AirPods Max are the best damn wireless headphones anyone has ever made.
If you can afford to buy them, buy them.
You forgot to put "In my opinion."
AirPods Max are the best damn wireless headphones anyone has ever made.
If you can afford to buy them, buy them.
Terrible product that is sold out for 3 months. Apple sure missed on this. #sarcasm
How are they for phone calls? How is your audio quality for the person at the other end? I like a lot of Apple’s wireless audio products of late, but I think this may be one of the weaker aspects. I love my Powerbeats Pro, but the mics are only so-so I’d say.
Sony has something called Tempest 3d audio that they implemented in the PS5. They're working on bringing it to all their products. But it's more 3d audio than spatial audio.Spatial Audio by Sony? I am not aware that Sony headphones have the hardware (accelerometers and gyros) to implement the head tracking necessary to implement what Apple refers to as Spatial Audio (with the exception of the PSVR headset, which implements head tracking by using lights on the headset that are detected by a camera). Confusingly, Sony markets a feature called 360 Reality Audio which is not the same feature as Spatial Audio by Apple.
We don't know how many they had in stock. If they had 1000, selling out isn't that impressive.Terrible product that is sold out for 3 months. Apple sure missed on this. #sarcasm
3d audio is amazing. It's basically just better surround sound, which has been around for decades. So, 3d tv and 3d audio couldn't be further from each other.Remember 3D TV? not sure 3D audio will fare any better
my wife would look good wearing them while cleaning and cooking!And what would be the response when women wear them?
That's a very sexist comment. Anybody can wear headphones. Lordy
Do women wear heavy headphones?
I am in the same camp, after getting used to high quality wired headphones, I only use bluetooth headphones for zoom calls. While comfort is the most important factor, the sound quality very second as it is pretty much limited by the sources, a.k.a, the microphones at the other end. i would never listen to music over a pair of bluetooth cans.What I don't understand is why people don't stop reading right at this point. Who cares what else they do if they can be blown away by a pair of $100 wired headphones (yes, any common pro-audio studio headphone is better.)
Apple must know its target market better than I do.
The problem with all wireless headphones is that even if I own $2,000 worth of end-end audio gear all of this gear is by-passed and the little chip and battery inside the headphone are used in place of whatever else I own. And because they have to be battery powered they are designed for power efficiency over just about everything else.
This trade-off is fine for a convenience headphone but not if the goal is high-end audio.
At least the reviewer was honest and came right out and said "AirPods Max won't match high-quality wired headphones".
Boy, I can't wait to listen to Elvis in 3D!Remember 3D TV? not sure 3D audio will fare any better
"it's only fair if everyone just said all Apple products are 11/10!!! 😭😭😭"Ah thanks for this. For a moment there I thought MacRumors decided to give a fair review rather than looking for constant reasons to trash Apple's products. You brought everything back to "normal" now. 🙄👎
I call marketing bull$hit. You can't "upscale" music just like you can't upscale an image - You can blur the artifacts, but at best you just get a fuzzy version of the crap version, nothing close to CD quality.This new review by Billy Steele from Engadget has several good points.
AirPods Max review: Expensive headphones with untapped potential
Despite how good they sound, Apple doesn’t offer any access to high-res streaming. From Apple Music, you get the same AAC (256kbps) you’ve been listening to there. The service doesn’t have a high-res or lossless tier like Amazon Music or Tidal. Those pricier services can be limited too, but they unlock things like Dolby Atmos Music and Sony 360 Reality audio. Sony offers LDAC wireless technology on its headphones that upscales audio to CD quality. Apple could do something like that with the AirPods Max if it doesn’t want to add more content, and a more expensive subscription, to its service. That’s if these headphones are capable of it, of course. For now though, these new headphones have some untapped potential when it comes to high-res music. You can certainly use them for those services and formats, but officially the AirPods Max only supports Dolby Atmos when it comes to anything beyond standard listening.
I'd imagine this is only an OS update away on Apple devices, but cannot see how other devices would do it as it would require the playback device to process the 5.1 signal to 2.0 or 2.1 to give the proper spacial effect.Apple debuted spatial audio on the AirPods Pro in September and, unsurprisingly, you’ll also find it on the AirPods Max. Basically, accelerometers in the headphones work with your iPhone or iPad to track head movement to keep the sound stationary while you move about. It’s meant to mimic the experience of a home theater for content recorded in 5.1, 7.1 and Dolby Atmos. However, it only works with Apple’s mobile devices right now. AirPods Max can be used with Apple TV, but spatial audio isn’t available on the set-top box, so the sound will only be so good. If the company can manage a level of immersive audio that Dolby creates with its Dimension headphones, the AirPods Max would be a compelling living room addition.
It's expensive, but most other cables are only using a plain copper cable, which is extremely cheap, whereas the the Apple one has a DAC/ADC built in.Another infuriating thing about the AirPods Max is Apple doesn’t include a 3.5mm cable in the box. Of course, the headphones don’t have a 3.5mm jack so you have to use one with a Lighting connection on the other end. Which means you’ll have to shell out another $35. So to use the AirPods Max for in-flight entertainment (whenever you fly again), you’ll need to spend $584. Most of the competition includes a cable in the box, and if I pay nearly $550 for a set of headphones I expect to be able to use them when travelling -- one of the times I need noise-cancelling the most.
Thanks for answering. I’ve been wondering about this, and haven’t seen any clear explanations like this before👍Most video playback devices delay the video when using bluetooth so the audio is in sync.
Latency is only ever an issue with gaming and production as it requires close to zero latency. The same with all other bluetooth headphones.
7. Comes with a case?The Sony XM4: 6 reasons to consider:
1. Build/ Comfort: nice and light, build seems fine for the weight savings
2.Audio Quality: Sound very good to my ears
3.Noise Cancellation: it works and is adjustable several ways
4.H1 Chip: Sony's chip does fine in Apple's Ecosystem, I can switch between two Apple devices quickly with no problems
5.Spatial Audio: Sony has this too, I think they invented it, works good too!
6. Savings of $275, very happy I did not dump another pile of cash into Apple for marginal gains in sound
Exactly my experience.I love my AirPod Max. I was sure I would return them, but they won me over, easily. My old Sony were due an upgrade (had them for six years), and these AirPod max are exactly what I wanted: fantastic sound, ANC, transparency (sooo much better than my old Sony), eternal battery. They’re also way more comfortable than my old ones, which has leather ear cups that make you sweat. Looking forward to handsome leather cases by the likes of Pad & Quill and Waterfield.
I see lots of people who seem irritated by these headphones. But why? There are so many other excellent options out there (including by Apple/Beats). Surely you can find something to like, rather than spend time hating on these ones?