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

Don't Buy Into Apple's Hype About AirPods Max Gaining Lossless Audio

newton4000 said:
AAC works well for most people and for many use cases indistinguishable. But it's like RAW versus JPG - it's vastly superior for some people.
Click to expand...
I’m unsure of that comparison. RAW is not processed, and will with default processing look the same as the designated output (be it JPEG, HEIC or AVIF). Without further processing it is useless. And since Apple is currently unable to render HDR from RAW for some reason(?) it is often worse than a baked format.
 
Not surprising to see Apple hype up the features. Good to see lossless support on AirPods Max. It should have been available from day 1 itself.
 
  • Like
Reactions: mganu
I notice a difference in audio quality if I connect my laptop to my amp with an optical cable and use lossless vs using Airplay. I also notice a difference when using Tidal Connect with lossless vs Airplay.

This really annoys me, as the fiber optic cable is not practical due to the computers placement, and Tidal is really buggy.

Granted I only notice the difference with a good audio setup (Nad M10 v3 with B&W 703 S3 speakers).
 
Lossless is kind of whatever (to me), but low latency sounds interesting, at least if it's low enough to be actually usable for casual games and the likes.
 
CalMin said:
I won’t say there isn’t a placebo effect at play, and I know some people really can hear the difference. It’s kind of like whisky: I can’t appreciate the difference between a 12-year and an 18-year aged bottle—aside from the price tag. Some people can, but I know where the price-to-enjoyment curve starts to flatten out for me.
Click to expand...
Agreed on this. I am definitely not able to hear the higher frequencies I used to. I suppose a lot of people think it's all just a matter of frequencies; probably the same people who think that a 44khz CD is overkill because most people can't hear a 22khz tone. Along those same lines ... as long as it's really accurate, there's absolutely no reason for humans to have more than one ear, or one eye for that matter, right?

A band of frequencies is gone to my 50-year-old ears, this is true. But they are still just as good at perceiving a 2D soundstage, from extremely small differences in timing between each ear.

Every single music track on my phone is in ALAC, and has been for years, and I usually listen with a DAC dongle attached. Perhaps it matters a lot less to me than it did 20 years ago when I started doing this, but there are situations where it still does. Is this headphone upgrade worth it for me? Well, all I need is a USB-C cable, so, yes. Obviously.

As for the people who don't feel it's worth it... Well, what do you want? A free USB-C cable? A pony?
 
Both are true. AAC is hard to distinguish from ALAC. And Lossless preserves the exact file you get to your ears. It’s great Apple is able to offer both
 
henrikhelmers said:
I’m unsure of that comparison. RAW is not processed, and will with default processing look the same as the designated output (be it JPEG, HEIC or AVIF). Without further processing it is useless. And since Apple is currently unable to render HDR from RAW for some reason(?) it is often worse than a baked format.
Click to expand...
Yeah, RAW would be like getting a recording of a voice before any processing like reverb, autotune, or volume normalization was added.

An uncompressed audio file compared to a high bitrate AAC file is more equivalent to a PNG file versus a JPEG saved at 100% quality. (and a JPG at 100% is probably worse than a AAC at 320kbps, when perceptually compared to the uncompressed original)
 
Not even being an audiophile, as my hearing has sucked since an Alice Cooper concert back in 1989, but still, on my stereo, comparing AAC to ALAC, the sound is fuller with ALAC. I don't hear more details, just a fuller sound. So, to me, there is a difference. BUT, it also depends on the music you are playing. Some music is just more revealing than other. And the more compressed the music is - as in, squashed dynamic range (especially if it borders on clipping) - the more pleasant ALAC sounds, compared to AAC.
 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: wbeasley and dtuck90
Kaptajn Haddock said:
Not even being an audiophile, as my hearing has sucked since an Alice Cooper concert back in 1989, but still, on my stereo, comparing AAC to ALAC, the sound is fuller with ALAC. I don't hear more details, just a fuller sound. So, to me, there is a difference. BUT, it also depends on the music you are playing. Some music is just more revealing than other. And the more compressed the music is - as in, squashed dynamic range (especially if it borders on clipping) - the more pleasant ALAC sounds, compared to AAC.
Click to expand...

This is exactly it. Live with lossless/hi res music for a month exclusively then if you go back to lossy it feels different.

We are spoilt by how well the AirPods Max handle Bluetooth AAC codec. I’m convinced the H1 chip is doing some secret upscaling like what Sony does with DSEE
 
  • Like
Reactions: wbeasley
SanderEvers said:
But lossless allows you to listen exactly to how the artist / producer meant the music to sound.
Click to expand...
A good producer these days knows that the music will be often listened to by streaming it from Spotify over basic earbuds, and will master their music to suit that target. A bad producer will just set the analog compression/loudness to kill…

Or you could go for the audiophile vinyl remaster - mastered to stop the stylus from jumping grooves & sould good on the appallingly poor bandwidth of vinyl..

