[HN Gopher] Wired headphone sales are exploding
___________________________________________________________________
Wired headphone sales are exploding
Author : billybuckwheat
Score : 395 points
Date : 2026-03-11 19:37 UTC (3 days ago)
(HTM) web link (www.bbc.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.bbc.com)
| healsdata wrote:
| My wired headphones never run out of battery. They also don't
| drop the connection if my pocket is at the wrong angle from my
| ears.
| PaulHoule wrote:
| I bought two pairs of premium wireless headphones about 10
| years ago. These failed gradually, I patched them up with tape
| and kept them going. One of them had the Bluetooth electronics
| fail but still works wired, the electronics are fine on the
| other one but physically it is a jumbled mess that I can't
| really tape together anymore but it kinda sits on my head.
|
| I went looking for the state of the art in headphones and
| bought (1) a set of AirPod Pros and (2) a recent Sony headset.
|
| My feelings about the AirPods are terribly mixed.
|
| 10 years ago I think the best reason to spend $250 instead of
| $25 on a set of Bluetooth headphones was that the $250 device
| would pair properly with multiple devices whereas it might take
| you 15 minutes of screwing around to unpair and repair the $25
| headphones every time you need them. But hey they are so cheap
| maybe you can pack one for each device you have and not worry
| about it.
|
| Today it is the other way around, somehow $25 headphones "just
| work" with Windows, Mac, iOS, Android, Steam Deck, whatever.
| After I disabled the microphone and switched to the microphone
| on my camera, the AirPods got reliable with Windows. Inside
| Apple's ecosystem it tries _really_ hard and almost works, yet
| the $25 headphones "just work" and don't seem to be trying so
| hard. I don't get messages warning me that somebody else's $25
| headphones are following me around but my iPhone tells me that
| about my AirPods all the time but I think it is a KPI for
| somebody in Cupertino that I see the word "AirPods" as much as
| possible.
|
| Now the sound quality of the AirPods is just great, I'll grant
| that, but I'm not going to be one of those annoying youngsters
| who is as hard as hearing as the oldest oldsters because I have
| some genetic polymorphism that makes me produce copious amount
| of earwax that eject the AirPods from my ears if I move too
| much. My doc says one of these days my ears are going to plug
| up and I shouldn't get so excited about it.
| Obscurity4340 wrote:
| Have you ever tried bluetooth wearables like the Bose
| SoundWear? Off topic but they are awesome
| seer wrote:
| I got myself a plastic welder - the thing that melts little
| pieces of metal to strengthen plastic joints - now I can keep
| old plastic things in shape almost indefinitely. Cost like 10
| usd or so and has prolonged the life of all manner of things.
|
| If you still want to make the old headphones work these
| welders are a godsend, and with some small amount of diy work
| of cleaning, sanding and buffing you can easily hide these
| welds.
|
| I personally like to leave them though since they accent that
| something that was once broken is whole again, and that it
| has a long history!
| rhinoceraptor wrote:
| For whatever reason, in my experience, the 1st gen Airpods
| Pro seem to pair much more easily to non-Apple devices than
| the 2nd gen. I have a 1st gen pair more or less dedicated to
| my Linux PC, and they auto-pair 99% of the time within a few
| seconds.
| az09mugen wrote:
| Same here. And also unlike airpods, you can't easily lose one
| that you can't replace. Which also renders the one left useless
| because you can't pair it with another orphan, what a waste.
| fhdkweig wrote:
| All that, plus with wires, I can run the cable under my shirt
| and up through the neck hole. When someone starts to talk to
| me, I can just pop them out of my ears and let them dangle
| across my chest without having to hold them in my hands. I also
| don't have to worry about dropping them on the floor.
| globular-toast wrote:
| This was common for kids in the 00s. Having just one bud in
| while talking to someone was common. There was also this type
| that instead of having two equal length wires, one to each
| bud, was asymmetrical and you would wrap the longer wire
| around you neck so you could easily "unbud". Sony invented
| this, I think. In fact there were some pretty crazy designs
| before Apple made the simple but conspicuous earbuds popular
| again.
| simonmic wrote:
| Mine do. The phone's lightning connector socket has become
| "flaky" (from age, or lint..), and at this point I must hold
| the phone in hand rather than in pocket while walking, for
| uninterrupted playback.
| procaryote wrote:
| Headphone jacks.
|
| Sony experia, Asus zenphone, Motorola Moto G, and a few
| others
|
| They're rare nowadays, but they're inherently superior when
| it comes to audio just working
| bigstrat2003 wrote:
| All that and they cost a fraction of the price! Wireless
| headphones are a strictly inferior product to wired, and it
| astonishes me that Apple convinced anyone to buy them. They're
| a total rip off.
| ahhhhnoooo wrote:
| I can leave my phone on the charger or propped up with a
| recipe on the counter while I cook and still get signal.
| Wired headphones cannot let me walk between rooms without
| picking up my phone.
|
| Wireless headphones take up much less space. I can put them
| in my pocket trivially.
|
| Wireless headphones can tell me where they are and if I've
| left them behind.
|
| Wireless headphones don't have a piece of plastic that
| dangles on my neck, shoulders, and face. As someone with
| sensory issues, this is genuinely important.
|
| I've never had to spend five minutes untangling the cords for
| my wireless headphones.
|
| I've never accidentally snagged the cable on my wireless
| headphones, causing them to snap off.
|
| I can put my phone in a waterproof case in my backpack and
| protect it while walking. I don't have to do cable management
| to route the wire.
|
| It's fine to prefer the wired headphones. I fully endorse
| that for you. Maybe drop the hyperbole about how wired
| headphones are _strictly_ better?
| Shank wrote:
| For me, all of my wired headphones and earbuds have died the
| same way: audio cutting out or completely lost due to cable
| damage due to storage and use cycles. Wireless has completely
| fixed this for me.
| kelnos wrote:
| It's weird, because I absolutely agree in principle, but 90%
| of my headphone use is wireless now.
|
| And I hate it: latency, glitches, randomly just deciding not
| to connect anymore, deciding to connect in the lower-quality
| headset mode when I want to listen to music, and refusing to
| switch to the high-quality mode, battery running out at
| inconvenient times, the cat knocking them off my nightstand
| and under the bed where I cant reach them. So many reasons to
| be annoyed by them!
|
| But I hardly ever take out my wired headphones anymore, and
| I'm not sure why. Back when I got my first phone without a
| 3.5mm jack, I just kept a little USB-C adapter in the little
| pouch/case that held my wired IEMs, and it was fine. But at
| some point I bought a new phone, and there was a deal on
| cheap (or free?) wireless earbuds with it, and I really just
| stopped using wired headphones for the most part since then,
| even though the wireless ones really annoy me for so many
| reasons.
| genthree wrote:
| Similar story here, I love wired headphones but have to
| admit that, after being gifted my first set of AirPods, my
| actual use of any sort of personal speaker device went up
| like 20x or more. It's exactly that factor of being able to
| get up and walk around without a thought that does it.
| That's the reason I'll often not put wired headphones on in
| the first place, but no such concern with wireless.
|
| (I actually _don't_ like 3.5mm jacks as much as some people
| do, though, as my experience has been the ports get janky
| over time if they're under any strain at all, which they
| will be on a mobile device and which is always a back-of-
| my-mind source of stress when using them, but quarter-inch
| jacks are awesome)
| wat10000 wrote:
| Wireless is more comfortable. I don't have to deal with
| cables brushing against my ears or sitting on my neck.
|
| Wireless can't get caught on doorknobs or other protrusions.
|
| I don't have to plug them in. I put them in my ears and they
| work.
|
| They automatically work with multiple devices. I put them in
| and make a phone call. I put them in and take a video meeting
| on my computer.
|
| There certainly are advantages to wired headphones and more
| power to you if you prefer those tradeoffs. But it's bizarre
| to call wireless "strictly inferior." It should not be
| difficult to find at least one thing about them that
| _someone_ might find to be superior.
| Tarsul wrote:
| here's hoping that someday headphones without pressure (e.g.
| active/passive noise cancelling) will make a comeback, too. But
| then again I think there still exist cheap wired ones without
| such "advanced" technology. As one woman in the article said
| best: "'I don't like how this feels' and we're all kind of
| returning to the last place we were comfortable."
| DerArzt wrote:
| > here's hoping that someday headphones without pressure (e.g.
| active/passive noise cancelling) will make a comeback, too
|
| What do you mean? There are tons of wired headphones that don't
| do noise cancelling at multiple price points.
|
| I can still pick up a new pair of headphones that I started
| using 10 years ago (AudioTechnica m50x if you want the
| recommendation).
| brudgers wrote:
| For wireless headphones I've gone to bone conduction and open-
| ear. Started with some cheap models from Ali-Express to see how
| I liked it. I did.
|
| Shokz had a black friday deal on Open-Run Pros and those are my
| goto. Admittedly, they are not as convenient as my Airpods
| were, but my ears appreciate not being bombarded with noise
| canceling.
| orev wrote:
| Every headphone that has noise cancelling also gives you the
| option to turn it off, and also to enable audio pass through.
| brudgers wrote:
| Yep.
|
| I prefer other technologies over noise cancelling in my
| ordinary use anyway. And my ears feel healthier. But that's
| me, not you.
| procaryote wrote:
| Bose QuietComfort Ultra 2 at least just allows varying
| levels of passthrough. You can have noise cancelling or
| noise cancelling + sound from the outside mike. You cannot
| have noise-cancelling _off_ for better battery life or to
| cope with windy conditions
|
| They're awful in several other ways too, which is sad for
| what should be their flagship model
| JoshTriplett wrote:
| I avoid noise cancelling as well; I find that it very rapidly
| gives me a headache. I prefer a nice set of headphones that
| _physically_ block outside sound.
| hurricanepootis wrote:
| I bought a pair of IEMs. A while back, the cable broke, and I was
| able to repair by just buying a new cable.
|
| Also, I enjoy not having another device to charge. I recently
| have been wearing a traditional Casio watch more often instead of
| my smartwatch.
| lm28469 wrote:
| Same here, I can't imagine adding 2 to 3 (earphones + case)
| batteries to my life, batteries that most likely aren't user
| replaceable, most likely will be cycled at least once a day and
| will inevitable die and take the whole device with them in a
| matter of years.
| jmpman wrote:
| I love my IEMs but I actually want a Bluetooth version. Heck a
| dongle that made them act just like AirPod Pros would be my
| dream gadget.
| vladvasiliu wrote:
| Shure makes some for their IEMs. I have an older model which
| has worked great for several years.
| jmpman wrote:
| I may have had the same. Wasn't impressed. But I'm rough on
| my electronics and it lasted less than 6 months.
| vladvasiliu wrote:
| I'm not rough, but don't handle them with white gloves
| either. I usually tend to roll them up in a ball in some
| pocket when not in use.
|
| The model I have, BT2, is "semi-wired", meaning that the
| Bluetooth and battery are common to the two earbuds,
| linked by a cable. And, outside the big heavy cables some
| big heavy headphones have, this one is the one that has
| held up best - I'm pretty sure I got it before Covid.
| They now have a newer model with no wires, which houses
| the BT and battery in some over-ear clips [0]. I have no
| experience with these. In any case, I expect other
| manufacturers to have similar options.
|
| Before this, I would have to change the (old-school) wire
| on these IEMs seemingly every other year. But at least it
| _was_ changeable, as opposed to other cheaper IEMs which
| would require to break out the soldering iron at best, or
| end up in the trash at worst if they were a glue fest.
|
| [0] https://www.shure.com/en-
| US/products/accessories/rmce-tw2?va...
| Copernicron wrote:
| I have the Shure TW2 adapters and they work great. No
| connection issues, great battery life, and the passive
| isolation I get with the right ear tips is better than
| any ANC I've ever used. As an added bonus, if you order
| when they're on sale, you can get the TW2 adapters with a
| pair of SE 215 buds for the same price as the plain
| adapters.
| hackingonempty wrote:
| Fiio has a couple of adapters that work with many IEMs and
| there are probably others on the market
| https://www.fiio.com/utws3
| aliher1911 wrote:
| As other comment suggests, FiiO does adapters like that, also
| Qudelix. Depends on what you mean by 'like AirPod Pros'. You
| won't get ANC, mic is so-so I believe and you still have
| wires, but you get LDAC/aptX HD codec, it can still act as
| USB DAC if you forgot to charge it, it has very capable DSP
| EQ that allows loading headphone profiles. I use AirPods Pro
| as muffs on transit and concerts which is a killer feature
| for me, but use Qudelix dongle with IEMs for music.
| worldsavior wrote:
| Wired headphones is the style these days.
| bpev wrote:
| Please let this mean that they'll start bringing back the
| headphone jacks to phones. usb-c is too unstable, and I prefer
| not having to deal with charging more devices and with pairing
| shenanigans when switching devices.
| itisit wrote:
| > usb-c is too unstable
|
| Would you share more? I've never had an issue with a USB-C
| cable. Helps to buy well constructed ones with legit specs.
| bpev wrote:
| I'm talking about this specific context, rather than in
| general. I find that for usb-c earphones and small
| dongles/dacs, they disconnect more when I'm walking around
| with phone in pocket. They also tend to wear down with use
| much faster than normal aux cables. Usually, they last a few
| months for me before I start having issues.
|
| And when usb-c phones disconnect just a little, usually the
| phone will pause the music completely and disconnect, whereas
| the aux headphones will just keep playing. So if the
| connection isn't perfect, the usb-c cable becomes
| unlistenable because I can't walk 20 steps without it
| pausing.
|
| edit: I've tried many cables and dongles, so if you don't
| have this problem, it might be just that I move around more?
| Biggest problem for me is commutes and walking around.
| leptons wrote:
| That problem might be considered a software problem, not a
| hardware or physical problem. The instant pausing of the
| music is the real problem. Software developers probably
| don't move around as much as you do, and I'd bet if they
| did, this problem would be fixed quickly with a simple
| timeout setting or something.
| zadikian wrote:
| Same issue with the lightning to 3.5 dongle. Plus the phone
| sometimes takes like 10s to recognize it.
| cmcaleer wrote:
| I gave up on USBC headphones because if your port becomes
| full of lint (say by being in your pocket all day), it
| doesn't take much to disturb a USBC connection and cause it
| to go through the whole handshake all over again for a few
| seconds.
|
| Compared to 3.5mm where the frustrations I remember were
| usually limited to sometimes getting a bit of a crackle or
| one of the audio channels dropping out and worst case
| scenario you just unplugged it and put it back in and it
| usually worked. With USBC you have to wait to see.
| cosmic_cheese wrote:
| It'll never happen but I'd love to see a new analog audio
| connector designed with portable audio and extreme durability
| in mind make a debut. The old 1.44mm connector is nice for its
| ubiquitous nature, but its internal footprint is large and it's
| prone to contact issues over time (I'm sure most of us have had
| a device/headphone pair where the jack had to be rotated into a
| "sweet spot".
|
| I'm not well versed in the world of port design, but what comes
| to mind is a little shallow magnetic nub with a couple of
| contacts on it. Easy to clean, impossible to break by
| accidental torquing, not deep enough to get stuff stuck in it.
|
| The cool thing is that whatever the new design is, making
| adapters for 1.44mm to the new thing is dirt cheap since it's
| still just an analog connection.
| ansgri wrote:
| What's 1.44 mm connector in this context? Common sizes for
| headphones are 2.5, 3.5 and (lately) 4.4 mm
| crote wrote:
| Don't forget the classic 6.35mm jack!
| chaz6 wrote:
| Since you mentioned 4.4mm, thought I would chime in and
| mention pentaconn (the trade name) which is a TRRRS
| connection (which does include a ground connection as well
| as L+/L-/R+/R-. I still do not understand the purpose of
| the ground connection in these plugs since there's nothing
| to ground on the other end.
| ansgri wrote:
| Isn't it the only common variant of 4.4mm? Since portable
| balanced audio is audiophile-adjacent, no wonder it
| includes the common ground of dubious utility.
| 101008 wrote:
| Please, it's the one thing I miss on my Pixel 10
| toast0 wrote:
| You can get phones with headphone jacks still. You have to shop
| carefully, because it eliminates a lot of options. My current
| phone is a moto g stylus 5g 2023... to get a headphone jack,
| snapdragon cpu, and reasonable cost, I had to also accept a
| stylus that I only use to fidget.
|
| Probably need to start shopping again soon cause updates stop
| in June.
| bigstrat2003 wrote:
| The moto g stylus 2025 is reasonable. It has some bloatware
| you have to go through and disable, and it is a bit bigger
| than I'd like. But it's about the best you can do in today's
| market.
| Suppafly wrote:
| Wired headphones are the top reason I've bought Moto phones
| the last two times.
| bpev wrote:
| At this point, I'm mostly just praying that the motorola +
| grapheneos collab will have a headphone jack. I probably
| won't purchase anything until I at least see what's cooking
| over there.
|
| Right now, since I buy audio files anyways, I've mostly been
| relying on a tiny audio player that can also act as a
| Bluetooth receiver for my phone.
| kefabean wrote:
| Totally agree, as an iPhone user it's literally the only
| 'innovation' that would make me lust after a new device.
| pathartl wrote:
| It's simple, I can buy some IEMs that sound better, cost less
| than a third of a barely-even-comparable wireless earbud, and
| roughly conforms to market standards so I can swap out the cable
| and tips. And I never have to charge them.
|
| I have a pair of Airpod Pros that I use solely for audiobooks and
| podcasts when I'm doing chores or shopping, but the audio quality
| is so garbage that's all they're really good for.
| eddyg wrote:
| Airpods Pro audio quality "garbage"? That is beyond harsh, and
| a quick search will find countless reviews extolling their
| audio quality.
|
| e.g. https://www.soundguys.com/apple-airpods-pro-3-review-
| close-t...
| brudgers wrote:
| The measure of audio is what comes out of the speakers not
| what is written on the web.
|
| My Airpod Pros are the most convenient personal audio device
| I have ever used. Sound wise they pale in comparison to my
| Sony MDR-ZX100 which I bought on sale for $9.99 at Best
| Buy...unfortunately the new model is about $15 regular price
| and maybe not as good (but I doubt it).
|
| Sure the Airpod Pros sound better than ordinary Airpods or
| the wired Airbuds, but that's a really low bar for an audio
| device.
| ActorNightly wrote:
| The problem with earbuds is that to have good quality, you
| need to create a seal, like IEMs do. Most professionals who
| use IEMs have them custom molded to their ears.
|
| If you are lucky and have a good ear shape, then airpods
| sound good. Still not as good as IEM because IEMs have more
| space for better drivers without needing a battery or
| bluetooth hardware.
|
| But if you are a person like me who has very hard time with
| any earbud staying in, then its gonna sound like garbage
| because you are never going to get a perfect seal.
| pembrook wrote:
| Yes, objectively Airpods Pro audio quality is not good if
| you're comparing it to a high-end IEM setup that uses
| multiple driver types, balanced armatures, electrostatics,
| etc. Also the tuning on the 3 vs. the 2 is worse.
|
| Airpods Pro have great audio quality _considering they are
| wireless bluetooth earbuds._ Remove that qualifier, and if
| you 're sitting at a desk all day and wired becomes an
| option, you can get far better sound quality/longevity for a
| fraction of the price.
| nitwit005 wrote:
| Backlash is probably wrong. There was some hype around wireless
| technology, but that always fades eventually. You can see this in
| other electronics like "smart" home appliances:
| https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2023/01/half-of-smart-applia...
|
| It seemed cool, people bought it, and then eventually many
| realized they didn't care about the fancy feature(s).
| deckplecksetter wrote:
| For me, using Bluetooth headphones with my (Samsung) phone is
| smooth and trouble-free. The experience is miles better than
| wired headphones, and I would never go back. Meanwhile,
| connecting to my TV with Bluetooth is an exercise in pure
| frustration.
|
| So it seems to me like the problem isn't Bluetooth, it's shitty
| implementations of it.
|
| And it's not just cheap devices. My TV is a fancy LG OLED. For
| the price I paid it should handle Bluetooth just fine.
|
| It's a real shame. When Bluetooth works, it's awesome, but a lot
| of people have had their opinions tainted by bad devices.
| pier25 wrote:
| It's super inconsistent across devices and implementations.
| I've had so many issues with it over the years.
|
| I've had headphones where a slight change in the environment
| around me while walking would disconnect audio. Or IEMs not
| syncing properly the L and R channels.
|
| Even in the best of cases using headphones with multiple
| devices is just terrible. Also syncing audio to picture rarely
| works as it should.
| mr_mitm wrote:
| Yeah, I'm reading these comments and I would have agreed 10
| years ago, but I'm regularly using three different pairs of
| wireless headphones plus a Bluetooth speaker and have literally
| zero issues. My Bose headphones are usually even paired with
| two phones.
|
| Yeah, charging is a bit annoying, but the added comfort is
| worth it to me and I can't tell that the audio quality is any
| different.
| ActorNightly wrote:
| >So it seems to me like the problem isn't Bluetooth, it's
| shitty implementations of it.
|
| Yep, but this is a problem that is present everywhere. For
| example, electric cars are supposed to be simpler, because its
| one moving part. In reality, you get essentially vertical
| integration of all the components like battery management,
| motor controllers, infotainment, gauge cluster and the software
| that connects all of that, and when bugs are present you can't
| even get into your car.
| olejorgenb wrote:
| > So it seems to me like the problem isn't Bluetooth, it's
| shitty implementations of it.
|
| Perhaps, but it kinda seems to me that there must be _some_
| inherent limitation of the standard which make it particular
| hard to create a high-quality experience?
|
| The latency for instance - in my (somewhat limited) experience
| audio over BT does not sync perfectly with video.
|
| The channels/codecs is/was so limited in bandwidth that until
| recently (few years back IIRC) headsets couldn't even send and
| receive decent quality audio at the same time. Even recent
| headsets like the Shokz Openrun Pro 2 has this limitation.
| (Which you could argue is an instance of "shitty
| implementation" since it was released after the availability of
| necessary tech (LE/LC3))
| tintor wrote:
| Wired headphones just work, unlike the bluetooth ones.
| ethagnawl wrote:
| While using wired headphones, my spouse's car never steals my
| audio when it starts or pulls into the driveway. Also, I can join
| a meeting seconds before it starts without spending a few minutes
| scrambling to verify that my BT headset will allow me to hear/be
| heard.
| xnyan wrote:
| A good bluetooth experience requires that both the headset and
| the audio source device implement bluetooth well, which is
| hard. That said, I have zero problems with my AirPods Pro
| pairing with my Mac or iPhone ever, it's pretty nice.
| ortusdux wrote:
| A few companies have demoed wireless cases with screens, and
| I would be very easy to tap connect on the case while I'm
| putting in the buds. My earbud was loose in my case
| yesterday, and it kept stealing the audio of a very important
| call. I almost threw them across the parking lot.
| maxerickson wrote:
| I have some generic Bluetooth dongle and some anker over the
| ear headphones and can turn the headphones on after
| initiating a call and not really have problems. Sometimes
| Windows doesn't find the microphone right away.
| toast0 wrote:
| AirPods seem pretty nice; but if you use them primarily with
| Android and connect them to Find My, they will claim to be
| lost all the time. Seems like you have to choose between
| annoyance or not being able to find them if you drop them.
|
| I personally prefer wired headphones... they're always
| charged and ready, even if I only use them with my phone once
| in a while.
| nottorp wrote:
| Tbh it may be the host that's causing the problems, not the
| headphones. I'm using pretty cheap JBLs with a mbpro and
| iphone and also never have any problems.
|
| Incidentally the same goes for bluetooth mice.
| sznio wrote:
| it requires that you only have a single pair of headphones,
| and a single device capable of connecting to it.
|
| with my bluetooth headphones, every time I use them in my
| house it's a hunt. First find my phone and disconnect them on
| it since thats what connected automatically. Then, go to the
| tv and disable bluetooth since that was the second thing it
| connected to. Then put the headphones in the case and back
| since they won't pair for some reason. Then go to settings in
| my PC. Realize my PC connected to my speakers, disconnect
| them, then connect to the headphones.
|
| Someone then calls me on the phone, I pick up and their voice
| comes booming from the speakers.
