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Reports Say Apple Is Shrinking Its Docking Connector With iPhone 5

Posted by timothy on from the hope-bluetooth-dongles-come-quickly dept.

jones_supa writes "Two sources have told Reuters that Apple's new iPhone will drop the classic wide dock connector used in the company's gadgets for the best part of a decade in favor of a smaller one. The refresh will be a 19-pin connector port at the bottom instead of the previous 30-pin port 'to make room for the earphone moving to the bottom.' That would mean the new phone would not connect with the myriad of accessories playing a part in the current ecosystem of iPods, iPads and iPhones, at least without an adapter. On the upside, a smaller connector will allow for more compact product designs. Some enterprising vendors in China have already begun offering cases for the new phone, complete with earphone socket on the bottom and a 'guarantee' that the dimensions are correct." Gizmodo writer Adrian Covert says it's for your own good.

19 of 427 comments (clear)

  1. Standard connectors? LOL you wish! by GameboyRMH · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I'm sure MicroUSB and other industry-standard connectors weren't considered. For how many years now has Apple been the last holdout with proprietary connectors?

    Even if they did they'd still find a way to make it proprietary with something like the charger resistor trick or the headphone recess.

    --
    "When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
    1. Re:Standard connectors? LOL you wish! by johnlcallaway · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I was thinking the very same thing. How sad that Apple continues to want to keep an iron fist over their product instead of admitting others may have better ideas. Of course, they didn't really 'invent' anything other than a style. Everything they have done has only incorporated incremental improvements over existing tech. I have yet to see anything truly innovative come out of Apple, other than innovative ways to convince people they have a product worthty the Apple tax and lack of options.

      --
      I rarely read replies, it's my opinion and if you thought about your opinion a little more, I'm OK with that.
    2. Re:Standard connectors? LOL you wish! by GameboyRMH · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Apple going through the trouble of abandoning their old proprietary connector and MAKING A NEW PROPRIETARY ONE instead of going to a standard one like every other phone has had for years sounds at least a bit nefarious to me.

      --
      "When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
    3. Re:Standard connectors? LOL you wish! by darjen · · Score: 1, Insightful

      This way they can charge $30 for an extra power adapter. I guess if you decide that you really like being a part of the iOS ecosystem, the extra cost will be worth it to you. Judging by the sheer number of iPhone sales, plenty of people think that it is.

    4. Re:Standard connectors? LOL you wish! by HarrySquatter · · Score: 1, Insightful

      'For years' is a bit of an exaggeration. It is only very recent that most phone manufacturers started using micro-USB consistently. It's still possible, though, to find phones not using micro-USB that aren't from Apple.

    5. Re:Standard connectors? LOL you wish! by tripleevenfall · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Do we know there won't be any adapters available? They have produced adapters for their products in the past, such as the numerous display adapters.

      It's kind of "heads I win, tails you lose".

      If Apple moves to a slimmer profile device, people say they are just trying to make people buy new cables. If they stay on an old one, people say they won't give up on their proprietary cables.

      If they produce an adapter, people will say they just want to cash in by selling the adapters. If they don't produce adapters, people say they just want to make you buy new cables.

    6. Re:Standard connectors? LOL you wish! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

      The problem is Apple phones are kind-of a primadonna about how peripherals can interact with them.

      If Apple put a standard port on their phone users would expect anything that will fit to work with the phone. That includes devices that use protocalles iOS does not support.

      Now there is an argument to be made that Apple could simply start supporting more protocalles. However that's never been how Apple rolls. They'd rather say "No it doesn't do that." than have something that "sort of works".

    7. Re:Standard connectors? LOL you wish! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      It's really sad that you're a fucking piece of shit moron. But we don't really care.

      I can appreciate that people get crazy-sensitive about their mobile phones, but "you're a fucking piece of shit" might be a tad over-the-top.

      Why does it matter to you in the slightest that Apple is using space and components efficiently, instead of creating huge devices with half-a-dozen ports?

      I don't know of anyone advocating half a dozen ports. What I do see is people saying it'd be nice if they used micro-usb like everyone else instead of a proprietary connector.

    8. Re:Standard connectors? LOL you wish! by chispito · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Why is it that stupid people hate Apple? Is there something about being stupid that I just don't get?

      And yet many of us prefer the company of the decent and stupid to the condescending and average.

      --
      The Daddy casts sleep on the Baby. The Baby resists!
    9. Re:Standard connectors? LOL you wish! by v1 · · Score: 5, Insightful

      For how many years now has Apple been the last holdout with proprietary connectors?

      OK then clearly they should have gone with the other industry standard cable that supports power, usb, video, remote volume and play selection, etc. Oh wait, that's right, there isn't another one!

