6 ms·

Mid range studio quality with active noise cancelation, great build quality, good BL codecs (aptx HD+ || LDAC)? Name that pair please. Those 8y Bose QCs are not

by chimen 6y ago

Mid range studio quality with active noise cancelation, great build quality, good BL codecs (aptx HD+ || LDAC)? Name that pair please. Those 8y Bose QCs are not even close to being a mid-range studio quality and are worst than a sony xm2 or xm3 in terms of ANC, built entirely of plastic also. You people are so quick to bash on this company for no reason. The only headset that I consider on par with this one is the recently released (at 800 euro) bang and Olufsen n95. The price is not always the sum of parts.

brokensegue 6y ago
WH1000XM4 is still much cheaper than the apple headphones. I doubt it's studio quality but I also doubt that of apple's offering (or the need for such quality).
- chimen 6y ago
  I have the WH1000XM4. It's like a Renault near a Mercedes when comapred with these ones (buld quality) or near BO n95. Depends what you want. My right earcup (right where it pivots) broke 2 weeks in. 100% plastic. ANC is good though I give them that. Also, "much cheaper" is only a feature when all other aspects match.
  - brokensegue 6y ago
    well anecdotes are anecdotes. I've had one in this line for years with no issues. I also had a parrot zik 2 which was all metal and way more expensive and it was generally worse.
  - what_ever 6y ago
    Another anecdote - I have been using my Bose QC 25 for 5 years without any issues. Yes, the plastic ones. Worn almost every day.
- threeseed 6y ago
  WH1000XM4 should be cheaper. - Controls are annoying i.e. you have to swipe 20 times on the earcup and then waiting for a deafening beep to set the maximum volume. - Loses track of current volume on different devices. - Pairing with multiple devices rarely works. - Audio quality is average. The only reason people rave about is its noise cancelling.
  - smileybarry 6y ago
    > Controls are annoying i.e. you have to swipe 20 times on the earcup and then waiting for a deafening beep to set the maximum volume. IIRC you can swipe and keep holding to keep increasing/decreasing volume until you let go. > Loses track of current volume on different devices. That might be somewhat intentional, Android remembers volume per-device (or in case of wired headphones, one separate volume for all wired headphones). When you connect/plug in a device you plugged in before, the volume automatically changes. Sony could be offloading this logic to the device on purpose.
- caconym_ 6y ago
  So you’re stating the obvious, that there’s a cheaper product out there that’s inferior to what Apple claims of their new headphones, and also opining that Apple is probably overstating the sound quality of their new headphones ... and that even if they aren’t overstating it, nobody could possibly want or need that kind of quality? Despite the fact that some people are out there paying tens of thousands of dollars for headphones? I don’t know if these will find the market Apple is hoping for, but seriously what is the point of this comment? Just to be negative for negativity’s sake? I’m not trying to be confrontational or dickish—I just don’t get it. Every time Apple launches some new expensive product it’s the same old story, people saying it’s going to be crappy and anyway who would buy it at that ridiculous price? and then it turns out that it’s actually not crappy, and some people buy it and like it a lot. I don’t see why we should expect anything different here.
  - actuator 6y ago
    The way I read their comment, they meant that even though Sony doesn't use the term studio headphones, they probably might be as good as whatever Apple is claiming the sound quality to be. The doubt was on the marketing term and the worth of the actual quality on the price. Airpods don't have the best sound, several rival wireless earphones beat them to that.
    - caconym_ 6y ago
