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Intel Wants To Eliminate The Headphone Jack And Replace It With USB-C (9to5mac.com)
An anonymous reader writes: With rumors circulating about how Apple may do away with the 3.5 mm headphone jack on its upcoming iPhone 7, Intel has shared a similar desire, citing "industry singling a strong desire to move from analog to digital." Intel believes USB-C is the future audio jack. They believe USB-C has more potential than the 3.5mm audio jack as it allows users to add additional smart features to headphones in the future. For instance, a future pair of headphones could monitor one's pulse or inner-ear temperature for fitness tracking, something that could only be possible if the headphones were connected to a smartphone via a USB-C cable. What's also worth mentioning [quoted from 9to5Mac]: USB-C already supports analog audio transfer through sideband pins simplifying the engineering steps necessary to swap 3.5mm with USB-C in device designs. In the second quarter, Intel should have a finalized USB-C standard for digital audio transfer. Intel does note that the transition from analog to digital will be expensive as the headphones have to include amplifiers and DACs, but scale will offset the early costs over time.
How about customer desire? I like my headphone jacks simple and robust, thanks.
I certainly could do without yet another converter and I don't feel like replacing my perfectly serviceable, simple and robust, headphones.
"USB-C has more potential ... as it allows users to add additional smart features..."
More to the point, it allows manufacturers to build DRM into the setup, so that this DRM decryption will happen inside headphones, instead of on the computer.
Not that this will stop determined rippers, but will make it easier to stop grandma from making a copy of her albums for use in her car.
Two reasonably hefty wires to supply power, and a fibre optic cable, (or maybe two), for data. If they're going to break with the past, they should take the opportunity to make a really good interface. Too costly? FTA:
"Intel says that such a transition may make digital headphones more expensive, as the headsets will have to include amplifiers and DACs, but scale will offset the early costs over time".
I would think the same reasoning applies to fibre optic transceivers and connectors.
'The Economy' is a giant Ponzi scheme whose most pitiable suckers are the youngest among us and the yet-unborn.
Charging while using the headphones. Needs to be possible, or else this is an awful idea. The times when that particular case may arise may be few, but when it does, it's going to be really annoying.
I can't imagine that this wouldn't be considered, but no article I've read about this has mentioned it, unfortunately.
So that means batteries, or pulling power from the source device ... yaaaaay(!)
Have you tried buying better products?
I have two BT headsets, one has constant drop-outs, the other keeps working for minutes if I forget my phone in another room.
So not only you monitor what we listen and say, but also our hearthbeat and temperature ?!? Aren't electronic devices getting a bit too close to this device?!?
I've had about 3 of them. All of them pretty much cover my house - phone in bedroom, won't cut out until I'm in the garage on the opposite side. They won't quite make the other side of a 1/4 mile track, so I can't just leave my phone in my bag on one side and have it work all the way around. It might in the middle.
I must know how to pick ones with good radios, less so on physical strength. Or maybe I just need milspec..
I don't read AC A human right
I can get headphones, not good ones mind you, but still headphones, for $3-10. They're perfectly functional for what I do. They also break or get lost frequently.
I've tried more expensive ones, but they break as well.
What will USB-C and the necessary DSP do except make headphones more expensive? I understand that there may be more options to 'tune' the DSPs to the individual headphone, but my hearing is damaged enough that I don't think it matters.
I don't read AC A human right
Intel has shared a similar desire, citing "industry singling a strong desire to move from analog to digital."
And by "industry" they mean "intel". I think most makers of headphones or things using headphones would very much prefer to keep their existing processes rather than retool, especially as this likely won't go down well with their customers.
Intel believes USB-C is the future audio jack.
Of course they do because they make and sell (and license?) USB3 chipsets.
They believe USB-C has more potential than the 3.5mm audio jack as it allows users to add additional smart features to headphones in the future.
You can already buy USB headphones and they work perfectly with any computer if you want "smart features". I in fact have precisely one pair: a USB headset with a mic. It has some "smart features" I never use. Mostly I have it because my old headset was dual jack, not 4 pole and I got the USB one for free. There's no advantage of the "smart" one over the old analog one.
For instance, a future pair of headphones could monitor one's pulse or inner-ear temperature for fitness tracking,
That is literally the most pointless thing I have ever heard.
something that could only be possible if the headphones were connected to a smartphone via a USB-C cable.
That's great, but if you instead connected the headphones to a 13A plug (and used ethernet-over-mains to transfer the audio) they could also double as a hairdrier!
What's also worth mentioning [quoted from 9to5Mac]: USB-C already supports analog audio transfer through sideband pins simplifying the engineering steps necessary to swap 3.5mm with USB-C in device designs.
Um that's nice, and kinda strange. So now we'll have perfectly good analog headphones able to work with a cheap adapter, but we'll also have to use up one of the precious and relatively fragile USB-C ports instead of using the dedicated, robust audio one.
In the second quarter, Intel should have a finalized USB-C standard for digital audio transfer.
Well it was nice of them to unfinalize it in the first place given that we've only had an audio over USB spec for nearly two decades.
http://www.usb.org/developers/...
I can buy any random audio device, jack it into my old and busted USB1, 2 or 3 (and presumably type C) port and it will work with no drivers. So what the hell is this new spec meant to be? Do they actually include an inner ear temperature monitor in the spec? What about an atmospheric pressure and humidity monitor? And maybe a seismograph? What about something to measure the level of crap on my desk when I put my headphones down?
