Does anyone else no longer recognise the tech community?

[D3K]

USB-C to USB A is a rollback. The rest of it is subjective.

Anything that removes modularity - removable storage, removable battery, etc - is not progress. It's a rigid design decision which serves the manufacturer more than the consumer, and is mistaken for being progress just because it's newer.

 

[Angilion]

But a tech enthusiast doesn’t care about ‘good enough’ in my view. That speaks or a ‘normob’ rather than an enthusiast. For instance, removing the 3.5 socket was simply getting rid of a redundant port that’s no longer used because a tech enthusiast would have gone Bluetooth a long time ago.

Ah, I see. It's your religion. No point carrying on then. I mistakenly thought you were asking for opinions rather than preaching. No True Scotsman fallacy thrown in for good measure as well.

And, of course, you ignored most of my reply. Preach on, brother!

 

[Sankari]

I prefer wired audio, but I've never had a pair of 3.5mm headphones that didn't crap out on me at some stage. As soon as the wire breaks inside the plug, you're screwed. And it will break. They always do.

That was my main reason for switching to Bluetooth.

 

[Haggisman]

Sorry OP, but based on your posts in this thread you don't sound like a "tech enthusiast" at all. If you were, you'd realise that people have different use-cases, and some value quality (e.g. CD audio vs mp3, wired headphones/speakers vs Bluetooth, 4k bluray vs streaming) or security & reliability (e.g. local storage vs cloud, expandable storage vs none, user replaceable parts vs saving 0.5mm thickness) amongst other things, over convenience. A tech enthusiast is someone who is interested in tech - that includes researching into & using the best tool for the job.

What you're describing (and I'm afraid this appears to be the category you fall under) is a tech consumer; someone who buys the latest and "greatest" because an advert told them to, even if it's not the best tool for the job...

 

[Angilion]

"Tech enthusiast" <> workplace

True, but I didn't state only workplaces. I just used one workplace as an example. It's also relevant in a larger sense because all workplaces added together are a large part of the market for devices, but it's not the only scenario where the idea applies.

Let's say, for example, a person spends £500 on a graphics card. It's a big upgrade from their previous card and they're very pleased with it. It plays all their games at the settings they want and at the max framerate their monitor supports. A couple of months later a new card comes out that has exactly the same functionality but averages 10% faster. 10% that will make absolutely no difference to their use of a graphics card. It's also £500. If they buy the newer card that has no benefit to them over their existing card, are they an enthusiast or just someone wasting money?

Even that's being generous to the OP because most recent technologies aren't simply better than previous versions. They're usually better in some ways and worse in others.

But what do you think about the main part of my post, not just the sidenote at the end of it?

 

[Flibster]

Why? Just connect your wired headphones to an adapter that connects to the port on your phone?

I think you’d be unwise to buy headphones with only 2-3 hours battery life!

So you want to add something to increase the faff level of wired headphones instead of... I don't know, just plugging them directly into the phone? Which doesn't require a second item to be charged or farting about with bluetooth pairing and will give you higher audio quality.

Just go buy yourself an iPhone, it seems the perfect choice for you.

 

[Angilion]

Apt timing:

https://www.theregister.co.uk/2020/05/27/adobe_cloud_outage/

Having access to your software and data is generally considered better than not having access to it.

 

[tamzzy]

Sorry OP, but based on your posts in this thread you don't sound like a "tech enthusiast" at all. If you were, you'd realise that people have different use-cases, and some value quality (e.g. CD audio vs mp3, wired headphones/speakers vs Bluetooth, 4k bluray vs streaming) or security & reliability (e.g. local storage vs cloud, expandable storage vs none, user replaceable parts vs saving 0.5mm thickness) amongst other things, over convenience. A tech enthusiast is someone who is interested in tech - that includes researching into & using the best tool for the job.

What you're describing (and I'm afraid this appears to be the category you fall under) is a tech consumer; someone who buys the latest and "greatest" because an advert told them to, even if it's not the best tool for the job...

