[yticolev]

iOS 14.7 fixes: "Dolby Atmos and Apple Music lossless audio playback may unexpectedly stop". tvOS 14.7 also released but not sure if it had this bug.

 

[Maukey]

Just a heads up for those interested, I did a comparison thread between the AirPods Max and some of my favorite wireless anc headphones.

https://www.head-fi.org/threads/sid...o-h95-dali-io-6-b-w-px7-nad-viso-hp70.958727/

 

[SparkOnShore]

I would like to ask you all something a little off topic, but it came to my mind reading the above thorough comparison review of @Maukey. @tinyman392 please express your point of view as well; Many times it is mentioned that APM as well as other similarly tuned headphones are smooth in upper mids and highs and as a result they miss in detail especially when compared with other more aggressive headphones in the higher frequencies. But my experience says that whenever I tried or owned some more revealing headphones, or as an example some BA iems, my ears perceive this high mids and highs' sparkle more like a distortion than a clear detail presentation. I can hear more detail in a smoother tuned headphone just because the high frequencies do not have this intention of drilling my ears. Of course you may say that it depends on the headphone, but it is strange because it has happened to me with many different examples of what has been said and reviewed as revealing and detailed headphones. Especially when many layers of high pitched sounds, instruments and voices play together in some songs' parts, on those revealing headphones, it is a clear distortion to my ears and for sure not a "revelation" or detail. If I listen to the same song's part on the smooth APM for example, sound has zero distortion and I can enjoy more the details of the particular sounds. Is it something that has to do with my ears? I mean are there experienced listeners who perceive this distortion as detail, or do they just not perceive it as distortion? The files are always AAC or Lossless on Apple Music, so I don't consider it to be an audio file or recording quality issue. I would appreciate your points of view. Many thanks...

 

[tret]

I'm finding myself sitting at a curious crossroads in my head-fi journey. Bear with me.

My first serious entry into this world was in ~2009 when I bought a pair of Grado headphones and quickly discovered that I loved everything about them, except perhaps for their all too brutal knife assault on my poor ears. I didn't end up keeping them, they were just too shrill for my tastes. My next attempt was in ~2015 with the absolutely gorgeous HiFiMan HE-560 & Marantz HD-DAC1 pairing. This is where I became hooked and where, I believe, my Tinnitus experience began.

In the years since I've owned many so-called "endgame" headphones, desktop rigs, (trans)portable setups and DAPs. Along the way I discovered Roon and shelled out the cash for a lifetime license and ultimately discovered that I prefer more relaxed (and musical) signatures with good dynamics and sweet tonality. Through this exploration I fell in love with the Sennheiser HD-650, Meze Empyrean and Meze RAI Penta in particular. In my opinion, and with my preferences in mind, the Meze flagships strike the right balance. They are plenty detailed yet relaxed, supremely comfortable and I get lost in the music. Just the way it's supposed to be.

I'm incredibly happy with my daily driver setup (RME ADI-2 DAC FS v2 & Meze Empyrean) and consider myself most fortunate to own this incredible equipment. Yet, after owning my AirPods Max since launch, I'm considering putting everything up for sale. This wasn't an overnight revelation. I am heavily invested in the Apple ecosystem but I wouldn't consider myself a fanboy. I certainly don't think they can do no wrong like some folks. Over the last 6 months AirPods Max has just been a great product all around.

To be clear, AirPods Max is NOT on the same level. Arguably, they aren't even playing the same game. That said, they do sound really great (again, for my preferences), they are very comfortable and they are incredibly convenient. I'm not rushing to make a decision and sell my TOTL gear but I'm tempted to. Sometimes, it's more the idea of the TOTL gear that holds me back more than anything.

TLDR; AirPods Max are a fantastic product and this lover of music and gear might be happy to let the rest go.

 

[James-uk]

Watching Loki with the APM using TVOS15 is some next level s**t. What apple are doing here nobody asked or thought they needed, yet I think it’s game changing for personal movie/ tv watching.
The wife and kids are asleep, yet I’ve got a convincing faux dolby atmos sound scape complete with ‘room’ shaking bass AND the ability to still here the baby monitor with transparency mode. It’s sounding better in many ways than my actual 5.1.2 atmos setup! The amount of times in the past Ive put off watching a film or tv show because I’ve wanted to experience the full sound but it’s been a bit late, well them days are over. This is the future of home cinema.