Intel does note that the transition from analog to digital will be expensive as the headphones have to include amplifiers and DACs, but scale will offset the early costs over time.
It won't be an expensive transition it will stay expensive since every pair of new headphones will need the digital stuff. They will always be mroe expensive to make than analog headphones because they are identical plus extra crap. Extra crap always costs more.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
Oh yes, Tons and tons of electronic garbage is what our planet needs right now...
I want to see their faces when they clash with the music production and entertainment industry, and the now vogue audiophile (...and pseudo-audiophile) community. They may well attempt to do so in the consumer world, but premium audio is all the rage these days and people won't want to downplay their expensive, high-res audio streaming services due to hardware companies wanting to save on ports, space, and that cumbersome DAC that occupies as much board as a 3g module. And yeah, I know the source is digital and the conversion process is lossy. But you go tell that to them vinyl lovers
In most gadgets the USB plug is the most flimsy part which breaks far too often and now they want us to abuse it even more? Also, tell me, how are we supposed to wear headphones and charge the phone at the same time (wireless charging is often not an option)?
A 3.5mm jack is sturdy as hell, perhaps that's what all this fuss is about. They want us to replace our headphones, gadgets and pay service centers a lot more.
Last but note least this "upgrade" will cost the consumer an arm and a leg, since from now on headphones will have to include their own DAC chip which doesn't come for free.
And laaaaaaaaaag. Regular BT has 300ms lag, and even the very best BT headphones+transmitter have more than 60ms lag in real world applications. That may be cool for lag-aware applications that just do local playback of video, but for anything live and general video review it's simply infuriating.
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
There are reasons to add USB-C connectors to PCs(if nothing else, a baseline USB-C connector is just a USB3 connector that works with USB-C cables; and depending on the situation it can also have additional advantages, as a replacement for various proprietary laptop charge ports, as an alternate-mode video-out, etc.); but what this proposal will do is make it even less predictable(and it's already fairly unpredictable) what a given USB-C port will or will not be capable of.
USB-C supports analog audio through the sideband pins, so a given port might support ordinary passive headphones with nothing more than a mechanical adapter or change in connector. However, on a device with more than one USB-C port, or with USB-C ports that predate this plan, it isn't likely that all the USB-C ports have analog audio, so those passive headphones will only work on certain ports, perhaps none; but 'active' headphones with a USB audio chipset will work on any of them(including USB1.1 or better ports with a mechanical adapter). For extra fun, if USB-C headphones become ubiquitous, even devices without any USB functions will probably want to implement sideband-only USB-C ports, so people can plug headphones into them; but those will only work with passive headphones since they won't actually have a USB host controller.
As with a number of USB-C design decisions, this seems like a pretty good idea if all you care about is bleeding edge cellphones; a troublesome-but-probably-worth-it one if all you care about is cellphones and ultra-skinny laptops; but a morass of confusion and suffering the more broadly you try to make it work. The USB-C port already suffers from the 'might be capable of anything, only actually promises to be capable of almost nothing' and this will only expand that unpleasant aspect.
This is an advertisers wet dream ... You WILL listen, and we have thermal sensor proof you had your headphones on. No listen, no goodies.
I can see that happening. And then I could see headphones that identify themselves as keyboards and do sneaky things.
HTC made a phone in the time with only a micro USB port... It was such a failure! The worst part was that it was impossible to charge the phone and have the headset plugged at the same time (very practical for long conf call). I made the mistake once, will not to do it twice.
How about customer desire? I like my headphone jacks simple and robust, thanks.
Nothing wrong with that. There is a real beauty in simple. However what might be optimal for you is not necessarily optimal for the majority. There is a saying in manufacturing that local maximums make for global minimums. Basically you can optimize one person's or group's requirements so much that it actually makes the overall system worse. For example for myself I almost never plug headphones into my phone. When I do connect it to an audio system I usually do it via wifi (home) or bluetooth (car). The audio jack really just is a place where dust gets into my phone and provides me no utility at all. So if we cater to your desires we are by extension making the product worse for me. Eventually something has to give.
I manufacture wire harnesses for a living. Believe me when I say that I appreciate the beauty of a simple interface better than most. But at some point keeping things simple starts holding back progress. I think we've just about reached that point with the 3.5mm jack.
I certainly could do without yet another converter and I don't feel like replacing my perfectly serviceable, simple and robust, headphones.
You wouldn't have to replace them. At worst you'd have to get a small adapter for them. I understand you not wanting to but I think the writing is on the wall on this one. The 3.5mm jack forces too many design compromises for it to remain in place forever.
I'm sorry Dave, I'm afraid I can't do that.
I absolutely *HATE* this idea. And I predict the consumer reaction will be swift and severe.
I bought a headset in about 2003. I expect reception quality has improved somewhat.
At the time the Linux bluetooth stack was a complete mess and the headphones would only support some legacy protocol via lots of fiddling with config files. I wonder if that's improved and/or whether interfaces target Android-only so you need to run some libhybris stack just to get it working. Okay, I'm slightly FUDing here but once bitten, twice shy.
Have you been under a rock for the past 50 years? Intel has been into everything electronic from the beginning.
Phono jacks are a global standard for audio connectivity. They are an old standard, yes. Very old. But there's no reason to try and make it obsolete. It's perfectly suited to it's task, and we are so path dependant now that making such a huge change requires more than the availability of a potential replacement tech. If there isn't a pressing need for a replacement, like a serious engineering or tech limitation, why bother?
