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Hardware microphone disconnect (2021)

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Re: Hardware microphone disconnect (2021)

#131

Post by threeseed »

gligorot wrote: post #69
lovehashbrowns wrote: post #62

They have this feature but closing the lid on a MacBook or even putting it to sleep allows Bluetooth devices to stay connected. Heck, a MacBook even while in sleep mode will connect to Bluetooth devices. As far as I can see, this requires a third-party app to fix. Can an application still use the microphone on a Bluetooth device that’s connected?

And you can’t turn bluetooth off without logging in first, a feature which is available for WiFi. Horrendous UX decisions by Apple.

> a feature which is available for WiFi

I am not able to disable WiFi from the login screen.

I think it would be a horrendous decision to allow random people to do this.

Re: Hardware microphone disconnect (2021)

#132

Post by slavik81 »

vbezhenar wrote: post #15
dymk wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How would a microphone work with the lid closed anyways? It’d be muffled. If you’re docking your laptop closed, you’ve got an external webcam / mic if you need those inputs.

Why would I need to get mic if I have it in laptop? It makes very little sense to me.

The laptop microphone will pick up whatever noise is in the room. It's easier to filter out background noise with a microphone that is closer to your mouth.

Re: Hardware microphone disconnect (2021)

#134

Post by hackmiester »

andoma wrote: post #89
elzbardico wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem here is that people that use external keyboards and mice over BT expect to be able to wake their MacBooks connected to external displays even with the lid closed.

Nah, Makes no sense. I can manually disconnect the BT audio headset while having keyboard and mouse still working fine over BT.

I do not think this is as simple as you believe it is. Would the average user not find this really confusing?

You plug your laptop into your dock and close it, and suddenly your AirPods stop working, even though the rest of the computer works fine?

Re: Hardware microphone disconnect (2021)

#135

Post by prepend »

lovehashbrowns wrote: post #62

They have this feature but closing the lid on a MacBook or even putting it to sleep allows Bluetooth devices to stay connected. Heck, a MacBook even while in sleep mode will connect to Bluetooth devices. As far as I can see, this requires a third-party app to fix. Can an application still use the microphone on a Bluetooth device that’s connected?

I like how sleep works on my MacBook in that I can close my screen and open it back up to work in less than a second. On windows this doesn’t work. Half the time my dell or Lenovo freeze up and the other half it hangs for seconds.

However, I notice that it sleep mode it will have tons of network traffic and I wish there was a setting to make it really turn off when the lid is closed and not do anything.

Re: Hardware microphone disconnect (2021)

#136

Post by giobox »

ehPReth wrote: post #120
cortesoft wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have AirPods, but the experience still sucks with multiple devices. I have my phone, my laptop, my iPad, and two iPads for my kids, all on my account. I literally am unable to make my kid’s iPads forget my AirPods, because it is tied to the apple account. If I have the iPads forget them, it forgets them on all my devices. It is annoying as hell, I have to leave Bluetooth off on my kids iPads.

The kids iPads should be on their own managed kids Apple IDs, should they not? https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201084

Emphasis on should here. In the "real world" with real family pressures a lot of the time good account hygene goes out the window. In my experience account sharing is rife on "kid" iPads, especially as many of them are often hand-me-down devices that people don't want to have to go through the pain of reinstalling everything again for a new user.

The ideal solution is iOS on iPad gets multiple user account support (like general purpose Macs and PCs have had for decades....), and you could just quickly throw on a new kid account, but Apple clearly like forcing you to buy one iPad per user account and reinstall everything every time it gets a new user - shared devices aren't as great for the company bottom line.

The sad thing is this support is largely there in the OS already built; its just locked to schools/businesses and is a PITA to setup for private owners:

https://support.apple.com/guide/deployment/shared-ipad-overv...

Honestly, the lack of multiple user accounts is borderline criminal in my opinion, especially on the high spec expensive M1 iPad models that cost as much as a multi-user laptop.

Re: Hardware microphone disconnect (2021)

#137

Post by threeseed »

gligorot wrote: post #130
porbelm wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well if you have the Find My Device functionality enabled, not being able to turn off Bluetooth (and WiFi) is a good thing, since a thief cannot disable location deriving and reporting features by turning them off.

I don’t think those are connected…or at least it would be silly for that to be the case. Say your laptop was stolen when your BT was off for some random reason - does that mean you won’t be able to find it?

Bluetooth is a fundamental part of the Find My and broader Location Services stack.

Low power devices like AirTag rely entirely on Bluetooth LE and the Find My network to determine their location.

Re: Hardware microphone disconnect (2021)

#138

Post by gligorot »

joshstrange wrote: post #90
gligorot wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And you can’t turn bluetooth off without logging in first, a feature which is available for WiFi. Horrendous UX decisions by Apple.

> Horrendous UX decisions by Apple. Is there any OS that offers that by default? I don't remember ever seeing that on Windows or any linux distro I used.

Whether other OSs do by default is irrelevant. Are you saying that I just be content with the ability to turn off WiFi?

Besides, MacOS is cherished by many as a UX/UI masterpiece, yet there are many annoyances that need to be fixed by the user. For example window management is a big one, I simply haven’t been able to achieve the comfort of i3 on my work Mac. (tmux comes close, but I can’t run Firefox in there)

Re: Hardware microphone disconnect (2021)

#139

Post by zamnos »

philsnow wrote: post #79
crazygringo wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The microphone is located inside the left speaker grille anyways, so it would be terribly muffled in clamshell mode anyways. Note this is in contrast to previous models where the microphone had a tiny hole on the left edge (next to USB-C ports) and it could be used in clamshell mode. Which at first I thought felt like a downgrade... but the reality is that your laptop isn't usually in a good position for mic pickup w…

> The microphone is located inside the left speaker grille anyways, so it would be terribly muffled in clamshell mode anyways I don't think the hardware disable is meant as a UX convenience ("let's always disable it in clamshell mode because it sounds terrible"), as that could have just been done in software. It's meant for people privacy-conscious people who want to see a closed laptop and be able to assume it's not…

Recording sound from a video-only device that has been covered, with no hardware modifications would be a really really neat trick! Using Van Eck phreaking against all sorts of hardware is fascinating to me. FM radio broadcast from how RAM gets accessed and things like that. Maybe noise in the camera sensor can be used to pick up noise from the microphone on the motherboard (which is where the microphone is on Apple Silicon devices). I'm not going to say it's impossible, but it seems highly unlikely given everything else in play.

Re: Hardware microphone disconnect (2021)

#140

Post by JustSomeNobody »

cj wrote: post #96
dvirsky wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This has to be the most annoying thing in MacOS. My laptop, soundly sleeping in my backpack, takes over my bluetooth headphones all the time.

Similarly, whenever I'm working at my kitchen table I always "lose" my mouse as if there's another monitor connected. I realized a couple weeks later MacOS display continuity (or "sidecar"?) was connecting to my Mac Mini located directly upstairs using it as a 2nd monitor while I'm downstairs. My apple watch also regularly unlocks my Mac Mini when I'm downstairs (Mac Mini in a bedroom upstairs). All of these features…

> There really should be a "Travel Mode" for MacOS that disables features like these.

Sadly that is not the Apple way. We'll have to wait years for them to come up with a "solution" that doesn't involve a disable button. If they even decide to work on it.

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