Are you a current owner of a Samsung Galaxy device and a pair of wired headphones? Didn’t it feel like someone just walked on your grave? Well, it should be because images of Samsung’s forthcoming 3.5mm to USB-C dongle just leaked as the final, irrefutable confirmation that Samsung will be joining the echelons of Apple, Google (not counting the budget Pixel 3A), and nearly every other flagship phone manufacturer in killing the headphone jack on the upcoming Galaxy Note 10, via SamMobile.
The images depict a dongle that is precise as you’d expect: there’s a USB-C jack on one end and a 3.5mm input on the other. Samsung seems to be using a sturdier, tapered connector that slopes down to the wire, instead of the more fragile step-style of reinforcement that both Apple and Google use on their respective dongles.
It is expected that Samsung will include the new dongle in the box with the Galaxy Note 10 and Note 10 Plus, which will likely soften the blow. While the cost for spare or replacement dongles hasn’t been revealed yet, it’ll presumably fall near the same $9 to $12 range that another dongles cost.
But it is not about how much the dongle costs. It is the cost of the inexorable march forward of progress, regardless of what systems break along the way, the cost of an industry that always insists that “new is better,” albeit it is not the case.
With Samsung, the last major holdout, seemingly on board with the effort to kill the 3.5mm headphone jack, the war on the headphone jack is effectively over, and the dongles have won.
It’s also expected that Samsung’s Galaxy Note 10 will be bundled with a pair of wired USB-C in-ear earphones, possibly sporting active noise-canceling functionality, as per a recent tweet from noted leaker Roland Quandt.
Of course, as with all pre-launch rumors, we won’t know for sure if any of this is true until the Galaxy Note 10 is officially unveiled in New York on August 7, thus it is not an extended wait till we finally see it all.