I know why Apple would want to 'bother' - shitty behavior. USB-C means they can lock out 3rd party headphones and force everyone to buy their own.
The real reason is to close the analog hole and add DRM to even your headphones.
For instance, a future pair of headphones could monitor one's pulse or inner-ear temperature for fitness tracking,
Guess that can only happen if the bud stays in the ear while doing said fitness activity. The one pair of in-ear earphones (bundled with phone mind you) I have, I struggle to keep in the ear even sitting, and start to hurt after a dozen minutes or so. (Then again, apparently my ear canals are somewhat narrower than normal.)
Good thing then that I didn't pay megabucks for the various over-ear replacements I tried until I found something comfortable and with adequate sound quality. I'm sure a pair that included all sorts of extra circuitry would not be quite as inexpensive...
I can imagine that if a number of the bigger mobile manufacturers start to bundle such USB-C earphones with their wares, it may start to gain traction, but hopefully their normal penny-pinching will continue to prevail and just-barely adequate underwelming gear will continue to be fostered on the consumer.
Free, as in your money being freed from the confines of your account.
"For instance, a future pair of headphones could monitor one's pulse or inner-ear temperature for fitness tracking, something that could only be possible if the headphones were connected to a smartphone via a USB-C cable."
Complete and utter BS. Bluetooth can do this right now and honestly wireless is the answer not a freaking special DRM encumbered digital connection. the reason everyone sticks to analog is because there is zero need for complex electronics in the headphones making them CHEAP. USB-C will require the DtoA and amp to reside in the headphones making them no different than bluetooth headphones except they have added DRM.
And that is what this is all really about... Intel desperately wants headphone DRM.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
"industry singling a strong desire"
I think somebody misspelled "singing" .
More likely "signalling".
This is just an excuse to try to bake DRM into your headphones.. after all, the analog headphone is the only remaining place where you can listen to music without someone's permission. You can plug your headphones into any device that has the jack and listen to music on it. In fact, you can physically borrow someone's digital music player or phone and listen to their libraries - WITHOUT PAYING FOR IT. OMG!
This will allow them to digitally tie a pair of headphones to a specific device and only allow the headphones to work with that device. Oh, and if you want to unlock an EQ, you can pay a little extra monthly subscription for that. Or, if you want a higher sample rate, you can pay a little extra for that, too.
This has nothing to do with innovation or user convenience.
Oh, I don't doubt that HDCP will show up(it is Intel's baby after all, even they don't take the lead on pushing it). The real hilarity will arise because a USB-C audio connector using the analog sideband pins won't be 'protected'; while one using the data pins and acting as a USB audio device potentially(but far from certainly) will; so there is epic scope for user confusion about what situations will and won't be broken by DRM. Should be a blast.
At least with video, the 'HDMI, yes, VGA, no." rule is pretty simple.
3.5mm connectors on laptops already have this issue where you have identical connectors for line in, line out and microphone.
The solution there have been a combination of color coding the connectors together with a marking that indicates in/out/mic.
I don't see why you can't place a sticker next to the USB-C connector that has analog out. Then you end up in the same situation as the one you have now with the difference that if you know your headphones support digital audio you can use any connector.
As for headphones; on the ones with digital support there is probably no extra cost of also supporting analog signals since the chip will have an analog part anyway. It's just a matter of a line in pin on the chip and an internal switch to select internal or external source.
This means that both digital and analog headphones will work on any device that just outputs the analog signal.
Both digital and analog headphones will work on any device with multiple ports if you connect them to one of the ports marked with the headphone.
If you want to connect to any port you will need digital headphones.
The issue arises if you make a computer with USB hosts and doesn't make one of them support analog audio. Then you won't have anywhere to connect cheap headphones that only supports analog.
I don't see this as causing much more confusion than the current 3.5mm connectors.
A cheap but somewhat functional set of headphones can be had for $1. Granted I tend to pay a bit more for mine but at the end of the day they're not expensive.
If all headphones needed a DAC and other fancy circuitry the minimum cost would jump up dramatically - not to mention that at any pricepint the average quality level of what you're getting would go down.
The whole thing is a solution in search of a problem.
"People who think they know everything are very annoying to those of us who do."-Mark Twain
At the time I had to execute a command line btsco command just to pair the damn thing using some deprecated ALSA config. I wonder if they still work in 2016 with PulseAudio and systemd!
Sure was painful...
For those of us who have experienced the asynchronous effect of wireless Bluetooth headphone currently the norm on my iPad Pro, for instance, exactly how many generations and revisions of this are we going to go through over the next decade before it works at a level even close to analog? Historically, such proposals seem to rarely work as well as what they replace for a very long time, if ever.
Of all the pirating methods I have seen used over the years, the "analog hole" was only done by 12 year olds copying cassette tapes or straight off the radio. Not exactly a high loss area of music pirating.
Movie pirating, on the other hand, has had telesyncs for a long time. A telesync is a bootleg copy of a film recorded in a theater with an adjustable frame rate camcorder and audio from an FM microbroadcast for the hearing impaired.
The jacks on my laptop are color coded.
Except one of the first things that'll come on the market is a dongle so you can plug your nice expensive Senheiser's or Bose's or whatever into the USB3 port.
And then watch the industry adopt something analogous to AACS's Image Constraint Token. A Blu-ray Disc can require all analog outputs to be downsampled to standard definition. Likewise, something like ICT for audio might require a compliant dongle to convert the analog output to mono and bandpass it to telephone bandwidth (300-3300 Hz).
