Shure AONIC 50 -

[WDitters]

Does anyone know the TRRS pinout of the 2.5mm plug on headphone end of the SA50? I would like to order a custom cable for it but I do not posess a multimeter..

 

[Kalli]

I use an iPhone as my mobile source of choice, so I just care about support for AAC anyway. But AAC also offers the best balance between sound quality and (more important even) connection stability: I don't care for a small advantage in possible sound quality which LDAC may offer if the connection gets unstable under more challenging conditions such as a busy street or public transport where available Bluetooth bandwidth is scarce.

I don't care for aptX at all, in my comparison it only added a slight emphasis in the lower treble, faking a more detailed presentation. aptX HD is so bandwidth hungry that I was unable to get a stable connection from an AK380 (not the SS version I now own but the regular aluminum version) to a Beyerdynamic Amiron Wireless at home on less than 1m distance. Never tried again. The numerous variants of aptX are a negative point as well -- regular, HD, LL, whatever this new variant is called that seems to merge LL and HD -- I don't care. And I don't want to hunt down products that both support this specific variant I might want. No thanks.

LDAC would be more interesting, but still not what I'm looking for for mobile use or while working... too dependent on bandwidth. If I need that last bit of sound quality I can always switch to a cable. Which is why I only buy wireless headphones that work well without active electronics... I really dislike DSP trickery like Sony did with their 1000-whatever: they sounded abysmal without electronics. Unacceptable to me.

I understand the problem with Android, its multiple versions, upgrade problems and different levels of support for different codecs. I'm quite happy that I don't have this problem... but it's understandable that it hurts And support for different codecs is more important to Android users Than it is to me.

You might take a look at the Drop Panda, which should be a rather neutral wireless headphone supporting many codecs.

I'm an Android user. And didn't have any connection problems with LDAC on my AONIC 50 yet. Since the 0.4.9 firmware update the sound quality is also really nice.
I also don't really care for aptX. The LL variant might come in handy for watching movies, but in experience even LDAC doesn't have a latency that's bad (tried it on my linux laptop connected to my projector via HDMI). Others might be more sensitive to that tho.

The passive point is also quite important to me. But in that regard the AONIC and the CLUB ONE seem to be quite similar (did only read and watch reviews). Both have pretty similar sound on wired (passive) and wireless (active) mode.

EDIT: how would u say does the ANC compare?
AONIC ANC is pretty nice on the low end, which is all I care about. I Don't give a crap on "voice ANC".

 

[Kalli]

Does anyone know the TRRS pinout of the 2.5mm plug on headphone end of the SA50? I would like to order a custom cable for it but I do not posess a multimeter..

The official answer from Shure is, that it works with standard cables. No idea if that actually helps you tho.

 

[plakat]

yesThe passive point is also quite important to me. But in that regard the AONIC and the CLUB ONE seem to be quite similar (did only read and watch reviews). Both have pretty similar sound on wired (passive) and wireless (active) mode.

EDIT: how would u say does the ANC compare?
AONIC ANC is pretty nice on the low end, which is all I care about. I Don't give a crap on "voice ANC".

Yes, both work well wired, which speaks to the acoustic tuning. I see that as an indicator of how important the product is, because a good driver with correct acoustic tuning is more expensive than a simple DSP correction.

I just tried ANC once on the Aonic (quite good actually, but I‘d mainly use that on a plane... I.e. not now or in the near future). The Club One activates ANC with each power cycle, I have to turn it off each time again. So I tested it involuntary... did not leave the impression of the highest efficiency, but may well be enough on a loud train or plain I guess.

overall passive isolation is more important to me, so I’m sorry not to be able to provide more detail on this aspect.

