Beats Studio Pro Debut With Improved Sound Quality, Spatial Audio, USB-C, and More

[Delorean2006]

I recently purchased AirPods Max, really liked the sound but are returning them in favor the beats because of the pain that the APM are causing my ears. I could go for xm5’s but I wanted to keep spatial audio, that is one feature I use daily. A lot of Dolby atmos content.

 

[SBlue1]

Flabbergasted everyone believes this. It’s a branding exercise. Beats won’t and don’t have the capability to develop their own SoC so I’ll wager it’ll be the exact same Apple designed SoC just with some select features disabled. Pretty much everything the H1/H2 offers these do too such as iCloud integration and FindMy support. Other than the automatic device switching and possibly Atmos support not sure what these are actually lacking over a branded H1/H2

With the Apple chips you can use audiograms. Most underrated and unknown feature on any headphones.

 

[SBlue1]

But can you?
I can’t see any reference to these being supported for Headphone Accommodations on either the Beats or Apple websites.
No H series chip = no go for this feature?
Been holding out on purchasing and this is my sole must have requirement.

Same here. It's a must have feature. A lot people over 30 should try an app like Mimi hearing test and try listening to music with this feature toggled on and toggled off. It's a night and day difference. Like wearing glasses for the first time.

 

[martens]

I had Beats Studio3, got them for less than $150 on a sale at Best Buy. They were okay, but long in the tooth by the time I got them: micro USB charging, Spatial Audio but no head tracking, ANC but no transparency.

Beats Solo Pro was discontinued long before Studio3, but have Lightning, Spatial Audio with head tracking, ANC and transparency, they start pairing when you open them up, and shut down when you fold them. I have a set and like them. Looks like you can still get these, just not from Apple Store. They also support Headphone Accommodations.

Needless to say the Studio Pro I just got are much better than the Studio3's in all of these dimensions, and the addition of lossless over USB-C (or just being able to use USB-C cable for wired connection) was a feature I wanted to explore. They also have Personalized Spatial Audio FWIW. And it's a simple stereo cable to plug into analog sources compared to APM which needs a special cable. I have a couple of Android devices, and it's lovely to be able to easily connect to those.

I'm still gathering impressions but so far they are positive and meet my expectations.

 

[Orkstomper]

Same here. It's a must have feature. A lot people over 30 should try an app like Mimi hearing test and try listening to music with this feature toggled on and toggled off. It's a night and day difference. Like wearing glasses for the first time.

I’m not an audiophile, all I want is a pair of over ears, preferably noise cancelling, that work with headphone accomodations.
Only current choice is AirPods Max which don’t do it for me for a range of reasons and are generally overkill for my own personal use case.
Thought these were going to be it and got quite excited by the rumours. Sigh!

 

[martens]

Regarding Headphone Accommodations, is it not possible BSP (and Apple OS's) can be updated to support it?

When I've engaged Custom Audio Setup, it tells me Standard settings are okay. My ears are far from perfect (tinnitus, difficulty hearing conversation in noisy environments, certain frequencies are distorted or absent) but appears this is not of any benefit for me.

I have tried Conversation Boost, and it doesn't do much to mitigate my hearing difficulties in noisy environments.

--

As far as auto-switching, I'm confused about that as well. Apple TV detects my BSP headphones when I'm in proximity, and offers to connect, but I have to manually select device for everything else. Again, subject to update?

Auto-switching has not always worked flawlessly for me (switching even when actively listening).

Anyone know of a web site that tracks Apple/Beats firmware updates with release notes?

 

[ayres]

I wanted to like the studios, owned them twice. but just a bit too tight on my melon.

 

[SBlue1]

Regarding Headphone Accommodations, is it not possible BSP (and Apple OS's) can be updated to support it?

When I've engaged Custom Audio Setup, it tells me Standard settings are okay. My ears are far from perfect (tinnitus, difficulty hearing conversation in noisy environments, certain frequencies are distorted or absent) but appears this is not of any benefit for me.

I have tried Conversation Boost, and it doesn't do much to mitigate my hearing difficulties in noisy environments.

