The iPhone X Needs a $25 USB Type-C Cable to Fast Charge

[Megalith]

While the iPhone X is already an expensive device, prospective owners will have to pay even more for fast charging: you'll need to spend at least $74 on a special charger and a USB Type-C Lightning cable for the privilege. It all comes down to the fact that Apple's Lightning protocol doesn't support the wattage, voltage, and amperage needed to enable true fast charging when it's connected to a standard USB Type-A port on the other end of the cable. Thanks Reimu.

Because the Lightning cables that Apple includes in the box with every iPhone have a USB Type-A connector on the end that plugs into the charger, they don't possess the pins needed to facilitate USB Power Delivery. Namely, the two channel configuration pins, CC1 and CC2. This is why the new iPhone models need a special cable — one that uses USB Type-C on the charger side — to take advantage of USB-PD 2.0 and enable fast charging.

 

[Deleted member 278999]

While the iPhone X is already an expensive device, prospective owners will have to pay even more for fast charging: you'll need to spend at least $74 on a special charger and a USB Type-C Lightning cable for the privilege. It all comes down to the fact that Apple's Lightning protocol doesn't support the wattage, voltage, and amperage needed to enable true fast charging when it's connected to a standard USB Type-A port on the other end of the cable. Thanks Reimu.

Because the Lightning cables that Apple includes in the box with every iPhone have a USB Type-A connector on the end that plugs into the charger, they don't possess the pins needed to facilitate USB Power Delivery. Namely, the two channel configuration pins, CC1 and CC2. This is why the new iPhone models need a special cable — one that uses USB Type-C on the charger side — to take advantage of USB-PD 2.0 and enable fast charging.

 

[Ocellaris]

Yes this is retarded. Even the iPad Pro doesn’t come with a USB C cable and people have bad luck with non-Apple cables to enable fast charging. The 2m cable for my Pro was $35

 

[[21CW]killerofall]

And Apple is laughing all the way to the bank.

 

[Nexus6]

Making the LG V30 look more attractive every day.

Apple makes one hell of an ARM cpu but that's about it.

 

[Deleted member 245375]

And Apple is laughing all the way to the bank.

I can just see it now:

"Coming soon, Apple's latest and greatest innovation: iBank, because we already have basically every penny you own, so why deal with a middleman? Now you can do everything you do with your life all at the same temp---errr... sanctuar---errr... compoun---errr... location!!!"

And you folks just fucking KNOW I'm not far off the mark, seriously.

 

[grtitan]

Apple makes one hell of an ARM cpu but that's about it.

Yeah, the recently leaked geekbench test shows that cpu to be a beast.

Of course, butthurt fanbois right away discredited the results when it showed beating some intel cpus.

Your nick is from the phone or the movie?

 

[bizzmeister]

Still can not wait to get my hands on the iPhone X when it hits out stores.


Literally the only thing that upsets me now is that fact that im reading that the phone does not support T-Mobiles LTE Band 71 (which is what they are rolling out now, the lower frequencies that improve the signal/reception that much more) Thats insane to me how they let this happen. Just the timing i suppose. Really annoying that we wont be able to take advantage of that but i dont know if this is confirmed yet or not.

 

[mope54]

This is a ridiculous article. All of the USB-C cables that come with Android phones terminate with a USB 2.0 end, which doesn't support QC either. You'd have to own a high quality QC charger *and* have USB-C on both ends to quick charge your phone. Is this yet another "feature" that Android users think they have because of a bullet point but don't understand it's not actually implemented in the market yet?

Still can not wait to get my hands on the iPhone X when it hits out stores.


Literally the only thing that upsets me now is that fact that im reading that the phone does not support T-Mobiles LTE Band 71 (which is what they are rolling out now, the lower frequencies that improve the signal/reception that much more) Thats insane to me how they let this happen. Just the timing i suppose. Really annoying that we wont be able to take advantage of that but i dont know if this is confirmed yet or not.

The iPhone X was already designed by the time this LTE band was considered. You won't miss anything. By the time it "rolls out" to your area, the iPhone will support it.

 

[scojer]

This is a ridiculous article. All of the USB-C cables that come with Android phones terminate with a USB 2.0 end, which doesn't support QC either. You'd have to own a high quality QC charger *and* have USB-C on both ends to quick charge your phone. Is this yet another "feature" that Android users think they have because of a bullet point but don't understand it's not actually implemented in the market yet?