Ps : Im not sure if anyone else has noticed but I’ve realised how the APM ‘knows’ where the tv is to utilise spatial audio. It’s very simple but clever really. It centres the sound based on the the direction you are looking most of the time. If you look to the left hand side of the tv for about 10 seconds for example you can hear the centre image moving to centre at that new focal point, then when you look back at where the tv actually is the sound appears to becoming from The left and it slowly moves back to the tv when the APM calculate that is the new focus direction. Basically as long as you look straight at the tv when watching it knows where the centre is. Simple but it works.

 

[Maukey]

I would like to ask you all something a little off topic, but it came to my mind reading the above thorough comparison review of @Maukey. @tinyman392 please express your point of view as well; Many times it is mentioned that APM as well as other similarly tuned headphones are smooth in upper mids and highs and as a result they miss in detail especially when compared with other more aggressive headphones in the higher frequencies. But my experience says that whenever I tried or owned some more revealing headphones, or as an example some BA iems, my ears perceive this high mids and highs' sparkle more like a distortion than a clear detail presentation. I can hear more detail in a smoother tuned headphone just because the high frequencies do not have this intention of drilling my ears. Of course you may say that it depends on the headphone, but it is strange because it has happened to me with many different examples of what has been said and reviewed as revealing and detailed headphones. Especially when many layers of high pitched sounds, instruments and voices play together in some songs' parts, on those revealing headphones, it is a clear distortion to my ears and for sure not a "revelation" or detail. If I listen to the same song's part on the smooth APM for example, sound has zero distortion and I can enjoy more the details of the particular sounds. Is it something that has to do with my ears? I mean are there experienced listeners who perceive this distortion as detail, or do they just not perceive it as distortion? The files are always AAC or Lossless on Apple Music, so I don't consider it to be an audio file or recording quality issue. I would appreciate your points of view. Many thanks...

I don't claim to be an expert on audio and human hearing either, but I do believe it could be a combination of what you already mentioned. I know many people that are sensitive to higher frequencies. It can also be the tuning of the headphones. For me, the new Beats Studio Buds are really fatiguing in the upper mids if I crank the volume. As I stated in my comparison, I'm more sensitive to upper mids as opposed to higher end frequencies. Don't get me wrong, I do have a threshold where the higher end can be too much, especially if complimented by an underwhelming bass. For example I, I'm not a big fan of some of the Beyerdynamic Headphones and their treble forward approach. The Dalis on the other hand I hear as detailed and airy where some hear it as too much. It just depends on your ears more times than not.

 

[SparkOnShore]

I don't claim to be an expert on audio and human hearing either, but I do believe it could be a combination of what you already mentioned. I know many people that are sensitive to higher frequencies. It can also be the tuning of the headphones. For me, the new Beats Studio Buds are really fatiguing in the upper mids if I crank the volume. As I stated in my comparison, I'm more sensitive to upper mids as opposed to higher end frequencies. Don't get me wrong, I do have a threshold where the higher end can be too much, especially if complimented by an underwhelming bass. For example I, I'm not a big fan of some of the Beyerdynamic Headphones and their treble forward approach. The Dalis on the other hand I hear as detailed and airy where some hear it as too much. It just depends on your ears more times than not.

Exactly. My perception of distortion has to do mainly with the upper mids and it is getting worse as I raise the volume. It is like the waveform has passed the theoretical (or actual) limiter and it anymore appears to be in distortion territory which becomes worse and worse as volume goes higher. On the other hand, there is zero distortion on smooth headphones like the APM, and as much as I raise the volume on them there is no perceivable distortion, which is amazing really. So I wonder, what is actually more detailed and revealing? The treble and high mids forward presentation which leads to distortion (to my ears), or the laid back, smooth and clean/deep bass presentation which presents no distortion even at maximum volume?? For me the answer is 100% the second approach.
P.S: Certainly I do not recommend to ever listen at max or high volume on any headset. I just write the above as an example of high end audio according to my preference, but for sure we all need to take good care of our hearing and listen at moderate volume only!

 

[3Putter]

I'm finding myself sitting at a curious crossroads in my head-fi journey. Bear with me.

My first serious entry into this world was in ~2009 when I bought a pair of Grado headphones and quickly discovered that I loved everything about them, except perhaps for their all too brutal knife assault on my poor ears. I didn't end up keeping them, they were just too shrill for my tastes. My next attempt was in ~2015 with the absolutely gorgeous HiFiMan HE-560 & Marantz HD-DAC1 pairing. This is where I became hooked and where, I believe, my Tinnitus experience began.

