Not justifying the removal of the port, but Apple's Dock [0] has its own standard audio-out port, and I'm sure others out there do as well.

[0] http://www.apple.com/shop/product/MGRM2AM/A/iphone-lightning...

Or you can get a phone with a Jack port.

  > Audio+GPS+Charging in non-Bluetooth Car.

I can do this with iPhone 6 already. And could do with iPhone 5. In a 2013 model year car. There is an USB port in my car, connect lightning cable and thats it: phone is charging, music is playing.

I don't know about you, but to me, 2013 is relatively recent. Plenty of cars don't have that capability.

I do this in my 2006 Nissan with a $100 stereo faceplate.

But then you have to rely on the car's data USB port supplying enough current to charge the phone while the audio + GPS are draining the battery. That's not always a sure bet, depending on the particular car's specs.

But we're not talking about iPhones, then, specifically. We're talking about every phone... Ever.

Other phones have separate ports for power and audio out, so they can charge from the cigarette lighter with more power while still playing audio and GPS through the speakers.

I had one of these many years ago with a dock connector instead of a lightning cable. It just lived in the car.

https://griffintechnology.com/us/collections/itrip/itrip-aux...

Does sending audio through a cable really take that much power that a USB-compliant port won't also charge at the same time? Sounds like a problem with the car, not with the port. Just because it's running over the same cable doesn't mean it's automatically half the bandwidth.

Sending audio is not what consumes the power. The screen is on if you're using it for directions and the radio is constantly going on and to ping GPS and cell towers for location.

But that's not unique to the iPhone 7 or even to the iPhone. Literally any phone is going to need the screen on and ping the towers for GPS. Even if you're playing music over the headphone jack and charging from the USB port, you'll have the same issue. So what's the point?

The point is with the cigarette lighter you can choose an adapter that provides a sufficient amount of power. The cigarette outlet is rated for 5A at 12V which is plenty to amply charge the phone no matter what if you buy a decent adapter.

The current output of the USB port can vary from less than 1A to up to 2.4A at 5V which is not as much power. Some are so low that they're unable to charge the phone while its doing all those things. Since the iPhone 7 uses only one port for both power and audio/data out you're stuck with whatever the car manufacturer happened to provide in the USB port.

Let's face it, providing a robust USB port is not high on the priority list for car manufacturers. They probably have an intern throw that in as an afterthought and the primary purpose for it is transferring data, not power since every other device besides the iPhone has a separate port to provide power and doesn't usually rely on the USB.

I have 2x Dodge Caravans 2005, and a 2000 Miata. Luckly the vans have AUX ports along with the mid-vehicle 6 disk dvd player. No usb, bluetooth, or tape deck.

yeah most cars with USB ports also have Bluetooth, so im not sure youre making a strong argument.

If you currently have a cigarette lighter charger and an aux port, how can you charge your phone and listen to music?

I'm sure someone will make a slitter to enable analog audio + charging. There will probably be an "official" one for $60 and Chinese knockoffs for $5.

$60 buys you entire radio unit that supports iOS USB cables, full control of playback using remote, etc.

Yea, but not from Apple ;)

I wonder how they will do that. Charging gives noise. Analog audio is very susceptible to noise.

There should be some sort of y-cable adapter which allows you to listen to music and charge the phone at the same time? But I am not sure if that is actually tech ically possible.

I've had this setup in my travel kit for years. I use it in every rental car so I can listen to music and charge my phone / use GPS at the same time.

Y-Cable (dock connector to audio & USB): https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B005LUKCX4

Dock to Lightning adapter: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B014854UWG

For a cleaner solution (and if you also need a cigarette lighter to USB adapter), there's this from Griffin, but it's out of stock and unclear whether it's discontinued: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00NCF0LHC

I've never had anything but a terrible experience with Bluetooth, and I'm definitely never using Bluetooth to connect my phone to a rental car, so I imagine I'll be using the above system for a long time to come.

The docks do this since years. You just plug in the lightning and the dock provides lightning out and audio out.

So an adapter is definitly possible.

This is a terrible solution though. To have to buy something new to retain a function that was previously available is just backward.

That'd be like having to use USB floppies. or USB dvd drives. Crazy!

The issue I've run into with the docks is that I have to remove my case to use them.

I just have a bluetooth car device that jacks into the Aux port. It also gives you tactile buttons for bt audio control. With a two-usb port cig. port charger, one powers the bluetooth audio, the other my charger.

Plugging an iPhone 8 into my car was my biggest worry but it looks like some type of BT adapter (that I never knew existed until today) will work just fine for me.

> 3.) No more listening to music/audiobooks as I fall asleep because in the morning the iPhone won't be charged for my desk usage the next day unless I wake up and plug it back in during my sleep.

Can you really sleep with earbuds in? In that use case, I use the device's speaker.

