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Bobs_Your_Uncle
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Re: Headphone market for 2018: Hot mess

Sun Jan 21, 2018 10:17 am

Say what you will ... and the debate will doubtless continue to rage ... but what it essentially comes down to is nothing less than a truly exceptional and unprecedented element of Corporate Courage!¹ Thus, by extension, all of us who are displeased by this manufacturing design dictate ... displeased at being denied elements of choice, functionality and convenience that were literally universal just a year ago ... we are nothing better than a bevy of cowardly little whiney babies who really should be happy to pay a premium for receiving less! Heck, who wouldn't want to pay more for a functionality that isn't yet at parity with that which it replaces?

¹ Of course Apple's acquisition of Beats, paired with the opportunity to force yet another new, proprietary, high-margin standard upon their substantial customer base, had absolutely no bearing on what is a decision of product direction driven ultimately by "marketing". Plus "Bonus Points" (I guess) for being able to lay claim to having "Chartered the course of The Industry at large" (... despite this path being actively hostile to customer preferences and desires).

Edit: double double word word
 
NovusBogus
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Re: Headphone market for 2018: Hot mess

Sun Jan 21, 2018 10:53 am

Apple is supremely arrogant and most of the others are comically unimaginative, that's hardly news. But will this trend really have an impact on headphone aficionados? I was under the impression that virtually all of the good can designs were ancient, and Bluetooth makes decent sense for cheap-ish portable headphones for when one is actually being mobile.
 
cynan
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Re: Headphone market for 2018: Hot mess

Sun Jan 21, 2018 1:40 pm

NovusBogus wrote:
Apple is supremely arrogant and most of the others are comically unimaginative, that's hardly news. But will this trend really have an impact on headphone aficionados? I was under the impression that virtually all of the good can designs were ancient, and Bluetooth makes decent sense for cheap-ish portable headphones for when one is actually being mobile.


This. Anything wireless is about convenience first. At nothing wrong with that. Those who really put fidelity first will be using a portable DAC/AMP combo with their phone, or a separate DAP altogether. And then of course regular old analog headphone connection (and a very few, perhaps the trrs balanced variety).
 
Darthutos
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Re: Headphone market for 2018: Hot mess

Sun Jan 21, 2018 2:41 pm

Look at it this way.
Your motherboard broke. Or your System disk, be it HDD or SSD broke.
It's not in warranty and you cannot fix it.
What do you do?

Buy a new system right?
Here's a new system, the retailer says. It comes with Windows 10, be it a Intel or AMD system.

Same thing with Bluetooth.
You dropped your non Iphone X, non android phone,
Here's a replacement.
I'm really sorry, the retailer says, it doesn't come with 3.5 mm jack. We do have these Bluetooth enabled earphones I know you will appreciate.
 
Bobs_Your_Uncle
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Re: Headphone market for 2018: Hot mess

Sun Jan 21, 2018 2:54 pm

cynan wrote:
NovusBogus wrote:
Apple is supremely arrogant and most of the others are comically unimaginative, that's hardly news. But will this trend really have an impact on headphone aficionados? I was under the impression that virtually all of the good can designs were ancient, and Bluetooth makes decent sense for cheap-ish portable headphones for when one is actually being mobile.


This. Anything wireless is about convenience first. At nothing wrong with that. Those who really put fidelity first will be using a portable DAC/AMP combo with their phone, or a separate DAP altogether. And then of course regular old analog headphone connection (and a very few, perhaps the trrs balanced variety).

Both of These; I really couldn't agree more with either comment. It's just a particularly regrettable commentary on the present state of the business when phone OEMs (both the supremely arrogant and the comically unimaginative) are so presumptuous as to anoint themselves the arbiters of what consumers want, and that They will decide which petty pedestrian desires are worthy of their efforts. "If it ain't broke don't fix it" has been superseded by "Move fast; break things ... (and do stupid stuff)!

The ineptness demonstrated by Microsoft and their schizophrenic approach to the market is perhaps the most regrettable transgression of all, in that they took down Nokia (arguably THE premier handset OEM) in a murder/suicide pact with their in-house mobile platform (IMHO possibly the BEST mobile OS and the one with the MOST potential). It's probably a pipe dream, but I'd love to see a resurrection of the old Nokia business sensibilities: 1.) Crank out terrific hardware that is actually supported and that people truly WANT & 2.) Periodically crank out various bizarre production concepts just to see what sticks ... and because it's kinda fun!

