Apple love to make things difficult with cables that break, that are expensive and cause us to find cheap alternatives.
The cheap cables are all well and good but micro usb cables are everywhere, and often good quality.
These little adapters, This is not official but for this price, acceptable.
Plug in a micro usb one end and use as an lightning cable.
These things are TINY.
great for putting in your wallet, travelling etc.
Maybe a better option than splashing out on potentially dodgy cables and these things are often well built and solid.
Hope this helps someone.
The cheap cables are all well and good but micro usb cables are everywhere, and often good quality.
These little adapters, This is not official but for this price, acceptable.
Plug in a micro usb one end and use as an lightning cable.
These things are TINY.
great for putting in your wallet, travelling etc.
Maybe a better option than splashing out on potentially dodgy cables and these things are often well built and solid.
Hope this helps someone.
The cheap leads lose conductivity over the length of the cable and hence dont charge the phone at full power so it will take longer to charge. Also, with the new ios 7, when you use a cheap lead a message comes up warning you. However, I have been using one of these adaptors for a while now with a micro usb cable, and firstly no warning message comes up, and secondly it charges the phone at the same rate as the original apple cable.
But I guess if you use a cheap quality micro usb cable, then you will come across the same problem.
What is it used for? X)
Farming
It converts a ubiquitous micro USB cable to an Apple Lightning connector, to charge up Apple devices that use that connector.
just read some of the feedback from the seller and am glad I didn't get one of these!
These are very handy too and have both types of small USB connector. It's surprising how many old and alternative charges can be pressed into action with one of these, eg Blackberry. I don't know if there is a Lightning equivalent.
Mine lasted about 6 months before breaking but for £3...
cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/…527
Thanks for sharing.
That's what I have heard too
Sucks but these are well rated. 1 negative review today, vs 460 positive. Thought for £1.15 the chances were definitely on our side
Yes I ordered one in the end, can use on various things in the house !
BTW I bought several cheap lightning cables that still work post IOS7 on my daughter's iPhone 5.
So got a 4 in one
ebay.co.uk/itm…365?ssPageName=STRK:MEWAX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1423.l2649
with roll up extension 2 foot lead.
Not for kids as a bit delicate to use (the plugs stack into one long one), but all plugs seem to handle both charging and data and no bits to lose. Love it.
Also, I've an old 3rd party USB-lightning cable here, never noticed any difference with iOS 7?? Only time I noticed a difference it's cos I'd filled the lightning socket on the phone with pocket fluff and it wasn't plugging in properly...
Might pick up one of these adapters though, could come in handy... Hot at that price!
Original ones are not cheap, but worth it in the end.
Got one for about a tenner from Amazon (direct, not from a fake 3rd party reseller)
You read a lie.
Chargers are rated at different amperages. And micro-usb certainly does not max out at 500mA. More for you to read here if you'd like:
extremetech.com/com…one
The 'reason why Apple don't use standard USB cables' is to profiteer from the sale of their over-priced proprietary chargers/cables (and try and licence a monopoly over associated technology (speakers etc.)). Now and again you will get them trying to justify it in other ways by saying that the micro-usb doesn't meet their standards/needs etc. (despite it being good enough for every other manufacturer). But at the end of the day it is pretty obvious why things are this way.
You will remember a few years back all the phone manufacturers were trying to peddle their own special cable headers...Apple is pretty much the only one arrogant enough to be continuing this practice...and their customers the only one to be foolish/passive enough to tolerate them doing it~
Micro-usb maxes out at 10W at 5V if it follows the usb specification strictly. That is fine for phones but not for most iPads that draw 12W and may possibly require more in the future as batteries grow in power. Something is going to give there.
You are right that Apple wants lock in and is not the only company that has tried this, however, you seem to be forgetting all the peripherals that companies put with Apple docks incorporated. These allow access to Apple hardware internals so that remotes can operate iPods and iPhones. Micro-usb does not have enough connectors to cope with more than transferring power and data simultaneously.
Because Apple designed a connector point, once it dumped Firewire, that would do that, it enabled the so called ecosystem of peripherals to cooperate with Apple devices. All the while Android users would moan about a lack of similar accessories for their devices while forgetting that micro-usb just does not allow that level of flexibility.
Bluetooth, Airplay or Miracast is going to make much of the audio peripheral dependency moot but that still leaves a lot of switches, heart monitors and other assorted high-priced rubbish that still rely on 30-pin and lightning connections to function.
Something up with eBay, couldn't leave feedback as it says it's already been left (it hasn't).
I would recommend the PortaPow Fast Charge Micro USB Cable, it costs less than a £5, which is at least 3 times faster than the standard cable. I use their Quad Mains Charger at home along with the Fast Charge Cable and my SGN3 charges extremely fast. Here is the link to the PortaPow site:-
portablepowersupplies.co.uk
Don't forget you will still need your standard data cable when you connect to a computer to transfer music, videos etc.,
Verdict: Very poor knock off. Probably bought in bulk for pennies each. Seller is coining it in as hardly anyone will bother sending it back.