Recently I can see even the "audiophile" segments have people joining the flat response club. DSP speakers, room correction software (and room treatment of course), and a bunch of traditionally studio-only equipment makers entering the consumer market. These guys will do DSP filters whenever they want "colors".
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Apple Provides Details on Using High-Impedance Headphones With New MacBook Pros
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Inside headphones, moving electromagnetic coils make the membranes vibrate and produce sound. If the moving coil is lighter, it has less inertia and may react more precisely to the input signal, and reproduce sound more clearly. The coil can be made lighter by using thinner wire. In turn, thinner wire means higher impedance.
If the overall design of headphones is bad, high impedance alone won't help.
Whilst this is a welcome addition, I wonder how clean the signal is. In my experience almost every computer I’ve used is prone to some ground loop / mains interference noise.
Also, I wish they’d bring back the hybrid optical outputs in the minijack port. That’s what I currently use on my iMac 5K to output to my amplifier which has a built in DAC. It solved a myriad of signal noise issues I was experiencing with both USB to a prosumer external soundcard and analogue via minijack.
Also, I wish they’d bring back the hybrid optical outputs in the minijack port. That’s what I currently use on my iMac 5K to output to my amplifier which has a built in DAC. It solved a myriad of signal noise issues I was experiencing with both USB to a prosumer external soundcard and analogue via minijack.
If only Apple had the Courage to remove the headphone jacks from the MacBook Pros altogether. This is one step backwards for mankind.
/s
/s
Now add this port to iPads, too. Especially Air and Pro, but I'd suggest all iPads.
This is all pretty odd. It's hard to imagine a real audio professional plugging headphones into the laptop's headphone jack instead of using a USB DAC. But apparently Apple thought there would be some marketing value in adding this feature to the MacBook Pros. Meanwhile, they give us an outdated HDMI 2.0 port and a slow SD card slot.
You
You say that, but the proof is in the pudding. It’d be good to see some proper tests demonstrating the quality of the audio output (and thus internal DAC): both listening tests, but also factual signal tests… SNR at different output levels, jitter, dynamic range, etc.
Maybe it’s really good?! And if so, there’s no reason a pro shouldn’t use it when on-the-go (unless they’re carrying an external sound card anyway for the inputs/preamps).
You say that, but the proof is in the pudding. It’d be good to see some proper tests demonstrating the quality of the audio output (and thus internal DAC): both listening tests, but also factual signal tests… SNR at different output levels, jitter, dynamic range, etc.
Maybe it’s really good?! And if so, there’s no reason a pro shouldn’t use it when on-the-go (unless they’re carrying an external sound card anyway for the inputs/preamps).
Traditionally the older Apple actually shipped really decent DAC and kept the noisiness of its AC/DC internals to minimal, but that trend started to change after the iPod became nano and then the iPhone happened. It wouldn't be hard to imagine them putting some effort in shipping what they used to ship.
Also on the "pro always use external DACs and amps", well, there are all sorts of scenarios in a professional environment. Some part of the workflow you only need to make sure nothing is technically very wrong. The internal jack being more capable means you have more flexibility in deciding to use it or not.
That said, I still miss the TOSLINK combo 3.5mm port on retina MBPs and earlier...
Also on the "pro always use external DACs and amps", well, there are all sorts of scenarios in a professional environment. Some part of the workflow you only need to make sure nothing is technically very wrong. The internal jack being more capable means you have more flexibility in deciding to use it or not.
That said, I still miss the TOSLINK combo 3.5mm port on retina MBPs and earlier...
My big HomePod now supports Lossless, but the HomePod is a different beast compared to APM. It connects to WiFi and therefore has a huge bandwith advantages over the Bluetooth APM. How do you think Apple would overcome the Bluetooth bandwith issue considering APM not supporting WiFi?
If it makes no difference, then why are YOU upsampling all your lower resolution audio to higher sampling rates? Very hypocritical. Don’t tell me you’re not, unless you’re using a NOS DAC. In which case, let’s see it. Time for money to meet the mouthI love my Sennheiser HD800sThey sound astonishingly good. But I wouldn't be plugging them directly into a laptop. I have a (relatively) cheap portable DAC, and a desktop DAC for proper listening. The headphones sound phenomenal, but they are also open-backed with no sealing at all, so you can hear everything around you as well as the music. So a quiet room is essential.
Sample rates above CD quality make no difference at all for almost all situations and all listeners. 96 kHz stuff is all marketing.
Pro laptop for creators and smartphone are quite different thing.