My wife won't let me sleep with the speaker, so I've adapted to have 1 earbud in depending on which side I want to sleep on. It eventually falls out and tomorrow I seek to the last place I remember in the book and repeat ;)

Hmm that sounds quite uncomfortable for what might be a common use case. I wonder if a parametric speaker would help.

ex. http://www.soundlazer.com/what-is-a-parametric-speaker/

Sure can! http://www.sleepphones.com/

I wear these each night and listen to relaxation videos such as ASMR [0]. Many people in that community use these.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autonomous_sensory_meridian_re...

The SleepPhones seems interesting... I hadn't seen them before. Just curious if you use the wired or wireless version?

I'm a big fan of SimplyNoise / SimplyRain, and also have a little one-line bash script colored noise generator that I use these days [0]. ASMR seems like a similar idea.

[0]: https://github.com/tedmiston/zero-noise

I use the wired version. Bought them on Amazon.

I've heard of SimplyNoise. I have used the RainyMood + YouTube webapp in the past. Pretty novel concept.

You can already do #1. I've been using one of these [1] plus an Apple 30-pin dock to lightning converter for years. It's been worth it just because there's only one thing to plug into the phone, and it allows you to route your cables nicely if you want.

[1] https://www.amazon.com/SunbowStar-Universal-Charger-Adapter-...

Yes, I do this too, and it angers me because it proves that this datapath is possible to build. Double-dongle sucks, but it works. I marvel at how backwards apple can be when it wants to be. I wonder if this new headphone dongle they announced can be hacked to do charging.

It angers you? Apple has both options available - the adapter or a dock - and tons of 3rd party solutions are available, so you're angry?

My car doesn't have aux, so I've been achieving it with a Bluetooth FM transmitter. It's not ideal with occasional FM interference when traveling, but it's also ≤ $50 vs replacing the head unit, etc. And it works in every car.

Head unit is $20 these days http://www.ebay.com/itm/Bluetooth-Car-In-Dash-FM-Radio-Stere...

> No more listening to music/audiobooks as I fall asleep because in the morning the iPhone won't be charged for my desk usage the next day unless I wake up and plug it back in during my sleep.

Well you could get a standalone charger and a spare battery-- oh wait, no, they got rid of that too.

The LG V20 can't come soon enough. It boggles my mind the amount of people willing to put up with a non-expandable non-replaceable battery.

I wonder why they didn't just have two ports...

The simple solution for that would be a special charger with a Y-cable so one can plug the headphones in there when the device is charging. No extra adapters that can be lost. Just include a charger with a y-cable thingie in the iPhone package and they would be done. You buy the phone, you get the new headset with the new connector including a charger that allows to still plug in the headset. If that will not be the case I don't know why Apple cannot think of such a simple solution.

you sleep with headphones? Not trying to be a dick here... I would like to do the same, but I'd fall asleep with headphones and roll over or something and send my phone flying.

Yes, I have the lightning cable come up in the middle of the bed and place the phone between my wife and I's pillows. I then route the headphone wire around my pillow and up the top so that when I fall asleep and it falls out it will be pulled back behind the pillow and I won't sleep on it. If I roll over i switch ears (only 1 ear in).

She requires complete silence to go to sleep ;)

Ha, that wouldn't fly with my wife. I occasionally get in trouble for reading silently in bed because I apparently breathe differently while focusing on something.

We both wear earplugs (and have CPAPs). We end up shouting a lot at bedtime.

My solution to similar problem: I just work or browse at night (made possible by f.lux) for an hour while wife goes to sleep; I am tired and don't browse in bed anymore (using melatonin as needed). We sleep with lights out. Kids can complicate this scenario :)

> iPhone won't be charged for my desk usage

Your desk probably has a power outlet located nearby in case you are willing to change your routine.

The solution to Apple design flaws, is not too carry a charger with your at all times.

I'm sure the Apple iCar will support simultaneous audio and charging via the lightning interface.

Only on Apple-built iRoads as long as you are connected to iCloud.

Apple could justify 1 by using CarPlay

1.) Audio+GPS+Charging in non-Bluetooth Car.

Is your car older than 3 years? If not, what prevents you from listening to audio via USB?

Yes, lots of cars don't have Bluetooth or USB. A quick Google search shows the average age of cars on American roads has reached 11.5 years.

My personal car is 14 years old and runs fine, but I need to use the aux input on the radio to listen to my phone.

In addition to the question of cars which don't have it, software quality a huge problem and cars don't get software updates.

I've rented a fair number of cars while traveling in the last year and hit a number of problems:

* Everything Ford makes has a bug where the car's computer will lock for a minute or two and either crash / decide the phone doesn't exist or display a blocking modal dialog telling you that you have too many tracks on your phone if you connect it using USB. I have ~11K tracks (iTunes Match) and that's apparently more than they tested with. Toyota had a similar failure with USB.

* Bluetooth is more miss than hit: pairing is usually buried in the UI, slow, and reconnects are unreliable so you might have to try a couple of times before anything connects.

* None of the cars have a UI designed for more than a handful of tracks so while you can get something to play eventually, the experience is terrible.

* Not everyone supplies enough power to charge over USB or does so inconsistently, so you may arrive with 10% battery if you used the GPS.

