iPhone 5 new dock connector

[carbondated]

As much as I get annoyed with Apple changing their connectors every few years or so, I have to say the new dock connector is a great improvement over the 30-pin connector that they haven't changed since the days of Firewire iPods. They claim that the new, reversible 8-pin is completely digital. The old 30-pin connector had line-level audio out, as the pinout chart tells us:


Pin Signal Description
1 GND Ground (-), internally connected with Pin 2 on iPhone motherboard
2 GND Audio & Video ground (-), internally connected with Pin 1 on iPod motherboard
3 Right Line Out - R (+) (Audio output, right channel) . See also Apple iPhone headset connector pinout
4 Left Line Out - L(+) (Audio output, left channel)
5 Right In Line In - R (+)
6 Left In Line In - L (+)
8
9
10
11 GND If connected to GND the iPhone sends audio signals through pin 3-4, otherwise it uses onboard speaker.
12 Tx iPhone sending line, Serial TxD
13 Rx
iPhone receiving line, Serial RxD

14 RSVD Reserved
15 GND Ground (-), internally connected with pin 16 on iPhone motherboard
16 GND USB GND (-), internally connected with pin 15 on iPhone motherboard
17 RSVD Reserved
18 3.3V 3.3V Power (+) ?
19,20 +12V Firewire Power 12 VDC (+)
21 Accessory Indicator/Serial enable
Different resistances indicate accessory type:
1kOhm - docking station, beeps when connected
68kOhm - makes iPhone 3g send audio through line-out without any messages
500kOhm - related to serial communication / used to enable serial communications Used in Dension Ice Link Plus car interface
1MOhm - Belkin auto adaptor, iPod shuts down automatically when power disconnected Connecting pin 21 to ground with a 1MOhm resistor does stop the ipod when power (i.e. Firewire-12V) is cut. Looks to be that when this pin is grounded it closes a switch so that on loss of power the Ipod shuts off. Dock has the same Resistor.

22 TPA (-) FireWire Data TPA (-)
23 5 VDC (+) USB Power 5 VDC (+)
24 TPA (+) FireWire Data TPA (+)
25 Data (-) USB Data (-)
26 TPB (-) FireWire Data TPB (-)
27 Data (+)
USB Data (+)
Pins 25 and 27 may be used in different manner.
28 TPB (+) FireWire Data TPB (+)
29,30 GND FireWire Ground (-)


...but the new 8-pin connector does not:


Pin 1 GND ground
Pin 2 L0p lane 0 positive
Pin 3 L0n lane 0 negative
Pin 4 ID0 identification/control 0
Pin 5 PWR power (charge or battery)
Pin 6 L1n lane 1 negative
Pin 7 L1p lane 1 positive
Pin 8 ID1 identification/control 1


Yet with the 8-pin to 30-pin adapter (which costs P1500!!) I still get an analogue audio output. So does that mean that this adapter has a DAC built into it??!

[carbondated]

Since I found out the answer to my own question, I'll post the results here. The Apple Lightning to 30-pin connector does contain a DAC, the Wolfson WM8533 and a Cirrus Logic Audio decoder. This explains why the sound (for me) is not as good as through the old audio out through the 30 pin connector, which used the internal DAC of the iPod/iPhone.

Here's the text from
http://www.chipworks.com/en/technical-c ... n-adapter/





Inside the Apple Lightning to 30 Pin Adapter

In our last teardown blog we promised that it would be the last one on an Apple product for at least a short while (we have a nice DSLR camera and a frightening Halloween teardown queued-up).

Lesson learned. Don’t make promises.

Reverse engineering is not forward engineering done backwards and so you never know what you will learn or when you will learn it. Enter the Apple Lightning Adapter plug. Deserving of some analysis since we are undertaking a full systems report on this particular slice of Apple technology. To quote one of our engineers, “there is a ridiculous amount of silicon here”, so when you plunk down your $30 you can feel satisfied that you are getting value-for-money.


Lightning Board Side 1
Once we have the board we can start cataloging the chips. On the one side of the board we have the same NXP20P3 that is also present in the lightning cable. It continues to present as an analog chip with very large transistors or diodes (confirmed with the polysilicon layer image). We think this is most likely an multi-channel interface filter. Again, this is looking at a die photo and not a complete RE project, but at this point we are fairly comfortable saying that.

We were initially surprised by the lack of a package similar to the Texas Instruments BQ2025 that was found in the cable, but after the depot treatment it was right there in the package marked 261L025, right below the NXP chip.

Over on the right side of the board we have the package marked DZB0J2CH with an Intersil ISL9110die inside. According to their website this is a 1.2 A High Efficiency Buck-Boost Regulator.



Lightning Board Side 2
Here we have the bulk of the media devices. The Wolfson WM8533 DAC, that we think is taking the digital audio and converting it into the analog signal that the 30 pin delivers.

We also have the Apple 338S1081 which is a Cirrus Logic audio chip with die markings CLI1596A0 and date code 2011. For those who might be wondering as to its functionality, it didn’t directly compare to the die we cataloged in the prior generations of iPhones (in the models we tore down).

We are adding this to our library of Functional Analysis Reports on Apple/Cirrus Logic.

No surprise is that there are no similar chips here for converting video since there is no support for video out into the older 30-pin devices. This may impact some niche peripherals out there, but you can’t fight progress.



Other devices depotted
The 8APLSGVG218Z which is an STMicroelectronics design win with die markings R764B
The VCR package had a die with markings that decoded to the Texas Instruments SN74AVC2T245 dual bit non-inverting BUS transceiver
An unknown die with the marking “F” (last one at right)