Hi Mike:
I am starting to believe this as well. Here's why. The AirPods Max 2 has a 24 bit 48 kHz DAC on the USB wired side which is little bit better that CD quality of 16 Bit 44.1 kHz which is 1411 kbps at 44.1 kHz. I tried this on the application called Flacbox with a file on my server that is .flac. Flacbox reported a playback of 706 kbs 48000 kHz--this varied by distance to the router and the track played. This is better than typical .mb3 files that are typically between 128 and 320 kbps. But know where near CD quality of 1411 kbps.
Maybe this is more a function on how I ripped to .flac and the file type. Maybe an .alac will preform better than a .flac for streaming from my router. My other though is that performance would be better if it is resident on my iPhone. Some fun experiments to try.
Here is what I do not understand as yet. With Apple Music they have high res lossless--24 bit 192 kHz using a wired connection. I do not know how this works if the best the wired AirPods Max 2 DAC can perform is 24 bit 48 kHz? I have tried researching this stuff on the internet but I am never able to get an answer that makes sense.
In fact, I am beginning to believe that none of these all-in-one headphones (whether they be Apple, B&W, Focal, etc) can ever play hires 24 bit 192 kHz--the onboard DACs are just not good enough. What is required is a good 24 bit 192 kHz external DAC going into high quality analog headphones.
Anyways, I have B&W PX7s3 on order. This has a wired DAC that has a specification that is 24 bit at 98 kHZ. I'll keep the headphone that has the best sound to me. Regardless, the best that you can hope for from a ripped CD is 16 bit 44.1 kHz because that is how they are encoded.
Let the games begin.
Don