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Consider d) phones necessarily require DACs for their speakers so they'll always be able to dump analog signals onto the usb-c pins. All that's needed is an agr
by gp7 10y ago
Consider d) phones necessarily require DACs for their speakers so they'll always be able to dump analog signals onto the usb-c pins. All that's needed is an agreement of what to expect from the connector when analogue audio is playing and not fry equipment expecting something else, and best-case scenario all those pins can now be used even for balanced 5.1 audio (there are 6 positive-negative pairs free for alternate use according to wikipedia). So the dreaded adapter, while still unappealing, can be as simple as connecting pins to the correct 3.5mm pins (altho if usb requires some acknowledgment to get to that point it would only require a small finite state machine to achieve, I couldn't say what the impact of that would be on adapter size)
e; it occurs to me i have no idea the different impedance for usb signals and line level, so this could all be hogwash
- falcolas 10y agoThis is, while a standard, not required for USB Type C implementations.
- gp7 10y agoThe article raises the spectre of DAC-less phones to cut costs but I don't see that ever happening unless the microphone and speaker are removed too, so not implementing it, at least for the foreseeable future where everything still has 3.5mm sockets, seems.. foolhardy. Maybe we'll have worse DACs? I know that in my experience the difference between an acceptable dac and a great dac is not one I can notice with my ears
- falcolas 10y agoWhether it's implemented or not will not depend on if the phone has a DAC, but if the USB chipset supports it. If the USB chipset does not support it, the phone could have the best DAC support in the world, and not provide analog audio over USB-C.
- olympus 10y agoYou can choose whatever impedance you want since you're going to have to isolate the analog signal from the digital usb in your solution anyway. Or the usb-c to 3.5mm adapter can have a matching circuit in it made up of cheap passive components. Not really a big issue. More importantly, is this an actual solution being pursued? It sounds good, but I can see this getting out of hand with each manufacturer having a different standard. Or there could be an "analog audio over usb-c" standard that codifies which pins get which channel.