AirPods Max
Jun 16, 2021 at 5:55 PM Post #4,381 of 5,629
Hello. Has anyone had the opportunity to compare the Sony MDR1AM2/B headphones vs the AirPod Max headphones? I love how crystal clear my MDR1AM2/B sound but if the AirPod Max are better I would buy them. Thanks!
 
Jun 16, 2021 at 6:31 PM Post #4,383 of 5,629
Lossless should have less of a noise floor as well as more accurate extremely loud moments.
This is dynamic range, particularly important in symphonic recordings. Lossless versus AAC should not have a difference (just talking dynamic range here). The noise floor is well, zero in digital recordings. Cannot go lower than that! I was around working in audio when CDs were first introduced. The total lack of a noise floor was stunning.
 
Jun 16, 2021 at 6:55 PM Post #4,384 of 5,629
I need to correct myself on the above. It looks like iTunes Plus is sampled at 44.1 Hz with a bit depth of 24 bits. I'm actually not sure what's sent to the headphones though, it would have to be between 44.1/16 to 48/24 since the AirPods Max peak out at 48/24 (digital through wire).
I think this Apple article explains it all; https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT212183. Both lightning to 3,5' as well as mac's headphone out can play lossless at 24 bit / 48 kHz. This is also I believe the limit of human hearing, on normal ears (there are people who could possibly hear differences on higher resolutions, not me though). everything seems clear to me now, thanks for your help.
 
Jun 16, 2021 at 7:20 PM Post #4,385 of 5,629
I think this Apple article explains it all; https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT212183. Both lightning to 3,5' as well as mac's headphone out can play lossless at 24 bit / 48 kHz. This is also I believe the limit of human hearing, on normal ears (there are people who could possibly hear differences on higher resolutions, not me though). everything seems clear to me now, thanks for your help.
And I’m ok with that. Anything about 48 kHz (or 24 kHz of actual playback with that format), is way above what we can hear.
 
Jun 16, 2021 at 8:28 PM Post #4,386 of 5,629
With all this talk about lossless and comparing bit depths and sampling rates, etc…I found this article today that is fantastic at explaining it all, along with how playback is specifically impacted.

My takeaway is essentially…

Sampling rates above 44 kHz (AAC) is inaudible. I.e. don’t bother improving beyond it unless you need to record higher frequencies for some purpose besides music. Recording bats maybe? Lol

Bit depth of 16 bit allows for accurate portrayal of recorded loudness of up to 96 dB. That’s very loud, but for instantaneously louder moments in classical recordings, for example, a higher bit depth would, in theory, have more accurate playback of dynamic range. It would seem here that bit depth could be most important for us audiophiles. However, 16 bit giving us an accurate playback of 96 dB range would essentially mean that most of the time we really won’t hear the differences of aliasing or artifacts come up in our music, when trying to compare 16 bit with 24 bit or higher.

Conclusion. On paper, it would make sense to say higher bit depth could allow for more accurate playback at the ends of the dynamic range in our music, but it will hardly be an issue for most playback if it is at all to most people. In theory, neither the increased bit depth nor sampling rate of lossless should have any appreciable impact on anything in normal listening conditions over 16 bit / 44.1 kHz AAC.

I ordered an audio switch box off Amazon and will compare two iOS devices, one AAC, one lossless, to see if I can notice any differences. I should, according to the article and my naive understanding, only hear differences at quieter and louder portions of playback. Lossless should have less of a noise floor as well as more accurate extremely loud moments.

EDIT:: Many of you know more about this than me and what I read in that article. If you can help educate me on how else music may be affected beyond the article, please help correct or reach me :)
I don't think Apple releasing lossless audio has anything to do with "sounding better". Apple even makes a point to say they feel AAC is audibly no different than lossless (except to some "golden ear" audiophiles). No apple speaker, headphone, or earbud can truly play lossless hires (96-192khz) formats. They did it as a move to stay competitive or even take out Amazon HD and Tidal. Since they had the lossless masters already, releasing them uncompressed wasn't a huge leap. Besides, look at the hype they created by doing what Tidal, Deezer, Qobuz, etc... have been doing for years.

Rapid ABX testing causes the brain to homologize some of the details making discerning the two tracks more difficult. Unless you level match precisely (via software, or some kind of SPL meter), you won't get a truly accurate comparison. The dynamic range of the track has the most impact to peak to peak loudness more than the playback format. That doesn't even take into account the hardware you are using (DAC, headphone amp, etc..). If you really want to go down the rabbit hole and ABX lossless and AAC, go for it. At least you'll feel more confident in your choice. The best method seems to be listening for longer segments and focusing on a certain detail, i.e. the shimmer of a cymbal, or the harmonics of a piano. Even then your brain will fool you.

The sound science section of Head-fi is a great place to poke around for how to set up ABX testing. Personally, since storage is cheap, I chose the highest quality format knowing I can always compress it down if I so choose. Whether I truly can hear a difference, I don't care. YMMV
 
Jun 16, 2021 at 8:33 PM Post #4,387 of 5,629
Does the Max use the 24bit/48khz from the lightning/3.5mm directly? Or does it do the same DSP stuff that it would do with 256 AAC.

I dont see the point of the cable much.

there should be somekind of passthrough so that it can take 24bit/192 or 32bit/192 directly from the DAC it is playing from.

With this cable it takes whatever your DAC does and takes it to the DAC of the cable and then to whatever the Max does internally?

The usb-c cable to lightning used to charge would be better if it could be used on PC to transmit sound.
 