Edit: Adding a pinch of salt to the deprecated MS Mobile platform wound, the Redmond crew has filed (received?) a patent for an ultra-thin 3.5mm headphone jack that uses elasticized panels to expand around and grip the plug. Sure, it could be licensed by any interested parties, but ...

Image
 
JustAnEngineer
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Re: Headphone market for 2018: Hot mess

Wed Feb 07, 2018 9:47 pm

Pioneer Rayz Plus fix some of the stupidity of Apple's missing headphone jack.
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Re: Headphone market for 2018: Hot mess

Fri Feb 09, 2018 4:09 pm

JustAnEngineer wrote:
Pioneer Rayz Plus fix some of the stupidity of Apple's missing headphone jack.

I'd almost have to argue that they further the stupidity. What happens if you love your headphones but decide you want to go Android? Lightning to USB-C dongle? Lightning to 3.5mm dongle? Replace the headphones?

This is what we get when companies we rely on fix what isn't broken.
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Re: Headphone market for 2018: Hot mess

Fri Feb 09, 2018 5:08 pm

NTMBK wrote:
Vote with your wallet, and don't buy phones without headphone jacks.


Not just vote with your wallet - send a simple email to said companies telling them why you chose not to buy their product. They might not clearly see the 'lost sale', which is harder to judge, but will see the email.
 
Kretschmer
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Re: Headphone market for 2018: Hot mess

Fri Feb 09, 2018 6:05 pm

As a recent Pixel 2 buyer, I feel your pain. Bluetooth never sounds as good as a modest set of 3.5mm earbuds, and having to keep two devices charged is a royal pain.

I would have bought a OP5T in a heartbeat if they were compatible with Verizon's network.
 
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Re: Headphone market for 2018: Hot mess

Sun Feb 11, 2018 5:08 am

kvndoom wrote:
JustAnEngineer wrote:
Pioneer Rayz Plus fix some of the stupidity of Apple's missing headphone jack.

I'd almost have to argue that they further the stupidity. What happens if you love your headphones but decide you want to go Android? Lightning to USB-C dongle? Lightning to 3.5mm dongle? Replace the headphones?


A portable Bluetooth AptX receiver would be an option, especially if you already carry a power bank. I've come across portable clip-on Bluetooth DAC/Amps.
 
HERETIC
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Re: Headphone market for 2018: Hot mess

Sun Feb 11, 2018 6:01 am

Usacomp2k3 wrote:
My opinion is that it was always about water-reistance and not about space.


Neither are correct.They are just a side bonus.Remember it's apple-
How can we get more money out of the suckers?
Revenue from Beats and apple ear products has probably doubled since.
 
ludi
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Re: Headphone market for 2018: Hot mess

Thu Feb 15, 2018 7:07 pm

More consequences of Apple's courage...meet the Hydra-phones:

https://www.theverge.com/circuitbreaker ... rging-dock
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Redocbew
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Re: Headphone market for 2018: Hot mess

Thu Feb 15, 2018 8:14 pm

Wait, what?

I tend to tune out the "courageous" meme these days, and most things related to it, but... really?
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DancinJack
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Re: Headphone market for 2018: Hot mess

Thu Feb 15, 2018 8:16 pm

I saw that thing today and immediately closed the page and would not read it. That's so damn stupid I just can't.
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Re: Headphone market for 2018: Hot mess

Thu Feb 15, 2018 8:53 pm

Well obviously if you feel a need for something like that, you're using your iPhone wrong. Why would any rational person ever want to use wired headphones while charging their phone? /s
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JustAnEngineer
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Re: Headphone market for 2018: Hot mess

Thu Feb 15, 2018 9:24 pm

The lightning hub built into the Pioneer Rayz Plus (so that you can charge your phone or transfer data between the phone and PC while listening to music) isn't nearly as ugly as those.
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Re: Headphone market for 2018: Hot mess

Mon Feb 19, 2018 4:55 pm

ludi wrote:
More consequences of Apple's courage...meet the Hydra-phones:

https://www.theverge.com/circuitbreaker ... rging-dock
My old Samsung M610 had a similar attachement to let me plug in headphones via the charging/data port. And as you would suspect, it was a strain on the data/charging port that hastens connector death.
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Re: Headphone market for 2018: Hot mess

Fri May 25, 2018 1:02 pm

No way in hell would I spend that kind of money on headphones. Unless they came with several live concerts from my favorite bands with it. Oh, and a pair of real speakers that can make you physically ill from the powerful bass.