In past exploits, attackers have scattered a few shiny USB thumb drives in parking lots in the hope that some employee will plug one into a work computer, infecting it with the malware payload the drive contains. Soon USB-C headphones will be the vector of choice. Who is going to do a security audit on a headphone?
And also so your new factory sealed headphones can install malware the first time you plug them in. There is no such thing as a secure USB device. No OS handles all USB attack vectors, including Linux.
I will not buy headphones that pose a security risk to my devices. Why can't simple things stay simple. If you want smart headphones, run another cable along with the audio cable and plug it into two ports, or use wireless.
Also, doesn't the USB 3 cables carry a lot of power? How safe will ear buds be if there's a nick in the cable and some wires get crossed?
I almost never plug headphones into my phone. When I do connect it to an audio system I usually do it via wifi (home) or bluetooth (car).
If someone's current car happens to support neither Bluetooth audio nor an ISO 7736 aftermarket head unit, I don't see who's willing to spend thousands of dollars for a new car or a newer used car just for Bluetooth audio. We might end up seeing Bluetooth-to-3.5 mm and Bluetooth-to-tape adapters (and Bluetooth-to-FM adapters in those countries that allow unlicensed micropower operation in the FM band).
More like a corporate obsession with overly complex solutions to problems ... and non-problems. The Red Queen races on.
For those -- probably not numerous -- situations where digital audio is needed, wouldn't it make for sense to put an ADC in the using device?
This "solution" would seem to require DACs (and amplifiers? (and therefore batteries)) in headphones and completely baffle a lot of non-geek users who would have to deal with three incompatible connectors -- 3.5mm audio, usb-C, usb-C with sidepins. And, of course, USB to usb-C adapter cables will turn up for folks who want to use older devices to drive usb-C devices. But they won't have audio on sidepins because regular USB doesn't support that -- yet. And software problems routing audio to the analog and digital hardware in the source device will probably make things worse.
You can't see ANYTHING from a car, You've got to get out of the goddamned contraption and walk...Edward Abbey
PCs still come with a PS/2 port [...] so that I can plug my model M in (which works fine on a "modern" i7 and is a superior keyboard to 99.99% of the junk available now).
With the other 0.01 percent being Unicomp's USB keyboards that continue the model M's buckling spring tradition, correct?
Awesome. Yet another way they want to screw us. While this might sound smexy-smexy to some, I don't see any upsides for consumers. We'd have to replace massive amounts of existing equipment, worry about the fragility of the new connectors and it's another opportunity for the music industry to lock down an interface with DRM.
I have a significant investment in music production equipment and ham radio equipment (both purchased and home-built). Having to worry about availability of something as simple as a set of headphones or how I'm going to get an analog signal between two points is utter BS.
Evidently, they want to keep content locked down so tightly, it will make things painful for the customer. Why not just force everyone to get a brain implant so they can bill us if one of their songs is stuck in our head?
They already screwed us over with everything else, why not this too?
Don't anthropomorphize computers, they don't like it.
For those of us who have experienced the asynchronous effect of wireless Bluetooth headphone currently the norm on my iPad Pro, for instance, exactly how many generations and revisions of this are we going to go through over the next decade before it works at a level even close to analog? Historically, such proposals seem to rarely work as well as what they replace for a very long time, if ever.
Asynchronous audio is not a factor when listening to music which is what I do with my Bluetooth headphones about 95 percent of the time. The rest of the time I'm using the headphones while watching online videos on YouTube or some such site where asynchronous audio is common enough even with chorded analog headphones that I've quite frankly given up being annoyed over it and solved the problem by getting used to it. If I want to watch video in high quality with guaranteed synchronous audio I'm going to do that on my laptop or the TV and not on my phone or tablet although I could do that because my Bluetooth headphones have chord option so I can simply plug them into the analog audio port if I want to. The only real annoyance I have had with Bluetooth is that I sometimes get interference but that is a rare occurrence and flicking the phone into airplane mode usually fixes that issue.
They mention "difficulty delivering quality audio" through the analog channels, and I surely have experienced hum, hiss and static interference on analog headphones, but... reseating the connector to get a better ground, re-routing carelessly placed intermediate cables, etc. usually can dramatically improve the situation, even in cheap headphones.
On the other hand, every single pair of sub $100 digital headphones I have ever used have a ton of digital hiss in the background, and there's nothing you can do about it other than adjust your expectations of what signal to noise ratio should be when listening to quiet music.
Nonsense! By 2025 or so, your Bluetooth headphones will likely deliver flawless audio. .... If you can find any source device that still delivers such a by then ancient and outmoded technology.
You can't see ANYTHING from a car, You've got to get out of the goddamned contraption and walk...Edward Abbey
The only practical consequence will be that now you will have to carry a proprietary dongle/adaptor that will convert from USB to the usual analog jack, because being tied to the universally crappy headphones commonly sold with the phones is going to be even less popular than this.
BTW, the USB consortium actually explicitly discourages putting on USB jacks on the headphones themselves in the spec.
I think the consumers will vote with their feet - fragile, expensive proprietary dongles that you need to carry only so that the manufacturer can save a few cents and millimeters in the phone are not going to be popular. They never were - like the early phone camera add-ons which were in this form.
I wouldn't be worried about DRM here. Who is recording music through the analog jack of their phone?? And pretty much nothing else is concerned - purely digital analog interfaces for computers have been around for decades and have never managed to push out the purely analog interfaces. People simply want to connect their stereos and loudspeakers. The only reason for this is cost cutting and space saving - especially Samsung and Apple are taking this to the extreme at the expense of usability.
