[ezzo]

Above is what you wrote yesterday, when you believed that ANY air gaps will cause a significant loss in bass, meaning that you get no air gaps, so perfect bass! Today you changed that to "no significant air leaks! Your today's text below:

"You mistaking the seal I'm referring to. The seal achievable on earbuds is not the same tight seal in IEMs.
You want the earbuds to be making contact around the contour of the AirPods, the part where it is directing the sound to your ear drums, so that there is no significant air leaks."

Your inconsistency is well proven here!!

I don't just believe, it's a fact that any sort of air leaks, air gaps or whatsoever will result in a loss of bass in IEMs and earbuds.

You're just harping on my choice of words when my intended meaning has been clear and consistent throughout.

I'm not going to play your silly games.

 

[SparkOnShore]

Is adopting? Where's the evidence for that?
Most of their consumer range of products are way off the Harman curve. One of the few companies whose products are engineered for the Harman curve is Etymotics. They even provide the frequency response graphs with the IEMs.
I don't think you would be arguing with me on this if you had taken a look at their products' frequency response.

What do you even mean by "do you know more than pro musicians?"
Did I claim that? No.
Do I think the AirPods have a more neutral frequency response than products such as the Shure SE215, SE535, Westone W30, W40? Yes.
Why? Because evidence(frequency response graph of the AirPods) supports it.

Just give us a comparison between the response graph of AirPods and the target response and compare the bass area especially. You will see for your self how off the AirPods really are!

 

[SparkOnShore]

I don't just believe, it's a fact that any sort of air leaks, air gaps or whatsoever will result in a loss of bass in IEMs and earbuds.

You're just harping on my choice of words when my intended meaning has been clear and consistent throughout.

I'm not going to play your silly games.

Chill! I didn't call you and your ignorant texts silly even though I could. Be little serious here, please!

So I repeat once again, iems do not allow AT ALL air gaps. Earbuds on the other hand just rest on the outer part of the ear, touching on the entrance of the canal, thus allowing some air gaps since they use no silicon and no foam. That's all, it was nice debating with you!

 

[Trager]

I love how this thread has gone from "Airbuds; are they any good?" to rabid discussion about "OMG, most audiophilic popular device evar!!1!!one!"

Now I'm just waiting to hear about how people are giving away their Sennheiser HE-1s because of how much better the AirPods are than anything else that has ever been invented in the world.

 

[ezzo]

Chill! I didn't call you and your ignorant texts silly even though I could. Be little serious here, please!

So I repeat once again, iems do not allow AT ALL air gaps. Earbuds on the other hand just rest on the outer part of the ear, touching on the entrance of the canal, thus allowing some air gaps since they use no silicon and no foam. That's all, it was nice debating with you!

Ay. You just showed how immature you are right there.
No. Don't be a hypocrite. You don't say it was nice talking to someone right after calling someone ignorant and other passive aggressive insults.
It was not a pleasant conversation.

I hope you will grow up and stick to constructive criticism, backed by evidence and not name calling.
And also address questions made by the other party while providing your rebuttal instead of just the latter.

Also, I will admit I made a mistake. I wasn't referring to the Solo series headphones but the BeatsX IEMs.

I'm done talking to you.

 

[ezzo]

I love how this thread has gone from "Airbuds; are they any good?" to rabid discussion about "OMG, most audiophilic popular device evar!!1!!one!"

Now I'm just waiting to hear about how people are giving away their Sennheiser HE-1s because of how much better the AirPods are than anything else that has ever been invented in the world.

Na. That wasn't it. No one here claimed the AirPods are high ends but they certainly are a good product for their price and features.

As for what that previous discussion was about, I will let other judge for themselves.

 

[SparkOnShore]

Ay. You just showed how immature you are right there.
No. Don't be a hypocrite. You don't say it was nice talking to someone right after calling someone ignorant and other passive aggressive insults.
It was not a pleasant conversation.

I hope you will grow up and stick to constructive criticism, backed by evidence and not name calling.
And also address questions made by the other party while providing your rebuttal instead of just the latter.

Also, I will admit I made a mistake. I wasn't referring to the Solo series headphones but the BeatsX IEMs.

I'm done talking to you.

I insist that it was nice debating with you, because knowledge comes from fights and disagreements! Important ancient Greek philosopher Iraklitos wrote: "War is the father of everything". I think I agree with that!

You still owe to this forum the comparison graph link between AirPods' response and Harman target. To check this way which one is closer, AirPods or Shure SE215? Thanks...

 

[SparkOnShore]

Na. That wasn't it. No one here claimed the AirPods are high ends but they certainly are a good product for their price and features.

As for what that previous discussion was about, I will let other judge for themselves.

You complained about my reactions, when I am really trying to understand your point of view. So I will provide hereby one more example of your inconsistency:

Above I quoted your wise text saying that you finally do not consider AirPods as high-end. We agree on that one! But just a few texts before you had written:
"Do I think the AirPods have a more neutral frequency response than products such as the Shure SE215, SE535, Westone W30, W40? Yes."
This is crazy; if you believe that AirPods are more neutral than SE535 which costs 500 eur in Europe, or W30&40, then what more high-end can be according to you??

 

[scrane]

Predictably, discussion of the Airpods has devolved to "my ears are bigger than yours". Perhaps discussion of a product like the Airpods geared towards general consumption by normal people on a highly analytic forum such as this is futile.

