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Bring Back the Headphone Jack: Why USB-C Audio Still Doesn't Work

posted by Fnord666 on Wednesday September 12 2018, @04:41AM   Printer-friendly
from the they-can't-hear-you dept.

canopic jug writes:

PC World has an article on why USB-C has not been a viable alternative for the 3.5mm audio jack. Problems with USB-C include variable handling of digital to audio conversion, incompatible SOCs inside the cable, and non-standard analog-passthrough. In short, the cables which contain computers themselves are not standardized in behavior and the author's conclusion is that mobile devices must have 3.5mm jacks until the USB-C cable technology gets sorted out enough that they become usable.

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  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by Subsentient on Wednesday September 12 2018, @06:58AM (2 children)

    by Subsentient (1111) on Wednesday September 12 2018, @06:58AM (#733515) Homepage Journal

    Agreed, analog audio works just fine. In the end, all speakers are analog at the end where you solder the two wires to the speaker connectors, so why bother with a digital interface? You're just degrading the audio quality by digitizing it into a compressed format and then converting it back to analog...

    Oh, I know the answer why they're doing this. Money.
    That's literally it. It has no advantages, and they know it.

    --
    "It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society." -Jiddu Krishnamurti
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  • (Score: 2) by Mykl on Thursday September 13 2018, @05:16AM (1 child)

    by Mykl (1112) on Thursday September 13 2018, @05:16AM (#734028)

    To be fair, you'll always be dealing with a digital signal coming out of your phone. Whether you convert to analog before the 3.5mm jack or within your headphones is a bit moot.

    That said, I much prefer having a headphone jack, as there are far fewer things that can go wrong with the headphones themselves.

    • (Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Thursday September 13 2018, @10:55AM

      by The Mighty Buzzard (18) Subscriber Badge <themightybuzzard@proton.me> on Thursday September 13 2018, @10:55AM (#734133) Homepage Journal

      Plus, universality of the connector means you could totally connect your phone's audio output up to anything that takes sound input made in the past fifty years and it will bloody well work.

      --
      My rights don't end where your fear begins.