      The comment said this: > I doubt it's studio quality but I also doubt that of apple's offering (or the need for such quality). Seems to me that the doubt is on charging $550 for mediocre sound or on whether better sound actually matters, depending on whether the sound turns out to be mediocre or not. That way we can be negative about Apple’s pricey new doodad regardless of whether it’s actually good or not—how convenient! > Airpods don't have the best sound, several rival wireless earphones beat them to that. I have not claimed otherwise and probably never will.
      - brokensegue 6y ago
        Yes. For most people buying studio quality is not a good value proposition. I doubt they will get that quality and in general most people don't notice the difference. Why is being skeptical of a product announcement problematic? Is stone-faced indifference the only acceptable response? Can I also not speculate on a film's quality from its trailer?
- actuator 6y ago
  I have XM2's and they are still running perfect. Coming from Bose, I love both sound and ANC. As long as this series exist, I am not sure I can even look at these.
cloogshicer 6y ago
I'd actually agree with that, they're probably pretty great in the ways that you've mentioned. Which is why I'm sad that they'll become obsolete after a while. I'm sure they'd still make great studio headphones for listening at home in 15 years when the battery is long dead (if they worked passively).
- spullara 6y ago
  Why do folks believe that Apple won't replace the batteries for a reasonable price like they do everything else?
  - Reason077 6y ago
    Of course they'll replace the batteries, for $79. Free if under warranty or AppleCare+. It's right there on the support page: https://support.apple.com/airpods/repair/service#battery https://support.apple.com/airpods/repair/service#battery
    - redler 6y ago
      That's surprisingly reasonable for a $550 product with what's probably a custom high-energy-density battery.
    - acomjean 6y ago
      For how long depends how long till the designate the model "Vintage/Obsolete". Typically 5 years if their computers/iphones/Beats headphones are anything to go by. You can always try your luck on the third party market after that. https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201624 https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201624
  - yarcob 6y ago
    Because they charge pretty high prices for battery swaps. For my two year old Airpods they would charge 55€ per pod + another 55€ for the battery in the case, which means that getting new batteries costs as much as the Airpods cost in the first place. (Prices in Austria) I hope my second pair lasts longer. For the Airpods Max they currently list a price of 87€, but as far as I understand there's only one battery to swap. But 87€ every few years is still a high maintenance price, hoping they don't increase that price. Also, Apple only offers service for a few years. I have a few bloated Macs that would need a new battery but Apple just doesn't service them anymore. For many devices you can get replacement batteries from 3rd party sellers, but quality is hit or miss -- there's no guarantee the replacement battery is going to last (but in my experience Apple's replacement batteries are also unreliable sometimes). Most of my Hifi gear is more than 15 years old. I doubt any of Apple's new audio products will last that long.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
mustacheemperor 6y ago
Not to mention the smart digital signal processing these will leverage to deliver better sound quality, which is a potential innovation to headphone design at large that Apple is uniquely positioned to create via their existing expertise. As a happy XM3 owner, I think if these are feature by feature identical to the XM3 they will be quite overpriced. I also think that itself is very unlikely, and that they will have additional qualities justifying the price premium. There's lots of room to improve, for example, the quality of your voice as picked up by the mic, especially in windy environments. Speaking of that, walking outside on a windy day can be really intrusive with the XM3s because the ANC tries to 'cancel' the wind and you get weird sounds in your ears. Those