I'd imagine a USB-C headset would support both analog and digital host connectivity; digital being preferred, but can fall-back to analog with the flip of a switch on the headset. Well, assuming the analog end-to-end capability exists. IC's are cheap, no reason to not include both capabilities in one package.
Life is not for the lazy.
Before Intel had a processor they were making RAM for IBM.
And multiple players operating through parallel interfaces will be - problematic, at best.
That's because it's a dictation over a digital audio device, and it cut out for a bit there.
Slashdot still doesnâ(TM)t support Unicode after it was added to the HTML standard in 1997.
That's a red herring, though, as anybody who has ever worked with pro audio equipment will confirm. Intel's audio (or that of your graphics card) hisses, because of their crappy drivers and circuitry, not because there is something wrong with the headphone jack. This stuff is so bad that you even need to disable it in the BIOS/EFI if you don't use it at all in order to get good audio performance.
You can easily test that for yourself by buying a high quality audio interface and plugging in a pair of high quality headphones.
1) USB connectors -- ALL of them -- are less robust than audio jacks. They're going to fail sooner. Guaranteed.
2) There are a bazillion analog headphone / earbud options. Do you want them obsoleted?
3) DRM. Do you want it? Ever pipe the output of your phone/pad elsewhere? Say goodbye to that.
4) We already have bluetooth if you want digital, plus, no wires, an actual reason to use it.
5) Digital wiring tends to generate RF interference. Analog wiring doesn't. Both can carry RFI from inside the device, but generally don't. Much.
6) Passive analog earbuds are less expensive to manufacture; you'll pay more for digital earbuds, which must be active
7) If anyone thinks an analog option will remain with these connectors, be aware that part of the proffered approach is the ability to "inform the user that analog audio is not supported" based on hardware support choice of the manufacturer; if, knowing that, you still think analog audio will remain an option, I have a bridge to sell you.
The smart thing here is to refuse to purchase anything that uses a USB-C approach to audio headphones. Consumers already let themselves get screwed over hugely by accepting HDMI incorporating HDCP; they're probably about to do it again with this, but there's still an outside chance a similar debacle could be forestalled or prevented.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
Ah. But people are forgetting that phone sales are flat and this makes manufacturers sad.
Their answer? Do away with the robust and simple audio jack and move to the fragile and critical USB jack. This way people have to use it much more and wear it out/break it. And then make it so they can't replace the battery for the new power sucking standard.
Won't anyone think of the billion dollar companies that need this to stay profitable?
It's all about Digital Rights Management folks. Sure, you can have the file for free. Oh, you want to HEAR it? Well, cough up some money for a listening license.
Ok so usb-c is better, we hear you. But, guess what... nobody cares. You'll have to give us both for awhile and let the community make their own decision just like in nearly every other standards conversion to digital. Apple jamming it's ideas down people's throats doesn't surprise me, that's kinda what they do. But I expected more from Intel.
If it ain't broke, don't fix it.
If someone's current car happens to support neither Bluetooth audio nor an ISO 7736 aftermarket head unit, I don't see who's willing to spend thousands of dollars for a new car or a newer used car just for Bluetooth audio.
You can buy a bluetooth adapter that plugs into the aux jack of your car for as little as $40. I have done just that and it works great. Even Dewalt makes them. No need to buy a whole new car just for bluetooth since it is trivial to add it to almost literally any existing car with a stereo.
Something I haven't seen mentioned are products besides headphones that use the jack. I am pretty sure that at some point Apple required a fee for anyone designing a hardware platform that would interface with their other port. Companies like Square avoided that fee and provided a reader that would work with nearly any phone or pad. There are also companies making medical thermometers, ECG monitors etc. that use the headphone jack. In some cases those companies selected the jack for low power advantages along with allowing for cross platform use.
How are we supposed to charge our phones while listening to music with one USB-C jack?
Seems like a pretty common use case, are all USB-C headphones going to come with a charging port?
Also, as pointed out by every other commenter in this thread, now my headphones can give me malware. It WILL happen, right from the factory.
John McAfee needs to lay off the bathsalts for a while and engineer a bacteriaphage to guard our sensitive USB ports.
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
Doesn't work on headphone jacks. What abouts USB-C?
There's no shortage of people who make use of audio jacks. Just because you don't use something doesn't mean other people don't.
Never argued otherwise. However you have the argument backwards. I like minimalist devices where you add features you need/want rather than complicated devices that come with features you'll never use. Many people listen to music via the 3.5mm jack but not all users do. As such adding that feature adds cost and complexity while simultaneously being redundant and reducing the reliability of the device. It's like when everyone was still buying PCs with floppy drives because everyone else had them long after they had been rendered redundant by newer technologies.
You're also neglecting the use of audio jacks for other purposes, like for the vision impaired.
I'm not neglecting it at all. Riddle me this. Exactly what use is a 3.5mm jack to a vision impaired person on a smartphone with no tactile interface. The front is a smooth piece of glass. Headphone jack or not, such a smartphone is mostly useless to them if they are substantially blind and if they aren't then the lack of the jack is of little consequence.
Want some fancy device interaction? Do it over bluetooth.
Or do it over the USB port that is ALREADY on the device and isn't going away. There is nothing the 3.5mm jack does that cannot be replicated in some fashion via USB and/or Bluetooth. A single purpose port on a modern mobile device is an idiotic idea.
