No earphone jack again. That’s a bit sad. Even though I mainly use BLT earbuds, I still sometimes wish I could use my wired headphones. It’s just a small inconvenience
I had a phone without before, that one came with a simple cheap passive adapter for USB-C to 3.5mm headset. You lose out on using headphones while charging, but other than that I was never really inconvenienced…
I disagree about this being a good solution. USB-C is not meant to take the strain of being used as an audio port when being used in the go so there is risk of damaging the port while a headphone jack is more stable and allows the plug to rotate. Plus I don’t want to have a dingle I can forget when in a rush.
It’s really a small inconvenience, but using an adapter would mean I’d be prone to misplace it when I use my headphones on anything else, so it hardly makes anything better
The reason for not using a headphone jack is making it simpler for the manufacturer, one less connector to handle which also limits how slim a phone can be.
I’m not saying this is good for the consumer, but there are reasons for integrating the functionality into the USB-C port.
If you want easily replaceable parts and a system that can unlock the bootloader for example, your argument can be made for 99% of phones on the market. The more requirements you add, the smaller the scope gets until there are no devices left to choose from.
These points were all disproved long ago. The jack is a the same thickness as the display.
The reason is because BT headphones have a much higher margin, and need to be replaced every few years because of the battery (if not already replaced because they were lost or damaged).
That means the audio still goes through another DAC, lowering the sound quality, compared to an analog 3.5 jack. Also, who wants to further risk wearing out\vreaking their charge port, jack inputs almost seem like they can’t break.
No one has been using aux cable mobile headphones for the past 10 years. Headphone jack is e-waste at this point. bluetooth audio is great and if you really want to be a boomer you can use the usb C headphones.
What the absolute fuck are you talking about? What am I supposed to do with the dozen wired headphones I already have? Some of them decades old? Throw them in the garbage? Sounds real eco-friendly.
bluetooth audio is great
It is. We had it on phones since before the original iPhone. No one wants to take that away.
Problem is BT headphones last 2 years then they go in the garbage because the batteries are dead. How eco-friendly is that!?
Problem is BT headphones last 2 years then they go in the garbage because the batteries are dead. How eco-friendly is that!?
My 7 years old bluetooth headphone would disagree.
It is. We had it on phones since before the original iPhone. No one wants to take that away.
And no one except a vocal minority want to keep it. There are a lot on data on that, and manufacturer make their decision on that data.
But lets ignore that, and let’s take my viewpoint as a customer. I don’t want a port I have no use for. I don’t want a DAC I have no use for. I don’t want the extra weight that comes with them.
My needs conflict with yours, so what’s the only way to make both of us somewhat happy? That’s by making the 3.5mm jack an addon, which is what any manufacturer that does not focus on music listening would do.
And no one except a vocal minority want to keep it. There are a lot on data on that,
I would love to see the data that says everyone wants wired devices only. I don’t believe you.
don’t want a port I have no use for.
Why would you even care!?
I don’t want the extra weight that comes with them.
😆 Buddy if you don’t want extra weight you need to talk to these OEMs about making their phones out of giant slabs of glass. A 1g connector isn’t going to make a difference. You’re being completely ridiculous.
My needs conflict with yours,
No they don’t. They can meet both of our needs by including a jack. Simple as.
I’m voluntarily exagerating my point here for irony sake.
My needs isn’t more important than anyone else, but I wanted to point out the selfishness of the oposite point of view by making mine as selfish.
Those in favor of keeping a jack port voluntarily choose to ignore any alternative, while trying to force their need on other people.
But it is true I do not want that port back. It is redundant, has no advantages over a dongle, and it inconveniences could easily be overcome by simply adding a second usb-c port. No need for internal DAC, you’d be able to do far more than you’ll ever be able to do with a 3.5mm jack, and you’ll be able to charge it while listening to your music with a wired headphone. All that with a smaller and more flexible port.
And it would take you 5min searching the web to get good review about usbc DAC with actually good sound, even better than any internal DAC.