Lossless as a format is vital as a “master” format of for use during production to provide “headroom” for manipulating the sound and avoid losses caused by repeatedly re-compressing with different schemes. You don’t need it to listen to - although with modern devices designed to store and handle the order-of-magnitude higher bandwidth of high res video, it’s not impractical.
 
MacRumors said:


Apple today announced that AirPods Max with a USB-C port will be gaining support for lossless audio and ultra-low latency audio with a firmware update next month, alongside the release of iOS 18.4, iPadOS 18.4, and macOS 15.4.

airpods-max-2024-colors.jpg

For context, audio files are typically compressed to keep file sizes smaller. There are lossy compression standards like MP3, and Apple's own Advanced Audio Codec (AAC), which result in some data loss. Then, there are lossless compression standards like Apple Lossless Audio Codec (ALAC), which preserve all of the original data. The entire Apple Music catalog of more than 100 million songs is encoded in both AAC and ALAC.

In a post on X today, Apple's marketing chief Greg Joswiak said lossless audio and ultra-low latency audio are the "ultimate" audio upgrades for the AirPods Max, promising "mind-blowing sound quality." However, this marketing claim appears to be at odds with what Apple states in a support document on its website.

In the document, Apple says AAC already delivers audio that is "virtually indistinguishable" from an original studio recording. Accordingly, the company also says "the difference between AAC and lossless audio is virtually indistinguishable."

If lossless audio offers no major improvement over AAC, according to Apple, then calling it an "ultimate" upgrade is unjustified marketing hype.

As for lower latency, that does not directly impact sound quality.

All in all, lossless audio is far less significant of an upgrade than Joswiak is making it out to be, as Apple admits on its very own website.



Article Link: Don't Buy Into Apple's Hype About AirPods Max Gaining Lossless Audio
Click to expand...
It's quite bitter to swallow bad medicine, especially when it's the same one you spit out earlier but now have to take again. To make matters worse, it was placed in the most unpleasant spot where you originally spat it out.
 
You’re not gonna get lossless audio over Bluetooth. with the usb c cable yes but chances are you won’t even notice the difference.

Having lossless is nice but the thought of people thinking they are getting a better experience while listening to music with AirPods (earphones) or through the device speaker is hilarious.

You could spend hundreds if not thousands of $ getting true high end equipment that supports it (apple products not included except wired Max) and it would likely be a lot of wasted money.

I have a system that can play lossless but I can’t tell any difference. I wish Apple would fix Apple Music on PC so I could actually listen to songs without them constantly skipping or audio dropping out. I’ve ditched it on PC and went back to Spotify. Apple Music is only for my iPhone now.
 
That's the hill, macrumors decides to die on? I know, criticizing Apple is a new trend to profit from, but imho there are a lot of things that I'd be more critical about than marketing a feature that actually adds new funtionality to a product.

What about homepod minis with fixed cables, perverse high pricing of RAM and SSD upgrades, point updates offering hardly anything new, buggy software that often gets neglected after release, iPadOS, increasingly soulless presentations and products, apple intelligence, a vast and non-focused product portfolio, years of penny pinching and sloppy software developement now biting them in the behind, low quality but overpriced cases...?
 
  • Like
Reactions: wbeasley
An ignorant, and quite frankly pretty stupid article to write, MacRumors. Have you not considered the possibility that “virtually indistinguishable” is more marketing spin by Apple to try and divert attention away from something an educated person would see as a downside? Maybe it’s not as indistinguishable as they previously claimed?


If you went to a restaurant and the chef replaced 5% of your soup with his urine, it would probably be virtually indistinguishable from the original. It’s okay, you can’t tell the difference anyway! So drink up! Slurp slurp!

But if they then turned around and offered you a soup that was guaranteed to be 100% piss free, you would probably call that a pretty ultimate upgrade.
 
  • Like
Reactions: wbeasley
This is plugged in right? If they had low latency in any form over Bluetooth that would be a massive deal for any music apps on iOS. No one play instruments in real time over bluetooth from what I know because of latency. Which is pretty annoying since most headphones are wireless nowadays and everyone forgets the cable or adaptor needed. Plus who wants wires anymore!

If my AirPods were low latency that would be a game changer.
 
Where was the criticism when the lightning AirPods Max did the exact same thing? (Aside from LL)

The only criticism should be that this should have been a day 1 feature last September
 
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