|
| Bluetooth would be infinitely better if it didn't connect
| automatically. Just press a button on the device you want to
| use. Instead it connects to everything but the thing I want
| to use.
|
| Recently I bought some cheap $10 wired Sony earbuds. I was
| surprised they sound much better than my $150 bluetooth
| earbuds.
| elcapitan wrote:
| This experience of different devices competing for a BT
| headphone is really the most annoying aspect of BT to me. I
| pair my headphones regularly with my work laptop, my phone and
| my private laptop, and when working from home and walking
| around in my apartment, the headphones sometimes just randomly
| pick another device, even if the current device has audio
| going, and the other does nothing. Sometimes the Macbook does
| that when it's on standby, which is bizarre. I always wondered
| if that is an implementation bug on one of the sides. I fixed
| it by forcing the Macbook to shut off BT when going on standby.
| peacebeard wrote:
| I never got on board with wireless headphones.
|
| * Having to charge them is a PITA
|
| * Having to pair them is a PITA
|
| * Having more points of failure is a PITA
|
| * Paying more is a PITA
|
| On the other hand:
|
| * Wires are fine
| xnyan wrote:
| Counterpoint: wires really suck and are not fine. AirPods Pro
| are great, I can afford them and they improve my quality of
| like quite a bit.
|
| Different strokes I guess.
| nkko wrote:
| was listening to music while coming with groceries and
| simultaneously juggling stuff to open the doors and change
| the track with Siri (the only use for Siri I have)
| reg_dunlop wrote:
| counter counterpoint:
|
| A wire sitting on a table does not suck. 2 people can gather
| around that table and still, the wire does not suck. As soon
| as 1 person picks up the wire and starts doing something with
| it....now an interaction with a wire sucks.
|
| But that's not the wire's fault.
| gruez wrote:
| >now an interaction with a wire sucks.
|
| >But that's not the wire's fault.
|
| So... "it's not the fall that kills you, it's the sudden
| deceleration"?
| reg_dunlop wrote:
| I believe that's a straw man fallacy.
|
| My assertion is that an inanimate object becomes a
| problem when a human interacts with it.
|
| Your attempted logical argument is that a law of nature
| is the same as an inanimate object.
|
| I am not contesting that an inanimate object is the same
| as gravity.
|
| I'm saying that humans make bad decisions with simple
| things and whine about inanimate objects and that's a
| very real first world problem.
| phrotoma wrote:
| Some years ago I commuted to work by subway in a city that
| had turnstiles at all transit stops. Having earbuds
| unceremoneously ripped out of my ears by spinning metal arms
| sent me straight to bluetooth and I have never looked back.
|
| Wires suck.
| stbtrax wrote:
| yeah I don't have this issue with airpods pro. charge them
| maybe every other week and never had issues pairing. The case
| charge should last for ~30-40 hrs of listening. The auto
| switching between laptop and phone is pretty great too for
| taking calls or walking away and not having to fiddle around
| with repairing
| cmcaleer wrote:
| Agree they're great but it does fascinate me when there are
| weird edge cases that Apple mess up.
|
| For example if I have my phone and laptop running, and I'm
| listening to something on my phone, I pause with my AirPods,
| and then I unpause with my AirPods, instead of what was
| playing on my phone resuming through my AirPods, a video that
| I'll have forgotten about will instead play through my laptop
| _speakers_ , and pressing pause on my AirPods will do nothing
| and I have to interrupt whatever I'm doing to pause on the
| laptop. Possible they've fixed this specific issue though
| since I've learned to not have anything that has media
| controls open on my laptop.
|
| The cross platform control stuff is probably very hard and
| usually works though.
| gruez wrote:
| >* Having to charge them is a PITA
|
| The equivalent PTIA for wired would be having to untangle them
| everytime you want to use them.
|
| >* Having to pair them is a PITA
|
| How many devices do you have that this is an issue? This is an
| issue that pops up a few times a year, at most.
|
| >* Having more points of failure is a PITA
|
| It's unclear which has more PoF. Wires can break, not to
| mention randomly catch on stuff and sending your phone flying.
| gzread wrote:
| It's hard to lose one or both of your wired earphones.
| siva7 wrote:
| Headphones were a solved problem. I had 20 years ago some high
| end IEM that i used back in the days on on so called mp3 players
| - those were pocket sized music players - and since apple
| released the airpods and bluetooth headphones were the new
| standard audio quality never recovered to the state we had two
| decades ago
| bob1029 wrote:
| iPod Shuffle + Shure SE215 was the pinnacle of portable audio.
| The ritual of maintaining a separate playlist that would
| actually fit made it intentional. Allowing Spotify to slip into
| an infinite stream of slop is so easy these days.
| ortusdux wrote:
| The trick is to use Google music. The recommendation
| algorithm is so bad that your brain rejects the slop it
| thinks you will like.
| cyberrock wrote:
| It wasn't a solved issue because 3.5mm is too anemic to power
| modern ANC. Remember when headphones like QC15 had a single AAA
| battery to power that? Maybe it's not an important feature to
| everyone, but ANC is critical to my experience on long distance
| transportation.
|
| Multipoint is also cool too. I like listening to music, taking
| a call, going to the toilet, and coming back to music all
| without doing anything.
|
| If there's a silver lining to the last 15 years, it's that
| replaceable cables became a standard feature and that there are
| IEMs with direct USB C cables now. If/when Moondrop/KZ/Linsoul
| release IEMs that can be used like wireless earbuds with ANC,
| and can also connect and recharge via USB C, they can just take
| my money.
| jbverschoor wrote:
| I like my EarPods, except that the wires keep tangling up. T for
| that I want to try those zipper hacks
|
| They have a good mic and fit properly.
|
| AirPods, nope nope nope. I could throw them away after one year
| and the multi device "dream" s was a nightmare.
|
| I still have my HD580, but I don't want to have the big cups on
| anymore
| phendrenad2 wrote:
| There are two tiers of bluetooth devices. There are the Apple and
| Samsung devices (and Bose and other high-end brands), which just
| work. Then there are the rest, which are terrible.
| hedora wrote:
| I wouldn't lump the high-end audio brands in with Apple.
|
| They often produce models that cost 25% as much and perform
| much better than the comparable Apple offerings.
|
| I think Apple is in a "fashion tier" that's distinct from "high
| quality" or "high end".
| iainctduncan wrote:
| Every blue tooth audio thing I've had sucked... and then stopped
| working altogether.
| aucisson_masque wrote:
| Tldr: that's a fashion trend. Couldn't care less.
|
| Personally I use wired headphone at home, either open back or
| closed back depending on the situation and Bluetooth outside when
| I don't want to be bothered by a cable.
|
| I think it gets the best of both worlds. Couldn't care less if I
| look 'cheap' because I have Bluetooth headphone.
| stuaxo wrote:
| Are Google one of the last holdouts ?
|
| I've been on cheap Android phones and just moved from Samsung to
| Motorola and both have headphones sockets.
| bigstrat2003 wrote:
| No, the Pixel dropped the headphone jack ages ago. It's why I
| don't have a Pixel any more.
| ahartmetz wrote:
| For my recent middle class Android phone, I got a USB-C
| dongle that I keep in my wallet since phones with headphone
| jacks have moved to the lowest end of the market and almost
| disappeared entirely. Doesn't seem worth it anymore.
|
| The dongle is tiny and seems to be of good mechanical
| quality.
| ndrake wrote:
| My daily headphones are the Google Pixel USB-C earbuds, but they
| seem to be no longer made. Anyone have good recommendations for
| similar style USB-C headphones w/mic?
| IshKebab wrote:
| Because it's a freaking pain to connect them, obviously! In my
| experience they work well enough once you have, but consider the
| experience of "plugging them into a different device".
|
| Barely any devices support being paired with more than one
| central. So you have to tediously disconnect with the first
| device in some shitty menu (e.g. on Android the UI is not at all
| clear), then maybe put it into pairing mode (again usually though
| some terrible UI because manufacturers think pairing is a rare
| operation) and then finally pair it on the other device.
|
| Absolutely ridiculous. Oh and what's the Bluetooth equivalent of
| a headphone splitter? Auracast? It's taken decades to get that
| and basically nothing supports it.
|
| I do use Bluetooth things and I think the sound quality and
| reliability can be very good (if you're lucky), but the
| connection process is miles worse than plugging in a wire.
| systemsweird wrote:
| For me AirPods are one of the greatest products I've ever owned.
| I resisted them for years and recited the usual tropes about
| wired being better. But after being gifted a pair years ago, I
| realized how wrong I was.
|
| I spend a lot of time at the gym or walking with headphones in
| and music, podcasts, or audiobooks on. It's so much better not
| having any wires when you're moving. I can't imagine doing these
| actives anymore with wired headphones.
|
| Battery life, pairing, charging, audio quality, and other
| complains are all non issues for me, but I'm also no audiophile.
| They work incredibly seamlessly inside the Apple ecosystem.
| scuff3d wrote:
| I've got a fairly cheap pair of Soundcores and I use an Android
| phone. Never really had a problem. Pair them once and they
| reconnect flawlessly, I only have to charge the battery case
| like once a month, and the earbuds themselves last more then an
| entire day. Mine get a lot of use, and I've never had an earbud
| die on me.
|
| There are a couple of minor annoyances for sure, like the car
| grabbing my phone when it turns on, but that's not a huge deal.
| And the annoyance of having a cord dangle around while I'm
| walking the dog or doing dishes or whatever the hell I'm doing
| far outweighs it.
|
| All of that said, if I wanted audio quality to sit and actively
| listen to music, I'd go wired no question. But I don't really
| care when 95% of my listening is audiobooks and podcasts.
| dbrgn wrote:
| An alternative to a wired dongle is a high-quality bluetooth amp,
| e.g. from Fiio. It's reliable, keeps your phone free from cables,
| but you can keep using your high quality wired headphones.
| volemo wrote:
| That seems a ~~wired~~ weird compromise to me: you get the
| downsides of Bluetooth (inherent latency, potential codec
| quality loss, spectrum congestion -- I occasionally experience
| interference and dropouts in crowded areas) but still have a
| wire hanging from your head and another battery to keep
| charged. :/
| dbrgn wrote:
| Latency doesn't matter for music and Fiio supports both LDAC
| and aptX.
|
| Keeping the battery charged is a weak point though, agreed.
| Simulacra wrote:
| For me it's cost. I used to be able to get those JVC gummy
| earbuds wired, for nine dollars. Now I have to spend upwards of
| $20 for Bluetooth. And of course, when the battery can't be
| recharged anymore, I'm supposed to throw them away. Much prefer
| the wired headphones. Sometimes Bluetooth makes sense, But
| economically wired makes more sense.
| leecarraher wrote:
| I've considered the move to wired not for quality but for the sad
| state that Bluetooth pairing headphones has become. Theycan't
| just be headphones anymore; They require their own app and
| pairing protocol. They want 19 different touch points and
| permissions to implement a handful of never used features I get
| people being frustrated at why they can't just do what copper did
| for the last century.
| LazyMans wrote:
| I do wonder if this is in part to Spotify educating people with
| their very much in your face notifications when you set your
| player to lossless quality mode. They inform you bluetooth won't
| pass the signal with enough fidelity and to go wired.
|
| I don't think many people thought their expensive
| Airpods/Bose/Sony were not capable of handling lossless and may
| feel left out or missing something.
| hedora wrote:
| Isn't aptx lossless an old and very standard thing?
|
| I haven't bought headphones in years, and my current set
| support it.
| kenhwang wrote:
| Old yes, but hardly standard.
|
| For phones, I think it's just the Sony and Asus and Chinese
| brands that support it. Pixels and Samsungs generally don't
| since they use Tensor/Exynos instead of Qualcomm/Snapdragon
| SoCs, and definitely not Apple.
|
| Story is even more bleak on the headphones side, Sony prefers
| their own LDAC codec so they support that instead of AptX
| Lossless, a pattern shared by many Asian headphones
| manufactuers. Many western brands only support up to AptX HD
| and AAC because Apple/Samsung devices have the majority
| marketshare. Qualcomm's own site only shows 12 headphones
| that support AptX Lossless.
|
| Now my opinion is LDAC is close enough to lossless that it's
| probably good enough for Sony and most people (the 1411kbps
| for uncompressed 16/44.1 CD quality generally compresses to
| under 900kbps which is below the 990kbps max of LDAC). Bose
| does have a headphone that supports AptX Lossless. It's just
| the Airpods that are far behind the competition.
| scuff3d wrote:
| As soon as they started talking about celebrities and it being a
| fashion statement they lost me on this being a real resurgence.
|
| For about a month we had videos of people getting in fist fights
| over fucking Stanley tumblers of all things, those stupid Labubus
| popped off too, and God knows how many other things come and go
| in like a month. Unless theirs a sustained long term resurgence
| in the market, it's probably just another tiktok fad.
| hedora wrote:
| I wonder what percentage of the people driving this trend have
| either only had AirPods (they make me dizzy, and I think the
| sound quality is terrible), Beats (even worse) or no-name $20
| bluetooth headsets.
|
| I have a nice high-end set of Sennheisers that cost ~ $150, and
| they're much better than my old wired set (both in-ear, both
| noise isolating, similar prices).
|
| The bluetooth ones win because they eliminate cable noise. I can
| actually jog with them. In quiet rooms, they're very comparable,
| except the bluetooth set has a built in EQ, which works around
| the fact that iOS / Android still inexplicably do not let you
| adjust treble and bass.
|
| The bluetooth headset market has been stuck in this weird spot
| where fashion mostly dictates. I guess I shouldn't be surprised
| that fashion now dictates wired headsets.
| debo_ wrote:
| I personally think people who jog with anything more intrusive
| than earbuds are bonkers.
| jofzar wrote:
| There's a guy who runs around my neighbourhood with airpods
| max, I don't understand it, it's a literal brick on your
| head.
| coreyburnsdev wrote:
| totally agree with you, though I have 3 sets of $20 bluetooth
| sets that I rotate on various devices and have no complaints
| whatsoever. Also use a DAC and $300 set of can on PC, so I know
| what good audio sounds like.
| tptacek wrote:
| I've never had a pair of headphones with a cable connection that
| survived more than 2 years. Can't say that about the Airpods Max.
|
| Like, I have opinions about high-end headphones based on how easy
| the cords are to replace. That shouldn't be the case.
|
| I was a discrete headphone amp guy, just to situate myself in
| this market. I didn't expect to get good wireless headphones and
| think "I'm never going back", but that's precisely what happened.
| bigstrat2003 wrote:
| Wired headphones are also 1/10 of the price of airpods. So they
| still come out ahead on the cost of ownership front.
| kasey_junk wrote:
| What high quality wired headphones (that you'd drive with a
| dedicated amp and have a replaceable cable) cost $55?
| autoexec wrote:
| I'm sure that there can be situations where it's better to
| sacrifice sound quality and reliability for the convenience of
| wireless but I think the ability to replace cables is a huge
| advantage and not a pain point at all. The only problem I've
| ever had was with an old pair from Sony where by the time I
| needed a new cable they'd stopped selling a replacement cable
| but I knew I was rolling the dice when I got that pair because
| the cable wasn't standard.
|
| Even in the extreme case where you're replacing them every
| other year you could buy a handful of spares right away so you
| have them on hand when you need them and your headphones will
| outlast the batteries in your airpods
| Aeolun wrote:
| I went back all the way to tape. It's surprising how well it
| still works 30 years after it became obsolete.
|
| Obviously with wired headphones, because tape players don't do
| bluetooth.
| prodigycorp wrote:
| Lots of good theories here, but none saying "TikTok", which I
| think is the answer.
|
| TikTok is a _big_ reason wired headphones are popular. AirPod
| microphone quality is spotty and improving the quality is non-
| deterministic. With wired earpods, people put the mic next to
| their mouth and get above-average audio quality.
|
| Like the article says, wired headphones have also become a
| fashion statement akin to vinyl culture.
| procaryote wrote:
| This is why I use wired for longer calls or video conferences.
| I've tried so many wireless in-ear things and all of them are
| more sensitive to surrounding noise and I have to repeat myself
| more due to dropouts or spotty quality.
|
| It's just much harder to get good sound quality when the mikes
| are by your ear rather than on a wire near your mouth
|
| Not to mention that it completely removes the risk of running
| low on headphone battery mid-call
| mft_ wrote:
| I dunno; IME many people who could barely be called a 'creator'
| seem to invest in a standalone microphone already, and many of
| these (the portable ones anyway) aren't wired.
| pimlottc wrote:
| Agree with the fashion. Big clunky headphones can be part of a
| signature style. No doubt anime and video game characters have
| had an influence here.
|
| They also project a clear message of "don't bother me" when
| worn in public.
| beloch wrote:
| This isn't a Vinyl vs CD thing where a clearly inferior
| technology lives on due mainly to sentimental reasons. There are
| a number of concrete advantages to wired headphones over
| bluetooth headphones.
|
| - They don't need charging. Charging may seem like a minor
| inconvenience, and we're used to charging a lot of devices.
| However, even a minor inconvenience is still an inconvenience.
|
| - They're harder to lose. When Apple almost immediately started
| selling accessories to connect their airpods together (i.e.
| Cables), it was pretty obvious that going _completely_ cordless
| was not entirely superior.
|
| - For an equivalent price point, wired headphones produce higher
| quality audio, and the top-end is a lot deeper.
|
| - Wired cans don't need to pair, don't glitch out, don't become
| laggy, pair with the wrong device, etc.. Bluetooth was never
| really meant for use as an audio connection, and it's never
| really become 100% foolproof. With Apple's proclivity for
| proprietary standards, I'm amazed they (or others) haven't rolled
| their own wireless audio standard by now.
|
| Too many android phones copied Apple and ditched the venerable
| audio jack, but a few kept it, and I've always insisted on it
| when buying phones. It's old but _far_ from obsolete.
| autoexec wrote:
| Bluetooth also opens your devices up to
| spying/tracking/monitoring/hacking/fingerprinting.
| gucci-on-fleek wrote:
| FWIW, Bluetooth LE Audio [0] solves most of these problems in
| my experience. Battery life is way better, pairing is almost
| instant, you can connect to multiple devices simultaneously,
| the latency is almost imperceptible, etc. The sound quality is
| still worse than wired, but it's close enough that it doesn't
| bother me personally.
|
| _Very_ few headphones support BLE Audio, and you need to
| enable some experimental Bluez flags for it to work on Linux,
| but both of these should improve with time. But it makes such a
| huge difference that I 'd argue that it's worth the effort,
| even right now.
|
| [0]: https://www.bluetooth.com/learn-about-bluetooth/feature-
| enha...
| blululu wrote:
| Just to be clear the parent is still 100% correct that wired
| headphones: * Do not need charging * Are hard to lose. *
| Offer better audio * Never glitch out with pairing.
|
| BLE Audio offers lower need for charging and better (but not
| equivalent) audio. So 2/4 are not as bad with BLE Audio (and
| arguably only 1 since you still need to charge). The other
| two 2/4 are related to the form factor. Wireless headphones
| have advantages but they are not the decisive winner.
| yallpendantools wrote:
| Is BLE the only way for Bluetooth to have multiple
| connections? I'm no audiophile but in my experience, the
| audio quality noticeably drops when multiple devices are
| connected (I've only ever had at most two at a time). I
| reasoned out that the bits were being divided so `quality
| /= 2` as well. I've only ever done this accidentally so I
| can't be certain the connection was really over BLE.
|
| Granted, I've only ever done multiple connections on Linux
| so maybe it's a Linux problem.
| gucci-on-fleek wrote:
| > Is BLE the only way for Bluetooth to have multiple
| connections?
|
| I think (?) that it's possible with Classic Bluetooth
| too, but like everything else with Classic Bluetooth,
| it's kinda buggy and unreliable.
|
| > I'm no audiophile but in my experience, the audio
| quality noticeably drops when multiple devices are
| connected (I've only ever had at most two at a time).
|
| I haven't personally noticed any audio quality difference
| with two devices connected over BLE, but I've never tried
| to play audio simultaneously from two sources. My phone
| and my laptop both auto-connect to my headphones, so I
| usually have two devices connected simultaneously, but I
| only ever play audio from one at a time.
| gucci-on-fleek wrote:
| Right, my point was just that "Bluetooth sucks" does not
| necessarily mean "wireless headphones suck", but since
| nearly all wireless headphones use Bluetooth Classic (or
| some proprietary analogue protocol), it can be hard to
| disentangle the two. But yeah, I agree no matter how good
| the protocol improvements are, wired is still better for
| some use cases.
| ben-schaaf wrote:
| I wasn't able to find the answer on that page or with google,
| does bluetooth LE solve the dogshit quality when using the
| microphone?
| gucci-on-fleek wrote:
| Yes, you can simultaneously use full-quality source and
| sink (speaker and microphone) streams [0]. And from
| personal experience, this works exactly as you would
| expect.
|
| As you've seen, the documentation on LE Audio is rather
| horrible. The Android documentation [1] is semi-useful even
| on other platforms, and the official book [2] is also
| helpful if you're willing to wade through a _ton_ of dense
| technical details, but there 's not really much else
| available on the internet. I've had to spend an annoying
| amount of time tracing stuff with Wireshark and reading
| through the specifications [3] (which are thankfully free)
| and the BlueZ source code [4] to figure stuff out.
|
| (The poor documentation mostly only matters if you're
| trying to do something specific; LE Audio mostly "just
| works" on Android out-of-the-box and Linux after you change
| the single config setting from [0])
|
| [0]: https://www.collabora.com/news-and-
| blog/blog/2025/11/24/impl...
|
| [1]: https://developer.android.com/develop/connectivity/blu
| etooth...
|
| [2]: https://www.bluetooth.com/wp-
| content/uploads/2025/01/Introdu...
|
| [3]: https://www.bluetooth.com/specifications/specs/
|
| [4]: https://github.com/bluez/bluez/
| input_sh wrote:
| In my experience, it's a significant improvement, but I
| wouldn't call it a solution. If non-LE drop in quality is
| like 1/10, with LE it's like 6/10.
|
| I should point out that unlike the other reply I haven't
| really bothered researching it at all, I just upgraded from
| a non-LE pair to a LE pair recently.
| alpaca128 wrote:
| > you can connect to multiple devices simultaneously
|
| I don't want to connect to multiple devices. I want to select
| one device and be 100% certain that it's switched to that
| device as a source. Even with 100% Apple devices this is not
| perfectly reliable with bluetooth.
|
| Putting the cable in another audio jack makes it physically
| impossible that the audio comes from the wrong source or to
| the wrong output device. And it is _a lot_ more convenient
| than untangling the mess once the bluetooth devices get
| confused about what to do and requiring you to manually
| disable bluetooth at some devices just so it gets the
| message.
| adzm wrote:
| And latency!! Anything that needs to be real time is impossible
| without wired headphones. Even the lowest latency wireless is
| noticeable.
| fixxation92 wrote:
| This is the big one for me, I hate all that lag with
| bluetooth, signal interference, and constantly wondering
| which device my headphones have connected to. So much easier
| for so many reasons, with a wire!
| maccard wrote:
| Real time covers a lot of different things, and have a lot of
| different solutions.
|
| Do you mean real time like games? "Wireless" headsets are
| perfectly fine and usable. Real time audio? Wireless
| transmitters and receivers exist and are used (granted with
| wireless in-ears but IMO that's mostly so the don't fall out)
| at the absolute highest level of audio production and live
| events.
|
| You definitely can't just say wireless isn't used for real
| time.
| vnorilo wrote:
| The wireless used for pro audio is never bluetooth,
| however.
| maccard wrote:
| Oh absolutely. The wireless for gaming headsets isn't
| Bluetooth either. If your argument is Bluetooth isn't
| suitable for real time, I'm on board - I'd even go
| further and say Bluetooth isn't suitable for anything
| other than fire and forget.
|
| Gaming headsets are usually 2.4GHz wireless, and pro
| audio stuff is ~500-800MHz and the proper stuff requires
| a wireless license to use.
| g947o wrote:
| I think we are talking about Bluetooth devices/use cases
| within the consumer world.
|
| Real time audio exists for sure. But it doesn't use
| Bluetooth, and nobody here cares about it, not to mention
| the amount of investment needed for equipment.
|
| This is just being pedantic.