But to save you a click, you have the Apple one, which has good review while being able to drive almost all headphones but the most energy intensive of them. It cost a whopping… $10.
As for the precise number, you can find them on market studies. Unfortunately they are quite pricy, and as I’m not in that field, I do not have access to them. But Fairphone does, and if they don’t bother adding that port back, they are most probably basing their decision on them.
My needs isn’t more important than anyone else, but I wanted to point out the selfishness of the oposite point of view by making mine as selfish.
There’s nothing selfish here. Keeping the jack benefits everyone except Apple and other BT headphone OEMs. It doesn’t hurt anyone else.
has no advantages over a dongle
The advantage is that you don’t need a dongle…
and it inconveniences easily be overcome by simply adding a second usb-c port
Still requires carrying a dongle or buying a pair of headphones that only works with phones and computers, and not the vast array of other devices that still use headphone jacks, new and old. So that solves absolutely nothing. As I said elsewhere, we’ve created a competing standard, for no reason.
you’d be able to do far more than you’ll ever be able to do with a 3.5mm jack
What? Do you think we’re suggesting removing the USB port? What are you talking about?
And it would take you 5min searching the web to get good review about usbc DAC with actually good sound, even better than any internal DAC.
I don’t want to search the web. I don’t want a DAC. I just want to plug in my headphones. This is absurd.
It cost a whopping… $10.
$10 to buy something that previously cost me $0. Only it’s inevitably going to get lost so you’d better buy a half dozen of them and replace them every few years, so you’re looking at dozens of $ per year for something that was previously completely unnecessary.
As for the precise number…I’m not in that field, I do not have access to them
Yeah, I didn’t think so.
But Fairphone does
Where? If you know they have it, then you must have it as well?
and if they don’t bother adding that port back, they are most probably basing their decision on them.
No, they’re basing that decision on the same thing everyone else is: money. Greed. Much like Apple they also released their own bluetooth headphones at the same time as they removed their headphone jack. But I suppose that’s just coincidence, right?
Fairphone removes the headphone jack > realize they would need an alternative > realize most TW headphones are e-waste to be > make their own with blackjack and hookers a removable battery, making it a solution to TW headphones with non-removable batteries.
Don’t call fool without any proof, or you’ll have a very sad life supposing the worst from anyone you’ll meet. Coincidence is no proof of causation.
Yes if they’ve lasted decades thats their job done. Now people are buying usb C headphones and there is no need to continue to support decades old standards. The ewaste from a pair of headphones is tiny so its not worth fretting over.
Also BT headphones last longer than 2 years. Mine are 1st gen samsung buds and going on 5 years at this point and still hold enough charge to listen to music during my work day. If im going to be using them all day I have 1 in and 1 charging in the case and then I can easily have music for 10+ hours on a 5 year old device. If I threw them away today I would consider them to have not been ewaste.
Yes if they’ve lasted decades thats their job done
No it means they’ll essentially last indefinitely, unlike BT buds.
Now people are buying usb C headphones and there is no need to continue to support decades old standards
No, what’s happened is that we went from a single open standard for audio jacks to competing standards (actually 3 of them before the EU stepped in and forced Apple to quit their bullshit). And gained nothing in the process.
The ewaste from a pair of headphones is tiny so its not worth fretting over.
It’s not a pair of headphones, it’s millions of audio devices.
Cars have had bluetooth and usb on their radios for almost 20 years. Even older than that you can replace the stereo for like $30. My car is 2004 and i did a stereo replacement and i’ve got bluetooth, usb C and aux.
Big? The headphone jack is not large enough to protrude from a cell phone chassis. Any company telling you they can’t fit it is just lying to sell you BT headphones.
I’m assuming they are removing the headphone jack cause the internal components take up too much space. I can’t imagine these companies removing the jacks cause they cost too much money.
You’re vastly overestimating the space required for a 3.5mm jack, and the reasons for its removal.
The jack takes up some internal space, but not much at all. The components required internally like the DAC chip are insignificant. It is a potential source of water ingress, but that can be mitigated and has been done many times before.
