw. Perhaps the mobile hard drive MP3 technology has not been perfected yet?
That's a good tip, but the whole reason we chose Macs in the first place was so we'd have "Everything Just Work" and we wouldn't HAVE to "pull a Linux" and solder stuff ourselves.
Plus I burn myself easy and my brother says he can't cover for me anymore, he's got his own life and doesn't have time to wire up all my broken stuff for me anymore.
I'm not normally an irrational zealous dickhead, but I figure "When in Rome..."
Personally, I'd like to see digital, wireless, headphones for the iPod, etc.
Corded connections are a damn nuisance and a point of failure always. I wouldn't mind sacrificing a bit of style and fidelity for a set of headphones that didn't scream "Mug Me!" to everyone within three blocks.
My iBook is a 700 mhz 14" ibook....yes, it's the model affected by the logic board issue. But no, it appears my serial number is just outside their accepted range, despite it being the same model as one of the 2 generations covered under the program. See, what Apple ( in their infinite wisdom ) did was that they decided 2 generations were covered (the 2 generations before the last ibook G3 generation), but they based their recall on when these generations went on sale, not when they were manufactured. Lucky me, I got an early one off the line, manufactured before they went on sale. Apple would have me believe (yes I've called them, to no avail ) that they "made them right" for a few weeks, and then made some change in manufacturing that went on for a year. Ummmm...right.
Forgive my somewhat sarcastic parody...Lots of money out of my pocket. Not cool at all.
I've been using apple stuff for like 12 years now.
..Guess my mid-80s sony discman isn't getting retired yet!
;)
That is very disappointing.. But, I've had *tons* of products with crappy audio jacks.
Hopefully apple takes care of the problem quicky. Especially while they are getting so much attention over the music store and the iPod... Wouldn't take much to give the whole apple-music thing a black eye.
If they dont take care of the problem and they are forced to jack up the 99c song price it could really be bad news.
I was actually considering getting a mini over a normal iPod for space / weight / coolness..
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There is nothing wrong in any way, shape or form with her iPod mini. Just because this guy, this ONE GUY has an issue plugging headphones in (here's a hint: pull the headphones out by the pluy, not the line, goof) doesn't mean that there is a "critical flaw."
Slow news day, isn't it?