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Apple to Adopt Micro-USB Connectors for iPhone Charging in Europe

Monday June 29, 2009 8:28 am PDT by Eric Slivka
Reuters reports that ten top mobile phone manufacturers, including Apple, have agreed to adopt the Micro-USB connector standard for smartphone chargers in the European Union. The shift, planned to begin next year, will allow smartphones from the companies, which control 90% of the market, to use the same charging cables. Apple currently uses a proprietary dock connector compatible with both the iPhone and iPod touch.

The chargers will be usable only for data-enabled phones, which have more capability than just standard calls and SMS texts. Data-enabled phones are expected to account for almost half of all new mobile handset purchases in 2010.

The Commission hopes that as people discard their old handsets, within three to four years all data-enabled phones in Europe will be using standardized chargers.

The plan also calls for new phones to be sold with Micro-USB chargers for a period of time before ultimately selling phones and chargers separately in order to allow customers who already own chargers to continue using their existing ones. While the agreement extends only to European phones, it is expected that the standard will make its way into phones around the world as companies attempt to keep their design and manufacturing costs streamlined.
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Depress
35 months ago
Actually, i think they are going to make a converter to the 30pin dock connector. Because of the many more features the dock connector has over the usb connector.

With that i think they will support trough the converter the following options:
charging and Headset(Stereo + Voice)
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MentalFabric
35 months ago
That would be awesome - but what would happen to all the accessories? The 'iPod' dock connecter has become an annoying standard of it's own...
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andrew0122
35 months ago
No more 30 pin? I really like the look of the dock connector. Some how it looks classier. . . Maybe it's just me.
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Warbrain
35 months ago
I somewhat doubt that they'll go to Micro-USB on the iPhone but just provide an adapter like others have said.
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walnuts
35 months ago

Actually, i think they are going to make a converter to the 30pin dock connector. Because of the many more features the dock connector has over the usb connector.

With that i think they will support trough the converter the following options:
charging and Headset(Stereo + Voice)


Does the dock connector have "more features" than usb? Will data transfer rates suffer?

This certainly raises questions as to what the app store developers should do regarding making devices that use the 30 pin connector. I would think that apple would be better off providing a separate mini usb port rather than replacing the 30 pin connector.

Also, isn't an adapter contrary to the point? Wasn't this initiative to cut down on proprietary cable waste? Making an adapter completely nullifies any benefit this might have.
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dubhe
35 months ago
Please don't do away with the dock connector, I don't want to buy a new set of speakers, my Bose SoundDock is wonderful.
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Eso
35 months ago

Actually, i think they are going to make a converter to the 30pin dock connector.


No. There are already all sorts of converters for the mini USB connector. The point of the standard is that so consumers don't need to use any converters because the port is standard across all phones. I expect Apple will put both ports on the next iPhone - the 30 pin dock will still be their standard for syncing/devices, and the mini USB for charging only.
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bigmc6000
35 months ago

I somewhat doubt that they'll go to Micro-USB on the iPhone but just provide an adapter like others have said.


I certainly hope that's the case as virtually all the companies who make accessories would be seriously PO'd if they changed the dock. I understand the issue for all the other phones but for the iPhone? Seriously? Is there a store ANYWHERE that you can buy a cable to charge a phone and CAN'T buy something to charge your iPhone? It's the same freakin connection to charge as all the iPods so there are already 100's of millions pieces of hardware out there that use the exact same connector...
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xUKHCx
35 months ago
Apple could still use the 30 pin dock connector and have a micro-usb somewhere on the side.


I like the move to micro-usb and when I first heard about this I wondered if apple would follow suit but they were quiet over the matter so just thought they weren't going to.
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daxomni
35 months ago
I thought they went out of their way making every charging and interface system overly unique in order to increase revenue. Am I wrong? Won't this hurt their ancillary revenue streams by allowing consumers to save money? My guess is that this never makes it over to the US.
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