Apple Puts Authentication Chip In Lightning Cable Ensures No Cheap Third-Party Option

[Suspicious-Teach8788]

Eh? No you don't. The whole point is that you don't get concentrated stress there.

Ok so having a thicker cabling is not a strain relief then I suppose. But not every microUSB cable has strain reliefs.

 

[WelshBloke]

Ok so having a thicker cabling is not a strain relief then I suppose. But not every microUSB cable has strain reliefs.

Having an abrupt change between a thick inflexible part and a thin flexible part would be a likely point of failure.

I'd be very surprised if every microUSB cable has decent strain relief given the wide variety of makes and prices.

 

[Howard]

And BTW, microUSB durability sucks compared to the Lightning connector. How much will it cost to fix your busted microUSB plug on your 600$ phone?

sig'd.

 

[jpeyton]

I'd be very surprised if every microUSB cable has decent strain relief given the wide variety of makes and prices.

That would be very unsurprising, actually.

MicroUSB cables are pedestrian, commonplace, and inexpensive. The engineers who designed them stuck to everyday standards; they weren't persuaded by industrial designers to remove durable strain relief in order to appease some company design standard.

Here are pictures of the 5 cheapest microUSB cables I could find on eBay, each 99 cents shipped:

There's basically an industry standard level for strain relief, and then there's what Apple's industrial designers think looks better.

 

[zCypher]

I've never had a problem with a microUSB cable, ever. I don't know anyone that has either. I'm clumsy as fuck too. If you're damaging the cable, you're doing it wrong. I have to say not needing to care about orientation is nice, but not nice enough for me to pay so much for a special cable. MicroUSB is pretty much standard now, and I'm happy for that.

 

[Zaap]

Samsung's cables that ship with the SGS3 have Apple-esque crappy strain relief also.

I firmly believe all of this revolves around user-error more than the cables themselves. I never wear out cables, of any type. All my iDevice cables, earbuds, etc of all vintage are pretty much in pristine working order, as are all my microUSB cables. I'm not even particularly careful with them, I don't even really consciously think about using them.

My wife on the other hand can wear out any type of cable in record time. I've never really observed what exactly she does that's so hard on cables, but she has several iDevice cables that look exactly like the worst examples in this thread. (Weirdly, all of them still work even frayed like that). A pair of mini headphones will last her at most about a year- beyond that and it's a knotted tangled mess, frayed connector, with a short in at least one channel.

Annnnyway...
It's funny how I was hoping Apple would put more thought into the connector this time around. Seems like they did- in completely the opposite direction I was hoping for. (Making it harder to maintain third-party support rather than easier, and moving toward more-proprietary/costly for the user vs. less.)

 

[Mopetar]

Samsung's cables that ship with the SGS3 have Apple-esque crappy strain relief also.

Either Samsung makes the cables for both companies, or that's just plain funny.

 

[Suspicious-Teach8788]

Having an abrupt change between a thick inflexible part and a thin flexible part would be a likely point of failure.

I'd be very surprised if every microUSB cable has decent strain relief given the wide variety of makes and prices.

Right, so if you incorporated a strain relief, and you had too thin of a cable, then you can have failure.

The fact is the Apple cable is very flexible. Incorporating a strain relief won't help much because the cable itself is very flexible while the strain relief itself isn't. The disparity will likely put enough stress concentrated there to still fail.

All those pictures of microUSB cables that jpeyton posted show THICK cabling. It's funny because my Nexus S and SGS2 came with the thinnest cabling yet. I have yet to destroy an iDevice 30 pin connector (I have 3, and 1 is carried in my backpack), but I did manage to cause a tear in my MacBook Pro connector. I've also destroyed 2 Dell chargers. It's all due to stress concentration. MacBook Pro connector was heavily abused and I just toss it in my backpack all the time. But i can see as it sits coiled up, it WILL fray. And yes they have strain reliefs on the MacBook Pro connectors too.

I think the trick is to have cable with lower flexibility. Funny enough I should be a cables expert soon as I'm now in charge of qualifying a large number of electrical cables at work, and one thing we ARE looking at is flexibility.

 

[Dari]

lol@people who think I'm I'm Japanese. I'm not.

 

[Howard]

Right, so if you incorporated a strain relief, and you had too thin of a cable, then you can have failure.

