AirPods Pro announcement and owners thread..

Forums › Apple iOS and devices › AirPods Pro announcement and owners thread..

premiumtouring

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#259892 29-Oct-2019 07:20

https://www.apple.com/nz/airpods-pro/

Just announced this morning at $449 NZD. Currently have Gen1, so have ordered a set. Glad I waited on the AirPods Gen1.1 update. AirPods Pro ordered today delivers Thursday. This is going to be great for the office.

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#2344673 29-Oct-2019 08:18

about time Apple is catching up to the rest of market with an A.N.C. offer....

would be good to see the reviews when the pros match it up against existing best in class wireless ANC's

premiumtouring

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#2344676 29-Oct-2019 08:30

I have the Bose QC 35s which I’ll compare them to and provide feedback when they arrive.

geekiegeek

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#2344678 29-Oct-2019 08:41

Just ordered. These will be great for work and on the bus and short plane trips. I had the gen 1 but the sound isolation was so bad that I couldn't hear music properly over the sound of traffic walking down the street.

alasta

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#2345684 29-Oct-2019 09:35

I have the regular AirPods and find them good for talk radio and as a phone headset, but I am struggling to understand why anyone would buy them to listen to music. This premium version presumably will have audio quality that is similar to the awful Beats range of headphones, and meanwhile there are real audio companies producing genuinely good headphones at this price point.

geekiegeek

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#2345688 29-Oct-2019 09:47

Have you listened to newer beats? I have the Powerbeats Pro and Studio 3 and they both sound great. They dropped the heavy bass some time ago and now have a more neutral sound. This comes from someone who has owned many pairs of $1000+ cans over the years.

Aaroona

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#2345713 29-Oct-2019 10:23

I'll be waiting for reviews of these before I look to upgrade.

I recently only bought the Airpods 2, on their release date this year. So for me a bit harder to justify.

Also worried about the Longevity of them (and bluetooth earphones in general) for an item as expensive as this.

I do like the look of the force sensor though. Will be interesting to see how well these do.

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alasta

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#2345714 29-Oct-2019 10:24

geekiegeek: Have you listened to newer beats? I have the Powerbeats Pro and Studio 3 and they both sound great. They dropped the heavy bass some time ago and now have a more neutral sound. This comes from someone who has owned many pairs of $1000+ cans over the years.

Yes, I owned a pair of Beats Studio 3 and, whilst I would admit that they are much better than the older Beats products, they are still nowhere near as mature as the Sennheiser PXC550 that I have replaced them with.

alasta

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#2345717 29-Oct-2019 10:27

Aaroona:

I'll be waiting for reviews of these before I look to upgrade.

I recently only bought the Airpods 2, on their release date this year. So for me a bit harder to justify.

Also worried about the Longevity of them (and bluetooth earphones in general) for an item as expensive as this.

For what it's worth I bought the first generation AirPods when they were first launched, and recently replaced them with the second generation due to the batteries gradually failing.

With my original pair I found that the battery life started to drop off noticeably after a couple of years of daily usage, and after another six months the battery state would tend to get down to around 25% after just over an hour of use.

So, in summary, I would say that the longevity is acceptable but you definitely shouldn't expect them to last forever.

Aaroona

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#2345719 29-Oct-2019 10:30

alasta:

I have the regular AirPods and find them good for talk radio and as a phone headset, but I am struggling to understand why anyone would buy them to listen to music. This premium version presumably will have audio quality that is similar to the awful Beats range of headphones, and meanwhile there are real audio companies producing genuinely good headphones at this price point.

Because I don't want headphones specifically. I want earphones, which are small and convenient, that doesn't have a massive driver hanging out my ear.

I'll admit the quality of sound from Airpods 2 and even their wired equivalent is quite noticeable (though, less so if you use Apple Music, I've found) - I haven't found another set of earphones that pair as easily (particularly between devices), gives reasonable quality and doesn't look (entirely) ridiculous, which also include some decent features (pause of removal, configurable forward/back/play pause, hey siri, etc.)

Maybe I need to do some more research, but still.

geekiegeek

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#2345722 29-Oct-2019 10:35

I think if you are completely in the Apple ecosystem, the beats and Apple range of Bluetooth devices make for a very easy life. Instant connectivity across all devices is an absolute godsend. I have two MacBooks (one for work, one for play), 3 Apple TVs an iPad Pro and an iPhone 11 Pro and an Apple Watch 5. I swap across devices constantly and have never had any other headphones come close to the ease of use.

Aaroona

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#2345724 29-Oct-2019 10:36

alasta:

For what it's worth I bought the first generation AirPods when they were first launched, and recently replaced them with the second generation due to the batteries gradually failing.

With my original pair I found that the battery life started to drop off noticeably after a couple of years of daily usage, and after another six months the battery state would tend to get down to around 25% after just over an hour of use.

So, in summary, I would say that the longevity is acceptable but you definitely shouldn't expect them to last forever.

Yeah, I definitely don't expect them to last forever and accept that, especially for such a small battery, they will degrade and become less useful. My issue is they aren't "serviceable" - you essentially pay Apple to replace the entire earphone. My complaint doesn't just apply to Apple of course, but for context, I own only the Airpods.

I'm also salty about that because AppleCare didn't exist when I bought mind and they wouldn't retrospectively allow me to purchase on the day it came out because I was a month over the 60 day period.. But that's another story.

But, I know I could be potentially swayed depending on how some of the reviews go. The Force sensor is definitely a big up for me.

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premiumtouring

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#2345775 29-Oct-2019 12:02

Aaroona:

I'll be waiting for reviews of these before I look to upgrade.

I recently only bought the Airpods 2, on their release date this year. So for me a bit harder to justify.

Also worried about the Longevity of them (and bluetooth earphones in general) for an item as expensive as this.

I do like the look of the force sensor though. Will be interesting to see how well these do.

I know it is super uncommon in NZ but one great thing about Apple is their American style returns policy. I buy Apple products and trial them for 14 days. If it doesn't work as advertised within that period, you call support and start a return. The returns process is incredibly simple (painless) and in my opinion world class. So if you're waiting for someone else's review to make your decision.. you're not really making a truly informed decision.

DjShadow

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#2345829 29-Oct-2019 14:14

Might be a little hard to achieve but I'd like to see a built in feature that if you are near a railway crossing the noise cancelling turns off

Aaroona

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#2345841 29-Oct-2019 14:27

DjShadow:

Might be a little hard to achieve but I'd like to see a built in feature that if you are near a railway crossing the noise cancelling turns off

Hadn't thought about that... Sounds like an awesome idea, but could you imagine if they tried to force this on people? Definitely as an option though, I don't see why it wouldn't be possible.

People get weird when a company forces something upon them, even if its for the "greater good" - Apple probably have the most successful track record of pulling it off though.

Use location services from the iPhone (not sure about iPod touch), then turn it off based on their Apple Map data... shouldn't even need to leave their ecosystem if my two second thought about it works out.

mattwnz

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#2345876 29-Oct-2019 15:42

A pity they are 'in ear' type, which I dislike, due to not liking to put things in my ear that far up.I also find they pop out. I like the older stype ear shape of the original ones, but not the long droopy sticks on the end. A pity they didn't upgrade the regular ones too to a more modern design

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