The reason for removal is two fold, first you simply don’t have to deal with any of the above, so from an engineering perspective it’s always easier to not do something. The second, and most important, **is to sell wireless headphones. **
You’ll notice that Fairphone came out with their own earbuds at the same time they removed the headphone jack. You could of course use Bluetooth headphones with the Fairphone 1, 2, and 3, but you weren’t forced to think about it and could just use your existing headphones. Removing the jack ads inconvenience and breaks user habit, causing people to re-evaluate their headphones and consider a new purchase, which the manufacturer just happens to have and likely in a bundle deal.
Apple, Google, and Samsung have seen huge uplift in earbud sales with the removal of the jack. So the anger of some power users is of no consequence to them. Seeing Fairphone follow in this behaviour what’s disappointing.
I made the mistake of believing that Fairphone is an enthusiast company, like the Framework of phones maybe. There is some overlap, sure, with the repair-ability aspect and available parts and schematics, but that’s about it.
Other than that, FP wants to be a mainstream brand, the eco-friendly Samsung or Apple; the power users can get shafted with their audio jacks for all they care. While Framework has actual hardware modularity and release updated HW modules so you don’t buy the whole device again for an upgrade.
Looking at FP’s financial statements, I get the impression they aren’t doing too hot lately, so I get it if they need bigger margins to continue operating. Just don’t be a fucking hypocrite and lie about the reason of the jack removal ffs.
Probably not a popular thing to say on here, but I think you’ve lost the battle for the earphone jack. It probably just requires way too much real estate to be practical on a modern day cell phone.
It absolutely does not require too much space. And you can still buy phones with headphone jacks, just not any of the (ironically) higher end models because OEMs know they can push their first party bluetooth headphones to these customers.
No earphone jack again. That’s a bit sad. Even though I mainly use BLT earbuds, I still sometimes wish I could use my wired headphones. It’s just a small inconvenience
I had a phone without before, that one came with a simple cheap passive adapter for USB-C to 3.5mm headset. You lose out on using headphones while charging, but other than that I was never really inconvenienced…
I disagree about this being a good solution. USB-C is not meant to take the strain of being used as an audio port when being used in the go so there is risk of damaging the port while a headphone jack is more stable and allows the plug to rotate. Plus I don’t want to have a dingle I can forget when in a rush.
They should make cases with the adapter built in, the way they used to (still do?) for external battery packs.
Just have the dongle permanently attached to your earbuds like it’s a part of the cable.
You also have to remember to have that adapter with you
An issue shared with the headphones themselves
If you need to plug the headphones into the adapter, you can just leave them plugged in after disconnecting from the phone
This way, the headphones almost become ones with USB-C connectors than auxiliary barrels.
It’s really a small inconvenience, but using an adapter would mean I’d be prone to misplace it when I use my headphones on anything else, so it hardly makes anything better
The reason for not using a headphone jack is making it simpler for the manufacturer, one less connector to handle which also limits how slim a phone can be.
I’m not saying this is good for the consumer, but there are reasons for integrating the functionality into the USB-C port.
For $700 I’m not interested in compromising my own convenience for theirs.
Fair, though the fact doesn’t exist in a vacuum.
If you want easily replaceable parts and a system that can unlock the bootloader for example, your argument can be made for 99% of phones on the market. The more requirements you add, the smaller the scope gets until there are no devices left to choose from.
These points were all disproved long ago. The jack is a the same thickness as the display.
The reason is because BT headphones have a much higher margin, and need to be replaced every few years because of the battery (if not already replaced because they were lost or damaged).
It’s just a dumb cash grab.
It’s not hard to manufacture a headphone jack. We’ve been doing it since the 80s. Probably costs them a penny BOM.
I don’t think his point was the jack itself but the device around the jack. Physically and electronically.
That’s what I’m also talking about.
The headphone jack is 3.5mm. iPhones are ~7.5mm thick, more than double. The smallest phone available on the market is 4.2mm.