| fhcbix wrote:
| Not trying to argue against your point, but most of the
| Bluetooth latency comes from the codec, not from it being
| wireless. Bluetooth LE Audio comes with LC3 which supports a
| codec latency of as little as 2.5 ms.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| I've been using AirPods on audio and video calls for many
| years now, and I notice no latency. Same with my bluetooth
| mouse.
| strix_varius wrote:
| Try using them to play a twitchy game and you'll notice.
| scarecrowbob wrote:
| I work with a lot of audio in a professional capacity. You're
| correct if you're saying that neither tech is universally "teh
| best".
|
| And you're correct that wired phones have a lot of advantages.
|
| Tack on that they don't have latency, though I've never really
| tried to track vocals on wireless cans. I have a pretty nice
| collection of what I consider to be quality mid-tier stuff for
| my studio (hd280, dt770, mdr7506, k240), and I think they
| mostly sound better and I can use them longer than I can use
| the various wireless stuff I use.
|
| And the "real" UHF wireless audio I use professionally (well,
| to collect rather than listen to audio) is very reliable and
| good sounding but also, like, $1000/ch once it's cased and
| cabled and properly accessorized.
|
| However, for almost all of my day to day listening I use either
| airpods or a some bluetooth'd 3M ear muffs. I even went back to
| airpods after going through both wired and other wireless
| solutions.
|
| I don't enjoy having my in-ears ripped out along with my
| pocket. And universally the cord ends and the physical
| connector on my phone are the weak spots that have had me
| replace stuff- I haven't bought a phone in the 5 years since I
| got one that could charge wirelessly and never has phones
| plugged into it, and I don't intend to get another one any time
| soon (knock on wood that my case keeps the screen from breaking
| and needing me to repair it).
|
| I have a bluetooth receiver with an analog out that I keep in
| my workbox, which I used for program music at a show tonight.
| It's nice to start my truck and my podcast just starts playing,
| too, without having to get out my phone and plug it in.
|
| You're right that wired stuff is better for some things. I
| still find wireless stuff to be superior in a lot of
| situations.
| kuschku wrote:
| > Tack on that they don't have latency, though I've never
| really tried to track vocals on wireless cans
|
| The truth is that the OS usually hides the latency of
| wireless heapdhones, e.g. airpods, by delaying video to keep
| it in sync. The real latency is somewhere around 100-400ms if
| the RF environment is crowded. Even worse is that the latency
| isn't actually constant, but drifts all the time.
|
| At many IT conferences organized by hackspaces, everything is
| done by volunteers, including broadcast and video/audio
| postproduction. And that is actually one of the most common
| issues: our volunteers use wireless headphones even if we ask
| them repeatedly not to.
|
| We cut talks in postproduction primarily based on audio,
| e.g., when does the applause start/end, when does the
| speaker's introduction start/end, etc. Obviously, that
| doesn't work reliably if the audio latency is
| nondeterministic.
|
| Even worse, as different venues have different audio setups,
| there are sometimes real audio/video sync issues that need to
| be fixed. But if our volunteers are using wireless
| headphones, they won't just set the wrong offset, but they
| end up trying to fix issues that don't even exist.
|
| And then you get complaints from viewers that e.g. the
| livestream audio/video is out of sync, even though it's not.
| The issue turns out to be caused by the viewer's laptop and
| wireless headphones not supporting the latency compensation
| technique I explained earlier. And there's nothing we can do
| about that.
|
| Wireless headphones tried to fix something that wasn't
| broken, and made it worse. In German, we'd call that
| "verschlimmbessern".
| vladvasiliu wrote:
| > The truth is that the OS usually hides the latency of
| wireless heapdhones, e.g. airpods, by delaying video to
| keep it in sync.
|
| Right, but that only works when you control both. I love my
| Sony and Shure Bluetooth headphones and have 0 issues
| watching videos with them; they work great even on Linux.
|
| But when people figure they're gonna use BT headsets for
| conferencing, it just turns into a shitshow of people
| waiting for the other to speak, then starting to speak at
| the same time.
|
| I have an old Jabra headset for my video call needs, and it
| uses DECT. That thing has so little latency that I can use
| it to play FPS games without issues (I'm by no means a
| competitve player, so YMMV). At the same time, its range is
| huuuge. For the life of me, I cannot understand why nobody
| makes such headsets anymore: they've all switched to BT for
| some reason. The only models that seem to still use some
| form of low-latency transmission are some "gamer" models,
| but I've never tried one.
| MetaWhirledPeas wrote:
| I have some Asus gamer earbuds with a dongle for a
| proprietary BT alternative: zero perceptible latency.
| pxx wrote:
| ugh the most annoying thing about the conversation clash
| latency is that the person causing the issue just thinks
| others are being weirdly rude.
|
| wireless headphones externalize the cost of latency to
| other conference participants. if you think your airbuds
| are "perfectly fine" it's because you're not the one
| paying the cost.
| ZekeSulastin wrote:
| Do you have a German word for ignoring the things the
| person you're replying to liked about a given thing?
| dotancohen wrote:
| Produktivegesprach
| kuschku wrote:
| Most of this thread is already exploring the consumer
| perspective, and as the previous poster said they
| couldn't talk about the professional perspective, I chose
| to only focus on the production/broadcast angle in my
| comment.
| scarecrowbob wrote:
| Fair enough. There are plenty of reasons why I don't have
| professional experience monitoring over BT wireless,
| which you lay out well.
|
| Though I've been working with writing software for esp32
| and so that might change in the next month or so.
| krisoft wrote:
| > Wireless headphones tried to fix something that wasn't
| broken, and made it worse.
|
| I think you are going to far here.
|
| Do wireless headphones have problems? Sure. Did they fix
| some problems wired headphones had? Yes. Yes, they did.
|
| Simply the ability of moving around without having to worry
| about the cable getting tangled or dragging the headphones
| or the phone is phenomenal. My wireless headphones are a
| lot more reliable than my previous wired ones. Somehow the
| cable and the connector was always the source of failures.
|
| Do you not like wireless headphones? Don't buy them. I will
| keep buying wireless headphones because they have clear
| benefits to me in my usage.
|
| I find it insulting that you represent your preference as
| some universal truth.
| KaiserPro wrote:
| > bluetooth'd 3M ear muffs.
|
| How do you rate those?
|
| I made my own, but they sucked balls. I have some Plantronic
| cans which have ~10db nrr, but they are falling apart now,
| and I'm looking for alternatives with decent NRR
| scarecrowbob wrote:
| Well, I have had them for about 2 years and would buy them
| again.
|
| To be clear, these are for noise protection and are heavy.
| They are big enough that I have another pair of muffs for
| shooting rifles and some ($$) molded westone earplugs for
| working on loud stages.
|
| I mostly use the 3m when I am running a chainsaw or driving
| vehicles with the windows down (I find that too damn loud
| for my tastes). For a while I'd track drums with them over
| my shure se215, but I've started playing quieter and have
| found that something like an HD280 cuts stuff down enough
| to track drums while feeling more comfortable.
|
| On one hand, they are kind of expensive, bulky, and the mic
| isn't great. Also their "ambient sound" is not anywhere
| near as loud or controllable as the muffs I use for
| shooting. On the other hand, they pair well, sound okay,
| have a lot of noise reduction, and they seem pretty rugged.
| They run on AAs and Battery life is pretty good, too.
| KaiserPro wrote:
| Oooo AA batteries? fuckyeah
| scarecrowbob wrote:
| Nothing like two weeks of my podcasts getting interruped
| every half hour by a voice saying "battery low"... :D
| loeg wrote:
| > With Apple's proclivity for proprietary standards, I'm amazed
| they (or others) haven't rolled their own wireless audio
| standard by now.
|
| Can you imagine Europe's reaction? They'd fine Apple to the
| moon -- no innovation allowed unless it interoperates with
| other products that don't exist yet.
| an_guy wrote:
| > interoperates with other products that don't exist yet.
|
| Are you claiming no other wireless earphones exist other than
| apples'??
| charcircuit wrote:
| That would implement Apple's proprietary protocol. He
| thinks Europe would think Apple is creating a monopoly for
| themselves for iPhone headphones since no other company
| could implement the protocol without Apple's approval.
| raw_anon_1111 wrote:
| iPhones work with any BT headphones.
| charcircuit wrote:
| But other BT headphone manufacturers wouldn't be able to
| get the ultra low latency / sound quality / perfect
| device switching / etc.
| mstipetic wrote:
| Oh yes, Europe bad, regulation bad. Maybe add some nuance to
| your thinking.
| esperent wrote:
| > Can you imagine Europe's reaction?
|
| And they'd be right to do so. The correct approach to
| creating a new standard is plan interoperability from the
| start. If a vendor plans lock in by introducing a new
| standard, they should get shut down immediately and told to
| do better.
| roenxi wrote:
| That sounds like a way to not get any progress. The way I'm
| used to this sort of thing happening is some company brings
| in a new proprietary standard, makes bank, then all the
| competition bands together to form an open standard to try
| and stop them. There is a bit of a tick-tock feeling as
| consortiums use more open and accessible standards to
| slowly lever power away from incumbents.
|
| It is interesting to just glance at the history of USB [0]
| through that lens was originally developed, and it is
| interesting to see that as I would have predicted the group
| of companies that developed USB (MS, IBM, Compaq, etc) seem
| to be disjoint from the companies listed as precursor
| technologies (looks like that was especially an Apple-led
| consortium of hardware manufacturers organised around
| firewire [1]).
|
| [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USB#History
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IEEE_1394#Patent_consider
| ation...
| sofixa wrote:
| > The way I'm used to this sort of thing happening is
| some company brings in a new proprietary standard, makes
| bank, then all the competition bands together to form an
| open standard to try and stop them. There is a bit of a
| tick-tock feeling as consortiums use more open and
| accessible standards to slowly lever power away from
| incumbents.
|
| And that leaves you with two standards (at least), non
| interoperable between them. In the case of hardware this
| can be really annoying, constraining and inefficient both
| for consumers and at large.
| roenxi wrote:
| How likely is it that that can be avoided if, as in this
| context, the starting point is the current standard not
| being that great? It pretty much has to end in 2
| different competing standards. Or there can be 2
| different flavours of the existing standard which are
| quite likely to break interoperability and make reusing
| the name an annoyance rather than a help.
|
| A downside of existing standards is it means it is quite
| hard to innovate on them.
| kotaKat wrote:
| It really is a damn shame that my Lightning connectors
| are all dead and useless despite being the empirically
| better connector because of Vestager's whinging and
| stupidity across the entire EU mobile ecosystem.
| raw_anon_1111 wrote:
| Lightning is not a better connector. It maxed out at USB
| 2 speeds and I needed separate bespoke adapters and
| chargers. I can now use standard USB C cords with
| everything, standard USB C headphones, connect my iPhone
| to my portable external monitor with the same USB C cable
| I use for my computer...
|
| https://imgur.com/a/fIwsjIQ
|
| And the iPhone supports all of the USB C standards that
| computers support - audio, video, mass storage, network,
| keyboard, mice etc
| my123 wrote:
| Side note: USB 3 Lightning did exist on iPad Pros.
| adrian_b wrote:
| As your link shows, even if the IEEE 1394 promoted by
| Apple was technically superior to USB (mainly because
| IEEE 1394 had been derived from SCSI), it was killed by
| patents.
|
| Many superior technologies have been killed by patents
| and the greediness of the patent owners has been futile
| and they gained very little from their patents, because
| people have always preferred something cheaper, even if
| less good, so the inferior USB has easily won against
| IEEE 1394.
|
| The patent owners that hope to gain too much from their
| patents always forget that instead of paying a too big
| royalty it is always possible to circumvent the patent by
| using an alternative solution, even if that is inferior.
| Mordisquitos wrote:
| > _no innovation allowed unless it interoperates with other
| products that don 't exist yet_
|
| Products that don't exist yet... so, future innovation? No
| innovation allowed unless it incentivises and streamlines
| further innovation? Count me in!
| ahhhhnoooo wrote:
| Vinyls are not necessarily the inferior technology. Given the
| choice, I'd prefer to play vinyl in some cases. In social
| settings vinyl's short length and need to be flipped creates a
| dynamic social environment. Someone has to regularly choose new
| music to play, acting with intent to do so. Someone has to
| regularly walk to the machine. These create dynamism and flow.
| CDs are much longer, and less tactile. There's less of the my
| turn your turn, who is going to flip the thing.
|
| They sound worse, if clarity is your goal. And they are huge
| and wear out. I agree with you 99%, I just wanted to point out
| that across some dimensions they are the superior technology.
| sambapa wrote:
| Vinyl is for plebs, hiring troubadours for your party is the
| way.
| meekins wrote:
| Please recommend a troubadour who knows the Neat Records,
| Guardian Records n' Tapes and Heavy Metal Records singles
| catalogues and I'm sold :)
| sambapa wrote:
| Known repertoire is a function of BAC only.
| dijit wrote:
| This is like saying "Candles are superior to lightbulbs
| because they burn out quicker and thats an advantage in some
| situations".
|
| I'm not sure how, its an aesthetic choice but an _inferior_
| technology by every metric that counts.
|
| Candles still have a place, we still buy them, but we can't
| reasonably call them superior either- even if, candles
| actually would have a real advantage of not requiring power.
| Vinyl doesn't even have that.
| bob1029 wrote:
| You have to look beyond the audio engineering on this one.
|
| Using constrained mediums _on purpose_ is often how the
| best artistic expression is achieved. For example, if the
| artist knows their channel is noisy and band-limited they
| can get a lot more liberal with the kinds of samples they
| use throughout. CD /SACD is kind of like 4K for television.
| The medium becomes so transparent that it causes upstream
| shocks in every other part of the process. You can no
| longer rely on the camera or audio chain to cover it up
| (unless you hobble yourself intentionally).
| mcdeltat wrote:
| With this logic you can argue the best audio medium is
| dirt because if you made good music with dirt, the music
| must have been so incredible to have counteracted the
| flaws of dirt as a medium. Ignore the fact that dirt
| cannot be used as a music medium. (Vacuous truth)
| atoav wrote:
| Yes, but your "IF" is doing the heavy lifting here and it
| would be your burden to proof how dirt would be a means
| of artistic expression before anybody could take your
| argument seriously.
|
| As a musician myself I can assure you that the high
| stakes releases for any musician are vinyl releases. They
| also happen to be the ones with which most musicians earn
| the most money.
|
| Now technologically vinyl isn't superior (and anybody who
| claims it is is an idiot in the sense of the word), but
| technology isn't everything. A noisy casette tape can
| evoke the same (and sometimes more) feelings than the
| digital recording. A vinyl record with a big cover, an
| inlay with band info, that you specifically _chose_ to
| put on the record player while reading the liner notes
| and examining the design is in a ritualistic sense a
| thousand times more gratifying than having spotify select
| a song for you without knowing why, in the background of
| the daily life. That is like the difference between a
| candle light bath and getting wet in a rainshower.
|
| Now that doesn't mean people will be binary either 100%
| vinyl or 100% digital. Vinyl is for the special occasion
| or for DJ sets, digital is for everything else.
| mcdeltat wrote:
| Yes that's my point with the "if"! And in general I
| largely agree with you.
|
| The parent comment basically argued vinyl is superior
| because when artists used vinyl the resulting music was
| creatively better (because of whatever process). Sure,
| but then you can't selectively ignore the great music
| that has been made with other recording technologies. I
| can point to a lot of good music recorded on tape or
| digital. Unless we are arguing that music back in the
| vinyl days was broadly better than now? (Different
| argument then...)
|
| As for artistic choices, I totally agree that vinyl can
| be a valid choice! Then it's silly to say one thing is
| "better" than another.
|
| But in terms of raw technology, I say it's just copium to
| claim vinyl is in any way superior to digital. Digital's
| recording capabilities are a superset of vinyl's. There
| is no magic sauce killer feature unique to vinyl.
| atoav wrote:
| Adressing your points:
|
| Music _may_ have been a bigger culturual force during the
| heights of vinyl record sales. Whether that translated to
| better music or whether it is some form of survivorship
| bias: I don 't know. In fact I doubt it. But there is
| something to the music that happened when it was new,
| e.g. Punk music was better when everybody was still
| trying to figure out what is punk and what isn't, while
| today it feels like most bands just copy was has been
| made in the past. You can extrapolate the same idea to
| many other genres that developed. So was the music better
| on average? Probably not. Was it more exiting and had
| more impact on society, fashion, culture? For sure.
|
| As for vinyl: I agree that digital is superior in terms
| of sound quality. Nearly every vinyl record is pressed
| from a digital master nowadays after all. Even those who
| want "vinyl warmth" could have that easily emulated in
| digital nowadays. Digital is endlessly flexible, you
| could theoretically envision (and some have done) a vinyl
| experience that is purely digital under the hood - or you
| could do whatever netflix is doing.
|
| But in practise vinyl comes with the experience, forces
| you to do the ritual, to listen to the whole album, is
| immensly direct (just the waveform pressed into the
| material) etc. This is a limitation if vinyl is all you
| have, but in times where you could listen to 10 nameless
| streams of sounds at once for the whole day that
| limitation has become a popular feature. I have friends
| with pressing plants and all of them have more job offers
| than they could realistically fulfill for years now.
|
| I'd advice against too easily dismissing the value of the
| ritual a technological dispositif forces onto the people
| interacting with said technology. Listening to a vinyl
| record in a time where people rarely ever sit down and
| just listen to music in a concentrated way _is_ a thing
| people look for. Those who say it is because vinyl is
| _technically_ superior are wrong, but the limitations and
| the listening habits a technology enforces are
| unseparably a part of the technology itself. And if you
| are looking for what vinyl gives you, vinyl is the thing
| that gives it to you best.
| otabdeveloper4 wrote:
| > Digital is endlessly flexible
|
| Not really. Analog electronic instruments are based on
| non-linear feedbacks loops. Those are pretty much
| impossible to emulate digitally without emulating actual
| electric circuits and current flow.
|
| (Yes, I know, irrelevant to the vinyl discussion.)
| gzread wrote:
| I used to think that, and indeed a computer can run any
| equations you want. However with analogue you're getting
| a bunch of interesting-sounding equations without having
| to think of them and write them down, and that's the
| "analogue sound." Analogue circuitry isn't a perfect math
| processor the way digital is, only an approximation, and
| the deviations from perfection are useful.
|
| Especially if you get into synths. A digital sine wave
| oscillator is doing sin(time*frequency)*gain. An analogue
| one is designed to produce a close to perfect sine wave
| at a certain set point, but you make it able to be varied
| around that set point by replacing some of the components
| with adjustable ones in somewhat ad-hoc ways, and see
| what it sounds like. The frequency may be set by a
| 3-stage RC circuit, you replace all the Rs with vactrols
| and see what happens, now the impedance changes as well
| as the frequency and it might affect other parts of the
| circuit. You may one-point calibrate it to 1 volt per
| octave but it won't be linear.
| mrob wrote:
| I'm convinced that at least 90% of "analog sound" can be
| simulated by taking the ideal block diagram and replacing
| every link with a parametric EQ->waveshaper->parametric
| EQ chain. Configuring those added components correctly is
| left as an exercise for the reader.
|
| Jim Lill's video on guitar amp tone is an interesting
| demonstration. Hear how close he gets to the original
| with an even simpler combination of EQ and distortion:
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wcBEOcPtlYk
| atoav wrote:
| [delayed]
| ghaff wrote:
| I have huge nostalgia for older analog audio and photo
| formats for many many reasons. I also don't really miss
| them. Had a lot of fun and memories with vinyl and
| processing B&W film in a darkroom--also shot a lot of
| slides--but you can't go home again and all that.
| gzread wrote:
| > There is no magic sauce killer feature unique to vinyl.
|
| Old-school DJing! Imagine carefully positioning the laser
| on a CD...
| cluckindan wrote:
| Early Motown records were tracked in a room which had a
| dirt floor.
| mort96 wrote:
| No, you can't argue that the best medium is dirt. Just
| like you can't argue that the best medium is vinyl.
|
| But you _could_ maybe argue that there are advantages to
| dirt (at least a hypothetical dirt which can be used as a
| musical medium somehow) which you lose by going to CD or
| vinyl. If this hypothetical dirt managed to be
| constraining in such a way that it produces kinds of
| musical works which would not have been produced for CD,
| is that not an advantage?
| alpaca128 wrote:
| > Using constrained mediums on purpose is often how the
| best artistic expression is achieved
|
| Artistic expression is not technology. Vinyl is strictly
| inferior as technology. That doesn't imply that it cannot
| have any advantages at all, but that wasn't the point
| being made.
| jszymborski wrote:
| > Artistic expression is not technology.
|
| Technology is sometimes used by artists to express
| themselves. Sometimes that means lo-fi recordings of your
| music on a shit tape recorder when better tools ate
| around. Sometimes it means pressing vinyls.
| Qwertious wrote:
| A CD is 100% technologically capable of having the
| duration and physical size of a vinyl.
| NBJack wrote:
| A return to laserdiscs (with CD or BluRay technology and
| information density) would be wild.
| Lio wrote:
| Reminds me of the Autechre album Tri Repetae which was
| labelled as "Complete with surface noise" on vinyl and
| "Incomplete without surface noise" on CD.
| dsr_ wrote:
| If they really wanted to do so, they could take the
| vinyl, play it with all the surface noise they wanted,
| and record that to CD so they could have the surface
| noise there, too.
|
| It would be the same surface noise each time, not getting
| worse.
| Lio wrote:
| We need a new consumer audio format with the ability to
| contain playback algorithms! :P
|
| > _It would be the same surface noise each time, not
| getting worse._
|
| Interestingly, not always getting "worse".
|
| A large portion of vinyl surface noise comes from static
| rather than groove wear.
|
| So you can zap it with a little petzo-electric gun and it
| goes away again. At least for a little while.
| steve1977 wrote:
| > CD/SACD is kind of like 4K for television.
|
| In theory. In practice most stuff is distorted and
| compressed to death and might as well be 12-bit ;)
| cj wrote:
| Instead of "Candles are a superior way to light a room" you
| can say "Candles are a superior way to create a romantic
| vibe in a room".
|
| Candles/Vinyl can be superior if you clarify the metric
| you're optimizing for.
| lb1lf wrote:
| Just so.
|
| The advantages of vinyl are basically making up for lack
| of self-discipline in humans. (I much prefer vinyl for
| that precise reason!)
|
| a) Since putting it on becomes more of a ritual -
| handling the album carefully, brushing off lint, placing
| the needle &c - I find I make more of an effort to
| actually _listen_ to the music I put on. I could listen
| as intently to Spotify or Tidal, too - but, alas, I most
| often don't.
|
| b) Seeing as you'll get some 20-odd minutes of music
| before having to make another choice - be it playing the
| other side or another album entirely - it enforces having
| to decide on what you'd like to listen to, rather than
| just letting your streaming service of choice play things
| it thinks you may like. (That being said, streaming
| services are a great way to explore new music!)
|
| c) Given the economics of streaming, buying physical
| media helps both the record stores - a good one is like
| an excellent library, in which the librarians give you
| all sorts of curated recommendations for things you may
| like, in addition to being great social meeting places
| with like-minded folk - and performing artists alive;
| I've no idea how many hours I would have to listen to an
| artist on Spotify before the payout is equal to their
| takeout from a single vinyl sale...
|
| d) Besides, it is cosy.
|
| That being said, you could easily DSP CDs or streaming to
| sound like vinyl if that's your idea of fun - just about
| any playback format is superior sonically to vinyl.
| However, to many, it is the whole ritual of putting on a
| record which basically makes it worth the sonic
| tradeoffs... (Call me a luddite if you like!)
| saalweachter wrote:
| In a similar vein, vinyl records make the unit of music
| _an album_ , and I like it in situations where the artist
| has created "an album" rather than "a collection of ten-
| ish tracks".
|
| I listen to most of my music on phones or computers and
| when I do, I like to pick out a track at a time or put
| together a playlist or just shuffle the whole damn thing.
|
| When I purchase or put on a record, it's because I think
| the album is a cohesive work and I want to listen to it
| as a piece; the constrained format created the concept of
| an album, and using it enforces listening to the music as
| an album.
| throw0101c wrote:
| > _In a similar vein, vinyl records make the unit of
| music an album, and I like it in situations where the
| artist has created "an album" rather than "a collection
| of ten-ish tracks"._
|
| I don't see how this is different between a record and a
| CD.