seem like cases where Apple is well suited to make dramatic improvements via DSP. Tech like the noise canceling the HoloLens 2 applies to its mic (to cut out noise from around the speaker) seems well within their capability. I don't make much use of the XM3's "smart" features because they're pretty compromised. Their 'transparency' mode/partial noise canceling mode is really more intrusive than useful. It doesn't sound like I am partly-canceling background noise, it sounds like microphones are selectively filtering some of what they pick up into my music while I walk outside. So I think there's definitely enough space for Apple to innovate on sound quality and other aspects of the wireless headset experience to justify the margin. Edit: Also, multi-device pairing and handoff is super janky with the XM3s. Worth mentioning, I had the XM2s beforehand and the mic was literally unusable on conference calls no matter where I used it - people would complain and ask me what was wrong with my phone every time. Wireless headphones are not a solved problem.
- woadwarrior01 6y ago
  I’ve got a pair of XM3s that I’ve used daily for a bit over 2 years now. And I don’t plan on buying the Airpods Max yet. XM3s hardware build quality is excellent. The biggest problem with XM3s is the crappy software. The iOS app that demands always on background location access. Although I’d learnt soon enough that it’s perfectly usable without the app. This is where Apple really shines, in the integrated hardware and software experience. The multi device pairing support on Bose headsets is slightly better than on Sony headsets, although both done even come close to how well AirPods do it on Apple devices.
mstade 6y ago
https://www.bang-olufsen.com/en/comparison/products/headphones/beoplay-h9/beoplay-h95/beoplay-h4 https://www.bang-olufsen.com/en/comparison/products/headphon... I have the B&O H9 3rd gen and I love them. I have no idea whether they stack up to what your write on the tech stack side of things, but the sound is phenomenal I think and that’s what matters to me. The mic is useless, but I don’t ever use them for anything but music anyhow.
dharma1 6y ago
I’m curious to hear the Apple headphones. There aren’t many studio quality headphones with ANC because studio headphones are usually open back, and it makes little sense to put ANC in open back headphones. I reserve judgement but don’t think the Apple headphones will compete with headphones used for mixing and mastering. There has been relatively little innovation in headphones (and speakers) the last decade or so aside from DSP correction. The last really innovative (from an audio engineering point of view) headphone in my book is the HEDDphone with Air Motion Transfer drivers previously unseen outside some exotic speakers. But it’s $2000, weighs 700g and requires an amp to drive it. I look forward to hearing the Apple headphones but am sceptical you can get as much of a boost with “computational audio” as you can with computational photography, compared to “dumb” headphones with similar drivers and tuning. I think the spatial audio stuff is interesting and possibly better than previous attempts on headphones. I think well off people will buy these headphones for the convenience factor (works and sounds marginally better than the next best competitor), and Apple will probably release a less expensive version down the line.
nvarsj 6y ago
That’s not even true. Bose QC35 ii measure objectively very well for headphones. They, like other high quality ANC headphones, use the ANC mic to EQ themselves to a good reference target. Also no one uses closed back headphones for studio work. What does “mid range studio quality” even mean. The vast majority of professionals use speakers in a sound treated room for mixing. Those that use headphones do so very carefully, using EQ to get them to sound right (or getting used to the sound profile of the headphones). The most commonly used are Sennheiser open backs in this area - a pair of HD650 is probably most common. In general it’s fairly challenging to mix with headphones accurately though.