In the years since I've owned many so-called "endgame" headphones, desktop rigs, (trans)portable setups and DAPs. Along the way I discovered Roon and shelled out the cash for a lifetime license and ultimately discovered that I prefer more relaxed (and musical) signatures with good dynamics and sweet tonality. Through this exploration I fell in love with the Sennheiser HD-650, Meze Empyrean and Meze RAI Penta in particular. In my opinion, and with my preferences in mind, the Meze flagships strike the right balance. They are plenty detailed yet relaxed, supremely comfortable and I get lost in the music. Just the way it's supposed to be.

I'm incredibly happy with my daily driver setup (RME ADI-2 DAC FS v2 & Meze Empyrean) and consider myself most fortunate to own this incredible equipment. Yet, after owning my AirPods Max since launch, I'm considering putting everything up for sale. This wasn't an overnight revelation. I am heavily invested in the Apple ecosystem but I wouldn't consider myself a fanboy. I certainly don't think they can do no wrong like some folks. Over the last 6 months AirPods Max has just been a great product all around.

To be clear, AirPods Max is NOT on the same level. Arguably, they aren't even playing the same game. That said, they do sound really great (again, for my preferences), they are very comfortable and they are incredibly convenient. I'm not rushing to make a decision and sell my TOTL gear but I'm tempted to. Sometimes, it's more the idea of the TOTL gear that holds me back more than anything.

TLDR; AirPods Max are a fantastic product and this lover of music and gear might be happy to let the rest go.

Hit me up when you're ready to sell but I think you'll realize that after some time you'll grow tired of mediocre sound quality for good sound quality. I didn't have the patience you did. I couldn't last more than a couple of hours on the APM's.

 

[tinyman392]

I would like to ask you all something a little off topic, but it came to my mind reading the above thorough comparison review of @Maukey. @tinyman392 please express your point of view as well; Many times it is mentioned that APM as well as other similarly tuned headphones are smooth in upper mids and highs and as a result they miss in detail especially when compared with other more aggressive headphones in the higher frequencies. But my experience says that whenever I tried or owned some more revealing headphones, or as an example some BA iems, my ears perceive this high mids and highs' sparkle more like a distortion than a clear detail presentation. I can hear more detail in a smoother tuned headphone just because the high frequencies do not have this intention of drilling my ears. Of course you may say that it depends on the headphone, but it is strange because it has happened to me with many different examples of what has been said and reviewed as revealing and detailed headphones. Especially when many layers of high pitched sounds, instruments and voices play together in some songs' parts, on those revealing headphones, it is a clear distortion to my ears and for sure not a "revelation" or detail. If I listen to the same song's part on the smooth APM for example, sound has zero distortion and I can enjoy more the details of the particular sounds. Is it something that has to do with my ears? I mean are there experienced listeners who perceive this distortion as detail, or do they just not perceive it as distortion? The files are always AAC or Lossless on Apple Music, so I don't consider it to be an audio file or recording quality issue. I would appreciate your points of view. Many thanks...

It could be both. What you're hearing could be actual distortion in the recording itself. The aspect that a headphone is unforgiving pushes this aspect in which if you give it garbage, it'll play garbage. The loudness wars has been one area which has caused this particular issue causing the treble to be pushed a bit more than what was normal (though it's probably considered normal now). It's actually the primary reason why Etymotic actually attenuated their highs going from their B to S and then again from S to P. A headphone with smoother treble tends to cover this up pretty well. Getting a headphone that can still be energetic but also cover up these types of issues is very difficult. Just about every modern recording has these issues still since loud still sells; they've been getting better at it though.

Note that there is the quality of the file and quality of the recording. Those are two very different things. Quality of the file is just numbers 24 bit/192 kHz for example while the recording is entirely different. I can have a lossless version of the original CD-release Death Magnetic at 32-bit/192 kHz and a 256 MP3 version of the same song, but from the popular game Guitar Hero. Although the lossless version is a better quality file, in all likelihood, the MP3 version will sound a lot better because the quality of that particular recording was a ton better than the CD-release. This caused quite an outrage.

Another note is that if you're sensitive to a specific spike in the frequency response, that could cause it as well. Many IEMs have a spike around the 10k range to induce some added sparkle which can have this effect. It's amplified if you're sensitive to this particular feature though. Note that a lot of measurements taken may not be able to tell you exactly where a treble spike would be, just that it has one. Crin for example sets it up so all of his IEM measurements have an 8k spike (even if the spike isn't at 8k) to get rid of insertion depth variables. If I'm not mistaken, the main standard before him was to measure from the reference plane.