Jun 16, 2021 at 9:05 PM Post #4,389 of 5,629
I’m the same. I turned on lossless and downloaded my albums/playlists, even if there may not be an audible difference that is apparent to me. May as well, just in case.
I did the same, but with 24/48, not hi res, since I never use external dac. So I chose lossless 24/48 for both streaming and download. It may present some difference when I listen on wired headphone, my APM will in any case keep on transmitting AAC. My opinion was always that there may be some slight differences when you go from 16 bit to 24 bit audio, but I could never discern any audible gain above 48 kHz. So to me, when wired, lossless 24/48, from either the lightning/3,5' or the headphone out of the laptop is just perfect and more than enough!
 
Jun 16, 2021 at 9:15 PM Post #4,390 of 5,629
Does the Max use the 24bit/48khz from the lightning/3.5mm directly? Or does it do the same DSP stuff that it would do with 256 AAC.

I dont see the point of the cable much.

there should be somekind of passthrough so that it can take 24bit/192 or 32bit/192 directly from the DAC it is playing from.

With this cable it takes whatever your DAC does and takes it to the DAC of the cable and then to whatever the Max does internally?

The usb-c cable to lightning used to charge would be better if it could be used on PC to transmit sound.
Again, I don't think Apple had the APM in mind to play lossless. The cable has an ADC to convert the incoming analog signal to 24/48 only to be converted back by the DAC to feed the onboard amp. You are getting an extra encode/decode which arguably would minimize or neutralize the sonic character of the incoming DAC or source. There is no evidence a digital only interface is possible with the APM.

That being said, you should get better fidelity from the cable compared to Bluetooth.
 
Jun 16, 2021 at 9:55 PM Post #4,391 of 5,629
I think this Apple article explains it all; https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT212183. Both lightning to 3,5' as well as mac's headphone out can play lossless at 24 bit / 48 kHz. This is also I believe the limit of human hearing, on normal ears (there are people who could possibly hear differences on higher resolutions, not me though). everything seems clear to me now, thanks for your help.
Definitely agree. One thing to keep in mind is that the 44.1 kHz sampling and 16 bit depth was created due to the limits of human hearing. Though it's pretty easy to say that 22.05 kHz is a good limit for human hearing (realistically 20 kHz is a nice limit), one might be able to debate the 16 vs 24 bit depth; though we're talking 96 dB of dynamic range vs 120-ish dB. This assumes that the recording itself can even take advantage of the dynamic range or has said dynamic range. Then comes the question of whether you can hear the lower-amplitude sound when two sounds are playing, one 96 dB above the other. Heck, I'd say even having something half that would be difficult to discern.

Edit: though I'll admit that I listen around 70-80 dB, so I wouldn't even be able to take advantage of that dynamic range to begin with :p
 
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Jun 17, 2021 at 12:34 AM Post #4,392 of 5,629
I'm really happy with spatial audio and I really hope older music gets Atmos versions uploaded. Especially hanging out for Nevermind. It's making me way happier about my choice to go with AirPods max instead of a wired dac/amp option. The spatial audio experience when done well (for example check out the spatial update for Billie Eilish's 'when we fall asleep where do we go') presents me pretty much what I was looking for - a better listening experience where I can get lost in the music a bit.

I'm fine with bluetooth also, I can still feel a big difference between lossy and lossless even over BT with the APM - although I haven't been able to discover why that might be technically. Still keen on an option for lightning to lightning digital input to the max, but yeah, I doubt apple would bother with seeing as they sound so damned good even being fed lossless over BT.

As an aside I wonder how the spatial / Atmos songs compare in terms of dynamic range. They feel much deeper and wider and I'm wondering if that's only soundstage, because they are also a bit quieter without soundcheck on. I'd be thrilled to hear that increased dynamic range is baked into the process - it's what it sounds like so far anyways.
 
Jun 17, 2021 at 1:06 AM Post #4,393 of 5,629
I'm really happy with spatial audio and I really hope older music gets Atmos versions uploaded. Especially hanging out for Nevermind. It's making me way happier about my choice to go with AirPods max instead of a wired dac/amp option. The spatial audio experience when done well (for example check out the spatial update for Billie Eilish's 'when we fall asleep where do we go') presents me pretty much what I was looking for - a better listening experience where I can get lost in the music a bit.

I'm fine with bluetooth also, I can still feel a big difference between lossy and lossless even over BT with the APM - although I haven't been able to discover why that might be technically. Still keen on an option for lightning to lightning digital input to the max, but yeah, I doubt apple would bother with seeing as they sound so damned good even being fed lossless over BT.

As an aside I wonder how the spatial / Atmos songs compare in terms of dynamic range. They feel much deeper and wider and I'm wondering if that's only soundstage, because they are also a bit quieter without soundcheck on. I'd be thrilled to hear that increased dynamic range is baked into the process - it's what it sounds like so far anyways.
The only differences between the lossy and lossless over BT would likely be the actual master that you’re hearing. It could also be a volume thing too.
 
Jun 17, 2021 at 8:54 PM Post #4,394 of 5,629
Also what I have noticed is that from my music selections of new albums, which are mainly electronic, idm and experimental, nothing is Dolby Atmos! But at the same time more and more appear in lossless! So lossless is more useful to my music, at least for the time being...
 
Jun 17, 2021 at 9:02 PM Post #4,395 of 5,629
Hi, from reading past posts here it seems using the airpods max cable is not completely lossless as per apple, but I’m still interested does it provide any audible improvement? The cable is finally available in our country months after i got the airpods max, so was wondering if i should get one to squeeze more quality out of the APM since i am using the lossless versions of the songs on apple music anyway (i have the lotoo paw s1 dongle connected to some of my wired gear). Thanks in advance :)
 

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