We need to talk about AirPods Pro(medium.com) |
We need to talk about AirPods Pro(medium.com) |
Although I'm not even sure if that's how sound waves work, and recently there was Bose's investigation into their firmware update that didn't actually reduce their ANC despite user perspective. It's a fun theory up there with the fake existence of Finland.
The patents violated expire in 2021 so it is likely they are holding out.
Couldn’t Apple or Bose just fall back on these methods which should work closely enough to whatever fancy method is patented? Or is the method I’m describing patented?
The only difference in my day to day was the Airpods Pro and biking to work with them.
And before I get asked about tip size, I've tried all of them and done fit tests on all of them. Fit tests always pass, and the pods always fall out. I even tried different sizes on different ears over time to compare the two but they seem to fall out at the same rate. I just (like as in 2 hours ago) broke down and bought some foam tips from Amazon to see if that helps.
It's really disappointing because my original AirPods were so magical and now I kind of don't like wearing the Pro's. I've considered more than once just buying AirPod 2's and giving up.
I think this problem is pretty far down the list of World’s Top Problems
It's not about pressure as having something tucked into your ears, but related to the noise cancelling: "You may notice a pressure-like feeling in your ears when you first put noise-cancelling headphones on, like when you want to 'pop' your ears. This is caused by your brain perceiving the lack of low low-frequency sound as a pressure differential between your inner and outer ear, just like when you ascend in an airplane." If you search for Airpods and pressure, there are also comments on Reddit etc. I did not investigate if those are referring to this phenomenon.
Something like this could explain why Apple would like to tweak with the noise cancelling.
[1]https://www.mcgill.ca/oss/article/did-you-know-technology/no... [2] https://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/03/technology/personaltech/0...
When I first tried the Bose headphones, I immediately felt an uncomfortable pressure on my ear drums. I can only wear them in airplanes and have to take breaks. I tried other headphones and none are perfect for me but I did buy the Sennheiser ones. It has okay noise canceling with only minimal pressure for me and with stellar audio performance. The noise canceling is noticeably worse than the Bose's but at least I can wear them longer. I also tried the AirPod Pros when they came out and felt very little pressure so from that angle I would have been comfortable with wearing them for an extended period. (I can't say for sure but it might not have been the launch firmware) As with all Apple headphones they just don't stay in my ears so sadly I passed them up.
Sounds like the author hasn’t ever used any other good ANC cans? Both the Bose and Sony pose the same hazard.
My lack of faith in humanity can see #4. Another great thing nerfed by dumb people.
Regardless, the firmware releases are an embarassing fiasco that demonstrates a lack of coordination and communication within Apple.
Did anyone else notice this?
One firmware update has even rendered one of my AirPods Pro practically unusable due to a strange clicking noise that would occur whenever I was walking/running with ANC enabled, likely due to accelerations acting upon it. I was convinced it was a hardware fault and was ready to return them until another firmware update fixed the problem (until now at least).
I would assume wearing earplugs you have the intent of reducing the sound coming in. AirPods you are blocking external sound and replacing it with audio of some sort.
With earplugs you could still hear things but at a reduced level. AirPods you’re covering up and external sound that could come through.
I am just absolutely fed up of the battery situation. By the time the devices are broken in and you are comfortable, it's time to buy another pair. I am not that rich.
However, about 1 month later I noticed that noise cancelling (and passthrough as well, which was even more annoying) wasn't really working on one side. I tried factory-resetting them, tried everything I could think of, and nothing helped. So I scheduled an Apple Store appointment. To Apple's credit, they replaced the one on the side that wasn't working, for free, with very few questions asked.
However, that's when things got weird.
Now the older one wasn't cancelling/passing-through as well as the brand new one. It was doing something, just not as much, which led to a really distracting audible asymmetry. This was confirmed by the fit test not working in just that one ear. Again I tried updating the firmware, factory-resetting, etc.
Eventually I found this thread on MacRumors: https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/airpod-pro-ear-tip-fit-...
tl;dr, it seems that some of the meshed gaps/microphones the Airpods Pro use to calibrate their various special audio features get very easily clogged by ear wax, skin oil, etc. And they're extremely sensitive to this, to the point where you have to clean them out very frequently to prevent degradation. I went through and rigorously cleaned them - rubbing alcohol, cotton swaps, etc. - and even then mine still have problems. The only way I can prevent the asymmetry it is to turn off the "active sound" features altogether. But this means that not only don't I get full noise-cancelling, I can't even safely use them just to listen to music in any spaces where I need to be able to hear my surroundings. They are now worse than the regular Airpods that I gave up when I got them.