by chimen 6y ago

brokensegue 6y ago

WH1000XM4 is still much cheaper than the apple headphones. I doubt it's studio quality but I also doubt that of apple's offering (or the need for such quality).

chimen 6y ago
I have the WH1000XM4. It's like a Renault near a Mercedes when comapred with these ones (buld quality) or near BO n95. Depends what you want. My right earcup (right where it pivots) broke 2 weeks in. 100% plastic. ANC is good though I give them that. Also, "much cheaper" is only a feature when all other aspects match.
- brokensegue 6y ago
  well anecdotes are anecdotes. I've had one in this line for years with no issues. I also had a parrot zik 2 which was all metal and way more expensive and it was generally worse.
- what_ever 6y ago
  Another anecdote - I have been using my Bose QC 25 for 5 years without any issues. Yes, the plastic ones. Worn almost every day.
threeseed 6y ago
WH1000XM4 should be cheaper. - Controls are annoying i.e. you have to swipe 20 times on the earcup and then waiting for a deafening beep to set the maximum volume. - Loses track of current volume on different devices. - Pairing with multiple devices rarely works. - Audio quality is average. The only reason people rave about is its noise cancelling.
- smileybarry 6y ago
  > Controls are annoying i.e. you have to swipe 20 times on the earcup and then waiting for a deafening beep to set the maximum volume. IIRC you can swipe and keep holding to keep increasing/decreasing volume until you let go. > Loses track of current volume on different devices. That might be somewhat intentional, Android remembers volume per-device (or in case of wired headphones, one separate volume for all wired headphones). When you connect/plug in a device you plugged in before, the volume automatically changes. Sony could be offloading this logic to the device on purpose.
caconym_ 6y ago
So you’re stating the obvious, that there’s a cheaper product out there that’s inferior to what Apple claims of their new headphones, and also opining that Apple is probably overstating the sound quality of their new headphones ... and that even if they aren’t overstating it, nobody could possibly want or need that kind of quality? Despite the fact that some people are out there paying tens of thousands of dollars for headphones? I don’t know if these will find the market Apple is hoping for, but seriously what is the point of this comment? Just to be negative for negativity’s sake? I’m not trying to be confrontational or dickish—I just don’t get it. Every time Apple launches some new expensive product it’s the same old story, people saying it’s going to be crappy and anyway who would buy it at that ridiculous price? and then it turns out that it’s actually not crappy, and some people buy it and like it a lot. I don’t see why we should expect anything different here.
- actuator 6y ago
  The way I read their comment, they meant that even though Sony doesn't use the term studio headphones, they probably might be as good as whatever Apple is claiming the sound quality to be. The doubt was on the marketing term and the worth of the actual quality on the price. Airpods don't have the best sound, several rival wireless earphones beat them to that.
  - caconym_ 6y ago
    The comment said this: > I doubt it's studio quality but I also doubt that of apple's offering (or the need for such quality). Seems to me that the doubt is on charging $550 for mediocre sound or on whether better sound actually matters, depending on whether the sound turns out to be mediocre or not. That way we can be negative about Apple’s pricey new doodad regardless of whether it’s actually good or not—how convenient! > Airpods don't have the best sound, several rival wireless earphones beat them to that. I have not claimed otherwise and probably never will.
    - brokensegue 6y ago
      Yes. For most people buying studio quality is not a good value proposition. I doubt they will get that quality and in general most people don't notice the difference. Why is being skeptical of a product announcement problematic? Is stone-faced indifference the only acceptable response? Can I also not speculate on a film's quality from its trailer?
actuator 6y ago
I have XM2's and they are still running perfect. Coming from Bose, I love both sound and ANC. As long as this series exist, I am not sure I can even look at these.

cloogshicer 6y ago

I'd actually agree with that, they're probably pretty great in the ways that you've mentioned. Which is why I'm sad that they'll become obsolete after a while. I'm sure they'd still make great studio headphones for listening at home in 15 years when the battery is long dead (if they worked passively).

spullara 6y ago
Why do folks believe that Apple won't replace the batteries for a reasonable price like they do everything else?
- Reason077 6y ago
  Of course they'll replace the batteries, for $79. Free if under warranty or AppleCare+. It's right there on the support page: https://support.apple.com/airpods/repair/service#battery https://support.apple.com/airpods/repair/service#battery
  - redler 6y ago
    That's surprisingly reasonable for a $550 product with what's probably a custom high-energy-density battery.
  - acomjean 6y ago
    For how long depends how long till the designate the model "Vintage/Obsolete". Typically 5 years if their computers/iphones/Beats headphones are anything to go by. You can always try your luck on the third party market after that. https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201624 https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201624
- yarcob 6y ago
  Because they charge pretty high prices for battery swaps. For my two year old Airpods they would charge 55€ per pod + another 55€ for the battery in the case, which means that getting new batteries costs as much as the Airpods cost in the first place. (Prices in Austria) I hope my second pair lasts longer. For the Airpods Max they currently list a price of 87€, but as far as I understand there's only one battery to swap. But 87€ every few years is still a high maintenance price, hoping they don't increase that price. Also, Apple only offers service for a few years. I have a few bloated Macs that would need a new battery but Apple just doesn't service them anymore. For many devices you can get replacement batteries from 3rd party sellers, but quality is hit or miss -- there's no guarantee the replacement battery is going to last (but in my experience Apple's replacement batteries are also unreliable sometimes). Most of my Hifi gear is more than 15 years old. I doubt any of Apple's new audio products will last that long.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

