hodar

Other than "ALLEGED" size, there is no reason to get rid of the 3.5mm jack.  All headphones, all speakers are analog devices.  They are simple motor windings that move a diaphragm either up or down; depending upon current flow and the displacement is based upon the amount of the current.  If Apple went digital, all they would be doing is moving the D/A converter from the phone, to the speaker - simply moving the conversion a matter of a foot or two would do ZERO to the fidelity of the music.  I would say that the fidelity of the music would be more affected by the overall quality of the D/A converter, and the quality of the Power Supply that would power the D/A converter.

Odds are that the Quality of the D/A converter in a vast majority of headphones, would be inferior to the quality of the D/A converter and power supply found in your common cell phone.  Why?  Well, for starters your cell phone has a pretty nice microprocessor and a pretty robust battery.  There is a huge quality in your cell phone, and the price drop found in mass production cannot be discounted - when compared to the individual costs that would be passed on to the consumer among the multitudes of headphone suppliers - who will all use their own brand of D/A converters and other cost savings in power supplies - in order to maximize profits.  The odds are that unless you spend an inordinate amount of money, you will be worse off with a USB-C headphone, than you are with a decent quality 3.5mm headphone.

wizard69 said:

eightzero said:

Privacy, meh. What do these people have to hide?

fMRI is a thing.

This issue has little to do with privacy and everything to do with the erosion of freedoms outlined in the Bill of Rights. One of those freedoms is the idea that you can't be a witness against yourself. Seriously download a copy to the Constitution and the Bill of Rghts and read it. If you don't understand it get somebody to explain it to you. It is extremely sad people don't give a damn about this country and the significant erosion of our freedoms in the last ten or so years.

I believe you misunderstand the term "forced to testify against yourself" or "self-indightment".  If you are an illegal bookkeeper for the mob, I may not force you to divulge your knowledge of the accounts, the embezzlements, the payoffs, nor the money made by prostitution and drugs.  I may not coerce your wife to testify against you.  However, if I use a search warrant and discover your "second" set of books where you kept track of such things, those are admissible.  That's all we are doing, instead of cracking a safe under a search warrant, we are using your fingerprints with the Search Warrant.  Your fingerprints are not private, you leave them on everything you touch.  Instead of a combination safe, you simply store the media under a different method.

SpamSandwich said:

wizard69 said:

This is one of the reasons I support the NRA and other organizations trying to protect the Bill of Rights. If we loose the right to bear arms the rest of the Bill of Rights will be trashed rather quickly. This administration has been rather active in attacking the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, so this isn't some pipe dream. Unfortunately there doesn't seem to be a political party right now willing to stand up for our freedoms. While it doesn't do much good each and everyone of us must make a point to impress on our elected represetives just how important the Constitution is. Many don't give a damn but there are a few elected officials that still represent their constituents.

FYI, the GOA does a better job representing the rights and interests of citizens than the NRA.

Without guns, the GOA is just whining and paper.  Like it or not, it's threat of violence that keeps both predators, and dictators in line.  If you look at history, the first thing every dictator did before the real bloodshed began, was disarm the population.  May I offer Dictators Adolf Hilter, Mao Tze Tung, Josef Stalin, Pol Pot, Idi Amin as just a few examples.

cnocbui said:

Smoke and mirrors.  Moving the the D/A and amplification circuitry a couple centimeters physically will not lead to any sonic improvement or greater utility, it will just drive up costs for consumers and line Intel's pocket.  It's completely pointless from a consumers perspective.

Absolutely. Speakers are analog motors. That's all they essentially are. Current goes one direction, drive moves up, reverse the current flow and driver moves down. Pure analog. All you are doing is moving the D/A converter upstream a few feet. At the end of the day, the quality of the D/A converter and the quality of the difference.