Have gnu, will travel.
Headphones work great, are an incredible consumer value and are universally compatible. How can we bust all that up, charge more, then sell it as a consumer win? "Skip buttons!" "DRM 'protecting' music quality" "Buzz words?" "Embedded ads in text scrolling display in-line with headphone cables!"
This ideas is as bad as the 3.5mm jack is good.
Recent developments with USB-C are so retrograde that I wouldn't be surprised if they were done with the express intention of persuading Apple to use the format.
Intel Wants To Eliminate The Headphone Jack
Headphone Jack is innocent, OK?
Besides the 3.5mm analog output being *the* standard also for non-headphone equipment, why would I want yet another accessory that requires a battery and/or recharging equipment?
The real reason is to close the analog hole and add DRM to even your headphones.
It's this. It's pretty much the last 'analog hole'.
Of course like so many things it only 'closes' it for the average user, or people who don't look hard enough. Easy enough to hack a pair of cheap headphones to provide an analog output, and I'm sure it'll be easy to order an adapter from some overseas company that does the same thing without having to modify anything.
Are YOU using the TOOL, or is the TOOL using YOU? Think about it!
Only if your hardware or operating system is set up to to execute code that happens to be on the device.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
This is true, that's also why it's a good idea if you're shopping for a motherboard to make sure and look at how much insulation/separation there is between the sound chip and the rest of the board.
Most good boards go even further with EM shielding around the chip (usually a little metal box in one corner of a board all by itself). Even with all this you can get interference and hiss from cables to close to each other.
I used to think it was just cheap chips/meterials too until I actually looked into it, it's all about interference from the electricity itself.
I can tolerate them taking away the jack if they add two or three extra usb ports. You can't charge the device with a keyboard plugged in, ridiculous! Now they want me to be unable to listen to music while charging.
which can now be barely thicker than the headphone cable.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
We might end up seeing Bluetooth-to-3.5 mm [...] adapters
You can buy a bluetooth adapter that plugs into the aux jack of your car for as little as $40.
Exactly. But this $40 has to be added to the total cost of ownership of one's first phone not to include a 3.5 mm jack. Can they make the phone $40 cheaper to compensate?
Memo to Apple and Intel: I doubt very seriously that I'm alone out here - don't waste your breath on that whole "superior connectivity" thing, and absolutely don't try to tell me that there will be adapters for dinosaurs such as myself.
Besides - I've been using (and got my wife using) Bluetooth headsets - digital and wireless, although there is a 3.5mm jack and audio cable provided on our comfortable ear-cup headphones. Not on my ear buds, but I suppose that would be counter to their design.
"For instance, a future pair of headphones could monitor one's pulse or inner-ear temperature for fitness tracking,"
No, just, no
I am looking forward to a day when my cellphone will have no jacks whatsoever and will be entirely sealed against any moisture entering the chassis.
Well they'd be pretty useless if they could only play single notes.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
Motorola had a whole series of phones that you could connect USB Mini headphones to, though I don't recall whether they'd eliminated the 3.5mm jack (I thought they had, but can't remember what model phone I had then....).
USB mini to 3.5mm adapters suddenly became important.
fencepost
just a little off
If you're that serious about audio quality, you shouldn't use any on-board analog audio. Either use S/PDIF or go with an external DAC.
Alex, I'll take keybindings not used by Emacs for $400....
But this $40 has to be added to the total cost of ownership of one's first phone not to include a 3.5 mm jack.
Wrong question. It's a sunk cost or will become one. The 3.5mm jack is almost certainly going away. You can either buy the bluetooth adapter now or you can buy it later but eventually you are going to have to buy it or an equivalent usb adapter of you prefer a wired connection. As such it is a sunken cost.
Can they make the phone $40 cheaper to compensate?
Probably not but Apple and Samsung and the rest aren't going to keep the aux jack solely so you don't have to spend $40 the next time you upgrade your phone.
I agree, It just depends how serious you are about your audio.
Making sure the audio onboard has good separation/insulation costs nothing though if you just don't want things like hissing noises.
Um, if only there was this connection that could be made between the headphones and the device that would allow data and media communication between them.
hm..nope, can't think of anything. Good thing Intel is on the case!
This is why I'll be purchasing a iPhone SE and tucking it aside until my current iPhone 4 dies. At least I'll have a damn phone that isn't one of Huxley's wet dreams. I already have a laptop tucked aside for this purpose.
Why can't simple things stay simple. If you want smart headphones, run another cable along with the audio cable and plug it into two ports, or use wireless.
If someone wants to sell smart headphones today, they could use USB today. Sell it with a set of adapters or cables so it'll work with normal USB ports, microusb, and usb-c. If they're doing smart stuff like heartbeat or temp monitoring or something, they can easily do digital audio as well, so the sidepin stuff isn't needed. There's no need for two cables today, and I don't see any real benefit to Intel's idea either (maybe to force use of it, and thus force use of something it has a patent on, and get money via that or from chips it sells?)
My experience is the opposite of yours. I've only bee using Bluetooth A2DP with my iPhone for a week, and I'm already ready to ship the Bluetooth receiver back. Every single freaking time I pause playback, the iPhone stops talking to the Bluetooth receiver to save battery power. When I hit play, I lose two or three seconds of audio while it reconnects. That means missed words when watching Netflix, which means every single time I pause, I end up having to hit the "back 10 seconds button". Every. Single. Time.