The fact is the Apple cable is very flexible. Incorporating a strain relief won't help much because the cable itself is very flexible while the strain relief itself isn't. The disparity will likely put enough stress concentrated there to still fail.

I think you do not know what a strain relief is for.

 

[WelshBloke]

Samsung's cables that ship with the SGS3 have Apple-esque crappy strain relief also.

...

The USB lead that came with my SGS3 looks nothing like that. (model number: apcbu10bbe)

Right, so if you incorporated a strain relief, and you had too thin of a cable, then you can have failure.

The fact is the Apple cable is very flexible. Incorporating a strain relief won't help much because the cable itself is very flexible while the strain relief itself isn't. The disparity will likely put enough stress concentrated there to still fail.

...

I still dont think your quite getting it.

The idea is to spread the strain over a greater area so that there is no point of stress. It doesn't matter how flexible the cable is because at some point its got to join a part thats rigid (the connector). The idea is to make this transition from rigid to flexible as gradual as you can. The strain relief starts out quite rigid (at the connector end) and gradually becomes more flexible as it moves towards the cable.

 

[deathBOB]

This is probably the lamest battle of the Internet Phone War.

 

[shortylickens]

This is probably the lamest battle of the Internet Phone War.

You crawled out of hiding just to say that?

 

[zsdersw]

Did you not read the quote he was responding to?

Also it's funny to see all these people raging who will never buy an iPhone in the first place. Yusomad?

Also since I actually have both a lightning connector and a mUSB in front of me, it's obvious which connector is more robust and easier to use. The mUSB cable at my work(i bought for my One X) is already broken and the one that came with my One X wiggles when I plug it in since day 1. In contrast to mUSb when you plug in the lightning connector it actually feels like it gets plugged in, there's like a click to it and it stays in place unlike the mUSB. As for how well it will work over time I don't know since I have had it for less than a week but I can safely say it will outlive my mUSB cables.

I'd say you're doing it wrong. Never had any mUSB cable (or port) break or become unusable... and I've had mUSB everything, from various phones to Mimio interactive whiteboards (at work) to external hard drives.

 

[Oyeve]

You crawled out of hiding just to say that?

Haha! :biggrin:

 

[deathBOB]

You crawled out of hiding just to say that?

I only reply to extremely stupid posts.

 

[Jodell88]

I only reply to extremely stupid posts.

:biggrin::thumbsup:

 

[mosco]

So has anyone proven that these are auth chips? So far no one has. So far the only evidence points to the ship being used to make the connector reversible.

There are already cables and adapters showing up on ebay.

 

[WelshBloke]

This is probably the lamest battle of the Internet Phone War.

Lol! :thumbup:

But not everything here is a battle, sometimes we just like yakking about stuff that doesn't really matter.

 

[dagamer34]

I actually wish Apple just sold the micoUSB to 30-pin Dock Connector and microUSB to Lightning Connector here in the United States, that way I'd only need to carry around one cable, and the adapter is small enough to carry around everywhere in my pocket. Sigh.

 

[Headcase_Fargone]

I actually wish Apple just sold the micoUSB to 30-pin Dock Connector and microUSB to Lightning Connector here in the United States, that way I'd only need to carry around one cable, and the adapter is small enough to carry around everywhere in my pocket. Sigh.

I can't believe people think it's acceptable to have to carry an adapter around in their pocket 24/7. That just seems so... capitulant.

 

[Red Storm]

I can't believe people think it's acceptable to have to carry an adapter around in their pocket 24/7. That just seems so... capitulant.

Yeah, I would never do that. It defeats the purpose of having one device for everything.

 

[cheezy321]

I can't believe people think it's acceptable to have to carry an adapter around in their pocket 24/7. That just seems so... capitulant.

I lump them in the same category of people who think its acceptable to carry around an extra battery. I could never imagine myself doing that in any situation.

 

[WelshBloke]

I lump them in the same category of people who think its acceptable to carry around an extra battery. I could never imagine myself doing that in any situation.

You could never see yourself carrying round an adapter?

Lots of brand new apple accessories for you then.

 

[NaOH]

Actually I read that its not an authentication chip but rather a chip that lets you plug in the cable in any direction. It just reverses the pin outs. This in itself acts like it blocks cheap ripoffs because its not a simple cable anymore. I'm sure vendors will be able to produce legitimate ones.