| lb1lf wrote:
| There's one (related) difference - an LP can hold approx.
| 45 minutes of music, a CD can hold 80-ish (The original
| spec called for 74, but I think the most I've seen on a
| single disc is 82-ish minutes).
|
| Unless an artist is very disciplined, that means what
| would be a decent album at 40 minutes worth of music in
| LP days would be half an album today.
|
| Again, this is a shortcoming in people, not in the medium
| itself - after all, a stellar 40-minute album can be
| released on CD, too.
|
| I have heard expressed many times, though, the
| expectation that a CD should be 'full' in order to be a
| proper product - or, for that matter, the artist can be
| less severe in the cutting room, seeing as 'Oh, we've got
| room for that one, too ...'
|
| I'd much rather have a condensed album which is mostly
| great than the same songs mixed with as many tunes which
| ought have been left in the archives pending a
| 'Collector's edition', 'Complete outtakes' or similar.
|
| Then again (again!), at least a CD lets you skip the
| filler and listen only to the good stuff - at the risk of
| losing some of the recording artist's vision. Which,
| again, is a matter of (lacking) self-discipline. The LP
| raises the bar for skipping songs, hence forcing us weak
| souls (I count myself among them!) to listen to the full
| work, as the artist intended.
|
| Or, at least as the artist intended before 'new release'
| meant uploading a new song to streaming services, making
| the album - as a somewhat cohesive collection of songs -
| a niche product.
|
| Apropos nothing, the latest album I bought is a CD which
| arrived in the mail today, and it clocks in at 55 minutes
| and 20 seconds. Picked up a handful of LPs last week,
| though.
| ahhhhnoooo wrote:
| Additionally, vinyl has two sides. So you get this lead
| in and end track on both sides. The flow is different.
| saalweachter wrote:
| The killer feature of CD players is shuffling and
| skipping tracks.
|
| Heck, it used to be all the rage to get a three or five
| CD changer and shuffle the whole thing, comfortable
| unpredictability, forty or fifty songs you like but never
| knowing which is next.
|
| You could likewise just listen to an album on your phone,
| in order, but it's too easy to let your distraction kick
| in and switch it halfway through.
| saltcured wrote:
| As someone who grew up during the transition, the killer
| feature of the CD was amazing audio quality and the lack
| of degradation from every playback. The period where we
| started finding albums marked "DDD", for fully digital
| production, was also amazing.
|
| It saddens me a little that, in spite of all the
| technology, actual Hi-Fi listening seems to have become
| less accessible or prevalent. I'm still not sure how much
| this is really for the commonly stated reason of
| convenience, and how much that is really cope and denial
| of a bigger socio-economic decline. I.e. it simply isn't
| as realistic for regular people to have a Hi-Fi listening
| space...
| lb1lf wrote:
| Anecdotally, I don't think hi-fi's decline has to do with
| cost - at least not cost alone. You can still get a more
| than decent system which will fit most living rooms for
| quite reasonable money - I just had a look at prices at a
| national retailer's website here in Norway, and you can
| get a pair of decent bookshelf speakers and a stereo amp
| delivering 2x60W into 8 ohms, built-in streaming support
| and a HDMI input to ease connection to the TV, covering
| the most common use cases nowadays, for less than $1,000.
|
| For comparison, median income after taxes is approx.
| $50,000 a year, so we're looking at less than a week's
| net wages.
|
| I think it is more likely that our media consumption
| habits have changed - when I was a kid in the eighties, a
| few - like, the bank branch manager, the dentist and a
| few others - had a VCR at home. The rest of us had TVs,
| meaning we watched what was on at the time, or (once in a
| while) rented a VCR and a movie.
|
| That aside, our media choices were radio, going to the
| cinema (not very often!) or - drumroll - recorded music.
|
| Hence everybody had stereos. I believe my parents were
| quite typical - when I was a toddler, they bought a
| number of LPs with radio dramas for kids on them, music
| for kids &c - the stereo was basically the entertainment
| hub.
|
| Today my family and I - wife and three kids aged 10, 12
| and 16 - have between us, let's see, 2xTVs, a 40" and an
| 85", the latter with a 5.1 system attached, both with
| Apple TVs, a stereo (making us an outlier!), three ipads,
| three smartphones, two dumbphones, a handful of radios,
| three - oops, four - laptops, a PlayStation, a couple of
| Nintendo Switches...
|
| There's basically so many more options to spend our media
| time on, and at the same time there's way more leisure
| activities aimed at kids now than when I was a kid, so
| the kids are barely at home during the week (at least it
| feels that way!), leaving less time (methinks) for media
| consumption than only a generation ago, while at the same
| time having many more options.
|
| So - basically, for many, only a generation ago, the
| stereo was the entertainment hub and you were kind of
| expected to have one. Nowadays the entertainment hub is
| some kind of internet-connected device, and a stereo is a
| niche product.
| ssl-3 wrote:
| That's very succinctly-put. Well done.
|
| Rather less-succinctly: I never got into vinyl and have
| never owned a turntable that wasn't built down to a
| price. I do still have my shelves of CDs, and it keeps
| slowly expanding. I usually listen to Spotify because it
| is convenient and portable and -- these days -- lossless.
|
| But my sister and her old man have put together a quite
| decent stereo system with a mix of vintage and modern
| gear in recent years, and also started a a rather serious
| vinyl collection. While there's certainly no romance
| there on my end, it's a lovely and deeply-involving
| experience to hang out with them in their tiny little
| city-dweller living room and spin records into the wee
| hours; sometimes for just one track, and sometimes for
| entire albums.
|
| I definitely prefer the way my own stereo, which I've
| built over the course of decades, sounds. It's detailed
| and big and it does all the things; it is by all
| technical measures very superior. But we have a lot more
| fun listening to vinyl at their place than we have
| playing CDs and Spotify at my place. The _process_ -- and
| indeed, the _inconvenience_ -- of playing vinyl makes it
| all much more visceral.
| mavhc wrote:
| The metric being house fires
| thom wrote:
| I'm sure somebody posted a link to E-Prime here recently
| (a form of English where all forms of 'to be' are
| forbidden) and this conversation is a wonderful example
| of the kinds of conflicts that it helps avoid.
| stef25 wrote:
| Really good analogy!
| emacdona wrote:
| I think we can agree that vinyl sounds different than CD,
| right? Is it so hard to believe that some people actually
| prefer the sound of music on vinyl? For such a person, that
| might be the only metric that matters.
|
| But, another example: when I was growing up (dating myself
| here), cassette tapes were superior to CDs in the only way
| that mattered (to me): they didn't skip in my portable
| music player (walkman) when I took them running.
| scns wrote:
| Really deep bassnotes can't be reproced by vinyl. The
| grooves would get too wide IIRC, it's a physical
| limitation.
| mrob wrote:
| The sound of vinyl is a subset of the sound of CD. If you
| take a high quality recording of a vinyl record playback
| and write it to CD, it will sound identical.
| emacdona wrote:
| Okay, sure. But if I prefer the subset of CD sound that
| is the same as vinyl, and my favorite band comes out with
| a new album... I just buy vinyl, right?
|
| Or are you suggesting that I buy the record, a blank CD,
| and all of the high quality recording playback equipment
| I need to write it to that CD?
| mikkupikku wrote:
| Candles are better than lightbulbs at melting the ends of
| frayed nylon strings and ropes. :)
| steve1977 wrote:
| And at PM2.5 and VOC output.
| Aldipower wrote:
| Vinyl isn't about technology it is about musicality, art
| and taste. If you try to explain and reduce vinyl to
| something technically, you are leaving out the most
| important part, the artful content that will be enjoyed
| from it.
| soopypoos wrote:
| > advantage of not requiring power. Vinyl doesn't even have
| that.
|
| well actually...
| RiverCrochet wrote:
| RAM shortages will never make vinyl more expensive.
| Anything digital requires a CPU to work.
| dijit wrote:
| AMPs: am I a joke to you?
|
| RAM prices are such an infinitesimally small component
| cost of digital audio equipment that I can't take you
| seriously here.
| RiverCrochet wrote:
| It was a stretch, so you're right to not take me
| seriously.
|
| I imagine any large about of RAM in audio equipment would
| strictly be for devices/functions that buffer large
| amounts of data as opposed to just decoding it.
|
| An old Akai S1000 sampler I had a long time ago had slots
| for memory modules (some weird proprietary slot IIRC),
| but that was a musical instrument, not really a player of
| any kind.
| rout39574 wrote:
| Candles are pleasant light, in a way difficult to acquire
| with other lighting types. That means there's a niche in
| which that facet is more valuable than the other
| technologies.
|
| I had candles at my dinner table last Thursday, and am
| likely to do so date night tonight... but the bulbs I turn
| off to give the candles reign are LED...
| adrian_b wrote:
| For me the fact that vinyl discs wear out is their decisive
| disadvantage.
|
| Many decades ago, those who bought vinyl and desired adequate
| audio quality never listened to vinyl discs, but they copied
| them immediately to magnetic tapes and always listened only
| to the tapes, keeping the vinyl discs only as a master
| source, to avoid wearing them out.
| Lio wrote:
| I mean, yes they do wear out but the rate is pretty slow if
| you look after them. I have some of my father's old early
| LPs and they still sound pretty good.
|
| You can get rid of a surprising amount of surface noise
| with a static gun and a line contact stylus (where shape is
| close to that of a cutting head so you get the biggest
| contact patch).
|
| I think most people only copied to cassette if they want to
| use a Walkman, play it in the car or give a copy to a
| friend. It generally wasn't for sound quality.
| bluGill wrote:
| He said tape not cassette. Tape would mean real to real
| tape in this context - cassette doesn't make sense. Tape
| can be wider than cassette, only two tracks, and run
| faster - all give you a lot better sound quality. Not as
| good as a good digital system and it costs more but still
| very good.
| Lio wrote:
| I actually still have an old Grundig reel to reel
| somewhere, although I can't claim it as ever really hifi.
|
| I would stand by recording to reel to reel tape for
| quality being even less common recording to cassette
| tape.
|
| Quality domestic reel to reel decks were just not that
| widely owned here. Maybe it was different where you
| lived.
| bluGill wrote:
| They we never common from what I know. However again the
| context is people who care about sound quality and in
| that group I believe they were much more common.
| UltraSane wrote:
| Any media that is actively damaged during every use is
| inferior.
| Aldipower wrote:
| Not if you see it from an artistic perspective.
| ahhhhnoooo wrote:
| The best meals I've ever had were damaged by their use, and
| many were quite artistic.
| badgersnake wrote:
| There's always one.
| Copernicron wrote:
| I would argue that vinyl sounds better thanks to the Loudness
| War[0]. CD is technically superior and should sound better
| but it's been compressed to hell and back during mastering in
| ways that vinyl simply can't be due to physical limitations.
| All that wonderful technology and they can't simply let it be
| so we get good sound quality.
|
| [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loudness_war
| Kirby64 wrote:
| But that has nothing to do with the technology per-se. You
| could recreate this by just having CDs that don't use all
| their space for music and having more of them, if the goal is
| dynamism. It's a restriction, not a benefit. You could do the
| same exact thing with an iPod with playlists that are
| shorter, and not auto playing after the playlist ends.
| shortercode wrote:
| All valid points, but I don't miss having a tangle of wire in
| my pocket or that wire failing after a couple of months meaning
| I have to get a new set of headphones.
| kelnos wrote:
| I have a set of IEMs that I bought at least 8 years ago, and
| they still work fine. And the wire is even replaceable,
| though I haven't needed to do so.
|
| If your wired headphones are only lasting a couple months,
| then likely you're buying at a price point where quality
| suffers.
|
| Agree with the tangle of wire, though.
| gonlad_x wrote:
| I'm looking for long lasting iems myself -- the bunny ears
| that I recently bought had the cables die on me pretty
| fast. What are your recs ?
| homebrewer wrote:
| Anything from Etymotic never failed me. The current ER3
| SE has been going for 7 years, and the cable is
| replaceable (when/if it fails -- they're still on the
| original cable).
|
| All Etys have a peculiar love/hate neutral sound profile,
| so you should try them before committing to them. I
| exclusively listen to podcasts, so they're a perfect
| match.
| craftkiller wrote:
| I have the Shure SE215 which has a replaceable cable.
| vladvasiliu wrote:
| I also have a pair of Shure IEMs, some 15-16 years old.
| They still work great, but I've been through at least 2
| cables with them, plus an additional 3rd party Lightning
| cable. I've then switched to BT and couldn't be happier.
|
| Yeah, paying a tad bit more for earphones with
| replaceable cables pays dividends. A cable doesn't cost
| much, and you also get much better sound quality (which
| _has_ to count, right? Since BT sound quality often comes
| as an argument).
| Copernicron wrote:
| I also have a pair of these and they sound really good.
| Then I received a pair of the Shure Aonic 4s for
| Christmas one year and those sound amazing. As an added
| bonus, the passive noise isolation with proper fitting
| eartips beats any noise cancellation I've ever seen.
| ricksunny wrote:
| I solved the tangle issue going on years now with this: htt
| ps://www.amazon.com/dp/B07Z8G6VH4?ref_=ppx_hzsearch_conn_..
| .
|
| You accustom to the wrap-unwrap motion and then that's it.
| boelboel wrote:
| I've replaced wires of my main headphone 2 times over 10+
| years. 40 dollars for something I use 8 hours a day, not too
| bad.
| rienbdj wrote:
| I agree but stuck with Apple ecosystem. I like the cheap wired
| lightning headphones they do. The audio quality is acceptable
| on public transit, they're cheap enough to lose and the mic is
| surprisingly good. Weirdly if Apple stopped making these I
| would jump ship for an Android phone with 3.5mm.
| pfortuny wrote:
| But you have wired earpods, both lightning and usb-3. I
| cannot be happier with those for my iphone and ipad, resp.
| rienbdj wrote:
| My bad, meant USBC - used to have Lightning
| mcdeltat wrote:
| What annoys me the most is that the industry collectively
| decided that 3.5mm jacks are obselete, removing the option of
| using wired headphones, for no(?) good reason. We could at
| least agree that wired and wireless each have their own pros
| and cons, but no, we're shoehorned into wireless because
| corporate decided it. Here, you must use <NEW TECH> simply
| because we said so! It's just the peak of trend following
| bullshittery and represents a lot of what is wrong with
| capitalist society.
| crote wrote:
| > removing the option of using wired headphones
|
| I am personally a fan of wired headphones with USB-C
| connectors. I am only ever going to use it with my phone,
| laptop, or desktop anyways - and all of they have at least
| one USB-C port.
|
| _In theory_ it could also be the best option for audio
| quality: if you move the DAC all the way to the headphone
| itself you minimize the length of the analog chain, which
| should also reduce the possibility for it to pick up any kind
| of noise or interference. Additionally, the DAC can be
| perfectly tuned to compensate for any imperfections in the
| headset itself, which _should_ result in a better audio
| output than a random 3.5mm headphone paired with a random
| external DAC.
|
| The obvious downsides are that you lose any kind of influence
| on the audio signal itself by forcing you to use a _specific_
| DAC, that the integrated DAC is yet another component which
| can break and be basically impossible to replace, and that a
| 3.5mm plug is far less likely to break than a USB-C one.
|
| On the absolutely high end you probably want headphone and
| DAC separate, but for a Teams call or some casual on-the-go
| Spotify a fully integrated mid-tier headset / headphone seems
| to be the better option to me.
| vladvasiliu wrote:
| > that the integrated DAC is yet another component which
| can break and be basically impossible to replace
|
| Meh. If you want your headphones to last for ages, you
| could go just a bit higher end and get a pair with a
| replaceable cable. Then you can just swap the cable with
| the integrated DAC, regular 3.5 mm jack, or whatever.
|
| I used to have a lightning cable for my Shure IEMs, worked
| great until the cable developed the usual problems around
| the connector, just like your regular analog cables. I then
| bought a BT adapter for the same headphones and never
| looked back. I've had them for 15-16 years now, still work
| as good as new. The BT dongle is something like 6 years
| old, and the battery still holds a good charge.
|
| My adapter is a bit of a pain nowadays since it's the last
| thing I have that uses micro-USB for charging. I hear Shure
| has released newer adapters with USB C and no wires at all.
| But that's too expensive to replace something that still
| just works.
| loloquwowndueo wrote:
| Got recommendations for good USB-C wired headphones?
|
| I don't find wireless (AirPods) all that convenient, so
| when they inevitably die of battery illness I'd like a pair
| that won't suffer the same fate.
| scns wrote:
| The newer Beyerdynamic models have detachable cables.
| They sell USB-C cables which i have not used but i am
| very content with the three out of the four pairs of cans
| i own by them. The pair i dislike are wireless ones. If
| you want em for music on the go i'd recommend the DT 700
| Pro X.
| avidiax wrote:
| JBL Tune is what I have. I wouldn't call them amazing,
| but the USB-C connection is super useful. You never pair,
| you never charge, you can't lose them, and even if you
| did, they are cheap.
|
| The only real downside is lack of ANC, and the wires can
| transmit some mechanical noise if it rubs on your
| clothing. I just have a little lapel clip (from my old
| Etymotics) to stop them moving.
| twelve40 wrote:
| i don't know what i'm doing wrong but my mac has terrible
| time recognizing any USB-C headphones. First, it takes a
| while to recognize, then it never switches over by default
| so i often end up blasting on speakers if i forget that
| it's oh, USB-C headphones. Same confusion on Zoom. At the
| same time, Mac's 3.5mm _just works_ , instantly.
|
| But i realize that it might be hard to have 3.5mm on phones
| due to insane amount of size optimizations on these
| sophisticated devices we kind of take for granted by now.
| 4k93n2 wrote:
| i have a headset that does all three, 3.5mm, usb-c and
| bluetooth and i usually go with usb-c when using them with
| a laptop or desktop.
|
| im not sure using them with a phone would be good in the
| long run, especially when you are moving around a lot more
| with the phone in your pocket. the usb-c connection isnt as
| tight as 3.5mm so its going to put a lot of strain on the
| usb-c port. if that goes on a phone youre in big trouble
| alpaca128 wrote:
| > Here, you must use <NEW TECH> simply because we said so!
|
| Because the integrated battery adds an expiration date to a
| device that could otherwise last decades if maintained
| properly.
|
| Same as Apple tightly coupling the iMac screen with the Mac's
| software support cycle even though nothing would stop them
| from just adding, say, a USB-C port that can act as video
| input.
| raw_anon_1111 wrote:
| Macs overall are only 10% of Apple's revenue and with
| 70-80% of those being laptops and the other 20% being split
| among Mac Mini's, iMacs and Mac Studios, what does you
| think are the chances of Apple spending time optimizing
| iMac sells?
| alpaca128 wrote:
| > Macs overall are only 10% of Apple's revenue
|
| "Only" $43 billion in revenue is more than 95% of
| corporations achieved.
|
| Apple is pretending to be eco-friendly and using that as
| excuse to ship fewer chargers, for example. If they can
| optimize the same Mac's packaging to use paper that's
| folded in all kinds of fancy ways, they can add a tiny
| bit of functionality to an existing port. You can't tell
| me Apple isn't able to care about small details, because
| they absolutely do when they want and not only when it's
| about revenue.
| raw_anon_1111 wrote:
| Apples revenue was $416 billion. Let's say $41 billion
| came from Macs and assume 20% of that was from all of the
| desktops that's $8.2 billion from iMacs, Mac Studios
| (more expensive), and Mac Minis (more popular). It's not
| too far fetched to estimate about $2 billion from iMac
| sales or less
| mcdeltat wrote:
| With the trend of computing devices getting more baseline
| capable but the functionality/usability not improving at
| the same rate, I do wonder what the endgame will look like.
| Will we have a reversion to more efficient, durable
| designs? Or will we end up with absurdly large computing
| power in every device to counteract the horrible software
| rot? Phones with 100+ CPUs? Smart fridges with 1TB RAM?
| (The latter is kinda scary, imagine rewriting all software
| in Python - we could easily piss away 1000x hardware
| performance for no functionality gained.)
| shalmanese wrote:
| What's interesting is that Apple was the one responsible for
| removing the jack from their phones but they've stubbornly
| kept them on all their computers.
|
| The only port in common between a 2015 Intel Macbook Pro and
| a 2026 Macbook Neo is the 3.5mm headphone jack. But also, the
| only port in common between a 2015 Intel Macbook Pro and a
| 1991 Powerbook 100 is the 3.5mm headphone jack.
| Gigachad wrote:
| Because the MacBook isn't particularly short on space. The
| MacBook neo appears to have massive blank space blocks
| where the speakers are.
|
| The 3.5mm jack is fine, there isn't any need to replace it
| on the MacBook where you can afford to have both. On the
| iPhone it makes more sense to use the usb c for audio.
| shalmanese wrote:
| That hasn't stopped them from periodic stalinist
| redesigns in an attempt to purge other ports from their
| machines. But the audio jack always survives.
