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Unsurprising, as there aren't any BT codecs that could provide the necessary bandwidth. By its very nature BT audio is lossy and compressed. This seems like a
by _djo_ 5y ago
Unsurprising, as there aren't any BT codecs that could provide the necessary bandwidth. By its very nature BT audio is lossy and compressed.
This seems like a bit of a non-story, though it does highlight the value there would have been in giving the AirPods Max a high quality wired audio option.
- tombert 5y agoCouldn't they have invented a non-standard codec that used data transfer to support this though? Like, I know this isn't trivial, but I could send a FLAC file between computers right now, and this is hardly a recent thing. Couldn't they conceivably use some HLS-esque thing on top of bluetooth to accomplish this? Granted, I suspect the issue might be bandwidth being too low to make this realistic.
- _djo_ 5y agoPossibly. That's the route Sony went with LDAC, which goes up to 990kbps.[0] It still isn't proper Hi-Res and won't be enough for Apple's Hi-Res Lossless, but it's a lot better than standard BT audio. [0]https://www.soundguys.com/ldac-ultimate-bluetooth-guide-20026/ https://www.soundguys.com/ldac-ultimate-bluetooth-guide-2002...
- rasz 5y ago>Hi-Res heh, audiophool market is so incredibly stupid. Wooden knobs, extra special power cables, and now audio recordings for Bats. All you gain as a human are aliasing artifacts.
- adrusi 5y agoSony's headphones do digital signal processing of the incoming signal. For instance, there's a user adjustable equalizer. This happens in the headphones themselves, rather than on the device they're connected to. This stuff does truly benefit from a higher bitrate.
- rasz 5y agoHow do you benefit from the recorded signal in bands humans are unable to hear?
- smoldesu 5y agoThat's not how audio codecs encode audio though. If we directly cut off bands that were difficult to encode, most codecs would stop writing anything above 1500hz, and then you'd be listening to a useless mumbled mess. A lossy audio codec will use the FFT algorithm to encode the entire spectrum, and the quality controls how aggressive the algorithm quantizes the waveform (through a process called sampling). On a lossless file, the compression will decode to an identical representation of the original master.
- rasz 5y ago>If we directly cut off bands that were difficult to encode not difficult to encode, inaudible to humans >entire spectrum oh boy, so why does Hi-Res stop at 192KHz? clearly its not the entire spectrum. We should be encoding at least to couple MHz, right? more better!
- goalieca 5y agoHehe. You jest but MHz is the range of ultrasound and is pretty useless in air.
- cush 5y agoIt makes sense that creative license is taken in the engineering of electronics targeted at people who love the art of music. Wooden knobs are fun. People like things that are fun. Chill out.
- rasz 5y agohttp://bobbyowsinski.blogspot.com/2012/05/485-volume-knob.html http://bobbyowsinski.blogspot.com/2012/05/485-volume-knob.ht... "Dynamics are better and overall naturalness is improved. Here is a test for all you Silver Rock owners. Try removing the bakelite knobs and listen. You will be shocked by this! The signature knobs will have an even greater effect…really amazing! The point here is the micro vibrations created by the volume pots and knobs find their way into the delicate signal path and cause degradation (Bad vibrations equal bad sound). With the signature knobs micro vibrations from the C37 concept of wood, bronze and the lacquer itself compensate for the volume pots and provide (Good Vibrations) our ear/brain combination like to hear…way better sound!!"
- cush 5y agoA 2012 blogspot opinion piece? Alright bud. "Now to be fair, I couldn't find the actual website for the above as the link now provides an error message"
- rasz 5y agohttps://web.archive.org/web/20060110015507/http://www.referenceaudiomods.com/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Product_Code=NOB_C37_C&Category_Code=VOLUME&Product_Count=2 https://web.archive.org/web/20060110015507/http://www.refere...
- cush 5y agoI will only accept your rebuttal in the form of an e-postcard https://web.archive.org/web/20000511085018/http://www.askjeeves.com/ https://web.archive.org/web/20000511085018/http://www.askjee...
- 5y ago
- dTal 5y agoCare to explain how increased sampling rate can possibly cause aliasing artifacts of all things?
- itake 5y agoMy guess is there are power constraints. Higher bandwidth would require more processing power and memory usage which would kill battery life.
- tombert 5y agoThat's fair, I guess they don't really want to force people to have a cell the size of a car battery strapped to their head to listen to music, but it does seem a bit strange to me that a company that prides itself on integrating all their devices to all their other devices didn't see this as a bad PR move. EDIT: Added a "don't" to the first sentence.
- KMnO4 5y agoI once had an old iPod with 128kbps MP3 copies of my FLAC library. I reencoded everything as 256kbps AAC audio (double the bitrate) and noticed the battery life went way up. Turns out those devices had better hardware decoding for AAC.
