Full FeedApple killing off Firewire on iPods
One of the stranger signs of iPod ubiquity: two years ago when I bought a microwave oven, it came with a free gift. It was an AM/FM radio that also had an iPod dock. It’s been astonishingly useful gadget, both for music and as an iPod charger when I can’t find a USB cable.
No more. Connect my new iPod Touch this morning, I was greeted with a message that “Charging is not supported on this accessory.” A little bit of digging on the internet turned up the reason: newer iPods have lost the ability to charge via Firewire.
Apple reseller Small Dog Electronics details yet another example of the phasing out of Firewire:
This compatibility issue is caused by the same change with the Apple Dock Connecter introduced with the iPhone 3G. Inside the iPod / iPhone Dock Connecter are 30 metal pins. Previous iPods and iPhones allowed for charging either over pins reserved for the USB connection or pins reserved for the obsolete Firewire connection.
While Apple apparently announced this upcoming change to manufactures of “Made for iPod” accessories back in 2005, Apple only formerly discontinued Firewire charging support with the most recent iPods. New iPods and iPhones can only charge via the USB pin.
Firewire was, of course invented at Apple, and was the only way to transfer music and charge the battery on the original iPod. Apple eventually added support for the much more popular USB technology (an Intel creation). While the two ports were original equals on iPod, Apple has slowly been killing off Firewire—first removing the ability to transfer music, but keeping the charging capability. Now it appears even that is on the way out.
Combined with the lack of Firewire support on the new consumer-level Macbook leads me to wonder if Apple is throwing in the towel on Firewire 400. Initially popular on camcorders and hard drives (where a high, sustainable rate of data transfer was necessary), Firewire has lost ground to USB 2.0, eSata, and—in professional circles—the next-generation Firewire 800. Firewire 400 was standard on all Macs for many years, but not with most PCs, who probably make up the vast majority of Windows users.
What a pain. Granted, it’s not too much trouble for me to dig out a USB cable, but I’ll miss the convenience of being able to use my charging station. Plus, my Firewire-based car charger, which I’ve been using since I got my 10GB iPod, is now useless. And it’s not just an issue of charging: other accessories which use the Firewire port will soon become obsolete as well. And how does that affect the “greeness” of these products? I mean, these are otherwise perfectly good electronics which have to be replaced, rather than migrated.
How much is Apple really saving by killing off the Firewire pin? Or are they trying to drive sales to new accessories? And for those of you with new iPods, what accessories do you have that are now obsolete?
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I have noticed that none of my docking speakers or adapters will play audio thorough the charging port on my new iPod Touch. What’s up with that?? Has anyone else experienced this?
on October 25, 2008 at 03:08 PM - LINKProbably the same issue: the accessories are using the Firewire pin to access the data. I wonder if this was a licensing choice: was it cheaper to license Firewire access through Apple (who may have given them a discount, since they were creating it for an Apple iPod, after all), rather than Intel’s USB technology.
on October 25, 2008 at 04:12 PM - LINKMy iHome that I purchased two years ago is now useless =[
on October 26, 2008 at 06:27 PM - LINKLittle bit of an update here: on the accessory I talk about, it turns out that I can play music through it. How odd, esp. when compared with Mia’s problem.
on October 27, 2008 at 10:02 AM - LINKI prefer the Firewire connection
on October 27, 2008 at 06:16 PM - LINK2 docks at home and 1 at work… useless with my new touch. There are several other things I don’t like about the touch as well… One being the inability to save On-The-Go playlists without syncing with the computer. On my video ipod, I could create and save these as much as I wanted, no need to sync. No copy & paste is what really surprised me on the first iPhone… Still not available!
I think the whole non-charging thing is a ploy to sell more accessories… I’m not biting.
I’m a PC
on November 6, 2008 at 02:49 AM - LINKI used to be able to use my dock to charge my ipod while sending music out to my speakers. I used to be able to plug my ipod into my car stereo to control music and charge it. I used to be happy with my ipod.
on December 3, 2008 at 03:41 PM - LINKI do alot of driving (I live 15 min outside of the city where I work), and I use my iPod (32 gig 2G Touch, which replaced my 80gig Classic) heavily while working, so it gets drained pretty fast. The device I used the most to keep it charged was my 300 dollar car stereo, which no longer charges my ipod (everything else works perfectly).
Pisses me right off. Screw you apple, you have no IDEA how hard it was to find a mounting kit for my “unique” car (‘03 Kia Rio), and now the stereo I bought solely for its ipod adaptor is pretty much useless for the thing I needed it most to do: Charge the damn thing.
on December 12, 2008 at 08:38 AM - LINK