100% of vehicles with AUX in lines work perfectly every time without any fussing. I want something like Bluetooth to work but there's this massive market failure where almost nobody seems to have a QA team or a support process where updates actually happen (BMW suggested that a friend buy a newer car to fix their bugs). I'll give Subaru an honorable mention for having reliable software but they desperately need to hire some UX specialists.

>* Everything Ford makes has a bug where the car's computer will lock for a minute or two and either crash / decide the phone doesn't exist or display a blocking modal dialog telling you that you have too many tracks on your phone if you connect it using USB. I have ~11K tracks (iTunes Match) and that's apparently more than they tested with. Toyota had a similar failure with USB. >* Bluetooth is more miss than hit: pairing is usually buried in the UI, slow, and reconnects are unreliable so you might have to try a couple of times before anything connects.

Bluetooth pairing seems to work just fine on my family's Ford Fiesta 2016 (using the simpler version of Ford Audio). Once done for the first time, it only takes a few seconds after I turn the key and they're working together. Occasionally sound cuts off for a sec or two if I have the phone in my pocket but I blame it on my ole' Galaxy S3 and CyanogenMod drivers.

Have you tried it with USB? That's what I had all of the failures with but I've heard that was a problem with the older Microsoft stack they reportedly weren't happy with. The cars I rented were either 2014 or 2015 model years.

I have not tried it, but honestly, I wouldn't want to. Creating a playlist would be extremely tedious navigating through dozens of albums with such an interface.

I only just got a car that has an AUX jack. Cars are expensive. I pay mine off and keep it for 10 or more years.

The funny thing is that updating the radio on a 20-year old car is cheap, but updating the radio on a 10-year-old can be prohibitely expensive, given the audio systems have been increasinly integrated.

And thankfully before aux jacks there were tape decks.

My car is a 2014 model and has neither bluetooth nor USB.

Out of curiosity, what car is it?

1. Most cars are Bluetooth enabled, and many old ones have aftermarket systems that are. 2. Most people listen to music at their desk with their computers 3. That does seem a bit of an issue, but part of the point of the AirPods

I just ad the Bluetooth convo with a friend and there seems to be this assumption that "most cars that people buy have bluetooth" but it just doesn't stand up very well when you look at what cars offer bluetooth in their base trim.

http://cars.axlegeeks.com/d/f/Bluetooth

yes, there are 11 pages but if you click on say Dodge and filter by 2016 you'll find only 3 high end vehicles with base trim on bluetooth. This means people actually need to choose Bluetooth which sounds crazy to us why they wouldn't but most people have no idea.

Hey cool, I've been looking at a few options for this but haven't seen this one yet. Have you used it?

My computer belongs to my employer, my iPhone/iPod/whatever belongs to me. I think my employer would be a little pissed if I filled the 256GB SSD with nothing but my music.

I'm continually underwhelmed with the reliability of the bluetooth in my car and others I've used recently. Annoying pairing process, random disconnects, arbitrary limits on the number of paired devices...I usually just use an aux cable.

I actually completely agree with this, it has been a pain in the ass from my experience as well. The after market stereos are almost always better though.

1) Buying another accessory for my car isn't the solution. What if I drive a rented car?

2) Most people store their music on their phones though.

I just recently bought this: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B019RVZ138/ref=oh_aui_deta...

It was on sale, so it was cheaper than what you see there.

I have pretty good experiences with it so far. It would also solve your rental car problem!

Thanks for that! I was hoping something like this existed so I could do the car audio aux + gps + charging.

Is there an opposite version of that, like one I could attach to my headphones and play through an iPhone?

EDIT: found it - https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01HQ0UVTG?psc=1

Well, the one I have does that. The silver thing you see in the image can be removed as it's just an adapter. Then you have the normal aux connection.

>> 2.) Listening to music at desk and still have enough charge for the Audio+GPS for the drive home.

If you're at a desk you probably have a computer. Why not listen on that? Most people are using streaming services so it's only a matter of logging into Spotify's website or iTunes and you have access to all your music.

>> 3.) No more listening to music/audiobooks as I fall asleep because in the morning the iPhone won't be charged for my desk usage the next day unless I wake up and plug it back in during my sleep.

I fall asleep to podcasts every night - I have never, ever had my phone plugged into a charger whilst doing that. The main reason is safety (I'm just not comfortably with a charging battery next to my head while I sleep). But the other reason is that it's totally unnecessary thanks to the sleep feature built in to the iPhone (in the clock app). I've go to bed with about 60% battery, wake up with around 40% and then connect it to my laptop when I get to work.

> you probably have a computer. Why not listen on that?

Is this supposed to convince me to buy the device?

Exactly - at the price point of the iPhone, it's a bit ridiculous to ask the user to make compromises as if it's an entry-level device.

Not all of us can access streaming services from work or install iTunes. I can technically access streaming services, but seems the corporate proxy server makes it impossible to use them effectively.

So as long as your work computer is fairly open, you're good to go. What about the other 90% of people?