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AirPods don't “just work”

philip.design

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Re: AirPods don't “just work”

#901

Post by chias »

Annoyance 3 -- or something very similar -- is going to be the case for any bluetooth headset. There simply isn't enough bandwidth in a bluetooth connection to have a high quality audio stream and a microphone stream going at the same time, so a bluetooth headset switches between high-quality-headphones and low-quality-headset modes. You can experience this in action by listening to music via a bluetooth headset then performing something which toggles them to headset mode (e.g. navigating to a Google Meet page or whatever).

I suspect there is a brief delay when switching modes, so the AirPods don't switch while actively playing anything. So immediately firing up some music before the AirPods switch back to headphone mode probably keeps them in headset mode.

Re: AirPods don't “just work”

#902

Post by glxxyz »

spacemadness wrote: post #449
thenerdhead wrote: post #191

Here's a few more: - Airpods sometimes do not charge when in the case. Usually need to pull it out and put back in again. - Knowing what airpod(s) and case are charging. The UI on the phone, the open the case sliding window, the widgets, and the case light itself are not very useful. - Spatial audio working on some apps but you're not usually aware if it's on until you tilt an ear one way to confirm. - Out of ear det…

Out of ear detection is my biggest gripe. If I take them out quick and place them on a table because I don’t have the case handy, they try to reconnect when I’m receiving a call or using audio in any way without them. I have to look for the icon in control center and manually remove them. It’s incredibly annoying. I also noticed the membrane sounds like it’s getting blown out when they attempt to deal with loud noise…

There was a recall about a year ago for the membrane blown out buzz problem- if you report it to Apple theyplace them.

Re: AirPods don't “just work”

#903

Post by glxxyz »

Me1000 wrote: post #732
glxxyz wrote: post #587

I've given up with AirPods Pro. I had to replace them several times during the warranty period (once was a recall). Even when working correctly they would have annoying connection problems, for several conference calls I had to switch back to an old school wired pair, which just always works. My attempt to have the case (which only showed life while connected to power) resulted in Apple throwing away my working AirPo…

I usually dont buy AppleCare for my products, but I figured since this was a 1st gen AirPods Pro and they were so small AppleCare was justified this time. And boy am I glad I did, I've had my AirPods Pro replaced like five or six times now. Issues I've experienced: - Loud random static noise (usually for about .25 seconds). It's like someone screaming in your ear. I've experienced this now with TWO pairs. - Noise can…

What I was really annoyed about was that Apple was trying to charge me above full price without the option to add AppleCare for the 'repaired' set. If any product needs AppleCare it's these.

Another issue I had (replaced under AppleCare) was the stem squeeze just completely failing in one of them. So many bugs and failures in one product.

They seemed magical for the first few days/weeks. Now I use a $10 wired pair for work calls and cheap but solid Pixel Buds A for wireless. For noise 'cancelling' around machines I also got some hearing protecion- 3M WorkTunes. Total cost of all 3 is half of the AirPods.

Re: AirPods don't “just work”

#904

Post by glxxyz »

smoldesu wrote: post #861
Me1000 wrote: post #732

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I usually dont buy AppleCare for my products, but I figured since this was a 1st gen AirPods Pro and they were so small AppleCare was justified this time. And boy am I glad I did, I've had my AirPods Pro replaced like five or six times now. Issues I've experienced: - Loud random static noise (usually for about .25 seconds). It's like someone screaming in your ear. I've experienced this now with TWO pairs. - Noise can…

My ex-boyfriend went through 3 or 4 pairs in one year, I could hardly believe he stuck around after the second replacement. Guy didn't even do anything besides sit in his office and type, either, I have no idea what could have caused their repeated failure besides bad QA.

I can believe it. I think it's a combination of buggy Software/firmware and hardware issues- they've tried to squeeze too much into too small a space and can't do it reliably.

Re: AirPods don't “just work”

#905

Post by laichzeit0 »

thenerdhead wrote: post #191

Here's a few more: - Airpods sometimes do not charge when in the case. Usually need to pull it out and put back in again. - Knowing what airpod(s) and case are charging. The UI on the phone, the open the case sliding window, the widgets, and the case light itself are not very useful. - Spatial audio working on some apps but you're not usually aware if it's on until you tilt an ear one way to confirm. - Out of ear det…

I thought I was going out of my mind, but I have all these issues as well. The “out of ear” detection failing and draining battery and the not actually charging while in the case issues are particularly annoying.