mustacheemperor 6y ago

Not to mention the smart digital signal processing these will leverage to deliver better sound quality, which is a potential innovation to headphone design at large that Apple is uniquely positioned to create via their existing expertise. As a happy XM3 owner, I think if these are feature by feature identical to the XM3 they will be quite overpriced. I also think that itself is very unlikely, and that they will have additional qualities justifying the price premium. There's lots of room to improve, for example, the quality of your voice as picked up by the mic, especially in windy environments. Speaking of that, walking outside on a windy day can be really intrusive with the XM3s because the ANC tries to 'cancel' the wind and you get weird sounds in your ears. Those seem like cases where Apple is well suited to make dramatic improvements via DSP. Tech like the noise canceling the HoloLens 2 applies to its mic (to cut out noise from around the speaker) seems well within their capability. I don't make much use of the XM3's "smart" features because they're pretty compromised. Their 'transparency' mode/partial noise canceling mode is really more intrusive than useful. It doesn't sound like I am partly-canceling background noise, it sounds like microphones are selectively filtering some of what they pick up into my music while I walk outside. So I think there's definitely enough space for Apple to innovate on sound quality and other aspects of the wireless headset experience to justify the margin. Edit: Also, multi-device pairing and handoff is super janky with the XM3s. Worth mentioning, I had the XM2s beforehand and the mic was literally unusable on conference calls no matter where I used it - people would complain and ask me what was wrong with my phone every time. Wireless headphones are not a solved problem.

woadwarrior01 6y ago
I’ve got a pair of XM3s that I’ve used daily for a bit over 2 years now. And I don’t plan on buying the Airpods Max yet. XM3s hardware build quality is excellent. The biggest problem with XM3s is the crappy software. The iOS app that demands always on background location access. Although I’d learnt soon enough that it’s perfectly usable without the app. This is where Apple really shines, in the integrated hardware and software experience. The multi device pairing support on Bose headsets is slightly better than on Sony headsets, although both done even come close to how well AirPods do it on Apple devices.

mstade 6y ago

https://www.bang-olufsen.com/en/comparison/products/headphones/beoplay-h9/beoplay-h95/beoplay-h4 https://www.bang-olufsen.com/en/comparison/products/headphon... I have the B&O H9 3rd gen and I love them. I have no idea whether they stack up to what your write on the tech stack side of things, but the sound is phenomenal I think and that’s what matters to me. The mic is useless, but I don’t ever use them for anything but music anyhow.

dharma1 6y ago

I’m curious to hear the Apple headphones. There aren’t many studio quality headphones with ANC because studio headphones are usually open back, and it makes little sense to put ANC in open back headphones. I reserve judgement but don’t think the Apple headphones will compete with headphones used for mixing and mastering. There has been relatively little innovation in headphones (and speakers) the last decade or so aside from DSP correction. The last really innovative (from an audio engineering point of view) headphone in my book is the HEDDphone with Air Motion Transfer drivers previously unseen outside some exotic speakers. But it’s $2000, weighs 700g and requires an amp to drive it. I look forward to hearing the Apple headphones but am sceptical you can get as much of a boost with “computational audio” as you can with computational photography, compared to “dumb” headphones with similar drivers and tuning. I think the spatial audio stuff is interesting and possibly better than previous attempts on headphones. I think well off people will buy these headphones for the convenience factor (works and sounds marginally better than the next best competitor), and Apple will probably release a less expensive version down the line.

nvarsj 6y ago

That’s not even true. Bose QC35 ii measure objectively very well for headphones. They, like other high quality ANC headphones, use the ANC mic to EQ themselves to a good reference target. Also no one uses closed back headphones for studio work. What does “mid range studio quality” even mean. The vast majority of professionals use speakers in a sound treated room for mixing. Those that use headphones do so very carefully, using EQ to get them to sound right (or getting used to the sound profile of the headphones). The most commonly used are Sennheiser open backs in this area - a pair of HD650 is probably most common. In general it’s fairly challenging to mix with headphones accurately though.