On the subject of DACs
Modern DAC components and amplifier devices typically have amazing PSRR ratings (power supply rejection ratio). Meaning even with noisy power, most noise wont make it into the signal chain. These designs are necessary in the era of switching power supplies typically used for low power devices. Also switching frequencies are typically far above human hearing, but not mixing products. Again because of the PSRR rations, this is greatly reduced.

I am sure you can find some real crap designs, since consumer level stuff cuts every possible corner to compete on price. Also there is no requirement of a manufacturer to use a modern device.
 
just brew it!
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Re: Headphone market for 2018: Hot mess

Fri May 25, 2018 1:23 pm

liquidsquid wrote:
On the subject of DACs
Modern DAC components and amplifier devices typically have amazing PSRR ratings (power supply rejection ratio). Meaning even with noisy power, most noise wont make it into the signal chain. These designs are necessary in the era of switching power supplies typically used for low power devices. Also switching frequencies are typically far above human hearing, but not mixing products. Again because of the PSRR rations, this is greatly reduced.

A caveat to this: I've found that it is often not true for portable devices which are designed to be charged via USB. Great SNR when running on the battery, but it goes to crap if you try to use the device while it is charging.
Nostalgia isn't what it used to be.
 
DancinJack
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Re: Headphone market for 2018: Hot mess

Fri May 25, 2018 2:04 pm

liquidsquid wrote:
No way in hell would I spend that kind of money on headphones. Unless they came with several live concerts from my favorite bands with it. Oh, and a pair of real speakers that can make you physically ill from the powerful bass.

What headphones are you even referring to?
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Re: Headphone market for 2018: Hot mess

Thu May 31, 2018 9:09 am

DancinJack wrote:
What headphones are you even referring to?

Oh, somehow I replied to an earlier post and removed the quote by accident. These:
https://en-us.sennheiser.com/high-end-h ... les-hd-820

So I just spent way more money on headphones than I ever have done, but what the hell, you only live once:
https://www.sony.com/electronics/headba ... wh-1000xm2
I was very impressed by the noise cancelling ability in Best Buy when suddenly I could not hear my kid and wife right next to me nor the general mayhem in the store. Then the audio quality and inaudible noise floor just blew me away. Nice flat clean response, no mud. Perfect. Couldn't be happier with the sound!
Also if I am reading the specifications correctly I can get BlueTooth hi-def audio or compressed with the sacrifice of distance for the hi-def. I may have to re-digitize my music collection without compression even though the sample rates are really high and the compression on MP3s set low.

Very luckily I have excellent hearing for my age, probably due to protecting my hearing while playing with any loud machinery. I can still hear to 16kHz while my wife can barely hit 4kHz.

Very impressed, and not impressed easily. Similarly priced Beats are a hot mess of colorized sound. Pure ****. Bose, a close second but the touch controls on the Sony headset are nicer and closed the deal.

Only complaint: I cannot hear my keyboard any longer, and I didn't realize how dependent I am on the sound to know if I hit the right keys. Weird.
 
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Re: Headphone market for 2018: Hot mess

Thu May 31, 2018 10:12 am

liquidsquid wrote:
Also if I am reading the specifications correctly I can get BlueTooth hi-def audio or compressed with the sacrifice of distance for the hi-def. I may have to re-digitize my music collection without compression even though the sample rates are really high and the compression on MP3s set low.

Fortunately I had saved all of the lossless rips I did 15+ years ago (burned the WAV files to DVD-Rs). A couple of years ago I reloaded all the lossless rips, and re-compressed them using FLAC and 160 kbit OGG. All of the lossless FLAC stays on spinning media in my file server now, and the OGG files are a reasonable tradeoff of fidelity vs. space for mobile playback.

liquidsquid wrote:
Very luckily I have excellent hearing for my age, probably due to protecting my hearing while playing with any loud machinery. I can still hear to 16kHz while my wife can barely hit 4kHz.

Wow, 4kHz is really bad! :o

I used to be able to hear nearly out to 20kHz. I know the top end dropped below 16kHz sometime in my 40s though, because I stopped being able to hear the flyback whine from old CRT televisions. I can still hear 14kHz (just checked using Audacity's tone generator function).
Nostalgia isn't what it used to be.
 
