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Condensation in AirPods Max after long usage
- Thread starter ssong
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It’s all very individual! I’ve had the APM since the launch day and I don’t see that at all on my headphones. I’ve been checking constantly since this “issue” emerged. Granted, that some would have higher body temperatures and amounts of sweat. They might also experience some specific temperatures in their rooms that would cause this. I’ve had multi-hour sessions with my headphones and even had the cushions slightly wet due to my sweat. But I didn’t see anything inside after removing them from the cup.
Quite interesting. And since this headphone is not water resistant, that could be an issue.
I will see if I can replicate it this weekend.
I have never experienced this with any headphone before, so it will be strange if the APM does this.
springconvert
Cancelled
I tested this out with mine tonight, and after about an hour of listening, sure enough, there was some (pretty light) condensation along the edge of the metal earcup interior. It was about 65 degrees in the room, mid 30s outside and some humidity, but it was not noticeable inside. I did see there appears to be some sort of plastic-looking backing behind the metal holes in the earcup, maybe that’s to prevent moisture from getting into the driver? Still not good if it’s affecting other sensors, of course.
I really hope Apple responds to this soon, otherwise I‘m afraid I might need to return them since my January 8th deadline is almost here. I really don’t want to, I love these things. They’re the best sounding wireless headphones I’ve ever used and the AirPods simplicity is huge for me, but I don't want to have to deal with this affecting functionality or possibly damaging the headphones. And I paid the high price tag because I expected them to last for many years to come.
I really hope Apple responds to this soon, otherwise I‘m afraid I might need to return them since my January 8th deadline is almost here. I really don’t want to, I love these things. They’re the best sounding wireless headphones I’ve ever used and the AirPods simplicity is huge for me, but I don't want to have to deal with this affecting functionality or possibly damaging the headphones. And I paid the high price tag because I expected them to last for many years to come.
ouimetnick
macrumors 68040
Form over function, it's how we got the amazing butterfly keyboard, the Magic Mouse charging port, less rigid iPad Pros, PowerMac G4 Cube, iPhone 4 (antenna flaw)
I'm not really convinced that the amount of water droplets I've seen will cause any issues, at least not any immediate problems. I'll be waiting for the dust to die down and for the early adopters to report back. I waited 5 months before buying the AirPods Pro.
This was exactly my frustration. There will never be a recall with Apple, except if it would endanger health (like batteries exploding). So best case we are left with a sub-par product with prolonged warranty (like 4 years for butterfly keyboards, which is a fairly short span for laptops).
It might work out. They anticipated this and protected the internals against corrosion.
On the other hand, this is just starting. Come summer, you'll be wearing them on public transport, in heat outside and then moving to a cool airconditioned home or office and each cycle there's gonna be a lot of condesation.
Apple might say they are not meant to be worn outside. But that means these are "stationary" headphones without a cable.
I did this "hope for the best" with their pre 2020 laptops. I'm not doing it again. I just exchanged them for Airpods Pro yesterday. If need be, I can get a second pair and no need to wait for charge during long flights.
I would prefer over-ear headphones, but...
You don't think its not summer somewhere now lol
I would guess 90%+ of Airpod Max (new, expensive product) owners live in the northern hemisphere. You disagree?
No lol, doesn't mean there isn't enough to test, people here are having the problem from reading, but we only have 25M here, Australia.
Until someone reports this causes issues with the headphones, who cares?
So just dismiss my issues with the headphones and others in this thread? Cool dude, glad level headed guys like you are around to defend corporations when issues arise with their products.
I’m having this issue and it’s affecting functionality. Hand waving it away isn’t solving the problem.
I haven’t seen anyone besides you claim it affects functionality and how do you really know? If it affects functionality that obviously is a problem. If it’s just water and everything works fine, who cares?
"It's just water."
You do know we're talking about delicate non-water resistant headphones?
I’ve seen similar claims on Reddit, I just got to work but I’ll go digging and get those posts.
My initial issue was the ANC not working correctly. I got them the Wednesday before Christmas and I had a wind tunnel noise in the right earcup. It kept increasing and I eventually just did a hard reset, which seemed to fix the problem. Then I had the same issue the next day, but I started losing sound in the left earcup and the noise transparency wasn’t working in the right earcup. Another hard reset and it seemed to fix the problem for 4 days, so I figured possibly a software bug that might get fixed.
The next time it happened, wind tunnel noise again. I did a restart on them after seeing posts saying that this worked, and it worked for a few minutes but then the noise happened again and ANC was wonky. I pulled off the earcups and saw condensation around the rim and on the driver mesh. Investigated on Reddit and saw someone else mention the same issue and water on the driver was affecting the ANC with a wind tunnel noise.
I love the headphones, but this is extremely disappointing and I’m just wondering if there can even be a fix without a redesign. I’ve seen a post of someone putting a paper towel over the mesh to keep the drivers dry, but that’s a temp fix and really not something anyone should be doing for $550 headphones.
springconvert
Cancelled
It’s not a big deal if it doesn’t affect the functionality, I agree, but I definitely am not going to assume water forming inside the cup is harmless unless Apple confirms they accounted for this in the design of the headphones.
If Apple puts out a support article that says “This can happen and we’ve designed the earcup and internal electronics to be protected from it” then everything is fine, but if it’s somehow not something that was anticipated or designed for, it’s a concern, especially considering the cost of the headphones. I definitely can’t afford to replace them every two years, no matter how much I love them otherwise.
If Apple puts out a support article that says “This can happen and we’ve designed the earcup and internal electronics to be protected from it” then everything is fine, but if it’s somehow not something that was anticipated or designed for, it’s a concern, especially considering the cost of the headphones. I definitely can’t afford to replace them every two years, no matter how much I love them otherwise.
This is a good recap.
It also means, that if Apple acknowledges that, these headphones become officially water resistant. Rain, sweat... generates pretty much the same amount of water (if not less) that we see in these extreme pictures.
springconvert
Cancelled
Thanks, the one exception to that though is if only the internals inside the earcup are resistant. The outer mics, buttons, and lightning connector may not be.
Herrpod
macrumors 65816
Ryanoceros
macrumors newbie
Quick thought. Is it possible that most closed, over-ear headphones accumulate condensation like this with long periods of use and that since this is an Apple product it's simply being scrutinized to a much higher degree than other products (as is almost always the case with Apple)? Additionally, I think it's worth noting that most headphones do not allow for such simple and easy removal of the ear cushions. I never removed my ear cushions on any of the previous Bose ANC headphones I owned to merely inspect the internals.
For what it's worth, I've had my APM's for 11 days and have worn them pretty extensively almost every day, and I have yet to see any condensation. Obviously, this doesn't mean other people aren't having this problem. But if it's not happening to everyone, we don't really know how big of an issue it is yet. Especially if the internals were designed to be protected from condensation (which we don't know yet, I realize that).
For what it's worth, I've had my APM's for 11 days and have worn them pretty extensively almost every day, and I have yet to see any condensation. Obviously, this doesn't mean other people aren't having this problem. But if it's not happening to everyone, we don't really know how big of an issue it is yet. Especially if the internals were designed to be protected from condensation (which we don't know yet, I realize that).
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JPack
macrumors P6
Same here. Apple didn't announce a keyboard service program until they were hammered with lawsuits from MacBook owners.
And even then they are replacing the keyboards with the same faulty ones... until extended warranty runs out.
First Macbook Pros and Macbooks from 2015 and 2016 are already there. Once the keyboard malfunctions, again, it's game over.