AirPods 2 Teardown: H1 Chip With Bluetooth 5.0, Same Batteries, and Water-Repellent Coating on Charging Case Board

[iluvbeer99]

How many hours are you getting? I used them everyday since purchase and get about 1-2 hours out of the advertised 5 hours. Maybe 30 min talk time. My point stands.

yep, i get about 30 minutes talk time on my gen1's after a couple years of heavy use.

They are amazing for business calls and i'm fine getting a new pair every couple years.

Would it be nice to be able to replace the batteries? Sure, but I doubt it's happening anytime soon.

 

[DNichter]

Why did you buy them in the first place? I will never understand why people don't make calculated decisions, like I did after I decided to skip the first generation without even trying them. I was able to do that thanks to the reviews and the Bluetooth 4.2.

To give them a try and make a hands on assessment. I was hoping maybe they would sound better.
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You can always wait until fall to purchase new tech, but the trouble is knowing which year!

I think this was a missed opportunity for Apple. Feels like these should have been released last year.
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I agree. If your first gen of airpods are working fine, there's nothing compelling about these. In my case, my daughter basically took over my first pair. Not sold on the wireless charging at all (not charging fully on pad i got)..in fact, I kinda regret paying the extra for it but since the next iphone should provide charging for it, I'll keep them.

No issue there of course. I considered keeping mine anyway and just giving my old ones to a family member. Everyone has their reasoning, I was just kind of disappointed how little of an upgrade these are.

 

[votdfak]

A discount for bringing them old stuff that they're trying to sell? Why would they do that.

Old stuff that maybe can be recycled? Apple should definitely offer discounted price when you bring old pair, but whatever. I crushed one boy dreams when I told him that his shiny new AirPods will die in two years.

 

[matrix07]

It's apparent you don't own a 2-year old first gen AirPods as I do, I have a disposable product in front of me with depleted batteries that I wish I could easily swap them out and continue using them instead of throwing them in the trash.

All that amazing tech, H1, bluetooth 5, inductive case etc, all of that in the trash in 2 years because you can't replace batteries. And no, Apple's battery service costs almost the same as buying them new.

Great! Why don’t you go design a small wireless headphone this good that battery is replaceable so I can buy it to save the world? Go go go..

 

[Kabeyun]

I find it sad that people are willing to accept that battery powered products cannot have the batteries replaced.

Given the tiny size, intricate complexity, and demands for ever tighter waterproofing of some battery-containing devices, I find it sad and unrealistic that people expect all batteries to be user-replaceable.

 

[DNichter]

You got yours? No different to your previous gen?

Yea I got mine Wednesday, no difference for me. At first I felt it sounded a little clearer and louder, but then I went and did a longer comparison and they sound pretty much the same. It has faster pairing (you pair once and that's that) and wireless charging (once every 3 weeks for me) so I just see it as kind of waste. I've been trying to be a little smarter with my Apple upgrades.
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They aren’t releasing any new ones in fall

I heard some rumors from reliable sources on Twitter that they were. Who knows though, obviously you could be right. I think the initial plan was to release these last fall (with AirPower) and then release the updated ones this fall. This update was so small, I think they will.

 

[joueboy]

iFixit rated AirPod repairability 0 out 10 just like that!

 

[DNichter]

Lol a product that went ~2.5 years without an update is going to be updated again 6 months later?

Potentially yea. Might make sense with the release of the new iPhone and being able to charge from there. I have seen a few sources say new colors, better sound and materials are coming. These ones were manufactured last year so I think they were originally aiming for a Fall 2018 release along with AirPower. They tried to get AirPower right and couldn't, so got these out now. I could be wrong of course, but there are rumblings that is what happened.

 

[Kabeyun]

Yea I got mine Wednesday, no difference for me. At first I felt it sounded a little clearer and louder, but then I went and did a longer comparison and they sound pretty much the same. It has faster pairing (you pair once and that's that) and wireless charging (once every 3 weeks for me) so I just see it as kind of waste. I've been trying to be a little smarter with my Apple upgrades.

Btw, you can not pair two sets of new AirPods with, say, an AppleTV 4K, in spite of the fact that both have Bluetooth 5.0. MR tried it and it didn’t work. Don’t mean to threadjack, but I’m posting this where I can, since they didn’t include that disappointment in the hands-on review. I would have absolutely upgraded AirPods and my ATV for that alone.

 

[matrix07]

I find it sad that people are willing to accept that battery powered products cannot have the batteries replaced.

I couldn’t replace my Bose QC35 battery. Where’s the outrages? Where’s the sadness?

 

[benshive]

Really? What about the iPad that is non-repairable either and much larger? Literally the majority of Apple's lineup is now non-user repairable. And I don't get the hatred towards millennials as I see just as many Boomers and Gen Xers with AirPods as I do millennials. I do not see what sociology has to do with headphone choice.