The iPhone X was already designed by the time this LTE band was considered. You won't miss anything. By the time it "rolls out" to your area, the iPhone will support it.

Quick Charge has been out there for a while. What the article said was that Apple's standard charging cable is the same one they've been using. In other words, it is cheaper for Apple to sell phones with the thousands of charging cables they have had for a while, and upcharge customers for the new cables, instead of just including it in the box already.

That is why they sell a separate cable with USB-C on the other end.

 

[mope54]

Quick Charge has been out there for a while. What the article said was that Apple's standard charging cable is the same one they've been using. In other words, it is cheaper for Apple to sell phones with the thousands of charging cables they have had for a while, and upcharge customers for the new cables, instead of just including it in the box already.

That is why they sell a separate cable with USB-C on the other end.

It's been out for a while but you need USB-C on the charging end to utilize it...and you need a charging unit capable of supporting it. Android phones still give out the basic USB chargers and USB 2.0 cables (they use USB-C on the phone end, which isn't where the problem is), which is exactly what Apple is doing.

If you wanted to use QC on your android phone you'd need a USB-C to USB-C (instead of the USB-C to USB 2.0 they provide) and a charging device that supported it. Apple is selling a lightning to USB-C cable, but you'd still have to buy a QC capable charging device. According to a Google engineer, the last year's phones' implementation of QC wasn't even compatible with USB-C anyway.
https://www.extremetech.com/mobile/...m-quick-charge-are-fundamentally-incompatible

Like I said, this is yet another example of Android people checking off "features" that aren't fully implemented yet have no idea how they actually work.

You think this is because they want to recycle their old cables? Who here has a charging device with a USB-C socket? I bet not one single person here. If Apple included a Lightning to USB-C cable and didn't include USB 2.0 everyone here would shit their pants.

 

[Deleted member 245375]

The iPhone X was already designed by the time this LTE band was considered. You won't miss anything. By the time it "rolls out" to your area, the iPhone will support it.

According to Apple's own iPhone X specs page at:

https://www.apple.com/iphone-x/specs/

the iPhone X does not have hardware support (which is what counts as it's not a software issue) for LTE Band 71 which is in the 600 MHz frequency region and what T-Mobile's new LTE network will be based upon. There is no way to "magically" just enable such support in the iPhone X at a later time as the SoC and the radio modem in the chipset simply don't support that band, at least as far as Apple's own published specifications currently show.

They could do some devious underhanded bullshit and magically enable some aspect of the hardware later on they never revealed was there in the first place - it's not something I would put past Apple to actually do - but as it stands at this moment the iPhone X will never work on that LTE band 71 for T-Mobile or any other network that might make use of it. It does support pretty much every other LTE band used worldwide according to those specs, but not band 71, not now, more than likely not ever.

 

[mope54]

According to Apple's own iPhone X specs page at:

https://www.apple.com/iphone-x/specs/

the iPhone X does not have hardware (which is what counts as it's not a software issue) support for LTE Band 71 which is in the 600 MHz frequency region and what T-Mobile's new LTE network will be based upon. There is no way to "magically" just enable such support in the iPhone X at a later time as the SoC and the radio modem in the chipset simply don't support that band, at least as far as Apple's own published specifications currently show.

They could do some devious underhanded bullshit and magically enable some aspect of the hardware later on they never revealed was there in the first place - it's not something I would put past Apple to actually do - but as it stands at this moment the iPhone X will never work on that LTE band 71 for T-Mobile or any other network that might make use of it. It does support pretty much every other LTE band used worldwide according to those specs, but not band 71, not now, more than likely not ever.

It's called a new device next year or whenever in the next three years since this rollout won't even be completed until 2020! WTF is going on here, I thought this was a tech site, LOL.

 

[_l_]

come on, it's only $25 ... they could charge $100 and most folks would probably buy it

 

[scojer]

It's been out for a while but you need USB-C on the charging end to utilize it...and you need a charging unit capable of supporting it. Android phones still give out the basic USB chargers and USB 2.0 cables (they use USB-C on the phone end, which isn't where the problem is), which is exactly what Apple is doing.