This is completely unacceptable for a product that costs $250, but at this point I'm exasperated. I'm tired of going to the Apple Store, and it's presumably not even open right now with the virus going. I wish I could just turn them in and get a refund, but I think it's been too long. If I could do that I'd probably even buy a new pair of the regular ones and just go back to those; mine had worked mostly without problems for over a year. At this point I don't know what to do about it all except hope there's a recall-like process like they did with the butterfly keyboards.
I wear them with the stalks pointing forward at around 45 degrees.
It’s not perfect. But it was a big improvement in my case. And it’s non-permanent.
But my biggest disappointment is the mic quality with my MacBook. Apparently some limitation in Bluetooth or something? No idea but mic sounds like crap. Works great on the phone but I hardly talk on my phone ...
They also seem to take longer to disconnect/switch to different devices.
ideally no, just the opposite. the idea of ANC is that you detect the frequency and amplitude of incoming waves, then generate a second wave with the same amplitude, but 180 degrees out of phase (so that the trough of the second wave aligns with the peak of the first). a perfect implementation would totally "cancel" the original sound with destructive interference.
I'm not very familiar with consumer ANC headphones (I prefer passive attenuation), but I would expect the cancellation effect does not increase when you turn up the volume, as this would just be perceived as noise if it exceeds the amplitude of the ambient sounds. I guess ANC might encourage people to expose themselves to very loud noises that the device can't compensate for, but that's more user error than an inherent flaw in the technology. people routinely listen to music way too loud in quiet settings anyway.
* A "live" ANC process has no control over the environment from which it receives the audio signals that it acts adversarially against.
* When transmitting audio waves from one medium to another, there will be latency. Perhaps not much, but it will be there.
If you accept these two positions, then consider this:
* What happens when a sound wave that is being combatted (via phase inversion) suddenly stops, or inverts it's own phase? That's right, ANC could potentially double the amplitude of the frequency being combatted.
* I imagine that ANC technology takes advantage of latency to ensure that they don't damage people's hearing, but the nature of ANC requires low latency in general, otherwise you can't be sure that you are combatting the correct frequency (at which point you risk doubling the amplitude due to abrupt changes) - if someone more familiar with the actual algorithms could chime and correct me I will happily stand corrected :)
Second off, instantaneous sound is only a health issue when it's really loud, like a gunshot (130-140dB SPL) near the point at which the ear drum ruptures. That means that you need to be in an environment where the background noise is dangerously loud to begin with, and because of the way sound is made - this might be unlikely. Which is interesting, because early ANC did have these problems - when it was being used initially for military applications (helicopter/tank pilots iirc).
Lastly the important thing to remember is that ANC is usually part of a dual pronged approach to ear protection. Latency is a problem when you need to cancel high frequencies (where you get past about a quarter wavelength and interference can become constructive), but ANC excels at low frequencies (below about 500-1kHz it can be remarkable even). This is great because passive reduction strategies (sealing off the ear, thick padding, good fit/headband adjustment) are much more effective at high frequencies.
So TL;DR it was a problem, been fixed, and where it might happen is pretty rare for a consumer.
Also noise rarely spontaneously inverts phase at a particular frequency. That'd be weird.
And yes, it would be weird if a frequency range spontaneously inverted - the only scenario I can imagine that happening in is some jerk doing it on purpose.
The reason I became interested in ANC was because every night I would hear a terrible frequency being emitted from the air conditioner units above me (top floor apartment building), and during my experiments I quickly realized how hopeless it would be to effectively combat them due to the varying intensity of the sound throughout my apartment, the dynamic interactions of the sound with itself within my echoey wood floor studio, and my location at any one time. All valid points though, thanks for chiming in. I learned more about ANC :)
Edit: Btw my goal was ANC via speakers, not headphones. Headphones would be much easier since they only have a single, summed audio source.
While the noise cancellation is active it will attempt to neutralize (destructively interfere with) sounds from the outside, including those generated by your speaker. You could indeed adversarially engage through something like a spontaneous phase shift (so the interference will become constructive, making the resulting signal louder) or generating a frequency the ANC can't compensate.