Reply to: Have you got standard jack?

[seanraaron]

I was still buying albums on vinyl in the early 90s. Must admin, most of my purchases were moving over on to CD at that point, but that was more to get away from cassettes than vinyl.

It was becoming more difficult to find a lot of new releases in the format and the record shops in Northern California, where I was living, were just dumping the format completely. Not to mention the quality of vinyl by that time was so poor I often had to do multiple exhanges just to get a record that wasn't warped or stack coins on my phono needle to stop the goddam record from skipping.

Still, it was nice to make a profit on selling my Bowie vinyl after the Rykodisc CD releases were announced...

But seriously, Neil Young's ranting about audio quality is nonsense. Anyone old enough to remember hearing vinyl back in the day has lost so much of their hearing range they couldn't tell the difference between a 128mbps MP3 and vinyl, much less a CD and vinyl. And you know records have compression too - notice how the rings get smaller towards the centre ;-) ?

[MrMarkyMark]

FTFY

I don't know about anyone else, but I only switched to CDs in the late 80s, because Tomorrows World fooled me by making CDs look indestructible, when, in reality, they scratched far easier than vinyl and the sound was of a lot poorer quality

[LondonManc]

A lot of the moaning about this is from people with very short memories. Less than a decade ago you'd be lucky to have a phone that could play standard MP3s, much less have a 3.5mm audio jack instead of having to use some kind of adapter. The jack tech is over a century old and it works, but don't be surprised to see it get binned.

Apple will no doubt drop USB on their computers next and people with USB-connected kit will need to use an adapter, just like they dumped their own FireWire connector. People complained, but they got on with it and enjoyed the higher speed connection of thunderbolt.

I don't know about anyone else, but I only switched to CDs in the late 80s because the music industry forced the issue by not issuing anything other than singles on vinyl. Apple is hardly alone in doing this kind of thing.

I was still buying albums on vinyl in the early 90s. Must admin, most of my purchases were moving over on to CD at that point, but that was more to get away from cassettes than vinyl.

[seanraaron]

A lot of the moaning about this is from people with very short memories. Less than a decade ago you'd be lucky to have a phone that could play standard MP3s, much less have a 3.5mm audio jack instead of having to use some kind of adapter. The jack tech is over a century old and it works, but don't be surprised to see it get binned.

Apple will no doubt drop USB on their computers next and people with USB-connected kit will need to use an adapter, just like they dumped their own FireWire connector. People complained, but they got on with it and enjoyed the higher speed connection of thunderbolt.

I don't know about anyone else, but I only switched to CDs in the late 80s because the music industry forced the issue by not issuing anything other than singles on vinyl. Apple is hardly alone in doing this kind of thing.

[MrMarkyMark]

FTFY

People bitch and moan when Apple change things, but 9 times out of 10, we just roll over and take it, as we are, totally, Apple fan boys, after all!

Main headphones are Bluetooth so not really a problem for me, although my walkaround pair will need to be replaced, but, I truly don't mind, whatever it costs, because Apple are totally cool.

[BrilloPad]

People bitch and moan when Apple change things, but 9 times out of 10 the rest follow once they realise that its not a bad idea after all!

Main headphones are Bluetooth so not really a problem for me, although my walkaround pair will need to be replaced.

I am sure they will replace the UK 3-pin plug soon....

[LondonManc]

Early days, but USB-C is very similar, especially in the "which ever way round" connecting, also how many phones now have no expandable storage and soldered in batteries?

Think that's more of a general a) customer feedback response and b) profiteering racket than everyone going "ooh, Apple have nailed it with that tech innovation."

[SimonMac]

Not seen anyone else with a lightning connector yet.

Early days, but USB-C is very similar, especially in the "which ever way round" connecting, also how many phones now have no expandable storage and soldered in batteries?

[LondonManc]

People bitch and moan when Apple change things, but 9 times out of 10 the rest follow once they realise that its not a bad idea after all!

Main headphones are Bluetooth so not really a problem for me, although my walkaround pair will need to be replaced.

Not seen anyone else with a lightning connector yet.

[SimonMac]

People bitch and moan when Apple change things, but 9 times out of 10 the rest follow once they realise that its not a bad idea after all!

Main headphones are Bluetooth so not really a problem for me, although my walkaround pair will need to be replaced.

[BrilloPad]

The 19th Century plug that's still being used - BBC News

[expat]

The "charging socket" on an iphone is also a data port, and USB just isn't fast enough for a lot of stuff that an iphone does, for example HDMI, and yes, I do play HDMI movies from my iphone.

[d000hg]

But micro usb is not a standard.

Yes it is. It's the most common, and it's not encumbered by patents.

[WTFH]

MicroUSB might not be the best but it's still a standard until the industry collectively switches to something nicer.

But micro usb is not a standard. It's used by some, but not by many others. And even those that have been using it are moving away from it - such as the Nexus.


So, it's not a standard and it's not the best and the parts of the industry that are choosing it are only doing so because they don't want to standardise on something that is better.

[d000hg]

It is in this country, but not everywhere, and not for all devices - what about electric razors & electric toothbrushes?.

European and particularly US plugs are just crap though. They wobble like crazy and the US ones you often get big sparks as you plug things in.

The UK mains plug is the best. MicroUSB might not be the best but it's still a standard until the industry collectively switches to something nicer.