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| I'm guessing there are some key "user journeys" for
| scientific / industrial customer base, that involve using
| 3.5mm jack for something _other than_ audio signal, and
| said customers would probably sooner change hardware
| suppliers than deal with dongles and all the problems of
| introducing USB into the signal path.
| Gigachad wrote:
| My guess is MacBooks are just used for pro audio work a
| lot where latency is unworkable. While few have latency
| sensitive work on an iPhone.
| numpad0 wrote:
| It was the solution to the "analog loophole" "problem". The
| idea of the "loophole" is that the hole must be plugged shut
| to eliminate piracy.
| gzread wrote:
| Not true, since Bluetooth to 3.5mm adapters exist, and
| they've long given up on full-assing audio DRM anyway.
| vladms wrote:
| There is an adapter 3.5mm jack to USB-C which works great, so
| from my perspective there is no option removed.
|
| I keep the adapter with my wired headphones (which I bought
| many years ago), and I did not encounter any issue (falling,
| heavy, etc.), it's just a slightly longer wire and a couple
| of euros spent to buy it.
| gzread wrote:
| Can't use a power bank at the same time.
| kevin_thibedeau wrote:
| You can with a data splitter. I haven't seen any power
| banks with that integrated which is a weird miss for an
| obvious product feature.
| kevin_thibedeau wrote:
| > we're shoehorned into wireless because corporate decided
| it.
|
| You can still buy such phones. You need to take the brand
| loyalty blinders off first.
| atoav wrote:
| Wired headphones are infinitely more durable when good. I had a
| single pair of Sennheiser HD25II for 16 years now and I use
| them to run 16km a week, often in the rain.
| HPsquared wrote:
| They have no latency, which is essential for gaming.
| MrDresden wrote:
| > _" Too many android phones copied Apple and ditched the
| venerable audio jack"_
|
| I understand this is a personal preference, but I never
| understood the anger some people had over the removal when it's
| as easy as just using a small USB-C to 3.5mm audio jack
| converter to use wired headphones.
| swiftcoder wrote:
| Part of it is jack longevity. I've never had a headphone port
| die on me, but I have multiple old phones with dead lightning
| or USB-C ports...
| criddell wrote:
| I've had lots of them break. Sometimes the jack was only
| attached to the board via solder joints which eventually
| break from fatigue.
| jahnu wrote:
| I tried the Apple one for a while but it's badly shielded and
| picks up interference a lot. I mean really obvious buzzing
| sounds if near certain sources of RF. Switched to wired ear
| buds with a lightning connector and no interference issues.
| So I'm sad I can't plug in my high quality headphones or hook
| up my phone to my mixer when I want without having noise.
| crote wrote:
| Why would you _want_ to carry around an additional dongle? It
| 's just one more thing which you can forget and which can
| break.
| jasode wrote:
| _> when it's as easy as just using a small USB-C to 3.5mm
| audio jack converter to use wired headphones._
|
| As someone who uses wired earphones exclusively and must use
| those USB-C adapters you suggest, it's not quite "just as
| easy" because there are several problems:
|
| - it's an extra $10 dongle to buy and potentially lose. I've
| lost several of them over the years
|
| - adds more mechanical stress to the USB-C jack. The office
| Apple USB-C 3.5mm adapter protrudes out from the phone and
| I've had several close calls with the wire getting snagged on
| a door knob which can damage the USB-C port. I've never been
| comfortable with this Rube-Goldberg dongle contraption that
| adds more risk to damaging a $1000 phone. It's a fear I never
| had with the built-in 3.5mm jack on my old iPhone 5. There
| are 3rd-party right-angle USB-C to 3.5mm on Amazon (including
| magnetic ones) but the ones I tried interfere with phone
| cases and they don't sound as good. (Apparently Apple uses a
| more premium DAC chip in their USB-C adapter.)
|
| - can't simultaneously charge the phone while listening
| unless you buy a different USB-C adapter that has both 3.5mm
| input and a USB-C passthrough charging port. These are
| bulkier.
|
| - it's an extra dongle that's easy to forget. I once got on a
| transatlantic flight and realized that I forgot my USB-C
| earphone adapter at home. I panicked and dreaded the idea of
| nothing to listen to for 8 hours but I was luckily saved by a
| friend that didn't need to use hers and let me borrow it. Why
| can't I just leave the USB-C dongle connected to the 3.5mm
| 100% of the time so there's nothing to forget?!? Because I
| often need to connect the earphones to things that don't need
| the adapter.
|
| With all those drawbacks, I still use the USB-C adapters
| because I have to. But it has definitely made life more
| complicated.
| ralferoo wrote:
| It's just one more thing to buy and lose. I know I own both
| Apple's lightning-to-3.5mm adapter and the USB-C-to-3.5mm.
| Right now, I know where my nice big-cans headphones are, but
| it's not with either adapter. I'm pretty such I know where my
| cheap wireless buds are. The lightning adapter should live in
| the same travel pouch, but I'm not 100% sure if it's there
| because I frequently use those with devices that have a 3.5mm
| jack, so they might have been separated. I know for a fact my
| USB-C-to-3.5mm adapter has been separated, and I've not seen
| it for over a year. I know it's in the house somewhere, so I
| certainly wouldn't buy another one (especially considering
| how infrequently I used it before), but I have no idea where
| it is and so if I did want to use my iPad with my nice
| headphones, I can't.
|
| Contrast that to the simplicity with devices that still have
| a 3.5mm phone - my daily Android phone, my Macbook Air - I
| can just plug any old headphones in and not have to go
| searching for the adapter.
|
| And despite the fact that I also own two bluetooth
| headphones, my wired big-cans headphones have far superior
| sound quality to either of them. I know it's not a fair
| comparison because they were well over $100 compared to $10
| for the others, but I'm still limited to what I can use them
| with - which in my case is absolutely everything except my
| Apple kit (laptop excepted).
| alpaca128 wrote:
| Because that small audio jack converter cannot drive my wired
| headphones, so now it's not a small dongle but another
| smartphone-sized gadget with usually another rechargeable
| battery, and at that point I might as well use my laptop as
| portable music player.
|
| And if you ever held e.g. Apple's adapter in your hand you'll
| know how incredibly flimsy its cable is, and how such
| adapters easily act as levers to mechanically strain the
| USB-C port. There's a reason headphone jacks are robust -
| they were actually designed for use with audio devices in
| mind.
| fzeroracer wrote:
| I've done that for years and it's a 'tax' for being allowed
| to use my actual headphones. Every single converter I've used
| will shit the bed after 6-12 months thanks to shitty cabling,
| and I've used both the official converters as well as third
| party ones. Eventually it becomes a fucking pain in the ass
| when it dies at an inconvenient time.
|
| In comparison the headphones I've been using have lasted me
| for over 10+ years with no issue, and any decent high quality
| set of cans makes the 3.5mm cable easily replaceable.
| homebrewer wrote:
| If they replaced it with a second USB port, not simply
| removed the jack, there would be far fewer complaints.
| g947o wrote:
| Actually, no.
|
| We know as a matter of fact that Android does NOT handle your
| audio properly when you transmit audio over USB-C then
| converter. It used to work fine with 3.5mm.
|
| https://android.stackexchange.com/questions/250602/how-to-
| di...
|
| And you could run into weird issues like this
|
| https://support.google.com/pixelphone/thread/238773737/assis.
| ..
|
| Which nobody needed to worry about.
| dtech wrote:
| You really cannot see? The experience is vastly inferior: the
| required dongles have a huge list of annoyances, and you
| either cannot charge at the same time or have to use an ever
| more finicky splitting dongle.
| mikkupikku wrote:
| I have bought probably two or three dozen different kinds of
| USB-C adaptors over the past few years, for old USB
| peripherals, for HDMI and display port, etc. They always last
| a few months then develop unreliable connectors and begin
| failing on any computer I try them with unless I baby the
| exact angle of the cable. There's something about USB-C that
| makes them particularly vulnerable to strain relief issues.
| Never had these kind of problems before with anything other
| than apple magsafe connectors. Certainly not from trusty old
| analogue jacks.
| deathlock wrote:
| Curiously, I have had the exact opposite experience. Over
| the years I tried dozens of earbuds and headphones with a
| jack connection and all of them after a few months of use
| started getting unreliable connections unless I kept them
| at the right angle. The pair which lasted longer without
| issues costs around 180EUR but still started showing
| problems after 2-3 years, though to be fair I left them
| almost always plugged in my pc. If I had used them with my
| phone I would've likely started experiencing connection
| issues much sooner.
|
| The only other connection type I found to be even worse is
| microusb. I lost count over how many cables I had to
| change, some even after just a few months. On the other
| hand I neved had any problem with usb-c cables or
| peripherals.
| muddi900 wrote:
| Can you charge the ohone while listening on the phone?
| letmeinhere wrote:
| I have a splitter but it's pretty niche and probably not
| the best DAC
| lta wrote:
| I'm one of those person who were extremely pissed. I've stuck
| with older phones for a long time to avoid the thing.
|
| The USB to Jack things are brittle and low quality. That's
| yet another stuff to not lose and carry around.
|
| Jacks just work. If it ain't broken, don't fix it.
| Larrikin wrote:
| Because it was strictly a money saving thing for the company
| that made the phone worse for no other reason.
|
| Sony phones were some of the first high end water resistant
| phones. They continue to be water resistant and still have
| the headphone jack and microSD card slot.
| jjav wrote:
| > They don't need charging.
|
| This is it. I have a lot of wireless headphones and every time
| I need to use one, it isn't charged. It's very exhausting and I
| don't want to deal with that. So I use them as wired headphone
| if possible, or dump them in the discard pile if not.
| Gigachad wrote:
| Why do you have a lot? I have one pair of AirPods and I don't
| think it's ever gone flat on me. I have to charge it less
| than once a week and it gives me a long notice period before.
| NikolaNovak wrote:
| Not the op but for me - Different headphones for different
| purposes.
|
| For convenience and casual on the go listening, or to not
| annoy anybody, I'll use earbuds or light headphones.
|
| If I really want to enjoy music I'll take the big ol' cans
| (circimaural open-back), lie back, and enjoy the music
| fully. Etc.
|
| (And I'm extremely not an audiophile! But big roomy
| headphones are super comfy and sound super nice to me :).
|
| If I'm on zoom calls all day I want something lightweight
| but with a boom microphone (massive Grrrr! To everybody
| joining meetings with airpods).
|
| etc. I'm an extreme example but I have a few different
| boom-mic headsets in my home office for work, gaming
| headphones, running around headphones, and listening to
| music headphones. All of that at a teeny fraction of price
| people used to spend on basic entry level home hifi setup.
| Gigachad wrote:
| For calls, I use airpods but set the mic to my macbook
| which seems to have an exceptionally good mic as long as
| there isn't much background noise.
| abruzzi wrote:
| I just hate the move to wireless for things that don't need
| to be wireless and having to constantly keep things charged.
| I got so frustrated with my $100 magic mouse at work a few
| weeks ago that its now in a drawer and I'm using a $10 POS
| Dell mouse. My wireless mac keyboard just has the wire
| permanantly plugged in. And wireless headphones? I've never
| gone down that road, and never will. I bought a handfull of
| the $10 Apple 3.5mm to lightning adapter because I lose them
| frequently, and when I'm eventually forced to upgrade to a
| phone with USB-C, I'll buy a handfull of the 3.5mm to USB-C
| adapters.
| bobthepanda wrote:
| Honestly I don't find these days bluetooth to a mobile device
| that bad.
|
| However, some of the other devices in my home are absolute crap
| with bluetooth headphones, particularly my windows desktop and
| my steam deck.
| raw_anon_1111 wrote:
| I have a AirPods Pro. But I also travel a lot and I have a pair
| of $60 Beats Flex that have a 12 hour battery life and if they
| fall out, they just fall around my neck. I also bought a third
| party pair of double flange ear tips that are better noise
| cancelling for flights than my AirPods.
|
| Pairing has been a solved problem for decade now with Apple
| devices. I pair my AirPods Pro or Beats with one Apple device
| by pressing a button and they are automatically paired with my
| iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch, Mac and AppleTV and switch
| seamlessly between them.
|
| Bluetooth was never meant to be used as an audio connection?
| While the original standard didn't support A2DP, it was a part
| of the standard in 2003?
|
| All Apple headphones support standard BT protocols.
| randycupertino wrote:
| > I have a pair of $60 Beats Flex that have a 12 hour battery
| life and if they fall out, they just fall around my neck.
|
| Exactly!! After losing an airpod into the depths of a Polaris
| seat and another one having to beg the guy behind me to find
| it on the floor I gave up my airpods for flights it was so
| annoying how often they fall out.
| porker wrote:
| I've yet to find a set of Bluetooth headphones or earbuds that
| don't have a level of background hiss that I can hear.
|
| Particularly for spoken word, it's annoying and distracting.
| nemo44x wrote:
| Sentimental sure but there's also a lot of music that was never
| properly remastered for digital so the vinyl distribution does
| in fact sound better.
| nemo44x wrote:
| I live this site - down votes even though it's 100% true.
| There are TONS of old recordings that don't even have masters
| anymore and the digital versions are ripped from a vinyl
| copy. There's entire communities around this.
| blep-arsh wrote:
| I also prefer open-back over-the-ears and there just aren't
| many wireless options for that.
| FpUser wrote:
| >"Too many android phones copied Apple and ditched the
| venerable audio jack, but a few kept it, and I've always
| insisted on it when buying phones. It's old but far from
| obsolete"
|
| Same here but I did not have a single phone that after a while
| did not develop a problem with quality of contact leading to
| problems with sound starting from mild and going to awful. It
| is better now after I started to use USB-C based headphones.
|
| Wireless - way too much overhead for me to manage. The only
| wireless audio I really use is Cardo headset when riding my EUC
| ghaff wrote:
| I actually keep an old pair of (good) noise canceling ear buds
| for travel. Even with retainers I don't really like using my
| Bluetooth AirPods on a plane. Aha, located them for an upcoming
| trip.
| NikolaNovak wrote:
| - they last _forever_. I still have sennheiser hd380 pro cans
| from 25 years ago that sound great.
|
| - cannot overstate lack of lag and simplicity. You plug in and
| it works, perfectly, every time, forever.
|
| - easily switch devices. I use my headphone on my phone,
| tablet, laptop, Synthesizer, Groovebox etc without a blink. And
| my phone never stops playing music and connects to our car my
| wife just started the way bluetooth ones do :-)
|
| - to me, it's like email. Icq, aim, msn messenger come and go,
| yet email is old and boring but survives.
|
| There's absolutely a time and place for wireless headphones and
| I probably use them more at this point. But killing 3.5mm from
| phones has been a Massive annoyance.
| doubled112 wrote:
| I prefer wired ones, mostly playing devil's advocate here.
|
| Every pair of cheaper earphones or earbuds I've had fail have
| failed due to the cable.
|
| We switched my oldest to a pair of BT headphones because he
| seems incapable of keeping track of the cord. It gets caught,
| he pulls, and something has to give. Longest lasting set he
| had in 2025 was BT.
| hamdingers wrote:
| Going cheap is the problem here, good earbuds and
| headphones have replaceable cables.
|
| I'm the same way as your oldest, if I'm up and moving
| around while wearing earbuds/IEMs I run the cable through
| my shirt.
| tjoff wrote:
| Expensive headphones have much higher quality cables...
| andoando wrote:
| Same. Either the jack fails or the one of the buds stops
| working or the cable on one side of the buds gets cut
| somehow.
| exitb wrote:
| I've used many pairs of wired headphones over the years,
| cheap and expensive, and never had ones with a cable that
| didn't eventually fail, unless they mostly stay plugged into
| a single device.
|
| The article prominently highlights mobile usage, in which
| case wireless headphones easily win on longevity.
| NBJack wrote:
| Most high end headphones have a replaceable cable. What
| have you tried on the expensive end of the spectrum?
| hokumguru wrote:
| Not even high-end nowadays, you really have to scrape the
| bottom of the barrel for something with a nonreplaceable
| cable. Even for iems.
| colechristensen wrote:
| One of the key features (for me) of my Sennheiser HD 600
| was the replaceable cables. Plugs at both ends of the
| cable.
|
| I LOVED my Grado headphones but destroyed three pairs of
| them and was soldering my own ends on the cables over and
| over.
| macNchz wrote:
| I think it's maybe close to a wash between non-replaceable
| batteries in wireless headphones dying and cords failing,
| in my experience at least. The ideal case IMO is over-ear
| headphones that have a replaceable cord--I have some 14
| year old Bose QCs and some newer Beyerdynamics, both of
| which I've replaced the cord on.
| RevEng wrote:
| The difference is I can easily fix a broken cable.
| kalleboo wrote:
| I bought a pair of Philips headphones with a replaceable
| cord. Instead the jack became loose.
|
| I've been using Bluetooth wireless headphones exclusively
| when I'm portable since 2006 (Sony Ericsson HBH-DS970
| represent), with only wired use at a desk and I've never
| looked back.
| LinXitoW wrote:
| Have batteries actually ever FAILED in wireless
| headphones? Sure, they degrade and charge becomes lower,
| but I've never had them outright fail. A headphone that
| lasts my 2-3 hours of commute/daily use is completely
| useable, even if it's original charge lasted 5 hours.
|
| Cables do fail though, completely. They become unusable.
|
| In my entire life time of using headphones/earbuds since
| school with the PSP, ALL wired options have failed after
| 1-2 years for purely mechanical cable reasons. Not a
| single wireless failed for electronic reasons. The did
| fail for me dropping them and stepping on them reasons,
| though.
| mtlmtlmtlmtl wrote:
| My sennheiser earbuds are now down to 15 minutes of
| battery life. Less if it's a cold day. Sure, they're not
| completely dead yet, but they're effectively useless. And
| it's not like I can easily replace the batteries. Most
| wired earbuds or headphones at a similar price point have
| replaceable cables.
| analog31 wrote:
| My daughter had to replace the LiPo battery in her
| headphones twice after they would not charge at all.
| dangus wrote:
| Of course you can get the Fairbuds which have replaceable
| batteries.
|
| Hopefully more Bluetooth headphone companies follow suit.
| Maybe we can even get a standardized battery.
| eptcyka wrote:
| All my corded headphones lasted at most 2 years of mobile
| use. My QC35s are still going strong. Wired sucks for
| mobile use. And if the cord doesn't go, the 3.5mm socket
| does. I replaced multiple sockets on my iPod and iPhone
| 3g. That replacement process sucks.
| fluoridation wrote:
| What are you doing that destroys cables and jacks like
| that? I use wired earbuds while riding my bike and I've
| never broken a jack, and the one time I broke the cable
| was because I made a mistake and dropped them while
| riding, which got them tangled up in the spokes.
| dripdry45 wrote:
| Let's critically think about this for just a second. Your
| concern doesn't appear to be with the audio, isn't it with
| the connector? That's a whole different argument than what
| we're talking about
|
| Isn't it the wire that failed, not the audio part of it? So
| why not do what I did? You put some JB weld across that
| bend in the wire, which is cheap and could probably be
| engineered to last a lot longer... now I have headphones
| that last a really long time. You could also get a better
| connector and simply put that on there, right?
| NikolaNovak wrote:
| Absolutely, As I said, it comes down to personal usage,
| needs, preferences. I personally never lost a cable (I did
| need to replace the earpads, but that happened on both
| Bluetooth and wired:). I do tend to use connected wireless
| earbuds when I go jogging etc.
| steezeburger wrote:
| I've used tons of wired as well. Maybe have bad one pair
| fail at the wire? I'm super active with them too.
| Snowboarding with them and my Sony g shock in 1998. Lots of
| cycling and running usage. You've had every single pair of
| wired headphones fail for you? Every single pair?
| Contax wrote:
| > my Sony g shock
|
| What is a "Sony g shock" if you don't mind? I know
| Casio's G-Shock and Sony's Sports series... did you mix
| them by chance as I suppose or is there a Sony range I'm
| not aware of?
| steezeburger wrote:
| Haha whoops, I totally conflated the two! The Sony
| Atrac3Plus had a feature called "G Protection". It was
| the only "anti skip" cd player that I tried that actually
| worked really well back then.
|
| I also exaggerated the year a bit. After looking it up, I
| think this cd player came out in 2004!
| ziml77 wrote:
| Same here. Wired headphones never lasted anywhere near as
| long for me as wireless ones. Any with inline controls were
| especially prone to failure.
| skeeter2020 wrote:
| or in my experience active use can damage the headphone
| jack, which is much, much worse
| asdff wrote:
| It depends on how you treat them. Some people burn
| through them like nothing. I have some 20 year old
| earpods still.
| blt wrote:
| For me it was worse, the headphone port on my phones always
| eventually failed. Maybe these rich people replace phones
| too quickly to experience that.
|
| I use wired at home, where I'm not cycling the connection
| very much.
| SmirkingRevenge wrote:
| There are lots of wired headphones out there with
| replaceable cables
|
| Honestly though you can get the best of both worlds.
|
| I impulse bought some over-the-ear headphones at the
| airport when I realized I had forgotten mine that do
| bluetooth, but can also use an audio cable when the battery
| dies.
|
| When using wired the audio quality is much better.
| moregrist wrote:
| Cord failure is definitely a problem, but if you're
| moderately capable with a soldering iron, it's easy to
| repair the cord if the failure is away from the headphone
| side. It's even fairly easy to replace an 8mm or 0.25"
| jack.
|
| Your soldering skill (and sense of adventure) would have to
| be far better than mine to even consider doing that for
| wireless earbuds.
| SoftTalker wrote:
| The few times I've tried to solder headphone wire I've
| been defeated because the wire isn't wire, it's some kind
| of copper and synthetic fiber weave, that the solder just
| won't adhere to.
| kimmk wrote:
| I've repaired a few headphone wires; theyre usually thin
| copper wires covered with enamel insulation. Burn off the
| insulation with a blob of solder, or sand it off, and the
| solder will stick.
| schrijver wrote:
| You're right, the kind of cable often used is not easy to
| solder. This makes it hard to solder a broken cable
| together again, or to replace a broken / bent plug. So
| best replace the entire cable and its plug -- it's still
| an inexpensive part.
|
| You'll need to solder it to the contacts inside the can,
| but that's quite straightforward.
|
| In case the internal cable that goes from one can to the
| other breaks, you can replace it with any bit of audio
| cable so you can use one that's easy to solder.
| jasonjayr wrote:
| It's an unbelievably thin stranded wire, but the wires
| are coated so they can be in contact with each other
| without shorting. It's all twisted around a thin thread
| of cotton or nylon to add strength, then then encased in
| it's sheath.
|
| The trick is to gently scrape the stranded wire with a
| blade for the solder to stick and to make a good
| connection.
| schrijver wrote:
| I've repaired many pairs of wired headphones over the
| years, as electronic repairs go they're very simple. The
| same can't be said for the wireless ones.
|
| Plus, the more high end ones come with repleceable cables.
| moron4hire wrote:
| I have not had an issue with any wires wearing out anywhere
| since my walkman headphones in the 90s.
| scns wrote:
| > they last forever
|
| Sadly have to disagree. I use Beyerdynamic though where you
| can order parts to repair em yourself, which i already did.
|
| [edit] cannot recommend their wireless stuff produced in
| China, the worst i ever had. The big corded cans are still
| manufactured in Germany.
| reactordev wrote:
| Those hd380's will last your lifetime. Almost like Sony's
| MDR-7506 if you can keep it from getting sat on.
| mbajkowski wrote:
| 100% this. I have had the MDR-7506 since my DJ days about
| 30 years ago. These are by no means expensive headphones,
| but compared even to much more higher-end Bluetooth
| headphones they can easily hold their own. They have good
| depth and are well balanced. They are just about
| indestructible, only requiring the occasional pads
| replacement. Probably one of the best purchases I ever made
| reactordev wrote:
| Relationships come and go but MDR-7605's are for life!
| LinXitoW wrote:
| They also lack any and all useful features. Even just the
| ability to tap for pause is critical to my daily life.
|
| I just wonder if wired fans just never skip forward a song,
| or adjust the volume. Or even use active noise canceling.
| kQq9oHeAz6wLLS wrote:
| Many have a small box on the cord with those controls, and
| you could argue that's handier since it's closer to where
| your hands naturally are at any given moment.
| steezeburger wrote:
| Tons of wired headphones have little controllers on them to
| change songs and pause.
| wiseowise wrote:
| Or ever do anything in parallel with listening. I've been
| working in my garden and went to a shed that's like 15
| meters away from my home only to notice that I've forgotten
| to take my phone with me - music never stopped.
| steezeburger wrote:
| I use a pocket for this scenario.
