The AudioFile: Jacking Off the iPhone
- June 29th, 2007
- 15 Comments
The iPhone drops today. If you didn’t know, you’re probably dead and aren’t reading this anyway. If you did know, hopefully you’ve been reading our roundup of early reviews. One thing in particular has caught my eye but has been the subject of very little gratuitous blathering speculation: the iPhone’s headphone jack.
Think you’re going to use the iPhone as an iPod with your fancy aftermarket headphones? Think different(ly). But is this a missed moneymaking opportunity for Apple, or a sign of hidden secret just beyond the horizon?
The iPhone is first and foremost a phone. I don’t care what else it can do. But it is also an iPod, and as such, it should be satisfying to listen to even if it doesn’t replace your regular ol’ iPod. In fact, it supports the ultra-high-quality Apple Lossless audio format, so it’s more than likely someone will want to plug in a set of $450 earbuds from Ultimate Ears or Shure to hear all that sparkly musical goodness.
But they can’t. For some reason, Apple decided to set the headphone jack so deeply into the iPhone’s body that many high-end headphones won’t fit in the jack even though it’s a standard eighth-inch plug.
A red flag went up in my mind, and I immediately thought this was going to be some licensing scheme along the lines of the Made for iPod program, whereby Apple would sell companies licenses to make headphone adapters or headphones with iPhone-compatible plugs. But a conversation with Mindy Harvey, head honcho-ess of earphone maker Ultimate Ears, revealed that there’s no licensing fee involved at all in making either accessory.
So let’s recap: The headphone jack is recessed, requiring an adapter or a straight plug with a small enclosure. But Apple isn’t making any extra money off this design. So I must ask, in all seriousness: WTF?
I put in a call to Apple’s PR team asking why the company might have designed the iPhone with such an inconvenient headphone jack, figuring I’d get no response as the team prepared for the product’s launch. So imagine my surprise when Apple PR rep Simon Pope returned my call yesterday to talk about it! Granted, he’s not actually on the iPhone team–he works primarily on iTunes.
Of course, he said that he couldn’t really say much about it until after the official product launch, and that he’s not even aware of the reasoning behind that particular aspect of the Jesus-phone. But he did say two extremely tantalizing things: First, he said “Apple does not make designs like this lightly.” In other words, there’s a method to the madness. Second, he said that next week, he’d be able to clue me in to what’s up Apple’s deeply recessed sleeve.
Sure, adapters are beginning to pop up from the usual suspects like Belkin, and companies are working furiously on iPhone-specific headphone models. But what could possibly be the purpose behind a headphone jack design that merely seems to defeat the purpose of having a standard eighth-inch jack?
Besides, have you seen the Belkin adapter? Do you really want something like that hanging off your sexy iPhone? At least is more practical (includes a mic) and a lot better looking…
For the life of me, I just can’t see why Apple would risk making the iPhone even just a little bit inconvenient–or at least without making money off that inconvenience via licensing fees. Stay tuned for an update as I hear more from Apple!
And of course, if you have any ideas about why the iPhone’s jack seems a bit off (sorry, couldn’t resist), please let us know in the Comments section below.
Paul G (Who am I?)
1 year ago
After reading your article, it seems pretty obvious that this new jack will support a microphone possibly remote control function. After all, it is a phone. The jack is recessed because apple doesn’t want you sticking anything unapproved devices in there.
But who really cares anyway - this is not the second coming of Jesus - it is a phone. As long as I have two pockets, one for my current cell phone and one for my current ipod, I don’t need a this. :)
Music Fan
1 year ago
Very good Question, and very good post, thanks.
I’ll be well interested to see how this pans out.
Keep up the good work!
Reply
Mike Kobrin (Who am I?)
1 year ago
Paul G —
The entire point is that Apple doesn’t need to approve it. So “because apple doesn’t want you sticking anything unapproved devices in there.” is definitely NOT the answer.
Paul (Who am I?)