You can find adapters that can charge while still having a 3.5mm back
fast charging / USB-PD may not work, and 3.5mm media controls may not pass through properly
That means the audio still goes through another DAC, lowering the sound quality, compared to an analog 3.5 jack. Also, who wants to further risk wearing out\vreaking their charge port, jack inputs almost seem like they can’t break.
Not having a headphone jack is just a slap in the face from a company whose whole image is supposed to be longevity and eco-friendly.
No one has been using aux cable mobile headphones for the past 10 years. Headphone jack is e-waste at this point. bluetooth audio is great and if you really want to be a boomer you can use the usb C headphones.
What the absolute fuck are you talking about? What am I supposed to do with the dozen wired headphones I already have? Some of them decades old? Throw them in the garbage? Sounds real eco-friendly.
It is. We had it on phones since before the original iPhone. No one wants to take that away.
Problem is BT headphones last 2 years then they go in the garbage because the batteries are dead. How eco-friendly is that!?
My 7 years old bluetooth headphone would disagree.
And no one except a vocal minority want to keep it. There are a lot on data on that, and manufacturer make their decision on that data.
But lets ignore that, and let’s take my viewpoint as a customer. I don’t want a port I have no use for. I don’t want a DAC I have no use for. I don’t want the extra weight that comes with them.
My needs conflict with yours, so what’s the only way to make both of us somewhat happy? That’s by making the 3.5mm jack an addon, which is what any manufacturer that does not focus on music listening would do.
I would love to see the data that says everyone wants wired devices only. I don’t believe you.
Why would you even care!?
😆 Buddy if you don’t want extra weight you need to talk to these OEMs about making their phones out of giant slabs of glass. A 1g connector isn’t going to make a difference. You’re being completely ridiculous.
No they don’t. They can meet both of our needs by including a jack. Simple as.
I’m voluntarily exagerating my point here for irony sake.
My needs isn’t more important than anyone else, but I wanted to point out the selfishness of the oposite point of view by making mine as selfish. Those in favor of keeping a jack port voluntarily choose to ignore any alternative, while trying to force their need on other people.
But it is true I do not want that port back. It is redundant, has no advantages over a dongle, and it inconveniences could easily be overcome by simply adding a second usb-c port. No need for internal DAC, you’d be able to do far more than you’ll ever be able to do with a 3.5mm jack, and you’ll be able to charge it while listening to your music with a wired headphone. All that with a smaller and more flexible port.
And it would take you 5min searching the web to get good review about usbc DAC with actually good sound, even better than any internal DAC.
But to save you a click, you have the Apple one, which has good review while being able to drive almost all headphones but the most energy intensive of them. It cost a whopping… $10.
As for the precise number, you can find them on market studies. Unfortunately they are quite pricy, and as I’m not in that field, I do not have access to them. But Fairphone does, and if they don’t bother adding that port back, they are most probably basing their decision on them.
There’s nothing selfish here. Keeping the jack benefits everyone except Apple and other BT headphone OEMs. It doesn’t hurt anyone else.
The advantage is that you don’t need a dongle…
Still requires carrying a dongle or buying a pair of headphones that only works with phones and computers, and not the vast array of other devices that still use headphone jacks, new and old. So that solves absolutely nothing. As I said elsewhere, we’ve created a competing standard, for no reason.
What? Do you think we’re suggesting removing the USB port? What are you talking about?
I don’t want to search the web. I don’t want a DAC. I just want to plug in my headphones. This is absurd.
$10 to buy something that previously cost me $0. Only it’s inevitably going to get lost so you’d better buy a half dozen of them and replace them every few years, so you’re looking at dozens of $ per year for something that was previously completely unnecessary.
Yeah, I didn’t think so.
Where? If you know they have it, then you must have it as well?
No, they’re basing that decision on the same thing everyone else is: money. Greed. Much like Apple they also released their own bluetooth headphones at the same time as they removed their headphone jack. But I suppose that’s just coincidence, right?
Could also have been the other way around.
Fairphone removes the headphone jack > realize they would need an alternative > realize most TW headphones are e-waste to be > make their own with
blackjack and hookersa removable battery, making it a solution to TW headphones with non-removable batteries.Don’t call fool without any proof, or you’ll have a very sad life supposing the worst from anyone you’ll meet. Coincidence is no proof of causation.