      Your argument is only valid when there are other non-proprietary options. It works well when talking about say, Sony's "i-link" proprietary firewire connector, or any of those proprietary USB connectors on cameras, where they're using a special connector to force you to buy cables and other accessories directly from them at some absurd mark-up. But that's not the case with Apple's dock connector.

      This is the only connector that does it all in discrete pins, vastly simplifying construction of accessories. Even cars are coming with Apple's dock connector in them nowadays. Apple's not being an ass and forcing you to use their connector to do what they could have done with another standard connector. They just happen to have pioneered the market and have been using this one connector for the last decade, with a crapton of accessories being made by other vendors. You don't have to buy your dock from Apple. Try getting an iLink cable from someone besides Sony. (for $35 or so) That's how you abuse proprietary connectors

      --
      I work for the Department of Redundancy Department.
    10. Re:Standard connectors? LOL you wish! by ericloewe · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Mouse? Not innovative, just applied to a home desktop.

      FireWire? Good for its niche, too expensive for mass adoption on the scale of USB.

      PowerPC? Sure, it's in the consoles, but it's not because it's good - it's cheap enough for them to get custom processors and actually own the design.

    11. Re:Standard connectors? LOL you wish! by FrankSchwab · · Score: 3, Insightful

      You have a simple life, eh?

      I have a charger at home, one at work, and a 12V one in each of my family's cars. Still pretty simple, but causes an issue if I change phones. Of course, I picked up a wife too, and if her phone didn't have the same charger as mine, I'd have to divorce her. Then, through mechanisms still somewhat mysterious, we ended up with two children. They have Nintendo DS's, and a portable DVD player for the car (all seperate proprietary chargers). My wife bought an iPad (30-pin), and the kids are getting old enough that we're considering getting them iPods (which, if we wait for the new ones, will have the 19 pin).

      Have you kept count of how many charging cords I need to have yet? Wouldn't it be nice to have one or two identical chargers in each car and in the house, and anyone could charge anything, as opposed to having 5 or 6 different chargers?

      This is a situation where Apple has their head firmly inserted into their rectum. An innovative, customer-oriented company would have put a micro-USB connector with standard USB charging protocols. If you want Audio out, or Video out, or whatever else comes out their dock, have it come out digitally and convert it in the dock.

      --
      And the worms ate into his brain.
    12. Re:Standard connectors? LOL you wish! by wiredog · · Score: 2, Insightful

      It's USB on the other end...

      --

      Best Slashdot Co
    13. Re:Standard connectors? LOL you wish! by ceoyoyo · · Score: 3, Insightful

      All the ones I found for Android used the headphone port for audio (not line out, which is much higher quality), couldn't control volume and/or playback, or was very expensive because it had to do everything over USB (and required a special app) or Bluetooth. If you can find one, please share.

      Some Android devices can do analog video out via their headphone jacks. Which means if you want to charge at the same time you need two cables. And again, if you want to have off-device controls you need a full USB implementation.

      I found a couple of Android speaker docks. Like this one: http://www.zdnet.com/blog/mobile-gadgeteer/finally-a-universal-speaker-dock-for-android/5506. It requires connecting a couple of cables, and using a special app for playback control.

      From the review:

      Again, if you have an iPhone or iPod dock, this may not sound like a huge feature set, but if you have an Android phone, this is heaven.

      Given the scarcity of speaker docks for Android, the $100 price is worth the experience.

      Perhaps you should try again? Or not....

  2. Just switch to USB by AmiMoJo · · Score: 1, Insightful

    Every other phone manufacturer seems okay with USB and a headphone socket. Same accessories, standard connector and charger.

    --
    const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
    SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    1. Re:Just switch to USB by GameboyRMH · · Score: 4, Insightful

      To Apple that isn't a feature, it's a bug.

      --
      "When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
    2. Re:Just switch to USB by Kenja · · Score: 5, Insightful

      USB lacks video & audio out as well as other feature connectors. So its one custom connector, or several standard ones. Apple wants fewer connectors, so a custom one is used. Not a big deal really.

      --

      "Have you ever thought about just turning off the TV, sitting down with your kids, and hitting them?"
  3. Yeah, but... by Antipater · · Score: 3, Insightful

    It's not about how big the connector is. It's how you use it!

    --
    Everything is better with chainsaws.
  4. Propriatary connectors are proprietary by Shompol · · Score: 3, Insightful
    From TFA:

    New standards are always rough on the early adopter

    Standards? What standards? Maybe if you stuck to the standards this would not have happened to you.

    All electronics stores everywhere overstocked on Apple peripherals to the point that speakers connecting to non-Apple device are hard to come by. This is the payback time! My turn to walk with a gleeful grin, as millions $ worth of equipment finds its way to the dumpsters worldwide.