 

[SparkOnShore]

Hit me up when you're ready to sell but I think you'll realize that after some time you'll grow tired of mediocre sound quality for good sound quality. I didn't have the patience you did. I couldn't last more than a couple of hours on the APM's.

Sorry, I don't mean to be unkind, but this comment is so out of these 300 pages thread, as well as out of any logic and audio knowledge! To not like it that much is one matter, but to say you can't stand the APM more than a couple of hours is exaggerated as hell and shows some deep Apple hatred. It is ok, be well!

 

[SparkOnShore]

It could be both. What you're hearing could be actual distortion in the recording itself. The aspect that a headphone is unforgiving pushes this aspect in which if you give it garbage, it'll play garbage. The loudness wars has been one area which has caused this particular issue causing the treble to be pushed a bit more than what was normal (though it's probably considered normal now). It's actually the primary reason why Etymotic actually attenuated their highs going from their B to S and then again from S to P. A headphone with smoother treble tends to cover this up pretty well. Getting a headphone that can still be energetic but also cover up these types of issues is very difficult. Just about every modern recording has these issues still since loud still sells; they've been getting better at it though.

Note that there is the quality of the file and quality of the recording. Those are two very different things. Quality of the file is just numbers 24 bit/192 kHz for example while the recording is entirely different. I can have a lossless version of the original CD-release Death Magnetic at 32-bit/192 kHz and a 256 MP3 version of the same song, but from the popular game Guitar Hero. Although the lossless version is a better quality file, in all likelihood, the MP3 version will sound a lot better because the quality of that particular recording was a ton better than the CD-release. This caused quite an outrage.

Another note is that if you're sensitive to a specific spike in the frequency response, that could cause it as well. Many IEMs have a spike around the 10k range to induce some added sparkle which can have this effect. It's amplified if you're sensitive to this particular feature though. Note that a lot of measurements taken may not be able to tell you exactly where a treble spike would be, just that it has one. Crin for example sets it up so all of his IEM measurements have an 8k spike (even if the spike isn't at 8k) to get rid of insertion depth variables. If I'm not mistaken, the main standard before him was to measure from the reference plane.

Yes, this is the first thing I thought of, but then again I wondered how a professional mixing and mastering could allow a so obviously distorted waveform (though only on those high mids parts where many instruments and voices play together on rather nearby frequencies), get out commercially on all streaming services!

Edit: To my book, if you mix properly, allowing the right headroom and master with a correct use of limiter and/or compressor, there should be zero distortion on your final track's bounce, as loud as you may play it. The presence of distortion means that either on mixing or on mastering or on both something has gone terribly wrong and the track should not be out commercially in that condition!

 

[tinyman392]

Yes, this is the first thing I thought of, but then again I wondered how a professional mixing and mastering could allow a so obviously distorted waveform (though only on those high mids parts where many instruments and voices play together on rather nearby frequencies), get out commercially on all streaming services!

Loudness wars; there is an entire history on why and how that happened.

 

[3Putter]

Sorry, I don't mean to be unkind, but this comment is so out of these 300 pages thread, as well as out of any logic and audio knowledge! To not like it that much is one matter, but to say you can't stand the APM more than a couple of hours is exaggerated as hell and shows some deep Apple hatred. It is ok, be well!

So, when I dropped my $600 and think they sound mediocre at best and my B&O's sound better, my IEM's and Grado's sound better I should keep them, come on here talking about how they good they would sound to me if only I had audio knowledge like Sparky here? Please. I would greatly benefit from Apple Audio gear being invested in their phone and MacBook but I guess I should keep my thoughts to myself for fear of offending some audio pansy here. Be well!

 

[tret]

Hit me up when you're ready to sell but I think you'll realize that after some time you'll grow tired of mediocre sound quality for good sound quality. I didn't have the patience you did. I couldn't last more than a couple of hours on the APM's.

I’m in no rush to sell, In part for fear of regret should the winds shift (as they tend to do). I do think the term mediocre is a bit dismissive (of the product’s quality) but our experiences are our own and I cannot judge or condemn yours any more than you should mine. Cheers.

 

[3Putter]

I’m in no rush to sell, In part for fear of regret should the winds shift (as they tend to do). I do think the term mediocre is a bit dismissive (of the product’s quality) but our experiences are our own and I cannot judge or condemn yours any more than you should mine. Cheers.

Bummer! Ha! I wish I felt the same about the APM's as you do. I'll keep my opinion quiet from here on, though.