Toggle sidebar Toggle sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

Apple to Bring Custom EQ to AirPods

H_D said:
Quite frankly, the APP3 sound as good as any manually-EQ'd Wireless IEs I ever owned (I use it with the «electronic» EQ preset). Especially with more modern tracks via Apple Music. Old and maybe ripped music and bad MP3 could use a bit of a boost, but overall I am amazingly happy with the sound. I think being able to boost highs and lows a bit will suffice – and it still is better than what, say, B&O offers instead of a real Equalizer. A full-spectrum graphic EQ would probably be too much for the average consumer. It's amazing that Apple is starting to give users a longer leash with this and with the «transparency»-slider for Liquid Glass an so on. And they know that one of the attractors to Apples ecosphere is that it is simple, you don't have to set up a trillion things... stepping away from that simplicity and embracing a more complex system isn't that easy on that scale. The more they open up, the more people can f*** the system up and blast support because stuff doesn't work anything after they twiddled too much with options. For anything more there are specialized options, if you need a 10/24-bnand EQ, the APP aren't agood solution, especially considering that Apple says that the APP have a kind of automagical EQ that adapts to the music it hears etc.
Click to expand...
really? my APP3 sound pretty bad compared to my IE 40 Pro or even Tangzu Wan'er (1 and 2) that i bought from aliex. Maybe it's a seal issue for me, guess I will have to roll tips a little
 
Real IEMs (especially with multiple drivers) sound very very different to a consumer-grade earbud like the APP. I have sealed IEM (rather really cheap, less than 100€ Chinese) with 12 drivers for my Drumkit and when I use them with the iPhone, they are MUCH louder and offer much more bass and highs than any Wireless System I ever tested. Actually so loud and present that listening to music with them is kind of stressful after a while... I compare the APP3 to the Sony Inner Ears, which have a dedicated graphic EQ, and personally (tastes differ) think the APP3 sound just as well or even better, depending on the song. (And much better for spoken word content). I would not compare any wireless inner ear to wired systems or systems with multiple drivers etc. But compared to the various regular wireless kits I had, the APP3 are very good in terms of sound and ease of use. This is what I meant with «specialized» products. What Apple does is always, let's call it «mainstream». It's a product that should work for a large group of average people, from teenager to grandmother. While other companies, producing in smaller batches and scale, can fine-tune what they offer and also maybe do not have to adhere to Apple's general mantra of «it just works».

And the rest really is down to personal taste in music and sound – some people love Bose, some B&W, some Sony etc. But I have to say, even if the «more bass» bug bites me and buy something else, I find myself returning to the APPs these days. :-D.
 
I thought AirPods Pro 2/3 already had custom EQ, because EQ is one aspect of configuring hearing aids to a particular person's hearing deficits.

I searched for these keywords:
configure airpods pro for hearing deficit

A top result from Apple Support:

Use the Hearing Aid feature on your AirPods Pro 2 or AirPods Pro 3 - Apple Support

AirPods Pro 2 and AirPods Pro 3 provide a clinical-grade Hearing Aid feature for perceived mild to moderate hearing loss, as well as a Media Assist feature that enhances the clarity of music, video, and calls.
support.apple.com support.apple.com

On that page, the link under "Audiogram results ..." leads here:

Use hearing health features with AirPods Pro 2 or AirPods Pro 3

Your AirPods Pro 2 and AirPods Pro 3 support your hearing health with Hearing Protection, on by default, and a Hearing Aid feature.
support.apple.com support.apple.com

Item 6 under the heading "Add audiogram results from your hearing healthcare professional" ends with "or enter the results manually."

To me, this looks like it should be possible to enter some kind of parametric gain/attenuation values in dB, at certain frequencies, producing a custom EQ curve. That's probably not something one does casually, or even interactively, but it seems possible.

Since I don't have AirPods Pro 2/3, I can't see what any of this looks like, nor the range of values supported, nor what interface is presented to "enter the results manually".

One interesting possibility might be to have an app you tweak interactively, and it then displays an audiogram as if it were done by an audiologist, then use the "Scan audiogram with camera" feature also listed in item 6.

Anyway, one other thing I'm curious about is if the new custom EQ feature would be combined with the audiogram parameters to make a new overall EQ curve, or whether the EQs would remain separate.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Genelec8341
Progress. Still need the ability to notch 5kHz on my AirPods Pro 3 to fix the annoying sibilance boost they have.
 
I have iOS 27 and the new AirPods version on my APP 3s. Where is this control? I cannot find it.

Never mind! Just found it.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back