If you wanted to use QC on your android phone you'd need a USB-C to USB-C (instead of the USB-C to USB 2.0 they provide) and a charging device that supported it. Apple is selling a lightning to USB-C cable, but you'd still have to buy a QC capable charging device. According to a Google engineer, the last year's phones' implementation of QC wasn't even compatible with USB-C anyway.
https://www.extremetech.com/mobile/...m-quick-charge-are-fundamentally-incompatible

Like I said, this is yet another example of Android people checking off "features" that aren't fully implemented yet have no idea how they actually work.

You think this is because they want to recycle their old cables? Who here has a charging device with a USB-C socket? I bet not one single person here. If Apple included a Lightning to USB-C cable and didn't include USB 2.0 everyone here would shit their pants.

Quick Charge has been around since 2013.
source. And that is an interesting read. Whether or not the current form of QC meets standards is not relevant, quick charging has been around for a while, and Apple is just now catching up. Honestly, there is nothing wrong with that, as most phones didn't support it until last year anyways.

As for Apple sending out devices with cables they've already had, it is a smart move. They are saving on costs by sending out cables they've had, made in bulk, for a long time. The new cables are "new" and a different standard. Apple is the king of accessorizing, and they can sell these cables separately because people will buy them.

If Apple included a USB-C to lightning, they would of also included an adapter for legacy connections. Though, they wouldn't make any money that way.

I'm not knocking Apple, they're making lucrative decisions. That is all I'm saying.

 

[SixFootDuo]

The best phone out / coming out is going to be the LG V30 @ $699 I think or $750.

Pixel 2 XL could also be a great phone if it's not too expensive.

 

[westrock2000]

I, uhh, notice you didn't post anything about the front of the phone there. Probably no significant difference.

The core thing is a foolish numbers game. The iPhone has consistently beat it's competitors since at least the 3GS days. Sure there might be 1 or 2 phones that come 6 months later and have some small edge (or aren't limited by form factor), but then the new iPhone comes out 6 months later after that and crushes everything again. Constant leap frog, but Android has been making ineffective use of cores for years now.

 

[Derangel]

While some aspects of that list others are pretty crap.

As much as everyone, Apple included, loves to talk about megapixel numbers they don't really mean a whole heck of a lot. My iPhone 7 Plus kicks the shit out of the S6 in terms of picture and video quality despite having less megapixels. The 7 simply has a better camera. Samsung's S8 and Note 8 also use 12 MP rear cameras.

The S6 isn't even as fast as the iPhone from its own year. Core count, like MP count, is a pretty crap metric. Supposedly one of the 4 weak cores in the new A11 is as, or more, powerful than one of the strong cores in the Note 8. So despite the Note 8's higher core count it is going to be the weaker chip, and that is without getting into how insanely demanding the Android OS is.

Android phones have always had more RAM than Apple devices. It sort of evens out though since Android is vastly more demanding than iOS. Of course it has a lot to do with iOS only being used on a very small set of hardware compared to Android, on top of Android having a lot more "power user" type of things built in that drive up resource requirements. On top of all the annoying pre-installed apps companies like Samsung love putting on the phones that eat up even more resources.

 

[Trimlock]

It's called a new device next year or whenever in the next three years since this rollout won't even be completed until 2020! WTF is going on here, I thought this was a tech site, LOL.

It's like these people don't realize that android phones (yet to be released) also don't support this band. But it's Apple and it's all their fault.

 

[Reimu]

This is a ridiculous article. All of the USB-C cables that come with Android phones terminate with a USB 2.0 end, which doesn't support QC either. You'd have to own a high quality QC charger *and* have USB-C on both ends to quick charge your phone. Is this yet another "feature" that Android users think they have because of a bullet point but don't understand it's not actually implemented in the market yet?


The iPhone X was already designed by the time this LTE band was considered. You won't miss anything. By the time it "rolls out" to your area, the iPhone will support it.

The cables from phones that are made in 2016 certainly supports fast charging straight out of the box, and the fast charger comes included across the board without fail for high end phones. S8, Note 7, V20, Pixel, P10, G5 and so forth off the top of my head all have fast chargers included. I ought to know this, given that I am using such phones.

It's like these people don't realize that android phones (yet to be released) also don't support this band. But it's Apple and it's all their fault.

