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Comment by zaptheimpaler | Hacker News Reader

Wireless headphones suck.

I have a good pair (WF-1000XM3) because my phone doesn't have an audio jack and they are always a pain. They connect to the wrong device frequently, the battery life is barely a few hours and the sound quality is ok. Always have trouble with voice quality on calls too. Often only one headphone will turn on but not the other. They are supposedly easier to carry because no cords, but they are harder because I need to carry two things (case + headphones) most of the time instead of one. Given how low the battery life is, carrying the case is essential

In contrast, my wired headphones are 100x easier - i plug them in and they work. It takes less time than fiddling with bluetooth and they are 100% reliable.

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I had the same Sony's. Pairing and reliability was a nightmare.

I switched to AirPods (Pros and Max) and a lot of my issues dissapeared.

Honestly it's a shame because the audio quality on the XM3 was better than the Airpod Pro but the software is just not there.

The AirPods aren't perfect either of course, but it's a night and day difference between the reliability of them vs the Sony.

I found the Sony was extra bad when there was either a busy area or if I took out just one ear. Often I'd start dropping connectivity to one ear and then they'd just crap out altogether till I reset them.

the XM4 adds the ability to be paired to multiple devices at a time, which seems to be the real magic of the airpods. when the headphones can be connected to both, you don't have to worry about disconnecting from one device before connecting to another lest you have your phone and your laptop fighting over your headphones.

Same here, I had the XM3 and the pairing issue was very frustrating. Particularly because I want to use the headphones on multiple devices (two Macs, iPad, iPhone) and pairing between devices took forever. I bought the Airpods Max and couldn't be happier. Pairing with devices almost always just works, most of the time I don't have to do anything. I walk with my phone and listen to a podcast, then I awake my Mac from sleep, hit play in Spotify, and it works. This alone is worth the steep price of the Airpods Max for me.

The only issue I had with them was that I recently tried to connect them to a Mac that wasn't in my iCloud. It is possible to do a non-iCloud paired direct bluetooth connection with them and this worked. But ~1 week later they suddenly disappeared from my main iCloud account. I'll not try that again.

I have the opposite of these experiences. My XM3s connect reliably and never drop, and have great battery life. My AirPod Pros have constant issues. This is with either my Mac/iPhone or Linux laptop.

That said I’ve gone back to plugging in the XM3s in an attempt to take advantage of Apple’s lossless music.

i still use my Sony 1000XM (the first gen) and have to say they're by far the most reliable headphones i've used on any android device. hardly useable on anything else though. Pairing is always a disaster on windows/linux and iOS (ipad).

I had the WF-1000XM2s and my experience was pretty similar. In particular when I used to travel into London for work, they would basically stop working when I entered a busy railway station at rush hour. But for me at least, upgrading to the XM3 solved everything. Had them for almost 18 months now and battery life is still great.

The one thing that really does piss me off about the XM3 is that the buttons are too sensitive - if I'm wearing a hood, the slightest brush against the headphones acts like a push of the button. I have to remember on rainy/windy days to turn the buttons off completely.

I should note I have no issues with the WH-1000X (headphones, not earbuds) from Sony. Audio quality is great [0], battery needs to be charged maybe once a week, pairing works perfectly and they are pretty comfortable to wear all afternoon in the office.

[0] Unless you try to make a call using the microphone, when it switches to a low quality codec, but are there any Bluetooth headsets that don't have this issue?

>are there any Bluetooth headsets that don't have this issue?

Yes. The recently released Bose QC45 headphones do not have this issue. I don’t know what they did to stop it, but it’s not present.

Too bad the reviews I've read about the QC45 have not been too flattering.

Any chance you have a summary on the key criticism?

I've seen user reviews complain about build quality, UX (like buttons being harder to find by feel and harder to press), buggy app, and active noise cancellation issues compared to the QC35s (static, loud bangs). Apparently they might also work worse in windy conditions than the previous ones.

Thanks. I have Bose 700 and sad to hear that the QC45 isn't an obvious improvement.

I actually ended up returning the pair for some of the exact reasons the sibling mentioned. The biggest one for me was how mushy some of the buttons were. It was very difficult to tell if I had pressed the buttons or not. The noise cancelling was alright, but not good enough to be almost 2x as expensive as the 35 II’s. Overall very disappointed in Bose.

I had those too. AirPods are incredible and will change your mind about wireless headphones

*As long as you don't need to connect to any non-Apple devices.

They definitely can pair with any Bluetooth device

I use my AirPods Pro with my main laptop that uses Windows.

Their codec availability for non-Apple is not great. They really work best inside the Apple ecosystem.

I have the AirPod Pro and they reliably try to fall out multiple times in an hour.

Depends on your ear

It’s very solid in mine

Yes, sounds reasonable.

I also guess they have tested it on many different persons but not my type of ears.

(I see many people with same ethnicity as me complain about it ;-)

Apple just came out with a new model called the Beats Fit Pro which has all the features of the AirPods Pro but also has an extra wingtip to keep them in your ear.

> Always have trouble with voice quality on calls too.

The Headset profile's audio codecs are hot garbage. Any time your device uses the microphone it switches to this and audio quality turns to mud.

Until they come up with a high definition profile for mic and audio, wired headsets will always have a place.

This!

I sometimes really struggle to understand others when they are using wireless units. It is AM quality at best, like 5 to 8Khz bandwidth.

That is not so bad frankly. But, couple it with cell phone call audio codecs and it is a mess.

I have to quicky switch to my earpiece from my wireless earphones whenever I receive a call just to avoid the low quality headset mode. It's so so bad. Not all wireless headsets are the same, however.

> Not all wireless headsets are the same, however.

Unless Apple or Samsung is using a proprietary protocol between their headsets and handsets, they pretty much are. You'll even notice the degradation of quality if you use your Mic on a Mac or PC.

I've never seen a Bluetooth device that simultaneously supports two active profiles so you could stream audio over A2DP and capture mic over the headset profile. Even if such a beast existed, I doubt devices would know how to handle it.

> the battery life is barely a few hours and the sound quality is ok... Often only one headphone will turn on but not the other.

Sounds like they are broken. I have XM3s. The batteries last for a very long time, something like 12h with noise cancellation on. I've never had an issue with the speakers turning on or off individually.

> Always have trouble with voice quality on calls too.

Their mic is their biggest weakness. It's pretty bad.

I’ve never owned a pair of the mx3 so I can’t compare but I have the mx4 and they don’t match your description: the battery life _without using the case_ is fantastic (8 hours, plus 24 hours using the case) and the connection is very consistent and reliable.

I don’t know how good they’d be for your use-case, but definitely worth considering the mx4 as distinct from the mx3.

edit: xm4 not mx4. Shows how little I care about headphones :-D

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