I see you’ve never used AirPods between multiple devises. It’s become a lot better in the last year, but that’s only because it started out infuriating.
QC3s were much better than AirPods at multi device up until a recent update.
QC3s were much better than AirPods at multi device up until a recent update.
Not the OP, but I've used AirPods since day one, switching between my iPad, iPhone, and Mac and they've been fine. I honestly have no idea what you are talking about. It's one of the things I loved about them from go, in fact a lot of people loved the way they switched between devices from the start. It was one of their most praised features.
Happened every week or two, and I've never seen this problem with Catalina, or in fact any previous OSX.
And I still get the thing where a device only picks up one AirPod and I have to stick them both back in the case to get stereo.
Dramatically better than any bluetooth speaker I've had? Of course. But not perfect.
I agree, save I wouldn't describe it as dramatically better. My experience with bluetooth headphones switching between multiple devices prior to the AirPods was pretty much unusable. So the AirPods delivering "Not Perfect" was by comparison night and day.
Bose requires using their mobile app that is always very slow to open and sync and full of useless bloated features, and for whatever reason they've decided nobody should ever have more than 2 devices as a firm rule. So you want to use them with a work computer, home computer, and phone? Gotta spend 20 seconds opening the shitty app all the time and fiddling with which two are the currently connected devices.
And then on top of that, even when exactly 2 devices are connected they frequently steal focus from each other (which may be MacOS behaving badly rather than the fault of Bose, but the end result is that I'm often connected to the wrong thing and my sound isn't working).
Like you mention it's hit or miss with the host device though. Sometimes it fails to connect and you need to connect from within the OS.
In the end I only use the QC35s on my laptop which is a total disappointment.
The app collects data on what music you listen to and sends it back to Bose. So obviously they want to encourage you to install and use the app.
Last I checked, at least. Also, there are _two_ Bose apps now, and which one you use depends on which Bose QuietComfort headphones you have. That I have no explanation for.
5% of the time, I get correct pairing when powered on. 20% of the time, going to the Bluetooth menu -> Device -> Connect works. The rest of the time is a frustrating time having to remove/go into paring mode/re-pair to get it to work (AirPods included).
We have some google nest speakers and wow, they get it wrong so often despite being stationary. They can connect to one person, not another, drop connections, vanish for days until I care to reset them and get them back online. Sometimes the voice changes, haha. Airpods though, I can share them with my family and they work great between each of our devices.
It’s one of those things where I consider myself lucky. As a software developer I don’t subscribe to the “no adults in the room” attitude, but I know this stuff is hard. I’d expect more people to have problems.
The switching itself technically works. The problem is it needs to be smarter to not switch away when audio is currently in use - especially if the mic is in use.
One issue I've seen a few times is if I have something playing on my mac, and a video going on my iPad, they've gotten into a switch loop.
I forget how this is on my Bose. I think video keeps playing with muted volume when you take the phone call so when you disconnect you just rejoin the video.
If your case is personal iPhone + work MacBook, it's probably easier to just use wired EarPods with the work MacBook. You'll get better microphone quality for meetings too.
I think this is much faster than going to either OSs bluetooth settings menu.