A Chinese company claims to have successfully cloned Apple's Lightning cable, and has produced its own third-party cable and dock.
The iPhone 5 Flash Lightning Dock has been created by iPhone5mod, and is one of the first third-party accessories with Apple's lightning connector standard to be mass-produced.
Apple has yet to authorise third-party Lightning-equipped accessories, and has been reported to be demanding that any Made For iPad, iPhone or iPod companies that want to launch a Lightning product must produce them in an Apple approved facility, which there are currently none of.
READ: Apple's iPhone 5 Lightning connector spawns accessory delays
Apple's Lightning connector requires a specific authentication chip, which meant that unauthorised third-party accessories were unlikely to be compatible with the iPhone 5 and other Lightning devices.
Chinese suppliers were said to be working to clone the chips, but it was expected that this could take some time and mean that compatible accessories would not be available for months.
iPhone5mod's Flash Lightning Dock is reported to be capable of the same functionalities as Apple's Lightning cable, with the added bonus of a dock, and even a glowing cable.
MacRumors reports that iPhone5mod have said that they are "currently using original Lightning controller chips from Apple's supplier," which ensures the correct functionality, and enables support for iTunes, data sync, battery charging for the iPhone 5 and future iOS upgrades.
Following the discovery of iPhone5mod's Lightning Dock, the company's website experienced such high traffic that they were forced to close temporarily to update their server.
iPhone5mod also claims to have got their hands on "cracked chips that bypass Apple's authentication functions," and that those are up to the same standards as Apple's chips.
This indicates that third-party Lightning accessories are about to flood the market, while Apple's Lightning adapters continue to be in short supply, and some customers have even received a refund for their order.
See also:
Apple granted wireless adapter patent that could solve Lightning compatibility issues
What Apple's new Lightning connector means for you
iPhone 5 owners report Lightning connectors stuck in USB ports
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Comments received
Dragonfly said on Wed, 10 Oct 2012
Why they didn't make lightening the partner to thunderbolt.... I have no idea. It would have been a huge boon for those contemplating Mac hardware if you could transfer data to your phone on a few seconds.
droid said on Wed, 10 Oct 2012
Thunderbolt isn't standard across all Macs yet (the Mac Pro still doesn't have it).
Thunderbolt support on Windows is less widespread, and that is a pretty large market for Apple (there are more iPhones & iPads than Mac users).
Thunderbolt should be faster, but the flash storage inside the iPhone & Touch cannot run at the speed of a Thunderbolt connection.
The new lightning connector doesn't even run at USB 3 speeds yet, it's still USB 2.
In theory Thunderbolt & Lightning will be good, but not until the hardware catches up.
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