^

 

[arknor]

I prefer wired audio, but I've never had a pair of 3.5mm headphones that didn't crap out on me at some stage. As soon as the wire breaks inside the plug, you're screwed. And it will break. They always do.

That was my main reason for switching to Bluetooth.

just attach a new plug no?

I've had the same pair of earphones for years, usually just scrunch all the wire up and stick them in my jeans pocket.
suprised they havent broke yet tbh they were only some cheap sony ones at an airport, well not so cheap but probably about 30 in a normal shop

 

[firstborn]

Sorry OP, but based on your posts....

What you're describing (and I'm afraid this appears to be the category you fall under) is a tech consumer; someone who buys the latest and "greatest" because an advert told them to, even if it's not the best tool for the job...

This.

 

[Yaayuh!]

I suggest that one possibility is that many people prefer what works well for them, especially if they've already paid for it. Adopting new technology purely for the sake of it being new technology is an expensive hobby.

I think it might have been less common for a while because new technology was markedly superior to previous technology. Take video, for example. Reel to reel and a projector --> videotape --> optical disc --> streaming or saved on a variety of media. Each time there were definite, useful improvements that clearly outweighed any drawbacks and justified the cost. Compare that with removing headphone sockets, which reduces functionality and provides no improvement except possibly to water resistance, maybe. Or replacing fingerprint sensors with facial ID, which serves the same purpose but not as well and seems creepier and more intrusive to many people. Or an internet-connected kettle that sends you a text message when it's boiled...and provides yet another route for hackers to enter your home network. And costs a lot more. More expense and less security in exchange for an absolutely trivial benefit. Change is not necessarily improvement.

Then there's the "good enough" thing, which has been a growing problem. For example, my workplace is still using PCs from the 1990s. Why? Because they're good enough. They still work and they're still powerful enough for the things they're used for. So why spend money on new kit that will provide the same functionality and just do nothing more often in between?

Sorry OP, but based on your posts in this thread you don't sound like a "tech enthusiast" at all. If you were, you'd realise that people have different use-cases, and some value quality (e.g. CD audio vs mp3, wired headphones/speakers vs Bluetooth, 4k bluray vs streaming) or security & reliability (e.g. local storage vs cloud, expandable storage vs none, user replaceable parts vs saving 0.5mm thickness) amongst other things, over convenience. A tech enthusiast is someone who is interested in tech - that includes researching into & using the best tool for the job.

What you're describing (and I'm afraid this appears to be the category you fall under) is a tech consumer; someone who buys the latest and "greatest" because an advert told them to, even if it's not the best tool for the job...

I concur.

Also, to give an example of a bit of everyday (less so in recent days) tech that I loathe and has made things worse rather than better, just for the sake of “woo technology, yay!”; touchscreens in cars. Am I right?! Bloody awful.

 

[Bear]

Come on Tech enthusiast, no doubt you will be buying a boat load of this cutting edge technology https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-52810220

 

[JRS]

Also, to give an example of a bit of everyday (less so in recent days) tech that I loathe and has made things worse rather than better, just for the sake of “woo technology, yay!”; touchscreens in cars. Am I right?! Bloody awful.

Yep. They suck. Give me physical buttons and switches any day.

The so-called tech community seem to now want things to stop changing or improving, and in some cases for progress to be reversed. Some areas I’ve seen this are the roll-back of USBC to USBA, roll back to 3.5mm headphone jacks, roll-back to micro-SD cards, roll-back to fingerprint sensors rather than Face ID type authentication.