 

[SparkOnShore]

@ezzo

http://www.rtings.com/headphones/reviews/apple/airpods

All explained and analyzed in the above link. All frequency areas explanations are given in comparison to the objective AirPods' response curve. See about all these that I have been writing you here; the lack of any seal, the resulting lack of low bass, the sibilant treble etc. They are good for what they are, as I have been writing over and over, but lacking in many important aspects of audio quality...

 

[MICHAELSD]

Funnily enough testing one after the other I actually think the Lightning EarPods included with the iPhone 7 have slightly better sound quality. A significantly better-sounding wireless version of these seemed like a great proposition, but unfortunately the AirPods only fit one of those attributes.

In fact I don't think the EarPods sound all that bad. Maybe I'll just suck it up and use these for outdoor runs, the Lightning version fixed all my real complaints.

 

[SparkOnShore]

Funnily enough testing one after the other I actually think the Lightning EarPods included with the iPhone 7 have slightly better sound quality. A significantly better-sounding wireless version of these seemed like a great proposition, but unfortunately the AirPods only fit one of those attributes.

In fact I don't think the EarPods sound all that bad. Maybe I'll just suck it up and use these for outdoor runs, the Lightning version fixed all my real complaints.

I disagree with you on this. AirPods are slightly better sounding than EarPods, first of all having more and deeper bass than the one of EarPods, as well as having better presentation of mid section. But to each his own...

 

[MICHAELSD]

I disagree with you on this. AirPods are slightly better sounding than EarPods, first of all having more and deeper bass than the one of EarPods, as well as having better presentation of mid section. But to each his own...

I agree that one of the two are slightly better, but they're more alike than I expected -- I was expecting the AirPods to be the clear winner. The EarPods may have a slightly larger soundstage while the AirPods may have better sub-bass. It's a closer call than I'd hope for. AirPods would be a win to me if they sounded better and looked more stylish... I had one person ask me if they were earrings. Unfortunately I couldn't get used to the sound or the styling for the price.

 

[Young Spade]

Funnily enough testing one after the other I actually think the Lightning EarPods included with the iPhone 7 have slightly better sound quality. A significantly better-sounding wireless version of these seemed like a great proposition, but unfortunately the AirPods only fit one of those attributes.

In fact I don't think the EarPods sound all that bad. Maybe I'll just suck it up and use these for outdoor runs, the Lightning version fixed all my real complaints.

Eh. Testing where? I can't see how anybody would think the earpods sound better in any way. They're heavier, less comfortable, more anemic sounding, and have no presence in the low end. 
 

I disagree with you on this. AirPods are slightly better sounding than EarPods, first of all having more and deeper bass than the one of EarPods, as well as having better presentation of mid section. But to each his own...

 
I'd say at least 2x better. The bass is really what makes it. What's interesting is that you know Apple tuned the original earpods to sound just like this, or even better, then retuned them to sound worse to plan for the future with the release of these. Next iteration I'd expect the SQ to stay the same and them add other features like longer battery life and custom taps in software. 3rd generation we get another bump in SQ. 
 

I agree that one of the two are slightly better, but they're more alike than I expected -- I was expecting the AirPods to be the clear winner. The EarPods may have a slightly larger soundstage while the AirPods may have better sub-bass. It's a closer call than I'd hope for. AirPods would be a win to me if they sounded better and looked more stylish... I had one person ask me if they were earrings. Unfortunately I couldn't get used to the sound or the styling for the price.

That's what I said after listening for the first 30 seconds. Then I listened to 320 kbs John Legend and it all came together. Everything sounds more refined; the lower and mid-end definitely got some love this time around. They're great headphones. In terms of earbuds they're the best I've heard. Do they rival my 100 dollar Sennheiser 598c's? No. But they're about 80% and can fit in a charging case that's the size of a tic tac box. 

 

[MICHAELSD]

  Eh. Testing where? I can't see how anybody would think the earpods sound better in any way. They're heavier, less comfortable, more anemic sounding, and have no presence in the low end. 
 
 
I'd say at least 2x better. The bass is really what makes it. What's interesting is that you know Apple tuned the original earpods to sound just like this, or even better, then retuned them to sound worse to plan for the future with the release of these. Next iteration I'd expect the SQ to stay the same and them add other features like longer battery life and custom taps in software. 3rd generation we get another bump in SQ. 
 

That's what I said after listening for the first 30 seconds. Then I listened to 320 kbs John Legend and it all came together. Everything sounds more refined; the lower and mid-end definitely got some love this time around. They're great headphones. In terms of earbuds they're the best I've heard. Do they rival my 100 dollar Sennheiser 598c's? No. But they're about 80% and can fit in a charging case that's the size of a tic tac box. 

I really wanted to love the AirPods, but beyond the basic functionality I'm not impressed. Bass and treble are both lacking while mids are more than adequate. The only use cases for me considering the mediocre audio quality would be for a run and for podcasts, which were the reasons I bought it, but nonetheless I expected more for $159. Even in a wireless package, I'm not sure they're worth their price. 
 
The volume levels (80-90%) I think that they do sound full-bodied at cause ear pain after a short session, though I'll admit there is an impressive amount of detail resolution at that volume even if the overall sound is still lackluster. They do sound better than EarPods in most cases, but not significantly so. I'll give them more time.
 
6-7/10 as far as sound goes. Still very listenable though.