--

As far as auto-switching, I'm confused about that as well. Apple TV detects my BSP headphones when I'm in proximity, and offers to connect, but I have to manually select device for everything else. Again, subject to update?

Auto-switching has not always worked flawlessly for me (switching even when actively listening).

Anyone know of a web site that tracks Apple/Beats firmware updates with release notes?

Try the Mimi Hearing test app on your iPhone. You do a test and it saves the results in an audiogram. You can use that audiogram to boost just those frequencies and just by as much as they are missing. Way better than just selecting Conversation Boost. I use this feature with the AirPods Pro so much that I don't use my Sony over ear headphones anymore. The only other option for me according to Apples website are the Beats Solo Pro since they also got the Apple chip. I wish there were over ears with Apple chips, this feature helped me listen to music like when I was a teen again!

I ruined my hearing with loud guitar playing. I am amazed people don't check their hearing and do something about it. I mean 50% of the people wear glasses by the time they are 30 yet they don't know that hearing degrades too. Apple should market this feature way more.

 

[mdm3]

Does anyone have a view on these versus the Sony wh-1000xm5? I am an Apple (only) user (iPhone, iPad, MacBook). My main requirements are related to sitting in my office occasionally having to drown out loud construction noises, (mainly classical) music, and most importantly Zoom and other calls (plus a tiny bit of watching TV in bed on the iPad). I also have a big head. Thanks.

 

[Unregistered 4U]

Seriously, remove the "b" from the cups of these cans, and you'd be hard-pressed to tell them apart from countless other mass-market headphones.

As someone who has been watching these things over time, it’s mainly because, seeing the success of the Beats design, the other vendors have all gone for a fairly similar look.

 

[Unregistered 4U]

Street thieves go after the $600 market Apple products which have high resale value. They can't tell quickly whether other headphones which look very similar are $60 or $300, but they certainly know the Apple AirPod Max. Those are the ones that thieves are steeling.

Thieves go after [expensive products, not only those made by Apple] which have high resale value [regardless of how they look]. And, considering that someone who has gotten close enough to someone to actually put their hands on a person’s headphones have very likely had an ample opportunity to tell these

from a $30 pair of headphones And, similarly, the only way the person that owns a pair can be fairly assured that they won’t be a target is to not bring them out in public. There’s nothing Audeze/Apple/anyone making expensive products can do to help the situation, certainly not changing the look of them. Because, regardless of the look, they’re still expensive and will be targeted because they have high resale value.

 

[HalSF]

As far as I know, the 3.5mm cable works by bypassing the internal DAC, effectively allowing you to use the Beats as if they were regular analog headphones, so losslessness would be determined by the source you're connected to. The Beats have two input ports, in other words: USB-C port connected to the internal DAC and a 3.5mm jack connected directly to the headphone drivers.

The APM doesn't allow this as it has only one port: Lightning. Connecting 3.5mm to Lightning results in an analog-to-digital conversion, then a digital-to-analog conversion. The Beats allow you to play lossless audio through the 3.5mm cable (from a lossless source) and through USB-C with its internal DAC.

I still puzzled about how the 3.5 analog input works on the Beats Studio Pro. First, they're not strictly passive ("as if they were regular analog headphones") because they have to be powered on to listen via the 3.5 jack input. So what exactly happens inside these headphones when fed with an analog wired signal? Is there a DAC or any DSP involved, and what is the functional purpose of requiring the headphone to be turned on? Amplification, or some form of digital conversion, or both?

 

[KaiFiMacFan]

I still puzzled about how the 3.5 analog input works on the Beats Studio Pro. First, they're not strictly passive ("as if they were regular analog headphones") because they have to be powered on to listen via the 3.5 jack input. So what exactly happens inside these headphones when fed with an analog wired signal? Is there a DAC or any DSP involved, and what is the functional purpose of requiring the headphone to be turned on? Amplification, or some form of digital conversion, or both?

Maybe it's just amplification? i.e. can you adjust the volume on the headphones while using the analog input?

I would be disappointed to find out it's using the same ADC --> DAC "extra level of conversion" that the AirPods Max does.