 

[WDitters]

Shure Aonic 50 firmware 0.4.9

https://www.shure.com/en-US/support/downloads/software-firmware-archive


IMPROVEMENTS

• Made improvements to Environment mode to minimize feedback and noise
• Improved the filter applied during calls to improve voice quality
• AONIC 50 now plays the “connected” message when connecting to certain sound bars, TVs and Bluetooth adapters that did not previously prompt the message
• AONIC 50’s volume buttons can now control the audio level in Windows 10 HFP (hands-free) mode
• The “Bluetooth Pairing Mode” voice prompt now plays even if voice prompts are turned off

BUG FIXES

• Fixed an issue that could cause sound artifacts at higher frequencies when using LDAC at 88.2 or 96 kHz on some Android devices
• Fixed an issue where repeatedly plugging in and unplugging the USB cable could cause the unit to power off

NOTES

• User guide
• Firmware updates for AONIC 50 are available in the ShurePlus PLAY app for iOS and Android

 

[Kalli]

Yes, both work well wired, which speaks to the acoustic tuning. I see that as an indicator of how important the product is, because a good driver with correct acoustic tuning is more expensive than a simple DSP correction.

I just tried ANC once on the Aonic (quite good actually, but I‘d mainly use that on a plane... I.e. not now or in the near future). The Club One activates ANC with each power cycle, I have to turn it off each time again. So I tested it involuntary... did not leave the impression of the highest efficiency, but may well be enough on a loud train or plain I guess.

overall passive isolation is more important to me, so I’m sorry not to be able to provide more detail on this aspect.

True story. I also like it, if I'm not living inside my headphones 100%. But low frequency ANC (Max) on the AONIC is really good. Did recently also try it on a longer train ride.

The default ANC is a bit annoying, that's true. I really like the AONIC solution. Since it basically acts like a "save state". Shouldn't be too hard to integrate into the firmware/app for the JBL tho.

 

[pilgrimbilly]

Afternoon all.

Was out and about today, and noticed a lot of wind noise with ANC on.

Very little ANC experience. is this normal?

 

[plakat]

Unfortunately many ANC systems have problems with wind... the Beats Studio 3 made a special point about killing that kind of noise.
At what setting did you have the ANC on the Aonic? Maybe it only shows this on max?

 

[D00M]

Was out and about today, and noticed a lot of wind noise with ANC on.

My Shure unit also amplifies the wind noise with ambient mode and ANC on (not max). Doesn't bother me as I don't use ANC and I don't need it outside. So not only your unit. Previous posts also mentioned this behavior.

 

[WDitters]

My Shure unit also amplifies the wind noise with ambient mode and ANC on (not max). Doesn't bother me as I don't use ANC and I don't need it outside. So not only your unit. Previous posts also mentioned this behavior.

It's pretty common in most ANC cans. The B&W and DALI also suffer from this. I can't remember whether Sony or Bose were also prone to this, but I would almost bet they are...

 

[ryanmatic]

It's pretty common in most ANC cans. The B&W and DALI also suffer from this. I can't remember whether Sony or Bose were also prone to this, but I would almost bet they are...

Yeah, it's a problem with B&W's ANC, but Sony has a specific mode designed to suppress wind noise. It works really well and only sacrifices a little bit of ANC isolation.

 

[WDitters]

Yeah, it's a problem with B&W's ANC, but Sony has a specific mode designed to suppress wind noise. It works really well and only sacrifices a little bit of ANC isolation.

The downside of the Sony is that they sound crap

 

[C_Lindbergh]

How easy can you switch between devices? I'm looking to use this with 3 different devices (LDAC-Phone, APTX LL Console and PC).

 

[ryanmatic]

It's pretty easy. They support multipoint pairing so they'll always connect to the two most-recently-used devices. If you want to swap to another device, you'll have to disconnect from at least one of the currently-paired devices first.

 

[WDitters]

It's pretty easy. They support multipoint pairing so they'll always connect to the two most-recently-used devices. If you want to swap to another device, you'll have to disconnect from at least one of the currently-paired devices first.

Correct.. And for the sake of completeness.. The maximum of two simultaneously connected devices is a Bluetooth SIG standard. This applies to every device that uses Bluetooth Multipoint technology...