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Re: Headphone market for 2018: Hot mess

Thu May 31, 2018 4:04 pm

just brew it! wrote:
Wow, 4kHz is really bad! :o


Tell me about it, a cause of a lot of repeated statements and yelling around the house. Frustrating. This is a result of fluid behind the eardrum. I suppose if something was able to be done to clear that out, her hearing would be greatly improved.

I was thinking of building a Tuba-HT https://billfitzmaurice.info/THT.html to give her a hand with getting rid of that fluid. ;-)
 
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Re: Headphone market for 2018: Hot mess

Thu May 31, 2018 4:16 pm

liquidsquid wrote:
just brew it! wrote:
Wow, 4kHz is really bad! :o

Tell me about it, a cause of a lot of repeated statements and yelling around the house. Frustrating. This is a result of fluid behind the eardrum. I suppose if something was able to be done to clear that out, her hearing would be greatly improved.

Blocked eustachian tubes? I believe there's a procedure where they can install stents to help drain that, if that's the case.
Nostalgia isn't what it used to be.
 
Captain Ned
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Re: Headphone market for 2018: Hot mess

Thu May 31, 2018 5:12 pm

just brew it! wrote:
Blocked eustachian tubes? I believe there's a procedure where they can install stents to help drain that, if that's the case.

When I was 5 I had had chronic ear infections most of my life (grew up in a chain-smoking house) and couldn't drain my middle ears the way Nature intended, so I had "tubes" inserted in my eardrums to provide a path for the fluid as well as having my adenoids (just what are these things, anyways) scraped off. The 3 months with the tubes allowed my middle ear to drain out and the Eustachian tubes to clear up, and for Bob know why, the adenoid removal pretty much knocked out every chronic sickness I'd ever had. Other than chicken pox (senior year of HS) and mono (college), I haven't been seriously sick, other than self-inflicted, in almost 50 years.
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ludi
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Re: Headphone market for 2018: Hot mess

Thu May 31, 2018 5:38 pm

Captain Ned wrote:
just brew it! wrote:
Blocked eustachian tubes? I believe there's a procedure where they can install stents to help drain that, if that's the case.

When I was 5 I had had chronic ear infections most of my life (grew up in a chain-smoking house) and couldn't drain my middle ears the way Nature intended, so I had "tubes" inserted in my eardrums to provide a path for the fluid as well as having my adenoids (just what are these things, anyways) scraped off. The 3 months with the tubes allowed my middle ear to drain out and the Eustachian tubes to clear up, and for Bob know why, the adenoid removal pretty much knocked out every chronic sickness I'd ever had. Other than chicken pox (senior year of HS) and mono (college), I haven't been seriously sick, other than self-inflicted, in almost 50 years.

I had those eartube things twice in childhood years. The really amusing/gross part was finding one after it had been fully rejected from the eardrum and emerged from the ear canal, embedded in a wax marble.
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Re: Headphone market for 2018: Hot mess

Thu May 31, 2018 6:00 pm

I had some really horrible ear wax problems ~20 years ago. Not unlike liquidsquid's wife's condition, it started to severely affect my hearing; I probably couldn't hear much above 4 kHz (maybe even lower). After repeated uses (over a period of a couple of weeks) of one of the over-the-counter earwax removal remedies, large chunks of impacted earwax fell out of my ears. I remember looking at the stuff, and thinking how the f*ck did I have all that sh*t in there?
:o
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Re: Headphone market for 2018: Hot mess

Thu May 31, 2018 6:07 pm

At least none of us (that I know of) have ever had this happen: https://nypost.com/2017/06/09/womans-he ... n-her-ear/
Nostalgia isn't what it used to be.
 
Captain Ned
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Re: Headphone market for 2018: Hot mess

Thu May 31, 2018 8:07 pm

just brew it! wrote:
At least none of us (that I know of) have ever had this happen: https://nypost.com/2017/06/09/womans-he ... n-her-ear/

I'll see your spider and raise you a cockroach:

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nat ... 583377002/

"Feeling a roach in the throes of death, lodged in a very sensitive part of your body, is unlike anything I can adequately explain."
What we have today is way too much pluribus and not enough unum.
 
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Re: Headphone market for 2018: Hot mess

Thu May 31, 2018 8:17 pm

I can imagine more sensitive (or at least disturbing) body parts.
Nostalgia isn't what it used to be.

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