V30 does support this band. I know of no other atm which does.

 

[phillyboy]

WTF is going on here, I thought this was a tech site, LOL.

No just drama-ish news postings and an audience response that makes it sound like they want to shame fuck Apple or something lol

Looks like Apple pissed in everyone's cheerios today (or this week, rather... ).

And yes, you need USB-C on the charging end of the cable along with a supported charger to get PD and any sort of quick charging. Which is still like 5% of the audience by my WAG.

I guess Apple should make an exception and put both cables in the box *shrug*

 

[mope54]

The cables from phones that are made in 2016 certainly supports fast charging straight out of the box, and the fast charger comes included across the board without fail for high end phones. S8, Note 7, V20, Pixel, P10, G5 and so forth off the top of my head all have fast chargers included. I ought to know this, given that I am using such phones.



V30 does support this band. I know of no other atm which does.

I didn't look at all the phones on this list but I have opened a Note 7 box and it had a plain USB-C to USB cable. The Note 7 has a couple different ways to charge faster than a standard rate, but in order for it to use Qualcomm's Quick Charge it'd have to include a USB-C to USB-C cable. They include a faster charger but it's not a QC charger, even though the phone itself supports it. Like I said, parroting "features" that have no meaningful impact...you can't quick charge in your car, at your computer, or from any wall wart that isn't purpose built.

The "trick" of charging an iPhone faster than standard has been around for a decade, FYI, if you use the iPad charger. This isn't the same thing as "Quick Charge," though, same as Android phones. The Note 7 just has a larger USB charger like using an iPad charger for an iPhone as far as I could tell from what's actually included in the box. MacBooks will adaptively charge at faster rates, if the phone has a larger battery, too, but nothing can Quick Charge a phone via a USB-A cable since it's not supported.

 

[SGTGimpy]

As long as Apple is following the USB power delivery standard for USB-C. All you will need to do to QC your new iPhone is get the USB -C cable and you can use any QC certified charger. But this is Apple we are talking about so more than likely they monkeyed around with the standard and in doing so. Will require to buy their chargers to use QC.

Also on the T-Mobile band 71 LTE banter. The V30 is the only phone for 2017 that will be able to use the Band 71 LTE. Not even the new Pixel 2 can support it so it is not just Apple. You will start seeing phones in 2018 start supporting Band 71 as standard.

 

[mope54]

They are following the standard, but just know someone is going to buy some $1 dollar piece of junk from China and blow up their phone...because fuck Apple.

 

[Derangel]

I didn't look at all the phones on this list but I have opened a Note 7 box and it had a plain USB-C to USB cable. The Note 7 has a couple different ways to charge faster than a standard rate, but in order for it to use Qualcomm's Quick Charge it'd have to include a USB-C to USB-C cable. They include a faster charger but it's not a QC charger, even though the phone itself supports it. Like I said, parroting "features" that have no meaningful impact...you can't quick charge in your car, at your computer, or from any wall wart that isn't purpose built.

The "trick" of charging an iPhone faster than standard has been around for a decade, FYI, if you use the iPad charger. This isn't the same thing as "Quick Charge," though, same as Android phones. The Note 7 just has a larger USB charger like using an iPad charger for an iPhone as far as I could tell from what's actually included in the box. MacBooks will adaptively charge at faster rates, if the phone has a larger battery, too, but nothing can Quick Charge a phone via a USB-A cable since it's not supported.

The Note 7 still used Quick Charge 2.0, so USB-C to USB-C wouldn't be required. I believe Samsung finally updated to QC3 for the S8 and Note 8.

 

[mope54]

The Note 7 still used Quick Charge 2.0, so USB-C to USB-C wouldn't be required. I believe Samsung finally updated to QC3 for the S8 and Note 8.

Then it does the same thing all larger battery iPhones have been doing when paired with higher amperage chargers like an iPad charger or MacBook.

 

[bastage]

Still can not wait to get my hands on the iPhone X when it hits out stores.


Literally the only thing that upsets me now is that fact that im reading that the phone does not support T-Mobiles LTE Band 71 (which is what they are rolling out now, the lower frequencies that improve the signal/reception that much more) Thats insane to me how they let this happen. Just the timing i suppose. Really annoying that we wont be able to take advantage of that but i dont know if this is confirmed yet or not.