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| That was solved long ago with invention of _pockets_.
| wiseowise wrote:
| My favorite way to work in the garden: with a slab in my
| pocket and a cord around my neck.
| 4k93n2 wrote:
| but it WILL cut out if you go far enough. wired headsets
| wont
| basilikum wrote:
| Many wired headphones have a little control thingy with
| buttons on the wire. Four pin aux connectors support
| control signals. If your headphones have a detachable aux
| cable I suppose you can just replace it with cable with
| controls.
| skeeter2020 wrote:
| by definition you're literally within 2 feet of the device
| playing the music; how hard is it to use your device to do
| any of that and more?
| raffraffraff wrote:
| I bought a tiny lapel clip Bluetooth receiver that has
| buttons and a headphone socket. Charge over USB, pair with
| phone, turn any headphones into Bluetooth. If the battery
| runs out, plug the headphones straight into the phone.
|
| However, the noise cancelling gap is real. I'd kill for
| wired IEMs with an inline battery + buttons, and noise
| cancelling mic & circuit in the earpieces.
|
| Closest is the Sony cans, which have wired mode (ie: they
| have a tiny jack, so you can use them passively) but I
| don't think they cancel noise when using them that way
| temp0826 wrote:
| Re: noise canceling... recently got a pair of IEMs
| (Etymotic ER2XR) with good foam tips and their isolation
| blows away any ANC I've ever tried. The only thing is
| noise from touching the cable but that was solved with
| some ear hooks to put the cables behind my ears.
| avidiax wrote:
| Yeah, Etymotic headphones were my go-to for probably a
| decade. Passive noise suppression was wonderful for
| public transport.
|
| The utility has dropped tremendously though, now that
| headphone jacks have disappeared.
|
| Would love to have a pair of "direct-USB-C" Etymotics.
| chrismorgan wrote:
| I have some Sony headphones from a decade ago with a
| detachable cable. Noise cancellation works just fine when
| wired, and you get better battery life since the
| Bluetooth part isn't active. The only time you can't use
| noise cancellation is when it's charging (Micro-USB,
| doesn't do audio over USB in case you were wondering).
| fgonzag wrote:
| Qudelix 5k (portable dac/amp) has weak anc / passthrough
| mode, only in Bluetooth mode.
| strix_varius wrote:
| Probably an exaggeration? But I hope that tapping for pause
| isn't critical for anyone's daily life.
|
| I use wireless headphones and in fact never use this
| feature (I have it disabled). Too unreliable when there's a
| large screen with a big pause and skip button within reach.
| dqv wrote:
| > I just wonder if wired fans just never skip forward a
| song, or adjust the volume.
|
| This has been a thing in wired headphones since at least
| 2007 lol
| dddgghhbbfblk wrote:
| The touch functionality is useful until it isn't. My Pixel
| Buds will activate touch controls randomly and
| unnecessarily all the time when I'm trying to use them in
| bed, from the contact with the pillow or sheets. Drives me
| nuts.
|
| But also, I don't think it's either/or for most people. I
| use both wired and wireless headphones all the time
| depending on the use case. Wired sounds far better and is
| more reliable, wireless is more mobile. Different use
| cases.
| eipi10_hn wrote:
| Many wired headphones have buttons and wheels too. We've
| been adjusting things via them for so long lol.
| mitthrowaway2 wrote:
| I just tap a button on the thing the headphones are plugged
| into. The cable isn't so long that it's ever out of reach.
| saltcured wrote:
| Hah, just shows how out of touch I am. Has ANC disappeared
| as a wired earphone feature? I keep meaning to shop for a
| new all-purpose pair with ANC, duplex audio, and either
| USB-C input or an adapter for that. But, I keep
| procrastinating. I don't have any headphones that work with
| my phone since the analog port disappeared.
|
| I can point to the shelf with my Sony wired ANC ear buds,
| which I bought years ago specifically for ANC during air
| travel, in the era when I would use my iPod and later an
| iPod Nano. The ones I have are the second pair, bought
| after the first was accidentally left on a plane. I think
| they were different product generations, a few years apart.
| These are so old, they are purely stereo headphones.
| Microphones for duplex audio hadn't become pervasive yet.
|
| These stick in my ear with little silicon flanges and have
| a part that sits outside with the microphone. Then there is
| a small control module sitting at the junction of left and
| right ear wires, which holds a AAA battery and has a power
| switch and a pass-through audio button (which always seemed
| more gimmick than utility to me). In their active mode,
| they also don't demand much of the source device.
| 4k93n2 wrote:
| if the phone is in your pants pocket then its fairly
| trivial to change the volume just by using the buttons on
| the phone
|
| even some of the cheapest in-line remotes that only have a
| single button will let you change the track by double
| tapping it
|
| if you dont have an in-line remote then theres also the
| option of using a key remapper app (probably not on iphone)
| to let you change track by long pressing the volume buttons
| jamal-kumar wrote:
| Other advantages: for music production, wired studio
| headphones don't have lag - also wired with mic is crucial
| for video games for same reason
| asdff wrote:
| You are right, in the past we never skipped a song or
| adjusted volume, just went with what came out of the
| factory and what was playing at the time. Those buttons on
| the device itself were for show.
| raffraffraff wrote:
| A friend worked at sennheiser about 15 years ago and I took
| advantage of his cost-price deal on a pair of HD700. They
| are, without a doubt, the best sounding and most comforted
| cans I've ever used. Now, I treated them badly, throwing them
| into ruck sacks etc, and eventually one of the transducers
| failed. I contacted Sennheiser who charged me EUR140 to
| "repair" them... They sent me a brand new set with the thick
| silver core cable (I never sent mine back so now I have two,
| and those cost over 100 bucks by themselves)
| f1shy wrote:
| How do they compare to Bose QuietComfort?
|
| - sorry just kidding. I couldn't resist.
| shiandow wrote:
| It is worth pointing out that not all parts age equally well.
| The cushions especially are not that durable and should be
| considered consumables.
|
| Sennheiser provides replacements should you need them. The
| effect they have on the sound is much bigger than you might
| think.
| perfect-blue wrote:
| Yeah the sound stage definitely gets impacted. I tend to
| use leather cups in the winter and fabric ones in the
| summer. Nothing worse than sweating from your temples while
| you work.
| dylan604 wrote:
| I've had to replace the pads on my Sony 7506 cans as well.
| I was very impressed with the parts that can be replaced on
| these cans. The packing includes an exploded diagram of the
| parts.
| faster wrote:
| I love my 7506s. And I have a recurring event on my
| calendar to remind me to buy new pads every 2 years.
| That's almost exactly how long they last. I've tried 3
| brands and they've all lasted almost exactly 2 years. The
| original Sony pads also lasted 2 years.
| bzzzt wrote:
| > Sennheiser provides replacements should you need them.
|
| Not anymore for my old 380 pro. Had to settle for
| aftermarket versions that feel a little softer but also
| sound a bit different.
| NikolaNovak wrote:
| Yeah, i got couple of third party replacements recently
| for my 2 hd380pros.
|
| The leatherette one was useless within 2 years. Outside
| became slimey / sticky, the inside just shrunk.
|
| The velour one works fine but feels different to
| original. I just ordered a mesh one to try too.
| ozfive wrote:
| I have some Sony cans that have lasted for over a decade
| and multiple third party suppliers have made the foam
| pieces easy to procure.
| adsteel_ wrote:
| I bought the official ear pad replacements for my PXC450
| back when those were available, for 1/4 of what the headset
| cost. They are so terrible that I stopped using the
| headphones entirely. I lost faith in Sennheiser after that,
| now I just use cheaper ear buds.
| ronyeh wrote:
| I bought the $21.99 Chinese replacement "Sennheiser" pads
| from Amazon. Straightforward to replace (though not
| trivial). Very comfortable. My headset feels as good as
| new.
| chmod775 wrote:
| > The cushions especially are not that durable and should
| be considered consumables.
|
| This is because they're mostly synthetic "leather", which
| doesn't last long. Everyone is probably familiar with how
| synthetic leather starts to flake off. Icky. If you get
| some pads made from real leather (usually lamb is the go-to
| choice) they'll last virtually forever. However since real
| leather is heaver and less porous, this changes the way
| they sound very noticably (makes them sound less open). If
| you use open/half-open headphones anyways, the difference
| won't be too extreme: just moves the sound closer to closed
| headphones. On closed headphones leather cups make it feel
| something is covering/plugging my ears. Uncomfortable.
| Would not recommend.
|
| Worse than how quickly fabric and synthetic leather
| degrades is arguably that those cups can hardly be cleaned
| and even when not that old get icky quickly, with dirt
| stuck in fabric and fine cracks.
| parpfish wrote:
| > they last forever
|
| Until my cat finds them.
|
| Any serious set of wired headphones better have replaceable
| wires because apparently they are _delicious_
| t_mahmood wrote:
| Any cable, I tell you ... any cable. Ruined multiple USB
| cables, and almost went through two Laptop charger cable.
| TheAceOfHearts wrote:
| Replaceable cables have always been a high priority for me.
| I've been using SHURE SE215 for almost 2 decades at this
| point.
| asdff wrote:
| Ehh I'm not considering it a dealbreaker. Easy to splice
| and fix 3.5mm. Donors found at thrift stores or in your
| drawer (or remaining length of undamaged wire).
| AStrangeMorrow wrote:
| Yeah for me the main sell of wireless is mobility/freedom of
| movement.
|
| I can use them while charging my phone or working out. Can
| play a video while cooking and moving around the kitchen. Or
| while watching TV/playing a game in the TV where a cable
| can't reach.
|
| However when static I used wired. That's mostly when on the
| computer, but like many people here I am assuming that's a
| good part of the day.
| randycupertino wrote:
| I got wired headphones after repeatedly losing airpods
| falling out of my ears onto the floor of planes. I like to
| sleep with my headphones in falling asleep to audiobooks, and
| I'm a side-sleeper so airpods would rub on the pillow and get
| lost in the seat machinery.
|
| Wired headphones at least if they fall out are still
| connected to a rope to get them back!
| devilbunny wrote:
| For airplanes, Bose or Sony both have noise-canceling
| wireless headphones in over-ear format with battery life
| over 18 hours. I wouldn't try to side-sleep in either one,
| but the relative quiet on aircraft is wonderful, especially
| if you find yourself on a turboprop.
| blawson wrote:
| For sleep a wired pillow speaker works great, the advantage
| being there is nothing to fall out of your ears, and you
| can isolate the sound so only you hear it through the
| pillow: https://www.amazon.com/Crane-Company-
| PS2-SoftSpeaker-Speaker...
| consumer451 wrote:
| > There's absolutely a time and place for wireless headphones
| and I probably use them more at this point.
|
| I've had a pair of Sony MD-7506s ever since I assisted in an
| analog recording studio, years ago. 7506s were the standard
| then, not sure about now. I am on my 5th set of cushion
| replacements.
|
| A few years ago I bought a high-ish quality bluetooth adapter
| I can put in my pocket and walk around. The one I bought is
| the Boltune BT-BA001. Looks like they are only $30 on eBay
| now, but there may be better ones out there. That little box
| is probably my most used piece of inexpensive electronics.
| throw0101c wrote:
| > _This isn 't a Vinyl vs CD thing where a clearly inferior
| technology lives on due mainly to sentimental reasons._
|
| "Half of Vinyl Buyers in the US Don't Have a Record Player, New
| Study Shows":
|
| * https://consequence.net/2023/04/half-vinyl-buyers-record-
| pla...
|
| Seems that people are buying records not to listen to, but to
| use an 'art object', or other type of artefact to publicly show
| their like and support of the artist(s) in question.
| hshdhdhj4444 wrote:
| A lot of people buy vinyls for the albums art.
| kQq9oHeAz6wLLS wrote:
| I'd say buy a poster instead, but it just now occurs to me
| that they're likely not displaying them full-time, and the
| LP has the advantages of being a uniform size and made of
| stiff cardboard for easy storage and retrieval.
|
| So I guess it actually makes sense.
| seniortaco wrote:
| I think a big part of the reason is that there is only one
| wireless option -Bluetooth- and it is a terrible product from a
| user experience perspective. It's 2026 and I still can't move
| through my world with earbuds in without my audio randomly
| switching to my wife's car in the driveway or our Bluetooth
| speaker that is on upstairs.
| happyopossum wrote:
| > only one wireless option -Bluetooth- and it is a terrible
| product from a user experience perspective
|
| That's an implementation problem, not a technology problem.
| iPhone with AirPods here - your scenario just does not
| happen. There's even an option for "yes be stupid and connect
| to my car even when I'm in the middle of a phone call" if you
| really want to use it...
| dwood_dev wrote:
| No, it happens even with AirPods Pro/Pro2.
|
| I have two iPhones and a MBP. I have to keep Bluetooth
| disabled on the MacBook otherwise it randomly triggers
| while I'm between podcasts or whatever and squeeze the
| AirPods to resume, instead it launches Apple Music, or some
| browser tab starts playing audio.
|
| This is far from solved if you have more than one Apple
| device.
|
| There is no option for me to say: never use AirPods for
| anything but podcasts, and absolutely never automatically
| select them as an audio source for zoom/teams. AirPods
| microphones just don't work for my vocal range, they sound
| horrible and underwater. The microphone on my MBP works
| great, the mic on my iPhones works great.
|
| AirPods are fine if you only ever use one device at a time.
| If you use more than one at the same time, it becomes
| extremely annoying.
|
| Let's not even get into the annoying ways which it becomes
| hard to manage when you have multiple AirPods, multiple
| iPhones, and multiple MacBooks.
| michaelchisari wrote:
| If a spec is regularly implement poorly, the spec is the
| problem.
| cptskippy wrote:
| > ...your scenario just does not happen.
|
| It happens to us all of the time.
|
| My partner is on a conference call, I hop in the car to go
| run an errand. Suddenly I'm on a conference call.
|
| My partner is in the kitchen listening to a podcast, I hop
| in our other car and suddenly I'm listening to a podcast.
|
| My partner is sitting in the car having a driveway moment,
| I arrive home with the other car and now I'm having her
| driveway moment.
|
| My partner is on a conference call at her desk and picks up
| her phone to respond to a message and then you hear "shit
| shit shit, hold on a moment!" and then frantic typing and
| clicking.
| throwaway894345 wrote:
| > However, even a minor inconvenience is still an
| inconvenience.
|
| I do not miss spending 30 seconds untangling my headphones
| every time I used them nor do I miss trying to find clever ways
| to wind my headphones back up so as to minimize the likelihood
| of them becoming tangled. If someone solved this problem well I
| would use them, but putting my airpods on a charger once a week
| is a much lesser inconvenience IMHO.
| ashdksnndck wrote:
| > - They don't need charging. Charging may seem like a minor
| inconvenience, and we're used to charging a lot of devices.
| However, even a minor inconvenience is still an inconvenience.
|
| I've always found it more convenient to keep the headphones
| plugged in when I'm not using them then when I am. The cord is
| not going to get tangled when it's not attached to my body, and
| aren't going to unplug themselves sitting on a shelf. Different
| strokes though.
| amelius wrote:
| > Wired cans don't need to pair, don't glitch out
|
| Cables can wear out. You can get a wire break.
| odo1242 wrote:
| All good wired headphones and earbuds ("IEMs") have
| replaceable cables. And the ones that don't are super cheap.
| amelius wrote:
| I once had a wire break in the cable that goes from the
| left can to the right can (not the external cable).
| Minor49er wrote:
| Analog formats are clearly inferior to digital ones, but analog
| speakers are superior to digital ones?
| hananova wrote:
| Digital speakers don't exist. No matter how the signal gets
| there, the end result is wiggling air in an analog process.
| dehrmann wrote:
| I compared the mic quality of Airpods Pro 2, Airpods 4 ANC
| (similar), and freebie Apple 3.5mm wired earbuds. The earbuds
| won. My limited research suggested either 1) compression and
| transmission take a lot of power, so the Airpods don't do as
| good of a job as something with a bigger battery can afford to,
| 2) the mic position is worse, or 3) Bluetooth doesn't have
| enough bi-directional bandwidth for two good signals.
| pxoe wrote:
| 4) The Bluetooth standard is just kinda bad. Technically
| there should be enough bandwidth for better quality audio,
| but the existing profiles like headset mode drop audio
| quality down to 8-16 kHz sampling rate in mono, not just for
| mic but for audio you're listening to as well. It's a huge
| flaw and it's been bad for decades with seemingly no
| improvement at all (at least certainly not in a way that
| could be widespread and commonly used).
|
| It's so bad you'd almost wish for a brand new wireless
| connectivity or wireless audio standard, or even resort to
| some proprietary 2.4 GHz nonsense, because it's genuinely so
| horrid. You could have the best most expensive headphones in
| the world, but because of Bluetooth and its ancient profiles
| and mic support it's gonna have baseline absolute garbage mic
| quality no matter what.
| odo1242 wrote:
| I tested this and based on my testing it's (3). The AirPods
| microphone actually gets (slightly) better in quality if you
| don't play something through the speakers while using it.
| Even then the 3.5mm ones were better tho
| pavlus wrote:
| * They don't need charging, but you will hear static regularly
| when attaching/detaching/touching things. Also, they pick up RF
| interference (TBF, BT ones also drop packets in RF-noisy
| environments, but they seem to be more resistant to it)
|
| * They are harder to lose, but the ones with non-detachable
| cords need repairing the cord if it rips, which happens
| frequently. Never happened with BT headsets I own.
|
| * For BT headphones with detachable cord I agree, that BT
| channel reduces quality slightly, compared to cord on the same
| device. It's not as bad as vinyl/tape, though. You have a
| chance to notice it on lossless. but not regular MP3s.
|
| * Wired don't need to pair, but need your awareness of the
| current relation between the cord and your body and
| surroundings, otherwise you will be constantly re-attaching
| them, or ripping cords. They don't glitch or lag, but pick
| static and RF.
|
| Wireless is really convenient, if you can afford headphones
| that last a full day, or a pair of them to switch between and
| don't have many sources of sound to play to the same headset,
| even at different times. There are own standards that skip BT
| and use analog RF to skip the lag and drops (with a dongle),
| but they too have the issue with RF interference. You either
| can have digital with lag and rare drops, or instantaneous
| analog with frequent noise without drops.
| fao_ wrote:
| > (TBF, BT ones also drop packets in RF-noisy environments,
| but they seem to be more resistant to it)
|
| I've experienced the opposite. The microwave will knock out
| my bluetooth completely, but the wired headphones are solid
| but in a decade of using both wired and wireless headphones
| I've never heard anything weird or staticy through the wired
| ones. My wired headphones were the Shure SE215, and now after
| a decade of using those they broke, so I have the Kiwi Ears
| Belle.
| pavlus wrote:
| Your microwave is leaky, and/or not grounded, but since you
| don't experience static, I assume you have grounding at
| your house. Without grounding static and mains hum is quite
| noticeable. Try touching the body of your pc and listen how
| silence changes in wired headphones.
| SoftTalker wrote:
| Yep, Bluetooth just sucks. I don't use it for anything, and
| it's disabled on my phone.
| sandreas wrote:
| Here are some lesser known facts about wired headphones that I
| wish I had known earlier:
|
| - there are TRS (3 rings) and TRRS (4 rings) connectors
|
| - TRRS has integrated mic, also ofen implements playback
| control via buttons
|
| - Apple headphones volume controls won't work on non-apple
| devices, because they implement a proprietary protocol based in
| an ultrasonic chirp authentication chip[1]
|
| - 1more headphones seem to have implemented this auth protocol,
| but it does not work reliably
|
| - Headphone remotes on apple devices have tap codes (in my
| opinion a huge benefit), that can be used to
| play/pause (.) next chapter / track (..) prev(...)
| fast forward (._) rewind (.._) even navigate menus
| (_, then + or -) ---- legend ---- .=click
| _=hold +-=vol
|
| - The same tap codes are also implemented on hardware buttons
| (e.g. iPod) - while fast forward and rewind only work for
| devices iPod Nano 6th or later (iPod Classic 2009 only has next
| and prev)
|
| - Apples USB-C 3.5 Adapters work with Android and iPhones and
| all headphones, Android does only implement play/pause and
| volume
|
| - headphones remotes are fundamentally broken on Android
| because Google reserves longpress (button hold) for voiceover
|
| - there are also balanced (often 4.4mm) outputs for much higher
| quality, often used in high res daps from fiio or shanling, etc
|
| 1: https://tinymicros.com/wiki/Apple_iPod_Remote_Protocol
| saysjonathan wrote:
| Technically TRS only has one ring (Tip Ring Sleeve) and TRRS
| only has two rings (Tip Ring Ring Sleeve). It does have four
| separate contacts though, separated by bands.
| sandreas wrote:
| That's correct... I meant this more visually :-)
| 4k93n2 wrote:
| i use an android app called keymapper (by sds100) that lets
| you remap the volume buttons so that a long press will change
| the track.
|
| my wired earbuds only have 1 button on the in-line remote but
| the app can detect the button being pressed whether its a
| single, double tap or long press, and you can just assign
| whatever you want to them
| squarefoot wrote:
| When the internal non replaceable battery dies the product
| dies; that's also one reason to prefer wired over wireless. I
| wrote product instead of headphones because the principle is
| applicable to every product whose battery can't be replaced by
| design. All those discarded single use vapes are a good example
| of that, and... surprise! All of them actually contain
| _rechargeable_ cells but no recharging circuitry and port, the
| reason being that rechargeable Lithium cells are much cheaper
| than primary non rechargeable ones because of economies of
| scale. Just another example of greed being so damn efficient at
| producing e-waste.
| 4k93n2 wrote:
| it will be interesting to see what the consensus is 50 years
| from now when people have more hindsight on this. how long
| will a wireless headset last until the battery no longer
| holds a charge, and if its only something like 10 years then
| that means someone is having to buy 4 or 5 headsets over the
| course of their whole life instead of 1 or 2 cheaper wired
| headsets
|
| theres also the issue of whether the wireless protocols that
| are in use now will still be supported in 50 years. removing
| the headphone jack from phones was mostly just a money grab
| to force people to buy wireless headsets so i wouldnt be
| surprised to see other tactics in the future where support is
| dropped for older versions of bluetooth, or whatever gives
| them a slight uptick in sales
| latexr wrote:
| > It's old but _far_ from obsolete.
|
| Apple themselves know this. Every MacBook, no matter how few
| ports it has and how "non-pro" it is, ships with a headphone
| jack.
| tjoff wrote:
| Longevity! The headphones I have on me are 15 years old.
| Batteries degrade quickly, especially in consumer products that
| does everything in their power to boost the spec sheet but
| sacrifice longevity.
| heraldgeezer wrote:
| I always try to use wired mouse and keyboard and headset at a
| PC for this reason. Charging. 0 reason to use wireless.
|
| For mobile devices I can understand it and do use it.
| the_snooze wrote:
| The 3.5mm audio jack is pretty close to engineering perfection
| on the important dimensions: cheap, fast, and good.
|
| Getting rid of it in favor of Bluetooth-only audio connectivity
| is creating a problem to sell you a (more expensive, less
| reliable, less time-tested) solution.
| mchusma wrote:
| I occasionally use wireless, but 90% of the time I prefer wired
| for this reason. Reliable, simple, harder to lose, no charging,
| easier to connect. I just done think the wires are a problem
| for me, sometimes a benefit, sometimes a mild inconvenience.
| Waterluvian wrote:
| - no latency. They're actually usable when playing video games.
| pjmlp wrote:
| Another point you missed, the microphones also have better
| quality, they don't get all the surrounding noises as most
| wireless ones.
| VerifiedReports wrote:
| Also you get reliable sound quality. The DACs in the iPhones
| were always decent. Now you have no idea what kind of quality
| you're going to get from a given listening device. Plenty of
| them are noisy POSes; my girlfriend had a Belkin adapter that
| had automatic gain (!) and would ramp up to blast hiss through
| the car stereo during quiet segments... and sometimes even
| during non-quiet ones.
|
| The phones will always have to have DACs in them, to drive
| their speakers if nothing else. Denying customers a physical
| connection to them is just a dick move.
| WhyNotHugo wrote:
| OTOH, with Bluetooth headphones I can stand from my desk and
| stretch, or rest my eyes focusing on something while standing
| next to the window -- without interrupting whatever I'm
| listening to.
|
| I can also freely move around the house while listening to
| music or any podcast. Carrying my laptop around would hardly be
| convenient.
|
| I do have a pair of wired headphones which I rarely use. My
| laptop has ended up on the floor twice due to me standing and
| forgetting about the cable. I almost broke the plug another
| time when I stood up and they were still plugged to the
| desktop. As someone who's grown up with the comfort of wireless
| headphones, using wired headphones is like wearing headphones
| with an anchor.
|
| Honestly, I hate dealing with cables, even more having cables
| wrapped around me. I can't imagine being out on the street and
| having cables wrapped around me, connected to the phone in my
| bag or pocket, while trying to move around or use my arms in
| the usual way.
| lexoj wrote:
| They are much much lighter due to lack of batteries which makes
| them quite ergonomic.
| glimshe wrote:
| I'm the trendsetter. I've never stopped using wired headphones
| and, after being made fun of for years despite much better audio
| quality, cost, simplicity and reliability, the rich finally
| decided to imitate me. Never let go of your convictions!
| soramimo wrote:
| Yep, same boat. That's why I had kept my pixel 4a for years
| until is finally kicked the bucket 2 years ago.
| yallpendantools wrote:
| > That's why I had kept my pixel 4a for years until is
| finally kicked the bucket 2 years ago.
|
| RIP I'm sure it was a noble device. My Pixel 3a is currently
| my wireless router for very German reasons. I worry this will
| kill off the still-decent battery life, as has happened with
| my OG Pixel.
|
| I have since allied myself with what I personally consider
| the devil of consumer electronics just to stay on this boat.
| chias wrote:
| I recently upgraded my 4a to a 10 two months ago. Besides
| getting security updates again, it feels like a downgrade
| in every way that matters to me.
|
| Can't lie flat due to camera bulge. No headphone jack.
| Fingerprint sensor on the front that screen protectors
| interfere with. No sim slot. Ai bullshit triggers if i keep
| my thumb to close to where you touch to switch apps. Ai
| bullshit also replaces the old power menu, which now
| requires a combo button press.
|
| Such a let down.
| solomonb wrote:
| Same. I've been using the same apple earbuds since like
| 2005(?). I still have the original plastic case for them and
| use it to store them in my backpack.
| debo_ wrote:
| Same, but I made the switch to usb-c headphones as needed for
| my phone without complaining about it. I still use 3.5mm
| headphones on desktop.
| globular-toast wrote:
| Not following trends guarantees you'll be the trendsetter every
| 5-10 years.
| 0x38B wrote:
| I'm with you! After I lost my gen 1 AirPods a couple years ago,
| I paid $20 for a pair of Apple's corded EarPods and used them
| until they failed (1) a few months ago. They had a good mic +
| music controls, sounded fine, and didn't need a dongle.
