When Apple unveiled the iPad, they also announced they would release a dongle called Camera Connection Kit to allow users to connect digital cameras and SD cards to their iPads. When the Camera Connection Kit became available, users found out that it was possible to plug a series of USB devices, keyboards (even Apple’s ones) and microphones in the iPad. The device running the old iOS 3.2 recognized the peripherals just fine.

As reported by Mark Gurman at 9to5mac last night, though, it seems like there is a bug on the recently released iOS 4.2 that prevents devices requiring more than 20mA of power to be connected to the iPad:

The essence of the issue with the connection kit and iOS 4.2 is that connected devices that require power of more than 20mA will no longer work. That means that many USB keyboards (Apple’s included) will no longer work with the iPad, as well as USB flash drives. When the user connects a device that is not self-powered and requires more than 20mA of power from the iPad they get the following alert: “The connected USB device requires too much power.

As you can guess, that’s not great news for photographers and users alike who got accustomed to plugging a variety of digital cameras, USB hubs and mics in the iPad. The issues have been also widely documented on Apple’s own discussion boards.

What’s interesting is that this might not be a bug at all, but a change Apple introduced on iOS 4.2. A day after the release of iOS 4.2 to the public, in fact, Apple updated its iPad Camera Connector support document, although we can’t confirm which actual changes went into the modified document.

As you can see, anyway, Apple clearly states:

If you use this accessory with other USB devices, you may see the following symptoms/alerts:

- Applications unexpectedly close or behave in an unexpected manner

- “The attached volume appears to be invalid”

- “Accessory Unavailable: The attached accessory uses too much power”

- “The attached USB device is not supported”

Perhaps Apple grew tired of users configuring unsupported with the iPad, such as Guitar Hero or Rock Band mics? Either a bug or a new “feature” in iOS 4.2, the Camera Connection Kit surely isn’t as useful as it used to be anymore.