1 year ago
Mike,
Maybe I’m missing something, but Apple doesn’t need to support anyone’s fancy headphones or any existing standards - though it would make sense that they did in this case. To date the majority of other music phones also don’t support standard 1/8″ jacks either.
Perhaps this new jack is needed for a series of unannounced, complicated devices that are not possible with the normal jack.
I’m sure there is nothing monopolistic in nature here (think Sony). We’ll all find out soon as we can seem to escape the iPhone propaganda machine.
BTW, you guys should post a picture of this so we can all see.
Aaron
1 year ago
Maybe we’re not supposed to use the jack at all… Apple said something before about a new bluetooth headset, could we be seeing wireless headphones?!
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Mike Kobrin (Who am I?)
1 year ago
Paul —
The jack itself is indeed a 1/8th inch jack. It’s just recessed quite deep, which to my mind seems like more of a design oversight than anything else. There’s really no way it could benefit a future accessory electronically, either, since it’s just plastic that’s in the way. Who knows? We’ll find out though.
Aaron –
The iPhone supports Bluetooth, and there are already kajillions of Bluetooth headphones out there that are compatible. So that ain’t it either.
Hmm…
Matt (Who am I?)
1 year ago
Possibly so that the iPod-style straight plug will also be more recessed into the iPhone? That way it wouldn’t fall out as easily?
Remo (Who am I?)
1 year ago
Everyone knows that Apple wants to control how you use the device. They want you to buy only Apple branded gear. “This” device only works with “this” and hey it’s Apple! They want to make it easy for all humans, so they give you one choice… Apple!
*I’m a geek, so I like total control over my devices and happily never purchased even one thing from Apple.
brian (Who am I?)
1 year ago
unlike a standard stereo-minijack-plug which has 2 rings around its shaft (mono headphones only have one ring), the iPhone headset/phones have 3 rings… what does the 3rd ring enable, and could this be the cause of/reason for this strange design choice?
scc
1 year ago
The rings on the plug are R and L audio out and mic in. The plug is not proprietary. V-moda is making the Vibe Duo for the iPhone using a compatible jack. Apple is not licensing the plug. The recessed jack is intentional as it reduced the possibility of the plug being sheared off.
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Phil Kulak
1 year ago
Eh, I think it’s just to brace the plug more so that yanking on it from the side doesn’t damage the phone.
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ActiveFan
1 year ago
The design idea is obvious if you step back and think about it. What did they design? Extra space on top of the headphone hack. Why would they want extra space on top of the jack? To allow space for something on top of the jack.
A transmitter for wireless headphones. This thing will slide right into the jack and the result with be a beautiful flush adapter to transmit to your wireless earbuds. This is how Apple thinks different.
Geez, the other companies in the world (like Belkin) just think like: Hey it don’t fit, lets stick an adapter in there that sticks out and looks like crap so people can use our headphones. unbelievable.
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Mike (Who am I?)
1 year ago
I found a very simple fix that cost nothing and looks factory. I simply took a sharp Exacto knife and carefully removed about 1/8″ of the rubber near the end of my headphone plug. If you lay the plug on the counter and lay the knife perpendicular (and back about 1/8″) and just roll the plug back and forth you’ll make a very clean cut. Then just pull off the extra rubber piece and it will fit perfectly (at least mine did with my Nike Vaport headphones)
Steve
1 year ago
Great idea with the exacto knife. A very simple fix indeed, however, does anyone want to do this to their $300 earbuds? I’m going to wait for the Shure adapter. Looked pretty good from the pictures. I’m not sure if it has a built in mike so that you can talk on the phone with it. That would be cool if it did. Too bad I have to wait until August!!!
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Henry (Who am I?)
1 year ago
I believe Phil is correct. Haven’t you guys realized the inherent mechanical weakness of the eighth inch plug standard. They break all of the time due to cyclic side loading. Everyone complaining about design oversight is really illustrating their lack of experience in any sort of mechanical design. Kudos to Apple for addressing this common failure mode.