|
| Now I'm down to my Shure IEMs (via an Apple lighting-to-3.5mm
| dongle) and a borrowed pair of old Galaxy buds - wanted to give
| wireless buds a try, since it's been so long. I don't like
| them.
|
| 1: emitting an earsplitting screech as they did so - the cable
| must have gone.
| vaginaphobic wrote:
| AirPods Pro 2 went through a washing machine cycle and still
| works. Having cables it's a pain, need to pass behind your
| clothes or outside dangling. Can't charge phone while using
| wired headphones
| normie3000 wrote:
| > Can't charge phone while using wired headphones
|
| You can with wireless charging!
| catlikesshrimp wrote:
| Phones used to have a 3.5mm port for a reason: sturdier,
| simpler and independent. Having dangling cable is offset by
| wireless having to be charged charged, for some only in a
| case with a charger.
| kevin_thibedeau wrote:
| They still do too.
| abc123abc123 wrote:
| Amen! This is the way. Many beautiful women have approached me
| finally! It shows that staying sane pays off.
| madaxe_again wrote:
| I bought a nice pair of sony studio monitors (MDR-7506), uh, 30
| years ago now, and they're still my daily driver. I've had to
| replace the earpads, but that's it, they're still fabulous
| headphones.
|
| Actually, they're so good, they're still making and selling the
| exact same model.
| The_President wrote:
| I bought a little rechargeable bluetooth transceiver with a 3.5
| mm jack on it - Just like having a 50 foot audio extension
| cord, plus it adds a mic.
| dguest wrote:
| I've almost caved and bought bluetooth because most stores
| stopped stocking wired headphones above crap-grade. But maybe I
| can just wait this out, if wired really is making a comeback.
| chihuahua wrote:
| I got a pair of AirPods Pro, paid for by a past employer, and
| it's the only Apple product I like. I'd even give some of my own
| money to Apple if I had to buy another pair.
|
| When I'm wearing wired earbuds, the feeling of getting the cord
| caught on something and having the earbuds violently yanked from
| my ears is one of the most annoying things, like a slap in the
| face.
|
| Plus I like being able to put my phone wherever I want, when I'm
| listening to podcasts while doing yard work. The phone stays in
| the house, or on a patio table, not in my pocket where pruning
| shears or dirt will get to it.
|
| There are various other situations where having wires going to my
| ears is annoying or impossible.
| Nursie wrote:
| It's fashionable. Some famous people have been seen with visible
| wires, therefore everyone needs wires.
|
| All these arguments here about technological superiority are
| quaint but miss the point. People in the wider world don't have
| the same concerns the people of HN have here, they're following
| icons.
| yallpendantools wrote:
| Actually, a week ahead of the BBC, my sister informed me wired
| headphones are making a comeback. With a smug grin I told her,
| "Comeback? It never left my side."
|
| I've had to ally myself with a brand I've once sworn off just to
| get a flagship model Android with a headphone jack. Killing
| Reader is a greedy betrayal (they were pushing us onto Plus, the
| whole social web thing) but removing headphone jacks from Pixels
| is a cowardly betrayal! Eyeing you too there, Samsung. You and
| Google both have made it extremely difficult to maintain a
| modicum of principle in today's consumer landscape! You made me
| justify my purchase with a utilitarian "Better the jacked devil
| than the blue-toothed one".
|
| (And before you ask, I only generally buy flagships because I
| upgrade my phone like, every five years, and in my experience
| flagships are just more bang for buck. YMMV tho.)
|
| Anyway, honestly, wired is not perfect. Wired and wireless each
| have their inconveniences it's just that I'm more willing to put
| up with the inconveniences of wired. Wired connections have
| _known failure modes_ , something which I really value in tech. I
| have a Sony WH-1000XM3 which can work both as wired and wireless
| and I love it for that.
|
| Long live wired connections! Here's to a future with cheaper
| flagship models with a headphone jack!
| recursivecaveat wrote:
| The drivers or whatever can influence the wireless experience a
| lot. Apple has the best bluetooth reliability of any manufacturer
| I've experienced. I can be out in a field next to my house and
| somehow the half-asleep laptop finds my headphones instantly
| unless I remember to switch its bluetooth off. On my windows
| machine sometimes, for seemingly no reason, you will be left
| standing around waiting and waiting for it to find the device
| right next to it.
|
| The convenience of being able to get up and walk around the
| house, or got out with the phone without wires getting caught
| makes it worthwhile though. On the other hand for stationary
| peripherals like mice I would never go wireless. I hate that
| feeling of complete helplessness to the pairing/connection
| lottery and the time waste of it.
| al123xiaaaa wrote:
| Every phone has a Type-C port, so why aren't headphone
| manufacturers following the trend?
| procaryote wrote:
| every headphone and phone had a 3.5mm connection, why did phone
| manufacturers fuck it up?
| unsungNovelty wrote:
| I have two wireless sony headphones for handling the battery
| issue. So yesterday before 5mins to my meeting, I plugged in one
| and it was out of juice. I plugged in the second one and it was
| also out of juice. Mind you, I was travelling and hence didn't
| follow the usual charging cadence I follow.
|
| I charged my wireless headphone for 5 mins and took the call and
| it went out of juice mid way through the call. I had to run to
| find a free conference room in the office which was present since
| it was friday.
|
| I also often connect my wireless headphone through the weekend
| and not know that it is still connected since friday with my work
| mac. Wired solves all of this.
|
| Thanks to this article, I just ordered a Apple Earpods USB-C 5
| mins ago in Blinkit. It is going to be delivered in another
| 5-10mins. Good bye wireless. I will use it for work with my Mac
| and my personal Samsung phone.
|
| Edit after 4 mins: Earpods Delivered!
| Schnitz wrote:
| Except on the go, I don't see the point for Bluetooth headphones.
| Due to the built in batteries that are uneconomical to replace
| they are essentially consumables, even high end ones like AirPods
| Max. Pairing and (re) connecting is a never ending pain. For less
| than $200 you can get a set of wired open back headphones that
| sound so good that unless you are in the audiophile niche they
| are your forever headphones. Models like Beyer Dynamic DT990 are
| built to last and very repairable, it just makes sense.
| MrScruff wrote:
| I think on the go is the point. I love my AirPod Pros but I
| wouldn't listen to them sat at my desk.
| adrithmetiqa wrote:
| Many pro wired comments here about quality which can be classed
| under the category "most people cannot tell the difference". You
| simply cannot compare the considerably greater convenience of
| wireless to wired when on the go. Also, any decent wireless over
| the ear headset allows for wired use when out of battery. That's
| hardly a game changer
| PowerElectronix wrote:
| You can have low quality, low cost and very portable wired
| headphones, as well.
|
| You can also go for moderately priced cans and just feel your
| ears tingling the first time you listen to something through
| them.
| zarzavat wrote:
| Not everybody is using their headphones on the go. 99% of my
| headphone use is at my desk while I work. Wired is more
| convenient than wireless since it's one less lithium battery to
| charge.
|
| It's true that humans are not particularly sensitive to audio
| quality, but they are very sensitive to audio latency. If all
| you do is listen to buffered audio sources then latency is not
| important but the moment you need to use your headphones in an
| input loop then wired is the superior technology as it offers
| close to zero variance in latency.
| nottorp wrote:
| Wireless is convenience on the go and when you don't give a
| shit, like work calls.
|
| Wired is for when you want to listen to music you really like
| and it's too late to use the speakers.
| rwmj wrote:
| Dear Sony, please start making the MDR-XB450 again. Lovely wired
| headphones that for some inexplicable reason Sony discontinued a
| few years ago.
| abhikul0 wrote:
| Aye, add to that the XB50 in-ears too. My current pair is ~8
| years old.
| volemo wrote:
| Can someone recommend USBC earbuds with good ANC? Sometimes I'd
| love to avoid battery and interference concerns of Bluetooth, but
| noise cancellation became a must-have for me.
| luag wrote:
| Is in-ear ok? With IEMs, you'll get passive noise canceling
| that I've found more than enough for most situations.
|
| I have a pair of IEM with the usb-c converter attached most of
| the time for use with phones.
|
| Give Truthear Hexa a try.
| duskdozer wrote:
| For me, it isn't, I need ANC also. This is the thing sticking
| me with wireless because as far as I can tell, the best ANC
| are all wireless.
| userbinator wrote:
| The elephant in the room is "chi-fi". There's been a huge growth
| in small Chinese companies with unusual names making amazingly
| cheap, yet great-sounding over-ear headphones, IEMs, and earbuds
| within the past few years, and the vast majority of these are
| wired.
| adamfarhadi wrote:
| I'm by no means an audiophile and it had been years since I
| owned a pair of wired headphones, but I picked up a pair of
| Linsoul 7HZ x Crinacle Zero:2 (yes that is actually the name)
| IEMs after seeing some glowing reviews online and I was
| absolutely blown away by how they sounded despite costing only
| 240 SEK (around 25 USD). Back in the early 2010s when I was
| more interested in hi-fi audio you definitely couldn't get as
| great sounding IEMs around this price.
| al123xiaaaa wrote:
| How long does it take from placing your order to receiving
| the headphones?
| adamfarhadi wrote:
| It took about two weeks to ship to me in Sweden from China.
| shrx wrote:
| Can you recommend some brands with good quality over-ear
| headphones?
| bwv848 wrote:
| I still find it hard to justify buying Chi-Fi. My HD650 still
| has no competitor in terms of style and cost efficiency, I wish
| I could afford HD800 but they sound very different. My IE80
| from 2012 is very outdated, but IEMs are technologically
| inferior, and even the Chinese ones are not cheap. So I just
| put a USB-C cable on it and use it occasionally.
| unleaded wrote:
| think their target market is closer to the PS20 segment than
| the PS200 segment
| bwv848 wrote:
| Nah, here's an example, Hifiman's planar offerings range
| from 50 USD to 8000 USD.
| jhbadger wrote:
| Maybe I am just old, but I have absolutely no idea what this
| passage is about -- why would people be fiddling with Bluetooth
| on a date and why would it cause them to forget their network?
|
| >"Bluetooth does not work," Kravitz said in a recent interview,
| and it's not just headphones, but Bluetooth connections in
| general. "It's ruining important moments. Imagine the amount of
| times that you're with someone on a date, you're trying to set a
| vibe, and then you have to forget the network. On a date!"
| qilo wrote:
| I found this confusing as well. She probably meant to "Forget"
| the device when the Bluetooth pairing with the headphones is
| lost.
| antonkochubey wrote:
| Picnic date with a Bluetooth speaker for some background music,
| perhaps? I often see that in parks/beaches/etc, and as long as
| volume is reasonable I don't think anyone minds.
| booleandilemma wrote:
| I've just been putting wired headphones on my date's ears. It
| makes it harder for her to run away too.
| OJFord wrote:
| I followed the link through to the video interview; it's not a
| lot clearer, except that she's definitely talking about trying
| to play a song (and it not working, ruining/frustrating the
| moment). Follows with the example 'or you're in a car, you have
| to pull the car over. To play a song?! On a date!'
| bongripper wrote:
| The idea is that you're at home with the other person and want
| to listen to some music from a bluetooth speaker.
| omnimus wrote:
| One segment I wish came back are bluetooth inear headphones wired
| together (untrue wireless, i guess).
|
| There are some models but none really explore their possible
| advantages (battery, ux, single signal source).
|
| I lost single wireless earpiece multiple times making the rest
| useless. This won't happen with wire. With wire its also so much
| easier and quicker to take them off they will just hang around
| your neck. There is reason why many workers in loud environments
| prefer earplugs wired together.
|
| My impression is that apple hyped the airpods so well that people
| forgot about other possibilities. And when Google included cool
| headphones with cables people thought they have to cut them...
| that was when industry decided its dead segment.
| elcapitan wrote:
| This is very true. Especially for sport, they are just great. I
| always found wired headphones annoying when running, because I
| need to take care of the wire somehow. Wired-together bluetooth
| in-ears like the Bose SoundSport kind of fill that niche, as I
| don't need to worry about one of them falling out. Looks like
| they don't make them anymore.
| omnimus wrote:
| Yeah sport is main reason companies are making them.
|
| I also have to say i haven't checked this for two years but
| there seem to be some new models now (under banner of
| neckband earbuds). So maybe there is something nicer now.
| camgunz wrote:
| I've had a set of Etymotic SR4s for years, I just replace the
| cable every 1-2 years. I love them to death, they're extremely
| flat though, so they make a version with bumped bass if that's
| your thing.
|
| If someone made a cable with a mic on it for them I'd probably
| buy 10--it's pretty annoying to switch to Apple earbuds for
| calls, but whatever.
| globular-toast wrote:
| There's a much simpler explanation. I regularly see boomers with
| wireless "earpod" type earphones out and about. They're not cool
| any more.
|
| Fashion is fickle and it's best to not pay any attention to it.
| Choose the right tool for the job. Sometimes wireless is better,
| like when running, sometimes wired is better, like doing serious
| listening in a quiet environment.
| snvzz wrote:
| If they want to take them away, they'll have to rip my Sennheiser
| HD600 from my skull.
|
| Legendary for their neutral, correct and pleasant sound, comfort,
| effectively forever durability, and being affordable to boot.
|
| I can plug them to current or 40 year old hardware, and they do
| work. I use them with Topping DX3 Pro+[0] today.
|
| It is no wonder they want us to instead adopt something active,
| crippled with bluetooth latency and dependent on lossy codecs,
| with a non-serviceable battery built-in.
|
| 0.
| https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/t...
| acd wrote:
| Will wired speakers make a come back? Stereo separation vs mono
| pods?
| rock_artist wrote:
| Audio engineer originally and a current audio software.
|
| In the pro audio, wireless was never a thing with an exception of
| live shows where you'd might want to be free on stage but avoid
| stage monitors.
|
| Notice that while Apple made everyone ditch the lovely 3.5", on
| the MacBook Pros they've actually kept it and *improved* it.
|
| As this is HN, I'll focus on technical aspects I didn't notice in
| the article.
|
| - Active Noise reduction
|
| While the article suggested the battery free magic of analog
| headsets. Flights are where the active noise reduction headsets
| shines. Active cancellation isn't needed for studio environment
| but on the go it can certainly make your listening more pleasant.
|
| - Hybrid devices There are several manufacturers with classical
| headset designs that also includes wired support with all modern
| features. This is a good balance in my opinion for benefiting
| from both worlds.
|
| - Latency
|
| Especially Bluetooth, our current consumer wireless is buffered
| and this latency is too much for creating music. Products such as
| GarageBand, Logic or FL Studio won't be that useful for tracking
| with Bluetooth.
|
| - Quality
|
| Indeed, analog 3.5" audio is uncompressed vs Bluetooth. But it
| doesn't mean the audio is superior for listening just because of
| that transition. Our modern devices are still mostly digital
| those days so there is DAC that takes those bits and converts
| them to analog (most of it today is done well as those chips are
| common) and the other step is the analog amplification.
| Audiophiles usually invest a lot in the headphones amplifier.
| Most android devices in the past were mediocre in that sense.
|
| So while wired is a trend, the "dongle" of USB-C to convert the
| audio is still a major part of the quality we end with.
|
| - Sharing is caring (my personal take)
|
| The biggest frustration I feel with Bluetooth is that it's now
| nearly impossible to use multiple headphones for listening. In
| the old days, you had a simple splitter and as long as both
| headsets were the same impedance, you can even have 4 people
| listening to the same content easily.
|
| With Bluetooth, only Apple addresses this in a very limited
| manner with a lock in to specific models and up to 2 devices and
| no video calls or live audio support.
| OJFord wrote:
| Active noise reduction isn't unique to wired models any more
| though - in fact I find it better on the wireless earphones I
| use now than my old similar wired model (same brand) because
| the microphones are right there in the ear, not bashed around
| or muffled by clothing halfway down the cable.
| rahimnathwani wrote:
| "With Bluetooth, only Apple addresses this in a very limited
| manner with a lock in to specific models and up to 2 devices
| and no video calls or live audio support."
|
| The Bose mobile app also allows me to use two pairs of Bose
| headphones on a single device, but still only 2 devices and
| AFAICT only for media consumption.
| user_7832 wrote:
| Tangential - The funny thing is, broadcasting Bluetooth to
| multiple devices isn't a new thing at all. Back in 2017,
| Motorola did it on their phone [1]. No extra hardware afaik,
| it was purely a software solution.
|
| Of course, the company disappeared, and now in 2026, we have
| _lesser_ tech than we had back in 2017.
|
| If you're wondering "Well, how did a company _disappear_?! ",
| feel free to take the most corpo/capitalist-dystopian guess.
|
| If you guessed "They got bought out by Google - presumably
| for IP - with the founders joining Big G, and Google of
| course promptly shelved it and did absolutely diddly squat
| with it", congratulations, you win... frustration and
| disappointment, I suppose!
|
| 1 - https://www.cnet.com/tech/tech-industry/the-most-
| exciting-th...
| pimlottc wrote:
| What have Apple done to improve the audio jack on MacBook Pro
| rock_artist wrote:
| https://support.apple.com/en-us/108351
|
| Not "audiophiles" standard though from a sound engineer pov,
| it is very decent (especially compared to my other laptops)
| tuzemec wrote:
| I own a pair of Focal Bathys - amazing sound, bluetooth
| connectivity, noise canceling, AND usb-c with DAC. I'm very
| happy with them.
| thehours wrote:
| Sony WH1000XM5 headphones are my daily driver, mainly Zoom calls
| and music. I'm generally pretty happy with them, but one big
| gripe I have is when I'm on a call and briefly take off my
| headphones to e.g. chat with someone in the room, there is like a
| 90% chance they stop working and I have to reconnect them.
|
| It happens so often I even wrote a script to switch to the
| MacBook internal speakers then back to the headphones.
|
| I've used wired headphones before (and the Sony even has a wired
| option), but I didn't like how the cord was constantly getting
| the the way of my arms.
|
| edit: Another big gripe is with the Bluetooth codec itself, and
| how the quality changes depending on if the mic is active.
| pxtail wrote:
| Thank you, this brings me a feeling of relief because after
| constantly dealing with various wireless bt headphone issues
| when using linux it frequented my mind that surely on the other
| side of the fence people don't have this kind of problems.
| Kwpolska wrote:
| You can use the Sound Connect app to disable auto pause and
| auto power off.
| rcMgD2BwE72F wrote:
| You don't need the proprietary and data-collecting app. I'm
| using GadgetBridge to configure the 1000XM5 (along with my
| Garmin Forerunner) and it works great!
| Flow wrote:
| Perhaps not related to the article but I find it puzzling that
| Bluetooth in 2026 still sounds like a fax machine when you use
| the mic too. That and a much too high latency in general.
| alpaca128 wrote:
| Using the mic requires the device to drop to a much older
| protocol for headsets designed for an old, obsolete Bluetooth
| generation.
|
| Afaik that's one big reason why BT is such a mess. Many
| different use-cases are dictated by different protocols, many
| of which are outdated, and two paired devices can only use a
| protocol supported by both. So the headphone can't just reuse
| the same nice connection and add a mic, it has to start
| pretending like it's some Bluetooth 2.0 device from 2005 or
| something.
| 4dregress wrote:
| They can focus on being pure transducers rather than being DACs
| and power amps as well.
| downsplat wrote:
| It's amazing how people will jump to something new just because
| it's there and it's being promoted.
|
| When wireless headphones came out, I looked at my wired ones and
| asked the simple question: is a tangling cable worse than
| bluetoth pairing and having to keep yet another thing charged? My
| answer was no, so I kept using cheap wired ones.
|
| A few years later, now that makes me look rich. Or something.
| raw_anon_1111 wrote:
| Bluetooth pairing hasn't been an issue with the iPhone in a
| decade. As far as charging, at night is it really a pain for me
| to stick my AirPods on the same charging pad my iPhone and
| watch are on anyway
| Aardwolf wrote:
| "The dangling cables of wired headphones are a must-have fashion
| accessory in 2026"
|
| Gee, is that the kind of stuff that makes people want this,
| rather than actual usefulness related reasons?
|
| I want it because I don't want yet another thing to have to
| charge, and because I'd want to be able to throw some cheap
| headphones in my backpack that I can use the one time in a month
| that I actually need them in combination with a phone (which of
| course isn't possible anymore today)
|
| Also, why are ANC headphones today worse for gaming than in the
| year 2018 when they supported aptx that had less lag? Technology
| is going backwards?
| calin2k wrote:
| so many replies here on HN, this post also have the vibe of AI
| generate comments. medium-long format, try to cover too much of
| the pectrum, miss a punch line or a main idea. just my 2c
| mvrckhckr wrote:
| My Bluetooth headphones are great and very rarely have any
| glitches. I use wired headphones only when listening to high-
| resolution lossless music (using the right hardware). I would
| guess the fact that some streaming platforms have these now is
| also a contributing factor to the rise in popularity of wired
| headphones.
| sourcecodeplz wrote:
| Fashion no fashion, I think it's great that they are making a
| comeback. Wouldn't hold my breath for the headphone jack to make
| a comeback though
| thendrill wrote:
| This article makes an elephant out of a fly. The explonation is
| much simpler...
|
| The microphone and communication protocols on Bluetooth is shit.
| Everyone that talks alot on the phone knows that the microphone
| one a wired headset is sooo much better than Bluetooth, simple as
| that. You hear better and they hear you better. That is it
| Springtime wrote:
| Article explains it's being partially driven from people
| following celebrities who believe they're using it as
| countersignaling, demonstrating economic class via things that
| could be perceived as the opposite.
|
| _" Wearing wireless 24/7 tells me you don't own any land."_
|
| I wonder how much is being driven by such lead following.
| faizan199 wrote:
| Yes, it is getting more popular in 2026. The main reason is
| because its affordable and easy to use.
| kumarvvr wrote:
| I used Sony ear buds. Never once have I had any issues with it.
|
| Charging is a minor inconvenience, but the freedom of not having
| tangled mess on my hands when I work while I speak is much more
| worth it.
|
| I suspect the vat majority of these wired ones are for use during
| online video calls on office computers and laptops.
| seydor wrote:
| This one can easily be blamed on apple. I wonder how many awful
| design decisions we suffered because of their trendsetting
| alpineman wrote:
| Love my JBL in-ear wired headphones but I can only use them when
| sitting still. When I walk with them they 'rustle' like crazy
| (don't know how else to describe the sound)
| twic wrote:
| I think you're talking about microphonics:
|
| https://zikman.audio/blog/cable-microphonics-what-it-is-and-...
|
| Also sometimes called the stethoscope effect.
|
| I think strictly speaking, this isn't actually microphonics,
| because that means that mechanical noise causes electrical
| noise, which then results in audible noise, whereas what is
| happening is just transmission of vibrations up the cable into
| the ear.
|
| Anyway, it can be fixed with better cables. They don't have to
| be fancy (they don't have to be the 349 euro cables that site
| is selling!) - i have a pair of KZ ZS10 Pro X earphones, and
| using the stock cables, i don't get rustling through those.
|
| (more generally, i have an embarrassing number of Chi-Fi
| earphones, and don't get rustling with any of them)
| alpineman wrote:
| Thanks! I'm probably just being cheap with my 20 euro
| headphones and need to upgrade to at least mid-range
| twic wrote:
| Well, those KZ ZS10 Pro X are still fairly cheap (40
| euros), and i really like them. But there is a huge range
| of amazing value for money earphones out there. You just
| have to wade through dozens of pages of forum posts and
| Reddit threads to find them.
| ryeguy_24 wrote:
| I still use AirPods for listening but if I'm ever taking a call,
| I always use EarPods (USB-C). The microphone quality is multiple
| times better and that's important to me. Especially for work. It
| only took me a few times to hear other people will AirPods to be
| tainted. It just seems unprofessional now because of how bad it
| sounds.
| merelysounds wrote:
| Anecdote, I like wired headphones for important online calls. I
| use earpods[1], I started using them back when they came with a
| phone, I'm happy that it's still possible to buy replacements. I
| like having a reliable wired connection that works and
| disconnects predictably.
|
| I guess a lot of that is nostalgia. My laptop model no longer has
| a webcam cover or a physical network switch; connecting and
| disconnecting the trrs[2] cable reminds me of these.
|
| But some of that is still practical needs. I have AirPods and
| Bose wireless headphones, both praised for reliable connections.