Yes if they’ve lasted decades thats their job done. Now people are buying usb C headphones and there is no need to continue to support decades old standards. The ewaste from a pair of headphones is tiny so its not worth fretting over.
Also BT headphones last longer than 2 years. Mine are 1st gen samsung buds and going on 5 years at this point and still hold enough charge to listen to music during my work day. If im going to be using them all day I have 1 in and 1 charging in the case and then I can easily have music for 10+ hours on a 5 year old device. If I threw them away today I would consider them to have not been ewaste.
No it means they’ll essentially last indefinitely, unlike BT buds.
No, what’s happened is that we went from a single open standard for audio jacks to competing standards (actually 3 of them before the EU stepped in and forced Apple to quit their bullshit). And gained nothing in the process.
It’s not a pair of headphones, it’s millions of audio devices.
how else are you supposed to connect it to cars that weren’t made yesterday?
Cars have had bluetooth and usb on their radios for almost 20 years. Even older than that you can replace the stereo for like $30. My car is 2004 and i did a stereo replacement and i’ve got bluetooth, usb C and aux.
I never use wired headphones even though I have a jack in my phone. But I have never bought a phone without a jack and probably never will.
Ipersonally think it’s user hostile to remove the jack and also goes directly agains the green profile Fairphone wants to have.
“Modularity” but still no headphone jack, couldn’t I just have a backplate with a big bump on it to accommodate a 3.5mm jack?
Big? The headphone jack is not large enough to protrude from a cell phone chassis. Any company telling you they can’t fit it is just lying to sell you BT headphones.
What about the internal connectors of the headphone jack?
What about em?
I’m assuming they are removing the headphone jack cause the internal components take up too much space. I can’t imagine these companies removing the jacks cause they cost too much money.
You’re vastly overestimating the space required for a 3.5mm jack, and the reasons for its removal.
The jack takes up some internal space, but not much at all. The components required internally like the DAC chip are insignificant. It is a potential source of water ingress, but that can be mitigated and has been done many times before.
The reason for removal is two fold, first you simply don’t have to deal with any of the above, so from an engineering perspective it’s always easier to not do something. The second, and most important, **is to sell wireless headphones. **
You’ll notice that Fairphone came out with their own earbuds at the same time they removed the headphone jack. You could of course use Bluetooth headphones with the Fairphone 1, 2, and 3, but you weren’t forced to think about it and could just use your existing headphones. Removing the jack ads inconvenience and breaks user habit, causing people to re-evaluate their headphones and consider a new purchase, which the manufacturer just happens to have and likely in a bundle deal.
Apple, Google, and Samsung have seen huge uplift in earbud sales with the removal of the jack. So the anger of some power users is of no consequence to them. Seeing Fairphone follow in this behaviour what’s disappointing.
I made the mistake of believing that Fairphone is an enthusiast company, like the Framework of phones maybe. There is some overlap, sure, with the repair-ability aspect and available parts and schematics, but that’s about it.
Other than that, FP wants to be a mainstream brand, the eco-friendly Samsung or Apple; the power users can get shafted with their audio jacks for all they care. While Framework has actual hardware modularity and release updated HW modules so you don’t buy the whole device again for an upgrade.
Looking at FP’s financial statements, I get the impression they aren’t doing too hot lately, so I get it if they need bigger margins to continue operating. Just don’t be a fucking hypocrite and lie about the reason of the jack removal ffs.
I was just hoping a phone like fairphone would give me the option to buy a small module or something to let me do it.
Yes, yes there’s adapters … yes, yes, you don’t need to use it … I understand. I just want it.
Probably not a popular thing to say on here, but I think you’ve lost the battle for the earphone jack. It probably just requires way too much real estate to be practical on a modern day cell phone.
It absolutely does not require too much space. And you can still buy phones with headphone jacks, just not any of the (ironically) higher end models because OEMs know they can push their first party bluetooth headphones to these customers.