Nokia Design Guru Urges Apple To End Cable Chaos 791
An anonymous reader writes "Nokia's former head designer has called on Apple to work with the broader technology industry and end its policy of having proprietary connectors for its device chargers and accessories. Other experts say Apple cannot continue to go it alone with Lightning Connectors and ignore Micro USB."
What's their problem? (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:European regulations (Score:0, Interesting)
You can get a Lightning to Micro USB adapter, pretty much everywhere you get an iPad.
The Lightning connector, for all its many proprietary ills, is so ridiculously better designed for actual usability compared to the nightmare that is Micro USB that it isn't even funny.
Re:Slashdot sinking to new lows (Score:3, Interesting)
Now we have people complaining of cable orientation and defending and defending closed proprietary products...
It's called maturity, something the /. crowd has a lot more of since the site's inception. Sometimes good proprietary stuff is better, sometimes small things like cable orientation matter. Sure beats the "if it's not open-source / Linux / GNU it's automatically crap" attitude of yore around here.
Re:I'm left to wonder, why not? (Score:5, Interesting)
Unlike the Dock which contained a whole load of dedicated video and audio connectors, the Lightning connector's just an 8-pin connector that gets its video and docking capability from sending a digital stream that's interpreted further down the line. There's no a lot that Lightning can do that microUSB can't do by a similar system such as MHL.
Re:Oh, I totally agree... (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Oh, I totally agree... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Oh, I totally agree... (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Oh, I totally agree... (Score:2, Interesting)
It doesn't appear owners are very happy with them... http://store.apple.com/us/product/MD818ZM/A/lightning-to-usb-cable?fnode=3a [apple.com]
Also, Apple discussion forums are pretty scathing but happy people don't post there.
You'll find similar ratings on a majority of their other adaptors and cables, stuff made for a pittance and sold for $25+. Check out the fail that is Mini-Display Port (-> VGA or HDMI) for example.
On the upside, they do try new things and bring ideas to market. I've thanked Apple numerous times for the Mag-Safe power connector which they definitely popularized. (Whoever said the iMac popularized USB is wrong.)
Also, I thought I blew a MacBook Pro a year or 2 back when I plugged in a Chinese knock-off adaptor. The PSU brick popped right away and the notebook instantly powered down. It turned out to be OK but that's an experiment you don't retry so after that I always buy the less crappy, safe and warrantied chargers from Apple. A chip in the cable may have come in handy there, otherwise it does seem like a money grab.
Re:Oh, I totally agree... (Score:0, Interesting)
The high quality of video output over it compared with no video over Micro USB suggests that it is universally "better".
Fixed that for you.
Comment removed (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Yep (Score:4, Interesting)
Hanging devices by connectors? Sounds like a terrible storage solution.
So just to be clear, you complained that the cables have poor retention, which is bullshit, but you don't actually care if the cables have poor retention, you just wanted something to complain about so you made something up? Got it.