Apple Replaced the Headphone Jack On the iPhone 7 With a Fake Speaker Grill (businessinsider.com)

Not long ago, Apple CEO Tim Cook explained why the company felt a need to remove the headphone jack from the new iPhones -- the iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus. He said, "that jack takes up a lot of space in the phone, a lot of space. And there's a lot of more important things we can provide for the consumer than that jack." His colleague Phil Schiller cited "courage" for the same. As people learn to live in a world where they have to use a dongle to use their existing pair of headphones, gadget repair community iFixit found today that Apple isn't really using that "extra space" it got after getting rid of the headphone jack. BusinessInsider reports: "In place of the headphone jack, we find a component that seems to channel sound from outside the phone into the microphone... or from the Taptic Engine out," they write. Yep -- in the place where the headphone jack used to be there's a piece of molded plastic. "No fancy electronics here, just some well-designed acoustics and molded plastic," iFixit writes.iFixit adds, "Closer inspection shows a new, second lower speaker grille that leads ... nowhere? Interesting." Update: 09/16 21:21 GMT by M : Apple says it's a "barometric vent." The Verge reports: Apparently adding all the waterproofing to the iPhone 7 and 7 Plus meant that it was more of a sealed box, and so to be able to have an accurate and working barometer, Apple used that space. The barometer is the thing that allows a phone to measure altitude, and Apple points out that on the iPhone 7 it can measure even minor changes like climbing a flight of stairs.

Comments

Re: So in other words it's used and is useful

[Reaperducer]

1. "Not as useful" is subjective. In the last six years I don't think I've ever plugged anything into any of my mobile phones 3.5mm jacks. Bluetooth audio has been around for a long, long time and I've always used that instead. Meanwhile, I've used apps that require, or would be enhanced by the presence of, a barometer pretty much every day. Weather trends, hiking, skiing, and lots of other activities other than playing Xbox in your mother's basement make a barometer very useful.

Old-fashioned 3.5mm jacks are so obsolete that in many Asian nations, they're only used for holding "mascots" — Little cartoon charms.

2. If you think you can fit both in, then you should patent your great knowledge and make millions. But you won't. Because you're not an engineer, just another internet troll. I'm going to guess that the fleets of highly paid, highly trained engineers Apple has on staff know a little more about how the iPhones are designed than some random loser who is such a total loss he has to post AC.

How's that floppy drive working out for you, Mr. Dell?