- viktorcode 5y agoThere are lossless audio wireless gaming headsets. Astro A40 used Kleer, which is 16/44KHz stereo. And now there's also Audeze Penrose. It should be noted though, that gaming headsets have different priorities. They usually sport bulky design enabling bigger batteries, and low audio latency is a must, so whatever codec is in use it must work fast.
- geon 5y agoWhy though? The sound will be played through a couple of medium quality in-ear ear buds. It’s not like anything above 320 kbps mp3 will be detectable.
- KMnO4 5y agoThat’s like saying “no video nitrates over 10mbps will have noticeable improvement”. It’s definitely true if you’re watching, say, Khan Academy. Switch it to a fireworks show and watch the quality suffer. 320kbps MP3 just means the codec allocates 320kb to store each second of compressed signal. Obviously some signals compress better than others and need much lower than that for an acceptable quality (audiobooks are often distributed at 64kbps).
- cush 5y agoExactly. Audio codecs for VOIP run as low as 6kbps and sound really good for voices, but completely break down if you try to play any kind of music through them.
- geon 5y agoFrom my own experience, 320kbps MP3 is enough to handle any music without noticable audio degradation. I have not done double blind tests, and this was in my 20s when my hearing was a lot better, but at 128 kbps I could clearly hear the loss of quality in some spots like cymbal crashes. At 192 kbps I could not tell the difference between the mp3 and lossless, using good over-ear earphones or speakers. And as I said, the airpods are medium quality earbuds. Not bad, not great. You will NOT hear any loss of audio quality if you play 320 kbps mp3 through them. I'm sure most people could not hear any quality loss on 128 kbps mp3 (I don't these days), or even 64. But above 320 there is just no way.
- IndySun 5y agoOften, when people say 'I couldn't (or cannot) hear the difference' they are not, or have not, been a/b'ing or making other technically meaningful comparisons. It is effectively saying, 'when I listened to the mp3 it sounded the same as when I listened to the lossless'. These are aesthetic remarks, which also count, but they may not be of value for everyone else.
- Shank 5y agoFor whatever it's worth, Apple does sell a lightning to 3.5mm cable for wired audio: https://smile.amazon.com/Apple-Lightning-3-5mm-Audio-Cable/dp/B07Z5R5DL4/ https://smile.amazon.com/Apple-Lightning-3-5mm-Audio-Cable/d.... Arguably there should just be a lightning-to-lightning connection option, but where there's a dongle, there's a way.
- xd1936 5y agoSounds like a job for an iPhone connected to an Apple Lightning to 3.5mm Adapter connected to a 3.5mm cable connected to another Lighting to 3.5mm Adapter to my AirPods!
- adrusi 5y agoThat converts the digital signal to analog and back again, which isn't ideal.
- sneak 5y agoI use this device all of the time with a TRRS gaming headset. Ideally is corded mic and corded ethernet. Failing that, corded headset and wifi from a phone is runner up.
- cosmotic 5y agoBluetooth 3.0 + HS supports 24mbit, certainly enough for 1.4mbit uncompressed CD audio which likely gets compressed to around 0.7mbit using FLAC or the like. Not sure what HS impact is on energy consumption though.
- kitsunesoba 5y agoYeah this is why for me, the Max's are a complement to my desk DAC+HD6XX setup, enabling a wired-like experience away from the desk, without wires. No it's not full fidelity, but that's not really the point.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- cush 5y agoIt's a complete non-story. Nothing BT offers comes anywhere close to wired. Latency, fidelity and stability are all basically 100% in even the cheapest wired connection.
- Mediterraneo10 5y agoBT does allow you to get around a low-quality DAC on a phone though. If you have decent headphones and listen to music where fidelity really matters (classical, jazz), you can quite readily tell the difference between the wired headphone output on a low-end Android device and e.g. the same headphones plugged into a FiiO Bluetooth amp connected to the phone.
- cush 5y agoVery true. I was using the fiio BTR3 for a while with my last phone which didn't have a headphone jack. But keeping the connection was so frustrating... It would just randomly drop or crackle. Making sure it was charged too. I switched to a galaxy s10 which is okay fidelity-wise but at least it's usable. Then I got a portable music player for music and audio books which was a game changer. Will never go back, so long as BT is the wireless standard.
- smoldesu 5y agoKinda makes you wish Apple just put a headphone jack on their $500 headphones so it could be a proper competitor with it's peers.
- cush 5y agoI would have bought them had they did. I think they're gorgeous and hear they're the best wireless experience out there right now. It's a 3.5mm deal-breaker.
- smoldesu 5y agoThe good news is that their competitors aren't afraid to fill in the gaps. I've heard nothing but good things about the Surface Headphones, which also offer the same ANC/over-ear setup as the Airpods Max, just at a $350 cheaper price.
- pupppet 5y agoI dunno, Apple tossed the headphone jack to the curb and has been preaching the wonders of wireless and now they've introduced a product that can't use wireless. Seems relevant to me.