Bluetooth is fine for phone calls. I've used it with a headset-profile head end in my car for years. But as a replacement for analog headphones, it has a very, very long way to go before it is usable, IMO.
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
From TFA: "USB-C already supports analog audio transfer through sideband pins simplifying the engineering steps necessary to swap 3.5mm with USB-C in device designs. " Note that they are talking about *analog* audio over USB-C, not digital.
The motivation behind a move like this is likely reducing parts count, not draconian DRM, which Apple eschews anyway.
This "solution" would seem to require DACs (and amplifiers? (and therefore batteries)) in headphones and completely baffle a lot of non-geek users who would have to deal with three incompatible connectors -- 3.5mm audio, usb-C, usb-C with sidepins
Why batteries? We're talking USB-C already, that's USB 3.0 which gives off more than enough power for a simple DAC. It's going to make compatible headphones more expensive, but we're talking a chip that probably costs less than $0.25, it's going to be negligible enough.
I don't support this decision, but your objection there is meaningless.
"Don't meddle in the affairs of a patent dragon, for thou art tasty and good with ketchup." ~ohcrapitssteve
This "solution" would seem to require DACs (and amplifiers? (and therefore batteries)) in headphones and completely baffle a lot of non-geek users who would have to deal with three incompatible connectors -- 3.5mm audio, usb-C, usb-C with sidepins.
There's no batteries added, you're talking about USB. It carries power. Just a $0.25 circuit to convert that into power for those headphones and the DAC. I don't like it, but it's simple.
"Don't meddle in the affairs of a patent dragon, for thou art tasty and good with ketchup." ~ohcrapitssteve
Of course there's a reason. The only valid reason to drop the analog port in the first place is that DACs cost money, and good DACs cost even more. The port isn't inherently any thinner than a 3.5mm mini plug, once you factor in the mechanical grip surfaces required for the USB-C and the resulting inability to make the upper and lower surfaces of the jack be part of the device case.
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
Monoprice's "Premium Hi-Fi DJ Style Over-the-Ear Pro Headphones". $16 before shipping. I've bought 3 so far.
I've tried USB 'phones before. I kept having to tell my computer where to send the data. No thanks.
Seems like this would totally remove the (need for an) audio chip on the motherboard.
This is awesome. 15 minutes, a set of headphones, a 3.5mm cable, wire cutters, and a soldering iron (heck, electrical tape) and you've got an HDCP-digital -> analog converter. Audio only, but still.
Wrong.
USB device poses as a keyboard and starts opening terminals and running commands shit the moment you plug it in.
I was thinking the same thing; I've had several sets of "USB headphones" already over the years...not sure how, other than being a "new type of plug" and having a bit more processing capabilities, this is "big news" from Intel. As opposed to I7 still, after almost a decade, still being their "top" CPU. Sure, it's shrunk quite a bit, but still an I7 since 2008.
Theoretically, a sufficiently-advanced compromised device could present itself as a USB keyboard and send keystrokes to the shell to type the malware executable in and then run it.
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
In my car it's even worse, since my phone also does two "beeps" when it connects...so I've got the volume up for the music, connect / diconnect..."BEEP BEEP" at volume 15 lol
I don't see why you can't place a sticker next to the USB-C connector that has analog out.
So a little headphone logo next to the port?
What about a mic logo? Does it work with my in-line microphone?
Does it support surround sound? I mean, if we're replacing audio ports with USB-C, we can get red of 6 audio ports with one USB-C port, can't we? That's the whole point, to get rid of those ports? And once those ports are gone, your 7.1 setup will need to plug into something. So we need at least 7.1 audio via analog pins.
Where would we fit the logo (or logos)?
Below the super speed plus ( SS+ {- ) logo? Above the charging port (lightning bolt) logo? To the left of the Thunderbolt logo? Wait, that's also a lightning bolt. Can we go back to the old battery logo for the USB charging port? Did we ever make that official? No? Uh, we're still telling people to make those yellow, right? How does that look for the USB C connector? Not good at all? And we can't actually use it as a charging port once we pass it off to the OS, right? And we can't indicate which one port has been set to be a charging only port in the BIOS/UEFI, thus making it work as a charging-only port even in the OS? Clearly we need USB-D, with an LCD display for each port telling you WTF it is and WTF it's capable of. Get Samir on it!
I've said it before and I'll say it again. Intel is becoming the next IBM and they've got the pedal-to-the-metal.
I would love to see a good digital headphone standard come out
For instance, a future pair of headphones could monitor one's pulse or inner-ear temperature for fitness tracking, something that could only be possible if the headphones were connected to a smartphone via a USB-C cable.
On second thought if this is the best example you can come up with, I guess I really don't need or want digital headphones.
I wouldn't call it a red herring when the current state of the consumer market for digital headphones sucks, reviews of digital headphones generally don't expose these quality problems, and the situation is not likely to get better when digital headphones become the only option.
Personally, I'd rather not have to put in audiophile levels of money and time to enjoy the same audio quality I used to get from my $25 turntable and $70 amplifier 30 years ago.
Just try plugging in a USB-C cable to the back of a PC while crawling behind a desk and you're going to end up with a broken connector or cable.
The analog jacks are used because the *work*.
I suspect the real reason for this moe is to get end-to-end DRM with audio the same way HDMI provides end-to-end DRM with video.
I don't think it's lower power than a 3.5" headphone jack. Aren't we all about saving power on the mobile devices these days? Keep it simple, stupid!