I sure wish it & every other 2017 phone had band 71 support, but the fact is that its not a deal breaker.. Apple was more then a year behind on band 12 support compared to LG & Samsung & this time around it looks like only LG will have it (with the v30 & it wouldn't surprise me if the Pixel 2 XL does as well). For anyone happy with the T-Mo network not having Band 71 means that the network will still get better, just not in the same way as a device with it (it will remove users from existing bands relieving congestion for those who cant use it directly).

 

[bizzmeister]

I sure wish it & every other 2017 phone had band 71 support, but the fact is that its not a deal breaker.. Apple was more then a year behind on band 12 support compared to LG & Samsung & this time around it looks like only LG will have it (with the v30 & it wouldn't surprise me if the Pixel 2 XL does as well). For anyone happy with the T-Mo network not having Band 71 means that the network will still get better, just not in the same way as a device with it (it will remove users from existing bands relieving congestion for those who cant use it directly).

No i totally get it, im with tmobile now and love them. Ive had all the networks and by far, especially for the money here in los angeles, they are the best. I can deal with it. I guess i was just bitching in my head lol.

 

[Kdawg]

so?

that's pennies compared to the $1000 price tag.

Moot argument. People who buy iphones don't care about value.

 

[Derangel]

so?

that's pennies compared to the $1000 price tag.

Moot argument. People who buy iphones don't care about value.

I'd argue that holds true for anyone buying high-end smart phones. People have their reasons for buying those phones and their uses for them, but none of them exactly present a great "value".

 

[nilepez]

I don't get why they're not providing the fast charging cable/charger...esp with the X. It's a $1000+ phone, WTF are they skimping charger? I'm waiting on reviews to decide on this new phone, but if I get one, I'll probably wait for cheaper versions of the cable/charger to be released. 75 is stupid expensive....then again, Apple want's to be the BMW of phones and BMW and Mercedes charge insane prices for options that are standard on lesser cars.

 

[Reimu]

so?

that's pennies compared to the $1000 price tag.

Moot argument. People who buy iphones don't care about value.

Christopher Poole (who?)

It's just a point of inconvenience really.

I'd argue that holds true for anyone buying high-end smart phones. People have their reasons for buying those phones and their uses for them, but none of them exactly present a great "value".

Yeah. Great c/p is at midrange really.

 

[Deleted member 245375]

Christopher Poole (who?)

That's moot. Moot is someone else entirely.

 

[diehardman]

That picture is pretty hilarious considering you could just replace the iPhone X with a Galaxy S8 for a "why upgrade?" point.

 

[Riccochet]

This is a ridiculous article. All of the USB-C cables that come with Android phones terminate with a USB 2.0 end, which doesn't support QC either. You'd have to own a high quality QC charger *and* have USB-C on both ends to quick charge your phone. Is this yet another "feature" that Android users think they have because of a bullet point but don't understand it's not actually implemented in the market yet?


The iPhone X was already designed by the time this LTE band was considered. You won't miss anything. By the time it "rolls out" to your area, the iPhone will support it.

My Pixel XL came with both standard USB-C to USB 2.0 and USB-C to USB-C for the charger for quick charging. So, don't say no phone comes with it. My phone came with both. iPhone won't. Good luck with that.

 

[mope54]

Makes sense given you probably have to charge your Pixel XL three times a day to keep it going.

Here's a lackluster review of the Pixel's battery life (and states it puts the XL "to shame"):
http://www.techradar.com/reviews/google-pixel-review/4

A breath of fresh Google air in a world of Android over-complication

Battery life

• A day’s use with moderate to light usage
• Regularly required a mid-evening top-up

The Google Pixel battery life is nothing special. If you’re careful with your usage you’ll get a full day out of the phone, but we found that given moderate use a mid-evening charge was required to ensure we made it to bedtime without a flat battery.

We put the fast charging to the test, plugging in when we were down to 13% at around 6pm. Fifteen minutes later the Pixel was up to 27%.

It seems unlikely that an additional 14% of juice would get you anywhere close to seven hours of use – you’d have to turn off Wi-Fi, mobile data, Bluetooth and NFC, while turning the brightness way down and restricting your usage to basic applications.


