... except Lightning is the production version of an early rejected Type C prototype. It was rejected because external facing pins are a common and well known fault point in connector designs.

Those external pins on Lightning plug tabs are the most common failure point of their cables.

Do you have a source for this? Curious to read more about it.

It's funny that you mention Bluetooth LE for mice. Audio has been stuck on classic Bluetooth due to bandwidth requirements. But that's fixed with Bluetooth 5, which gives us audio over BLE. There are a bunch of functional improvements other than low power radio. Lower latency and better pairing for instance. I think BT 5.0 headphones will be a huge improvement.

Given the timing of the release of AirPods and the development of the BT5.0 spec, I've had a theory that Apple borrowed features from BT5.0 in the case where you use AirPods with Apple products.

except ble - I think is a different and simpler protocol

Doesn't fit the "Apple is a walled garden" narrative though :p

I worked as a "technical expert" at apple during school (recently), and I can say this is not exactly true. The biggest problems with airpods were invariably customers trying to use them with non-Apple devices. As far as I understand, airpods are unable to update their own firmware without being paired to an Apple device. Pairing was also much, much more difficult with airpods than standard bluetooth headsets.

I don't know. It has a nice ecosystem around it. Everyone has a bunch of lightning cables everywhere now. Just like the 30-pin it's not perfect, but is so widely used there's one almost everywhere you need.

Why is the 30-pin connector better than a well-made micro USB connector? As a consumer, I can think of a number of advantages going with the standard USB port.

Even though the connector is much wider I found it way more reliable and easier to plug in without looking at the bottom of the device. It also seems way sturdier when jamming your player into a speaker dock. You mention "well-made" cables. Micro USB is now 14 years old and I don't know of a reliable brand (maybe Anker?). I still constantly throw out cables not knowing if they're broken, not rated for use, or what.

I love standards. I don't know why it took decades to come up with a reversible connector. I've been waiting for USB-C to take off for awhile. Sadly, cable compatibility seems to be a mess (between power, speed, thunderbolt compatibility, etc).

I often had problems with USB C in my previous phone on the phone side.

Apple cables fray almost immediately.

I know of no specific reason why this should be more common with micro-USB than with other connectors, but I've only seen it happen with micro-USB in person.

The real problem is we don't bolt the ports to the chassis in most cases, we just put them on the PCB with little bracing them in the direction of applied force.

See page 40: https://www.usb.org/sites/default/files/CabConn20.pdf

Then I realized that the three volts that were supplied from a pair of AA batteries was really more of a suggestion. That summer, lots of gadgets I had became "USB powered"

Apple's 30-pin connector was released in 2003. And was undoubtedly in development for at least a year or two before that. It served Apple for nine years until 2012. It carried audio, video, FireWire, USB, and also charged connected devices.

In the span of those nine years, USB:

- didn't have a batter charging specification until 2007

- didn't have a power delivery specification until 2012

- deprecated mini-A and mini-B in 2007

- introduced a new connector in 2007

USB has always been a mess. Apple's connectors are the stability that people should strive for, not deride.

USB-C seems more robust but it may have other issues I haven't discovered yet.

As you have proven, it is usually possible to get those parts back out of the port, which is hopefully undamaged, even though the tip of the cable broke off inside.

Yikes! Oh well at least they are protected from power surges...

It also requires a larger port than Lightning, so you can see why Apple would be okay with adding it to iPads, but not to iPhones.

If Apple can fix their supply of USB-C ports so they uniformly, consistently last for more than just 6-12 months instead of some do and some don’t, I’d be onboard for switching. As it is, it is frustratingly common for Apple Lightning plugs to wear out the fingers and Apple USB-C ports to lose their “click” (even when just standing in a laptop cradle on a desk and otherwise covered with a port plug when carried around).

This is a feature. If the metal inside the port wore out instead repairs would be a lot more expensive.

I’ve also only experienced lightning plug wear with cheap Amazon Basics or gas-station cables. The Apple lightning cables have much better made plugs, but they have a different flaw: the super-thin outer cover detaches from the connector housing over time, exposing the shielding wire.

I haven't seen or heard of an issue with USB-C ports. My beefs are that there isn't enough, you can't get more with a hub, and generic power supplies and cables have only been available in the past couple years. The older devices I had with USB-C I got rid of when they fixed the keyboard. I definitely had them longer then 6-12 months.

I have only experienced this with 3rd party cables, but never ones made by Apple.

Even Lightning cables from "alright" brands like Amazon Basics have lots of issues, whereas the only microUSB cables I've had issues with are the really bargain basement stuff that comes bundled with aliexpress junk. It seems the required tolerances for Lightning are way higher (=more expensive).

I don't have enough experience with cheap USB-C cables to make generalizations there though.

Rarely do I use a Lightning cable anymore. I bought an Apple Watch and there's nothing but an option to wirelessly charge it. Before that I would have been skeptical about the idea that Apple is not going to switch to USB-C but instead just use wireless charging. Now it seems reasonable.

PS: I had used various Bluetooth headphones before. The killer features of the AirPods Pro are their small size (I can fit the case in my coin pocket) and the ability to skip 30 seconds ahead in podcasts.

I had used various Garmin Vivofits and loved that they lasted a year on a coin battery or two. But I found that "completing my circles" on my Apple Watch was just enough gamification that I'm moving significantly more than I did before I got the watch. It does make me understand why some health care organizations give them out to members to try and get them to move more. I switched from the SE to the 6 because the SE takes 2 1/2 hours to charge instead of the 6's 1 1/2. It's still annoying to have something that requires such attention to keeping it charged and then charges so slowly. But the trade-off was worth it for me.