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[Lyle Williams]

There are two responsibilities here:

Spreading the signal adequately; and

Not transmitting with too much power.

Home-built solutions are probably going to fail on both counts. 

But yes, wires are predictable.

[Stephen Swaffer]

Apple has been bold in removing multiple previously "standard" items from computers:
serial ports - killed by Apple in favor of USB. Suddenly a standard Intel couldn't promote to save it's ass became ubiquitous because we all had to upgrade.

DVD drive - I have one mac out of 5 in my house that has a Superdrive, and that's because I bought a used 2011 Macbook Pro as my work computer. Not used any more; people thought they couldn't live without them, but now...

Ethernet port - on laptops, again how can you live without ethernet? Turns out WiFi is ubiquitous for most and if not there's an adapter. I need mine perhaps 10% of the year traveling.

Now I'm definitely not a Joney Ive fanboy, and hate that he's reduced a macbook to 1 USB-C for power and anything else, but all of the things Apple has done have been leading the way vs. following, and for that I'm happy.

The thing that kills me about the USB situation is that everything (almost) outboard needs a USB port.  Last year we bought an iMac to essentially be our media backbone at church-and Apple is supposed to be great with media (and they are even if they aren't always user friendly).  Problem is this-plug in our QU for audio, a mouse (hate and don't trust magic mouse), a superdrive, an external drive and my ports are full.  We are using thunderbolt to VGA to our projector.  Cordless keyboard has to charge somewhere.  Yes you can get hubs and chargers, etc.  I just hate that I have to start trying to figure out how to distribute limited resources after spending close to $3000 on a computer.

[Tim McCulloch]

The thing that kills me about the USB situation is that everything (almost) outboard needs a USB port.  Last year we bought an iMac to essentially be our media backbone at church-and Apple is supposed to be great with media (and they are even if they aren't always user friendly).  Problem is this-plug in our QU for audio, a mouse (hate and don't trust magic mouse), a superdrive, an external drive and my ports are full.  We are using thunderbolt to VGA to our projector.  Cordless keyboard has to charge somewhere.  Yes you can get hubs and chargers, etc.  I just hate that I have to start trying to figure out how to distribute limited resources after spending close to $3000 on a computer.

Grrr.  You got me started.  This is the kind of shit that is a portion of the reason I don't own Apple products for personal use.  I'll buy them because I *must* in order to run specific software for work, but I otherwise refuse to own an i-Anything.  To say I'm not a FruitCo fanboy would be an understatement.

Apple doesn't know what's best for my situations and needs and their continuing need to re-skin existing technology (their own or not) for cosmetic and perceived value changes while eliminating tools and changing accessory use is solely aimed at the same kind of purchaser that buys a new car because the color options are different this year (and the bragging rights that go with it).

[James Feenstra]

I cannot use Square without a phone jack. Some people pay that way.

I use square all the time without a phone jack. I don't think I've ever used the card reader.

You can manually enter the credit card information into the app for payment.

Enter Amount -> Charge -> Credit Card -> Enter information -> Charge

[veditor78]

I use square all the time without a phone jack. I don't think I've ever used the card reader.

You can manually enter the credit card information into the app for payment.

Enter Amount -> Charge -> Credit Card -> Enter information -> Charge

That ups their take by another 1% or so.

[veditor78]

I for one, welcome our new overlords that eliminate the headphone jack.

[Pete Erskine]

I use square all the time without a phone jack. I don't think I've ever used the card reader.

You can manually enter the credit card information into the app for payment.

Enter Amount -> Charge -> Credit Card -> Enter information -> Charge

There is a square device for Apple Pay, Android Pay, and chip cards but it doesn't have card reader which would need to plug into the lightning adapter.

[Ned Ward]

The thing that kills me about the USB situation is that everything (almost) outboard needs a USB port.  Last year we bought an iMac to essentially be our media backbone at church-and Apple is supposed to be great with media (and they are even if they aren't always user friendly).  Problem is this-plug in our QU for audio, a mouse (hate and don't trust magic mouse), a superdrive, an external drive and my ports are full.  We are using thunderbolt to VGA to our projector.  Cordless keyboard has to charge somewhere.  Yes you can get hubs and chargers, etc.  I just hate that I have to start trying to figure out how to distribute limited resources after spending close to $3000 on a computer.

My 2009 iMac has 4 USB ports and didn't consider that a limitation, and I also had an iLok, another USB Key and USB MIDI keyboard to deal with. Hubs are cheap and work well. Funny - had a magic mouse, but with Pro Tools for a while you had to turn off Bluetooth, so I still rock the regular Mac keyboard (with the 10-keypad) and the regular mouse, which together take up 1 USB port and can also charge/sync an iPhone.


I think even if the iMac had 7 USB ports like some all-in one PC's, it wouldn't be enough.


Curious - what are you using the superdrive for? on my 2009 iMac, I ditched the superdrive for a SSD boot drive and never looked back.

[Stephen Swaffer]

Curious - what are you using the superdrive for? on my 2009 iMac, I ditched the superdrive for a SSD boot drive and never looked back.

Mainly for flexibility-we often have missionaries in.  A high percentage now use USB or even internet downloads for their presentations-but I still get handed the occasional DVD.

To be fair, I wanted a MacPro.  The two younger people involved in the decision were wowed by the big 4K display.  Its cool-but overkill for a machine that is primarily media playback, or audio recording in the background.  I'd have put that money towards a Pro and then had the flexibility of picking the screen size that fit in the media booth space.  Guess I've worked with too much stuff that was gee-wiz in its day but is now obsolete to take that over practical.

The old, all but obsolete tower form factor, had expandability-had its disadvantages, but how many of us like to wear "one size fits all" clothing?

I can live with losing the phone jack on the iPhone-it IS a phone.  I know phones are always at hand-but if I am doing audio work, my phone is vital for coordination.  Unless I want to throw some sample music on the setup, I really can't have my phone tied up anyway.

[Ned Ward]

A high percentage now use USB or even internet downloads for their presentations-but I still get handed the occasional DVD.

Funny you mention internet download presentations - my old boss was addicted to Google Docs, Sheets and Presentations, and didn't understand that WiFi wasn't available everywhere, and that it MIGHT be a lot easier to have a Keynote presentation on his MacBook Air that had all the videos embedded vs. hoping that YouTube might load up his video clips...


For those of you asked to put together presentations, WonderTube is a godsend to save the underlying YouTube as a video file to not be in the mercies of internet, wifi, etc. during a presentation to several hundred people...

[ProSoundWeb Community]