USBC to USBA - I'm assuming that you're referring to laptops here. What's the first thing that most people, even tech enthusiasts, buy if they've got a laptop with only USBC ports? A USBC->USBA cable so they can actually use anything
3.5mm headphone jacks - wired headphones and speakers are still more reliable than Bluetooth. Headphones plug in, sound comes out. Every time. Bluetooth headphones paired, sound somes out until one day the phone obstinately refuses to see them and you have to re-pair them from scratch. Similarly, I have a Bluetooth ODB2 reader for my car that will work fine for months and then just sit there refusing to connect to my phone unless I delete the pairing and start over. How Bluetooth can still be so crappy after all this time bemuses me.
MicroSD cards - more robust than cloud storage, less expensive than larger onboard storage, and I could probably make the argument that they're more convenient than cloud storage as well.
Fingerprint sensors - my phone has both a rear-mounted fingerprint sensor and Face ID. Face ID, I hold the phone up and it takes a moment or three to check me out before unlocking, it also sometimes fails to recognise me. Fingerprint sensor, it's instant and quite literally works every time. Plus, my forefinger naturally lands right on the sensor whichever hand I'm holding my phone with...well, it's a no-brainer which system I'm going to use.

 

[Kreeeee]

.

 

[Kenai]

The tech world has reached a point where half of the innovation on offer is not real advancement but marketed improvement. Some will continue to buy into the marketing and feel like they're ahead of the curve, above and beyond whether it actually offers a real tangible benefit to them. To me this is more gullibility than tech enthusiasm.

Bluetooth headphones for example - I have a set but they don't get much use between me and the girlfriend because it's a complete pain in the arse to keep swapping them between devices depending on which one of us is using them and whether on the phone or the TV or the laptop etc. So my old wired Sennheiser set still get used most because their ease of use is far superior - pick up, plug in, use immediately. The Bluetooth set will normally auto connect to the last device they were used with, so you have to go to that device and disconnect (but avoid unpairing) before you can connect to the device you want. I had hoped to replace the older ones as I don't particularly want multiple pairs kicking around various drawers or cupboards but it never really worked because the usability was just a big step backwards for my use case. For someone who is the only user and rarely has cause to listen to more than one device, then they're OK.

USB C only laptops, great idea until you end up buying new cables for half your peripherals or having a crap adapter hanging out the side. Both is better still, there is minimal practical advantage to a USBC only laptop.

Cloud storage again, lovely idea but is it really better? Lose your connection and you lose access all your data. Slow connection and your photos take minutes to open. Data storer goes down, you lose access to all your data. It's a great backup medium or syncing method but a crap primary storage solution.

 

[Martynt74]

Mildly ironic that you mrochester related uses the word "normob", a word that appeared what, 10 or so years ago, had its few minutes in the sun and then disappeared as rapidly as it appeared.

Does anyone really use the word "normob"?

I'm not saying that in the same way as people say things like "Do people still eat McDonald's?!", I really mean it - who on earth says normob?!

I'm glad you brought that up, i've never heard it before and the OP is the only person in this thread to have used it. I assumed it was a word he's invented!

 

[Haggisman]

I'm glad you brought that up, i've never heard it before and the OP is the only person in this thread to have used it. I assumed it was a word he's invented!

Haha, I thought it was some MMO kidspeak, e.g. a basic enemy rather than elitemob, bossmob, etc.

 

[Eurofighter]

I like to move forward at a fast pace but legacy tech still has its place. Im happy to use cloud storagecandvstreaming instead of an SD card orbut a phone with more storage but the bluetooth in my car is fooked and a couple of friends dont have bluetooth amps so i still need a headphone socket. But i guess i could use an adaptor. Seems very apple

 

[Randomface74]

It's like people wanting corded vacuum cleaners when cordless is the latest tech. What's that all about?

The battery goes bad after a few years. Corded doesn't have that problem. Same as the headphones debate. People want new tech but not planned obsolescence. Batteries = planned obsolescence. Same story for cars too.

 

[d_brennen]

The thing with USB C is that it's a nice connector and the speed boost with the latest standards is nice but what are you going to plug in? Most users aren't video producers. Most flash storage is limited by the media not the interface and REALLY fast USB C thumb drives are nice, they are hardly essential these days, with vast internal storage, fast broadband and cloud/network storage/backup solutions.

Removing headphone jacks is just a crock. It's a bid to upsell Bluetooth headphones. I'm a big fan of BT headphones, I have two sets I rotate for my commute so I get a week's worth of charge but I still appreciate being able to plug my phone in to a stereo by 3.5mm. There's no good reason to drop 3.5mm