Re: AirPods don't “just work”

#907

Post by notreallyserio »

lqr wrote: post #890
asdff wrote: post #812

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The latter I mean. "Take a left on pico from this stop sign, hold your breath and good luck, no one will let you in." Somehow google maps ignores these and prefers me to make a right out of a parking lot or a stop signed street and take my lefts at lights (or off the major arterial) seems like its just a simple set of rules you can apply to your navigation algorithm to avoid these entirely, but the fact that they are…

It does seem like it should be simple to avoid those. I can imagine it might be complicated if the model treats turns as instantaneous and only considers edges in the road graph as taking time. I would love a road navigation tool that gives more options to modify the cost of various route features other than pure distance/traffic. To me, Google is too willing to give a complicated route to save a tiny amount of time.…

Apple could farm their data to see how long people wait to make turns it recommends and adjust the edge weight accordingly. I'm guessing that's what Google does.

Re: AirPods don't “just work”

#908

Post by toastal »

thebean11 wrote: post #270
toastal wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Additional anecdote, I have Sony XM3s and they are constantly having issues on both Android and Linux while being expensive and having excellent noise cancelation. They just worked for like the first 2-3 months but after a year, they've seemed to have gotten worse in basically all aspects (although interestingly switching from Sony's app to GadgetBridge for pairing and config, I seem to get better battery life). The…

All Apple laptops have a 3.5mm headphone jack though..not sure you can blame Apple.

Never said the laptops didn't, but Apple was the first major player to remove the standard of having headphones on a portable compute device with the iPhone. This caught on to other manufacturers first in phones and then percolated up to laptops.

Re: AirPods don't “just work”

#909

Post by ajyotirmay »

eternityforest wrote: post #886
nsxwolf wrote: post #733

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I like "workarounds become a reflex". This is a very succinct way of describing one of the causes of why people often claim to have no issues using something that universally has issues. A great example is the gaming PC vs gaming console war. PC gamers often seem to refuse to admit there's untold little quirks you have to deal with when using a general-purpose operating system and modular hardware to play games. They…

The more minimalist a system is, the less people seem to think in terms of "annoyances". In fact, simplicity fans seem to pride themselves on doing a bit more themselves. Like, manual transmission people think of the constant need to manage it yourself as just how driving is supposed to be. It's a big problem in Linux, where things can totally break and nobody bats an eye.

I guess I'm eligible to answer this as I'm both a Linux user and a stick shifter.

I hate Linux for when things fall-apart. But I also know most of the things are being made by devs because of their passion. My hardware doesn't fail because Linux is blindly arrogant, but because of the hardware vendors who don't support the platform or me (as I paid them money)

Manual transmissions are an extra level of engagement that's fun to drive and useful in many casses. My 86bhp car lacks torque and power, specially combined with its heavy metal body. When I need to overtake and I lack the power for it I can downshift and pass. Add in the rev matching, and it makes it sweeter and perfect.

In a country like India, you pay a good price for a reliable automatic. So that's money saved.

It's the same difference as a home cooked meal and a takeout.

Apple doesn't get slack from me because they know the hardware, the software and still manage to mess it up with loyal fans defending their bad decisions

Re: AirPods don't “just work”

#910

Post by ashtonkem »

vel0city wrote: post #629
ashtonkem wrote: post #537

Earlier quoted context omitted.

950 down, 50 up. Wifi will pull 450 easy, but my hub will only do 100, despite claims to the contrary. 450 is good enough for my use case, so it’s easier to just not worry about it and avoid running another wire up the sit stand desk. If I upgrade my hub to something that’ll pull the claimed 1G, I might change. Or maybe not. I dunno. Literally nothing I do on the internet can get close to saturating it. Edit: wifi ad…

If your dock is only able to negotiate a 100Mbit connection despite theoretically being 1000Mbit, and you're experiencing dropped packets, it might not be your dock. That sounds like an issue with ethernet cabling. Bad cabling will usually result in ports not being able to negotiate their max potential throughput, and sometimes they'll negotiate higher than what they can realistically do.

It’s not the cable. Same exact cable to other nearby machines gets the maximum throughput.

It might be the laptop. That machine has always been more finicky than other laptops I’ve had, and it’s way less stable than my Mac mini.

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