There's a seemingly large amount of people that like to blame everything on millennials and bring all conversations to complaining about millennials. It's basically a dumb buzzword at this point.

 

[netdudeuk]

But that's, like, the point of the assessment? They grade repairability for whatever comes in. Dont take it personal.

Don't forget that the Samsung ones got 6/10, with the batteries being easily replaceable. Apple can do the high technology and they could do replaceable batteries if they wanted to.

 

[carrrrrlos]

Amazing engineering!

 

[TeamMojo]

iFixit has such a terrible worldview. It's great that they provide parts and videos. But their absolute expectation that things be made repairable is just ignorant, foolish, petty and dangerous. These are the guys that are behind the efforts of using government to force companies to make their products more "repairable." But what this ignores, and the reason why their efforts are so ignorant, is that there are very good reasons why the AirPods are not "repairable." Namely that they are tiny and low cost. To add screws, clips, seals, and other engineering for repairability would significantly increase the cost of the device, and most likely lower the dependability in that then they might be less sweatproof, etc. It's not that Apple just wants to make them hard to repair, it's that they are trying to produce a reliable product in very high volume at the lowest cost so that a lot of people can afford to purchase AirPods. Glue and welding happens to be the easiest way to make that happen.

The iFixit manifestos and other trite quasi authoritarian marketing jargon is just so lame. Manifestos are not good.

 

[netdudeuk]

Apple H1 chip in this AirPods is as powerful as A1 in iPhone 4 and much more powerful than the computer that sent people to the moon so yes, it’s an engineering triumph.

But they can't work out how to have a swappable battery ? Surely a much more trivial feat.

 

[matrix07]

Don't forget that the Samsung ones got 6/10, with the batteries being easily replaceable. Apple can do the high technology and they could do replaceable batteries if they wanted to.

Batteries in Samsung product had burnt people house & car down so yeah.. you go ahead and enjoy Samsung battery.

 

[DNichter]

Btw, you can NOT pair two sets of new AirPods with , say, an AppleTV 4K, in spite of the fact that both have Bluetooth 5.0. MR tried it and it didn’t work. Don’t mean to threadjack, but I’m posting this where I can, since they didn’t include that disappointment in the hands-on review. I would have absolutely upgraded AirPods and my ATV for that alone.

Yea, it's definitely strange that they didn't implement that feature. Oh well, happy to hang on to my current pair (still love them) and wait for the next version.

 

[matrix07]

But they can't work out how to have a swappable battery ? Surely a much more trivial feat.

I don’t think it’s trivial at all.

 

[netdudeuk]

Batteries in Samsung product had burnt people house & car down so yeah.. you go ahead and enjoy Samsung battery.

The one in the video is a Varta
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I don’t think it’s trivial at all.

Apple have made several devices with weirdly shaped batteries. They will probably sell millions of AirPods so worth the extra design effort. Think different

 

[matrix07]

Apple have made several devices with weirdly shaped batteries. They will probably sell millions of AirPods so worth the extra design effort. Think different

I don’t think it’s about an effort but design choice. I don’t think it’s as easy as you think but if you think it’s that easy, fine.

Makes one and I’ll shut up.

 

[DotCom2]

Wireless charging is the best part of it to be honest...

To be honest, I just don't see the attraction of Wireless especially on this device. They charge soooo fast via cable I don't see the need for me anyway. Plus I have cables all around my house so I can charge all my devices just about in any room as well as for my guests. And who doesn't have a cable in there car, purse, gym bag etc.? I just don't get the convenience unless you have an equal amount of charging mats as you do cables?
Someone please educate me on the wireless convenience for this device.

 

[Vjosullivan]

Given the tiny size, intricate complexity, and demands for ever tighter waterproofing of some battery-containing devices, I find it sad and unrealistic that people expect all batteries to be user-replaceable.

I'm pretty sure no-one anywhere has said that all batteries should be user replaceable. With respect to the AirPods though; making the batteries in them user replaceable (without compromising the rest of the design) would be a trivial problem for any competent design engineer and I'm pretty sure that Apple employs a lot of competent design engineers.

 

[truthertech]

"as iFixit says they remain "disappointingly disposable."

How does this article slip by the editors?

They aren't disposable, unless you choose to do so. The battery can be replaced by Apple ! I understand that iFixit has a grudge against Apple for designing products so small and complex that they are extraordinarily difficult for joe blow to work on, and that costs iFixit lost sale, but to simply repeat this propaganda is disappointing.

 

[Gilligan's last elephant]

Given the tiny size, intricate complexity, and demands for ever tighter waterproofing of some battery-containing devices, I find it sad and unrealistic that people expect all batteries to be user-replaceable.

Other manufacturers manage fine, the Galaxy Buds bring a perfect example of designing to allow battery replacement.

 

[Vjosullivan]

To be honest, I just don't see the attraction of Wireless ... I have cables all around my house/car/purse/gym/bag

I think you've just explained the attractiveness of wireless.