"Good luck with that"

 

[capt_cope]

It's been out for a while but you need USB-C on the charging end to utilize it...and you need a charging unit capable of supporting it. Android phones still give out the basic USB chargers and USB 2.0 cables (they use USB-C on the phone end, which isn't where the problem is), which is exactly what Apple is doing.

If you wanted to use QC on your android phone you'd need a USB-C to USB-C (instead of the USB-C to USB 2.0 they provide) and a charging device that supported it. Apple is selling a lightning to USB-C cable, but you'd still have to buy a QC capable charging device. According to a Google engineer, the last year's phones' implementation of QC wasn't even compatible with USB-C anyway.
https://www.extremetech.com/mobile/...m-quick-charge-are-fundamentally-incompatible

Like I said, this is yet another example of Android people checking off "features" that aren't fully implemented yet have no idea how they actually work.

You think this is because they want to recycle their old cables? Who here has a charging device with a USB-C socket? I bet not one single person here. If Apple included a Lightning to USB-C cable and didn't include USB 2.0 everyone here would shit their pants.

About that... both my nexus 5x and pixel came with a quick charge capable charger (usb-c) and usb-c to usb-c cables... Not sure what fanboi planet you live on, but most devices I've bought in the past decade came with the cable(s) required to use them fully.

 

[Deleted member 88301]

Apple Fanatics = Masochists.

 

[mope54]

About that... both my nexus 5x and pixel came with a quick charge capable charger (usb-c) and usb-c to usb-c cables... Not sure what fanboi planet you live on, but most devices I've bought in the past decade came with the cable(s) required to use them fully.

Why do you lie about something so easily researched?

Here's an unboxing of a Nexus 5. It comes with a standard USB-C to USB-A cable (2:30)


Here's a conversation about the fact that it's not capable of utilizing Quick Charge 3.0 or higher:
https://forum.xda-developers.com/go.../nexus-5-quick-charge-3-0-charger-to-t3280755

It charges at a faster rate with a wall wart that can deliver enough amps, but isn't doing Quick Charge 3.0 by any means. It's doing the same thing all large battery iPhones do since the 6+ debut when plugged into a device capable of delivering more amperage.

I don't know about "fanboi planet" you think this is on, but it's one where facts prevail. Sorry you don't even understand what your phone supposedly does or doesn't do...if you even have a Nexus 5. I mean, if you actually owned a Nexus 5 it should have been pretty damn obvious it didn't come with a USB-C to USB-C cable...assuming you know what that even looks like.

Pathetic.

 

[Deleted member 278999]

I, uhh, notice you didn't post anything about the front of the phone there. Probably no significant difference.

The core thing is a foolish numbers game. The iPhone has consistently beat it's competitors since at least the 3GS days. Sure there might be 1 or 2 phones that come 6 months later and have some small edge (or aren't limited by form factor), but then the new iPhone comes out 6 months later after that and crushes everything again. Constant leap frog, but Android has been making ineffective use of cores for years now.

What about it? It's just a low res Super AMOLED display?

While some aspects of that list others are pretty crap.

As much as everyone, Apple included, loves to talk about megapixel numbers they don't really mean a whole heck of a lot. My iPhone 7 Plus kicks the shit out of the S6 in terms of picture and video quality despite having less megapixels. The 7 simply has a better camera. Samsung's S8 and Note 8 also use 12 MP rear cameras.

The S6 isn't even as fast as the iPhone from its own year. Core count, like MP count, is a pretty crap metric. Supposedly one of the 4 weak cores in the new A11 is as, or more, powerful than one of the strong cores in the Note 8. So despite the Note 8's higher core count it is going to be the weaker chip, and that is without getting into how insanely demanding the Android OS is.

Android phones have always had more RAM than Apple devices. It sort of evens out though since Android is vastly more demanding than iOS. Of course it has a lot to do with iOS only being used on a very small set of hardware compared to Android, on top of Android having a lot more "power user" type of things built in that drive up resource requirements. On top of all the annoying pre-installed apps companies like Samsung love putting on the phones that eat up even more resources.

Apple designs pretty good SOCs. They got a lot of help from the get go then hired off from those companies and stole technology.

The camera on iPhones has always been pretty good. But it's been going down hill the past few years.

Apple products in general have been headed downhill since Steve Jobs died