So don't buy items without 1/8" mini jacks. Some new laptops (my work PC) only have one for either mic or headphone, which already sucks. Yes, outboard sound devices that use USB are pretty cheap, but who wants to have to carry more crud around? Just give me my two analog stereo mini jacks. It takes up very little space. Drop the stupid fingerprint readers instead.
The real reason is to close the analog hole and add DRM to even your headphones.
While also charging you more for headphones.
Sure... but if all you are expecting is to insert a hard drive, any appearance that the device has as a keyboard can be ignored by the operating system. Just turn plug and play off.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
Mentioning this may place you in violation of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. You're disseminating knowledge concerning digital lock overrides.
But are Intel and Apple going to subsidise the extra cost to the user too?
Large company wants to replace an ubiquitous standard with a proprietary overly-complex and unnecessary interface that they control.
Why should we listen to these guys again?
"Nine times out of ten, starting a fire is not the best way to solve the problem." - my wife
Intelligent headphones that can sense the pulse, temperature of my ear etc. What crap? I use commodity $6 headphones and I am happy with them. Now Intel and friends want me to buy separate $60 loaded with crap headphones, that will sound just like my $6 headphones . And I will have to carry 2 sets of headphones. That's exactly why monopolies suck.
Layoffs aplenty, yet they still won't learn & are stuck to x86 and media lock-in (DRM) tech.
Bluetooth's the superior multi-interface (including digital audio). My $60 headphones have it.
Science & open-source build trust from peer review. Learn systems you can trust.
The USB gadget class allows a device to change what it offers to a host, lots of phones do this and its an easy way to be slightly peer to peer with USB. This is benign version of what badusb does. I guess you could have a USB firewall but it would feel like a design failure to me.
[site]
Actually, it's the other way around. If any significant percentage of customers are plugging in and unplugging 3.5mm plugs several times per day, then replacing those with much-more-fragile USB-C connectors dramatically reduces the reliability of the device for that percentage of your customers.
Let's assume what you are saying is true for a moment. You don't have data but your supposition is a logical one. However it's also incomplete. You're forgetting a few important facts because you are only considering the failure modes from repeated connections of the connector. That's important but there are other failure modes to consider. Failures from dust/water entry into the device. Failures of the extra electronics. Failures of the software to manage the extra hardware. Etc (this isn't an exhaustive list) The list of failures does not stop at and may not be dominated by # connections. Further if the MTBF for USB-C substantially exceeds the typical time of ownership then it is a moot issue for most people.
You also have to consider what the cost of each of these failure modes. I'm pretty sure Apple and other smartphone makers have copious data about the various failure modes and their relative costs. A failure mode might be infrequent but expensive to mitigate. Failures have to be weighed against the costs they create. Its not merely a question of frequency but also severity and difficulty/cost to mitigate.
No, it isn't even slightly like that. People bought PCs with floppy drives, and something like one percent of them used them more often than once a year.
The floppy drive was obsolete LONG before that become the case. There were technologically better options commonly available by the early 1990s and yet floppy drives limped on for another decade and were still in shockingly common use until the late 1990s. Software was still routinely installed by floppy disk even as late as 2000. It wasn't until the late 90s before software became most commonly distributed on CD.
And even if the adapter were only $5 (instead of a more typical $20 early adopter penalty), every affected customer would still pay a lot more for even a single adapter than they would for the 15-cent headphone jack.
By separating the headphone jack you are letting those who want one a means to pay for it without imposing the cost of it on others who have no need for it. If it is worth $5 (or $15) to you then you should be willing to pay that. The makers of these devices aren't running a charity. If customers really do turn out to want one then either it will find its way back on the the device (unlikely) or people will migrate over time to other options. In the mean time we find out what the real economic value of that particular feature is.
In those 52 years, that connector has not changed significantly, despite many, many companies trying to do so. It isn't going to magically go away just because a couple of badly misguided consumer electronics companies think it it is out of date....
Nobody is claiming the jack will disappear entirely. It won't. But there is no reason it necessarily needs to stay on your smartphone if its cost exceeds its utility. We seem to be getting close to that point if we haven't passed it already. I'm sure some smartphones will still come with a headphone jack for those who still want one. Others won't and I'm reasonably confident that the ones that don't have one won't miss it very much. Personally I'd rather the space currently devoted to a headphone jack be used for more battery instead but that's just me. The headphone jack is (near as makes no difference) a unitasker on a device that by its very design is supposed to be multi-function. A single purpose connector really doesn't make any sense on a compact mobile computer.
Or maybe its just that they don't control that standard?
Well yeah.... essentially you would be whitelisting what types of devices could be plugged into the ports, but in the case where you expect to be plugging in something like headphones, that is *EXACTLY* what you'd want to be doing for the port that you plug your headphones into.
Of course, at that point there is no real advantage to using a general purpose port in the first place.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
And in the darkness bind them
SJW: a person who perceives an injustice, and while correcting it, commits a greater injustice.
How to make investments in earbuds and headphones obsolete in a flash! Also jacks in cars. This idea is beyond stupid.
Already have bluetooth headphones eliminating the need for the jack entirely.
A jack for audio. How quaint. How behind Intel and Apple are. At least two years with the watch, looks like about 5 years with this. Anyone want apple stuff anymore?
Remember when Apple tried to force us to buy headphones with volume and selection controls built-in by removing the controls from smaller their music players? Didn't last long. I've invested in decent headphones. I won't be buying players that force me to replace them or use a shitty external DAC.