Because there is a relationship between higher impedance and lower harmonic distortion. There are tons of articles and papers on this topic.
As far as people's excitement goes, whether you benefit from this new high-impedance support does not depend on whether or not you understand the theory behind it. It simply depends on whether or not you happen to have high-impedance headphones. The higher the impedance of your headphones, the less loud the will go at a fixed maximum voltage. So better high-impedance support means you can drive higher impedance headphones louder. A lot of pro-grade headphones have impedances of 300 Ohms or more, and so for people who use those, a typical consumer-grade laptop's converter might not provide enough juice to drive the headphones as loud as you would like.
Working in music and often using headphones with an impedance of more than 150 Ohms, this is great news for me!
HobeSoundDarryl
macrumors G5
With the:
- GREAT decision that facilitates some of us being able to jettison some dongles/hubs because they put a few "old" (but thoroughly mainstream) jacks back into the cutting-edge MBpros... AND
- the fact that Apple's new lossless offering simply can't work with Bluetooth but certainly will in wired connections... AND
- the fact that the DAC Apple builds into iPads and iPhones is almost certainly better than the $10 retail one sold in the dongle... AND
- there was some time & talent investment within Apple to improve this very part...
If one wants to fully hear Apple lossless, the easiest, most ubiquitous option is WIRED connections. It "just works" for Apple lossless and also works with pretty much everything else we encounter OUTSIDE of the bubble. Bluetooth just doesn't have the bandwidth and is still not even close to the ubiquity outside of the bubble.
Should Apple re-consider this one too?- perhaps to make more use of these innovations in their more important products- there is no loss/sacrifice whatsoever for the Bluetooth crowd. That will still work exactly as it does now. The other camp would simply get back this very nice utility too... sans dongles. Hopefully Apple is listening and reconsidering OTHER divisive decisions made in the last half decade or so.
I'll hope right with you. I definitely miss it in an otherwise spectacular iPad Mini 6.
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Why is that hard to imagine? I'm a real audio professional and I'm definitely going to try it out. If that MacBook Pro DAC can drive my headphones sufficiently well and I can rely on the sound, then that saves me one piece of equipment to carry around with me in many situations.
I don't consider this a gimmick, on the contrary. I wish professional-grade DAC and amplifiers for headphones were more of a focus on pro laptops.
MacRumors completed missed out the onboard DAC. The point is not that there is one (every device with an analog out port has one) but that the new DAC in these MacBook Pros goes up to 96kHz.
Automatic? Never seen this before. Headphone amps often have switches for gain (low/mid/high). Another spec that's useful is the output impedance of the jack. In-ear models are greatly effected by this as their impedance can be very low (which is the opposite for high impedance headphones). So there's a spectrum. Apple's Ipads and phones have really good specs for In-ear models.
Most people don't need all this stuff anyway. There are really good headphones with low-ish impedance. Most of them out there are this way. But wtf.
Most people don't need all this stuff anyway. There are really good headphones with low-ish impedance. Most of them out there are this way. But wtf.
Dear Apple,
This is a nice move. Please continue in this direction and offer a 4.4mm Pentaconn balanced connector option for the next MacBook Pro models.
Sincerely,
A customer for the last 36 years
This is a nice move. Please continue in this direction and offer a 4.4mm Pentaconn balanced connector option for the next MacBook Pro models.
Sincerely,
A customer for the last 36 years
Well, the point is that now the Pros might have the option of just using the jack. Apple likes doing this sort of thing: make others redundant
You could have lossless on wireless headphones if WiFi is used for connectivity. Not sure if any are made.
Bluetooth versions that have been released, on the other hand, don't have the bandwidth to support lossless.
HobeSoundDarryl
macrumors G5
Analog out is not the only confirmation: any device that plays music our ears can hear. For example, there are great Apple-made DACs inside of ALL new iPhones and iPads because the digital music needs to be converted to analog so that it can play on the speakers of those devices. Every time we take a call on iPhone, an iPhone DAC is converting the other person's digital stream into analog so we can hear what they are saying. The removal of the jack simply severed a direct connection to make use of those DACs for wired headphones/buds.
I'm glad to see Apple investing in improvements to 3.5mm. I hope it- like the HDMI jack revival in MBpros- is resurrected in future mobile devices. That won't hurt those perfectly happy with Bluetooth options at all- they can still listen exactly as they listen now- but it will open up the highest quality connection option for those who would rather connect that way.
Consumer utility is good. Welcome back HDMI and welcome improved 3.5mm. Dongles be gone!!! Please!
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Wish they would bring this to the port on iPhones.