| Every now and then they take a bit longer to connect or the
| volume changes unpredictably, or they need to be charged, etc -
| when wired headphones just work.
|
| [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_headphones#EarPods
|
| [2]:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phone_connector_(audio)#TRRS_s...
| blep-arsh wrote:
| I very much appreciate it when people use wired headphones with
| a decent mic for calls. Speech clarity is just so much better
| even with Earpods compared to tws earplugs.
| dutchCourage wrote:
| I'm also team USB-C wired earbuds (the Apple ones are cheap and
| solid, mic is also nice for calls) for podcasts and commute.
|
| I never stopped using wired headphones at home but also had BT
| ones on the go. When they started showing signs of age I got a
| cheap BT receiver instead of replacing them. It's not quite as
| practical but for many people it's something to consider, they
| work surprisingly well!
| zeta0134 wrote:
| I'm firmly on team "dual USB port" for this problem. We do this
| on computers, which can then perfectly well charge _and_ play
| audio at the same time. Why not phones? It seems like there 's
| plenty of space for a second port.
| catlikesshrimp wrote:
| the usb port is much more complicated than a 3.5mm port. It
| is more expensive, it takes more space. Do you add another
| real port or a built in hub? (they would go with the latter,
| probably)
|
| The advantage is you have a backup port.
| superultra wrote:
| I have three teenage kids and they've all switched to wired. Many
| of their friends have as well.
|
| It has nothing to do with fashion or retro vibes, as far as I can
| tell.
|
| They've all lost too many AirPods through the years. AirPods just
| too easy to lose, and at their school, too easy to be stolen by
| someone else. And they're expensive. Yes you can buy cheaper
| Bluetooth headsets but those often don't sound as good and get
| lost just as easily.
|
| So you're either on a subscription basis relationship wih
| Bluetooth headsets, or you use wired headphones, which are
| actually harder to lose and less desirable to steal.
| somewhereoutth wrote:
| and there is that whole thing of sharing one of your wires with
| your mate/partner that is super cute and great for bonding I
| should think.
| stogot wrote:
| I also been seeing many "protect your brain" shorts on
| youtube saying that athletes are switching to wired
| pimlottc wrote:
| I don't get it, what's safer about wired headphones?
| gzread wrote:
| I read the implication of AI slop content, so I'm
| guessing RF emissions.
| phil21 wrote:
| It's a growing trend in the "alternative" health scene. I
| have a few friends who should absolutely know better do
| silly stuff like use wired headphones due to RF, and even
| as much as turning Wifi off at night for health reasons.
| Nevermind they just switch to 5G in bed on their phones.
| asdff wrote:
| Ask them why they stopped wearing their copper bracelet
| mschuster91 wrote:
| Probably the usual "RF is bad for your head" quackery
| that has been floating around ever since the first mobile
| phones, and for athletes, wired devices aren't in danger
| of getting damaged when they fall out of your ear.
| cube00 wrote:
| No doubt with a convenient affiliate/collab/gifted link
| nearby.
| mschuster91 wrote:
| People still steal AirPods despite them being remotely
| brickable? Jeez.
| asdff wrote:
| Sound wise they are exactly the same. This is what bewildered
| me at the time with the airpods. Everyone is raving about the
| sound. Same chinsy crappy earppod sound they always had. Might
| as well use one of the five pairs of those you've accumulated.
|
| And then also everyone I know who was heavy into airpods has
| also over time moved off them because, the battery. Everyone
| uses over ears from Sony now. Like look at what the walkers in
| your neighborhood are doing, everyone has overears now with
| actual battery life that isn't going to be ewaste in 18 months.
|
| Heavy usage on these is just killing the battery. It is worst
| case for battery health: people just draining these down in one
| session constantly. In like 1 year maybe 2 your battery life
| has sunk like a stone and apple wants $50 out of you. 10 years
| half a grand spend on $5 sound quality.
| rhinoceraptor wrote:
| I have good wired earbuds and over ear headphones, but I still
| almost always go back to bluetooth. If I'm vacuuming, mowing the
| lawn, etc. I use my Airpods Pro. If I'm practicing drums or
| working with loud tools, I use my bluetooth 3M Worktunes.
|
| Being able to get my phone out of my pocket and not have to worry
| about the cable is worth all the tradeoffs. At my desk, I have
| studio monitors, which I prefer over any headphones. For video
| calls, I use just the right Airpod to prevent echos, and so I can
| still hear myself.
| Lio wrote:
| I refurbished a pair of old Sennheiser HD-25s I've had since
| 1998ish recently.
|
| They work just like new and there is something really satisfying
| about bringing old tech back to a useful life.
|
| I'm using them for monitoring things that don't have Bluetooth.
|
| I still use AirPods day to day though because it's so useful to
| always have something in your pocket that can block unpleasant
| noise. Bluetooth works fine for me.
| icar wrote:
| One can only hope this trend is big enough to make phone
| manufacturers bring the 3.5mm jack connector back.
| sbinnee wrote:
| I started seeing this trend nearly a year go in Seoul. I think it
| is just a sort of fashion trend. I like wired experience when I
| am alone in a silent place listening to classical or instrumental
| music. But it's hard to beat convenience of Bluetooth elsewhere.
| bandrami wrote:
| I find them the opposite of convenient ("where are they? are
| they charged? are they paired? did they lose pairing? did I
| just pair to my downstairs neighbor's TV? did he just pair to
| mine?")
| bandrami wrote:
| The DACs in most bluethooth earbuds are absolute garbage, but I
| think the bigger issue is people are tired of both having to
| charge them and having to keep track of where they are.
| sinkasapa wrote:
| You can get cheap wired earphone splitters and share what you're
| listening to on long bus rides or flights. I miss that. Maybe one
| wants something between needing to be on and conversing and the
| isolation of separate bluetooth listening.
| UltraSane wrote:
| I've listened to hundreds of audiobooks using Sony and Bose
| bluetooth ear buds. But when I'm sitting at a computer I use
| wired headphones so I don't have to worry about charging and
| latency. The bluetooth latency is noticeable during video calls
| interestpiqued wrote:
| A bit off topic, but I sometimes wonder if OpenOffice would have
| become as prevalent without wireless ANC headsets be coming the
| default for focus.
| wehrend wrote:
| A few years ago I was looking for my favorite Headphones for my
| synth (some AKG ones, I dont remember the concrete model name by
| heart) - prices went to the roof... I prefer Bluetooth for mobile
| applications, as my sockets respectively wire got defected after
| a few months...
| markus_zhang wrote:
| Bluetooth headphone has one disadvantage --- if it "sleeps" then
| I have to put them back to the charger container to wake them up.
| I don't need to charge it, just need to put it in and take them
| out. But this is a hassle as I need to bring the container around
| with me. Other than that, it's better than wired headphones.
| saalweachter wrote:
| So what are some recommendations for good wired headphones?
|
| The Sony MDR-J10s I used to buy stopped being manufactured, and
| old stock is showing up online less often for more money. They
| were also never the most durable model, which wasn't a problem
| when they were easier to replace.
|
| So what are some good, durable wired headphones? Suitable for
| active use, cords not going to snap with a light tug, don't fall
| off when running, plug/wire connection doesn't wear out and need
| to be held just so?
| nickjj wrote:
| I have 2 wired headphones.
|
| My main ones are Sony MDR-V6s which I've had for 10 years. They
| are the best headphones I've ever owned and they sound just as
| good today as they did a decade ago. They were originally made in
| 1985 and the wire never tangles.
|
| The other are crappy $8 earbuds / mic combo that are maybe 7
| years old and work just fine.
|
| I have wireless earbuds that I occasionally use since the Pixel
| 9a has no 3.5mm jack. They are worse in every way that I care
| about. I have to babysit them to make sure they are charged.
|
| Sure the wired earbuds get tangled sometimes but it's not a big
| deal to address that. I also think wired is an advantage for
| portable usage. For example, for running or doing any activity
| the wire ensures if they fall out of your ear you won't lose
| them. They also don't need a case so you can stuff them anywhere
| without a bulge.
| rapnie wrote:
| I also went back to a wired mouse and never having a sudden lo-
| bat that interrupts my computer work.
| randerson wrote:
| You are lucky to get lo-bat. I get no-bat. Working perfectly
| one moment, not responding the next. Not so much as a popup
| telling me why my PC just got unresponsive.
| grumpoholic wrote:
| The removal of the 3.5mm port is literally satanic behaviour.
| ZekeSulastin wrote:
| This is a more Reddit comment section than I've seen on
| r/headphones in ages. It's almost nostalgic!
|
| I use my wired Sundara (which have dropped in price greatly since
| I got them years ago!) at my desk with DAC/AMP all the time, of
| course, and have a very nice set of Etymotic IEMs with a USB-C
| dongle permanently attached (once I stopped using it for my PC*).
| For use with my phone I haven't actually reached for those Etys
| over my AirPods Pro 2 in years as the latter are significantly
| more convenient. They also work fine with Windows 11 (which
| supports AAC over Bluetooth, as can Linux IIRC) if I want to use
| them there for whatever reason. Maybe I'm blessed in that I don't
| require my phone to be a critical listening device?
|
| * If you have hissing/interference/etc when plugging headphones
| into your PC, the Apple USB-C dongle is _very_ good and only 9
| USD.
| ramgine wrote:
| I use wireless almost exclusively. ANC in the office is a must. I
| also know that a good pair of wired headphones will have way more
| fidelity than AirPods. But I do have some nice wired headphones
| and I pair them to my iPhone with the Fiio BTR5. It's been a good
| mix of the two. I'm of the mindset to go back to an mp3 player
| and use the fiio to connect to my car Bluetooth
| JensKnipper wrote:
| FiiO is great to get the best of both worlds. Using IEMs with
| FiiO UTWS5.
| hdivider wrote:
| Here's a standard-structure, VC-funded, exit-oriented startup to
| consider: make video calls reliable. As in, you provide a
| guarantee and pay the customer if the call didn't work.
|
| Wired headphones could be one part of the solution. They're just
| far more reliable ( _if_ they don 't break, which they will). But
| if the reliability of video calls can be improved so that it's
| literally as reliable as talking to someone next to you in a
| quiet room, I bet lots of people would pay for it. There is so
| much latent frustration about unreliable calls, even with the
| best setup, even in NASA, in DoD, corporations, zoom and other
| platforms fail to perform reliably in so many cases.
| moooo99 wrote:
| > make video calls reliable. As in, you provide a guarantee and
| pay the customer if the call didn't work.
|
| Microsoft would be ruined, haha. Over the past week, I had
| about a 30% chance of the call not working and a a 80% chance
| of the screenshare not working
| user_7832 wrote:
| Funny you mention it; I actually have been thinking of this as
| a startup/solution for ages (especially since covid). I
| realized that it's likely a fair bit more difficult (you'd need
| significant control of both software as well as hardware
| stacks.)
|
| If you or anyone's seriously interested in pursuing it, feel
| free to reach out to the email address in my profile page.
| computator wrote:
| This trend story about wired headphones is possibly a "submarine"
| story as Paul Graham calls it[1], like a headline that "Suits
| make a corporate comeback":
|
| _" The suit is back," it begins. Trend articles like this are
| almost always the work of PR firms. Once you know how to read
| them, it's straightforward to figure out who the client is. With
| trend stories, PR firms usually line up one or more "experts" to
| talk about the industry generally. In this case we get three: the
| NPD Group, the creative director of GQ, and a research director
| at Smith Barney. When you get to the end of the experts, look for
| the client. And bingo, there it is: The Men's Wearhouse._
|
| [1] https://paulgraham.com/submarine.html
| nvarsj wrote:
| Possibly it's a paid for ad. But the trend is real, at least
| among Gen Z/Alphas. I recently modded an iPod Mini 2nd gen for
| my daughter and put Rockbox on it. The thing is amazing, and I
| am thinking about buying an iPod classic myself. The touch
| wheel interface is one of my favourite interfaces ever.
| SubmarineClub wrote:
| I've been thinking about doing this too! Would love to get
| back to maintaining a personal music collection on a
| dedicated mp3 player.
| graypegg wrote:
| First off, you're a kickass parent, that's an awesome thing
| to do for your daughter. How easy is it to sync with music
| she wants to listen to? I haven't touched Rockbox in quite a
| while, but I imagine it's still expecting DRM-free audio
| files of some sort right? Other than bandcamp I can't think
| of any good source for finding some beyond ripping audio
| streams and organizing it yourself.
| nine_k wrote:
| Amazon Music sells DRM-free MP3 files.
| ted537 wrote:
| Qobuz too!
| prepend wrote:
| A lot of my drm-free mp3s come from friends. I probably
| have 2000+ cds that I've ripped, or downloads from buying
| vinyl. I'll make a copy for friends to load onto devices
| and it's the equivalent of loaning a disc to a friend.
|
| I suppose there's probably music torrent sites out there,
| but haven't heard of anyone pirating music in many years as
| I'm too old now.
| iamdamian wrote:
| Apple's music has mostly been DRM-free since 2009!
|
| I love this about Apple and give them as much of my
| business I can to show that there is still a healthy market
| outside streaming. (7digital is another good source,
| although more expensive than Apple. They offer FLAC and
| 320kbps.)
|
| Makes me wish e-book stores would get onboard...
| t0mas88 wrote:
| Cool! I wrote a significant part of the graphical UI for
| rockbox about 20 years ago. It was text based before that.
| Needed it for my back then very fancy harddisk based mp3
| player.
|
| The project was great to work with, Daniel Stenberg (also the
| curl maintainer) was really good at helping newcomers like me
| participate. That may be a big part of why the project is
| still around 20 years later.
| rienbdj wrote:
| Do the old iPods still hold battery well?
| kevin_thibedeau wrote:
| I saw one yesterday pointing out how phone cases are passe and
| "unnecessary" because of replacement plans.
| furyofantares wrote:
| I agree. At the very least it's vastly overstating a real
| trend.
|
| > Sales are through the roof in recent months.
|
| OK, I'll follow the link here. It goes to an article titled
| "Wired Headphones Growth Is a Throwback to 2016"[1], already a
| far cry from "through the roof".
|
| From that article we have this:
|
| > After 5 years of sales declines, which culminated in a $42M
| drop in 2024, wired headphones rebounded in 2025, growing 3%
| (about $15M).
|
| OK, great. So wired headphones are a little bit trendy after
| years of decline. And of course they have some real advantages
| as many people here are testifying.
|
| But c'mon, "sales are exploding", "sales are through the roof".
| They're not through the roof, they did a little bounce when
| they hit the floor. OK, to be fair it also says "the trend
| really gained momentum in the second half of 2025, with sales
| surging 10% between July and December", so maybe it's getting
| some momentum, but let's not get so far ahead of ourselves.
|
| [1] https://www.circana.com/post/wired-headphones-growth-is-a-
| th...
| PlanksVariable wrote:
| So who is the client? In all of the article's photos of
| celebrities, they're wearing Apple EarPods. Is Apple trying to
| convince people to buy their $19 EarPods instead of their $250
| AirPods?
| some_random wrote:
| It's obviously a fashion thing.
| moooo99 wrote:
| It absolutely isn't
| some_random wrote:
| Look up "performative male starter pack".
| moooo99 wrote:
| Yes, i know the memes. But these are the reasons why people
| around me go back to wired:
|
| - lost many airpods - wired tends to be cheaper than
| wireless equivalents
|
| It can be very simple
| some_random wrote:
| Just because there are defensible reasons around a
| fashion trend doesn't mean it's not a fashion trend.
| mlitwiniuk wrote:
| So the fact, that I recently bought used iPod, replaced the
| battery and storage and use it now with pair of IEMs make me some
| sort of a... trendsetter?
| wat10000 wrote:
| Headline: "sales are exploding"
|
| Actual fact: sales were up 3% last year, a whopping $15 million.
| asah wrote:
| meh, same as "record sales are back" - it's missing a zero in
| scale and two zeroes in money.
| Zigurd wrote:
| I wonder how much of this has to do with the popularity of the
| MacBook Air and now, potentially, the Neo. My current desktop
| setup is a MacBook Air and a big 4K monitor. I considered getting
| an outboard DAC/amp for headphones but the headphone jack on the
| MacBook Air sounds pretty great to me through my mid-price
| Hifiman cans.
| neya wrote:
| I picked up a Sony MDR-Z7 and Z1 and an iFi headphone amp and
| threw out my wireless Apple headphones. Of course comparing them
| to the expensive Sony's isn't fair but once you experience the
| soundstage in the wired headphones you will never look back. You
| don't need to even buy the expensive headphones, you can even get
| something like a V6 or a 7506.
|
| The difference is the battery dies in the wireless models in 2-3
| years irrespective of the brand but these wired headphones live
| on for ever.
| evrenesat wrote:
| It's funny how this coincides with a time when BT headphones have
| finally become cheap, reliable and capable enough. I recently
| bought two different sets from Lidl: one for EUR8 and the other
| for around EUR12. Both have ANC and a battery life of around 5
| hours, and the sound quality is quite respectable. I've been
| using headphones all the time since I was 11, so that's 37 years
| with many different kinds of headphones. Even now, I have more
| than ten headphones that work. IMHO, Bluetooth headphones have
| never been closer to becoming a natural counterpart to mobile
| phones for everyone.
| happyopossum wrote:
| Setting aside debates about which is "better", this article
| appears to be based on crap. The link to the supporting analysis
| uses the words "through the roof", but here's what it says:
|
| " wired headphones rebounded in 2025, growing 3% (about $15M)."
|
| So now a 3% growth in sales is "exploding" and "through the
| roof"? No, I don't think so...
| zadikian wrote:
| And a 30% increase in sales across a cherrypicked 6wk time
| window. This is one of those articles that's more wishful
| thinking than real news, even though I have the same wish.
| y-c-o-m-b wrote:
| This is the BBC. I've been reading their site every day for
| many years now. They're mostly good, but at times they have a
| way of steering their audience towards an agenda through bunk
| articles like this. It was especially evident with the remote
| work hit-pieces they published regularly during the RTO
| movement a couple of years ago. It was clear someone was
| pulling strings at the BBC to generate negative headlines about
| remote work, but when you dug into their sources, you'd see
| data to suggest the complete opposite.
|
| I'm not sure what the agenda would be in this case and maybe
| there is no agenda, but it's something to be aware of. It could
| be simply one of their contributors has a bone to pick with
| manufacturers over the lack of reliability in Bluetooth audio
| technology.
| themafia wrote:
| > They're mostly good, but at times they have a way of
| steering their audience towards an agenda through bunk
| articles like this.
|
| Real-time Gell-Mann amnesia.
| ghusto wrote:
| I wouldn't choose those words, but a 3% increase of something
| that's been steadily in decline is significant enough to
| warrant hyperbole of some kind.
| Zufriedenheit wrote:
| I am still waiting for a wired AirPod 4 ANC equivalent. Wired,
| earbud but not silicon in-ear style. Still using my normal wired
| headphones never switched to wireless so far but longing for an
| ANC version.
| 1a527dd5 wrote:
| I'm waiting for a wired bone conducting headset (mic included),
| so far only Chinese producers for that market.
| Ylpertnodi wrote:
| You're not buying the ones available...because they're chinese?
| DiskoHexyl wrote:
| Apart from all the other things everyone mentioned, wired
| headphones never really become technically obsolete. I can still
| connect my 15-year-old pair of headphones to a laptop, and they
| work just fine. Sure, I swapped cushions a couple of times, and
| the headband is all new leather, but the sound is great.
|
| A pair of BT headphones from 15 years ago, even if they worked
| (which in my experience, they don't), would use an outdated audio
| codec- no one in their right mind want to listen to an SBC now
| the_arun wrote:
| Another underrated simplicity with wired headphones is - you
| don't need to charge it. It just works. Sound quality for sure is
| one of the biggest advantages of wired phones.
| andrewmg wrote:
| This seems backwards to me, mostly. A decade ago, quality sound
| on the go meant a pocket headphone amp wired to deep-seated
| inner-ear earphones or clunky over-the-ear cans.
|
| Today? Airpods Pro do the trick: the second- and third-generation
| models rival or exceed most wired options. And that makes sense:
| Apple's R&D spending and engineering capabilities for a product
| like Airpods dwarf the resources of traditional audio companies--
| the built-in DSP alone is a staggering achievement. So they ought
| to sound great, and they really do.
|
| And that's before you even consider all the other capabilities,
| like taking calls, etc. My pocket amps and wired 'phones
| (Etymotic, Shure, B&O, a few others I'm forgetting) have been
| gathering dust since the Airpods Pro came to market. I do not
| miss de-tangling the cables.
|
| Of course, it is possible to do better, but not easy or
| inexpensive. On my desks at home and at the office are dedicated
| headphone rigs: DACs, amps, and wired open-backed cans (Focal,
| HifiMan). Those set-ups sound great--although not nearly so great
| as my two-channel speaker systems. But that's what it takes to
| get appreciably better sound than Apple's Bluetooth sets, and
| forget about portability.
| lazide wrote:
| It's money.
|
| Wired headphones are dirt cheap.
| tcfhgj wrote:
| do Airpods even work on most of the available phone models?
| lacoolj wrote:
| Good luck finding a phone with a headphone jack anymore though :(
|
| I love my wired headphones though. They support BT but I've used
| that maybe twice. Ever. Obviously was only because I was using my
| phone with them, which again don't have a port for the cord.
| freehorse wrote:
| It is not an either-or. Many bluetooth headphones (not earbuds)
| also have an audio jack to be used wired. I use my bluetooth
| headphones (sony wh-1000xm3) through bluetooth when I am on the
| go, and wired when I am at home, especially if I want low
| latency. If anything, I would rather be able to replace a simple
| jack cable if it breaks, as it would consistently happen back
| when I was using wired earphones.
|
| I find using all these cables when I am on the go inconvenient,
| and I cannot imagine going back there. Especially with earbuds, I
| have probably changed over 10 or sth over the years due to cables
| failing (but I hate earbuds now anyway regardless). On the other
| hand, eg when gaming I definitely notice latency issues,
| especially if I compare them with wired, so I prefer to use them
| wired.
| youknownothing wrote:
| I wonder how much of the "it sounds better" argument is just a
| fashionable make-believe, like the gold-plated HDMI cables that,
| for the most part, don't really make a difference but somehow
| people believed it does.
|
| Or like people who think that brown-shell eggs are better quality
| than white-shell eggs.
| slicktux wrote:
| CD audio quality is the best...specially with wired headphones
|
| https://youtu.be/cIQ9IXSUzuM
| rimbo789 wrote:
| Both wired and wireless headphones of all types fail for me
| between 10-13 months. Something breaks no matter the price or
| brand.
|
| The only wireless headphones worth the hassle of using Bluetooth
| (which never connects on the first try, disconnects randomly all
| the time, and is generally far too unreliable for daily use) are
| shockz bone conducting.
|
| If shockz made a wired version I'd only buy those
| glitchcrab wrote:
| This is a you thing. I had the same pair of Sony wireless
| headphones for years and I only replaced them because the ear
| cups started disintegrating. Their replacements (also Sony)
| have already lasted me a couple of years with no issues. I also
| have absolutely no problems with Bluetooth either, the
| headphones are paired with maybe 6 devices across iOS and Linux
| and they never fail to connect.
| osigurdson wrote:
| I never understood the appeal of AirPods. To me, it just seemed
| like an inferior product at a much higher price. You now have to
| worry about charging them (not to mention charging the case), you
| have three things that are easy to lose vs one that is hard to
| lose, and finally, to my taste, they are somehow gross to look at
| - like hearing aids from the 1950s. The product just seems like a
| manifestation of complexity for the sake of complexity.
| amelius wrote:
| Their size is nice. You can easily take them wherever you go
| without questioning if you need them. It's not all bad.
| Aurornis wrote:
| I prefer wired headphones at my desk but my AirPods are
| incredible for being on the go.
|
| The noise cancellation is also great. I'll use them if it gets
| noisier than my closed headphones can block.
|
| > and finally, to my taste, they are somehow gross to look at -
| like hearing aids from the 1950s.
|
| I do not care in the slightest how they look. They're small and
| work well.
|
| > The product just seems like a manifestation of complexity for
| the sake of complexity.
|
| As someone who actually uses them, I disagree on every level.
| otherme123 wrote:
| > The noise cancellation is also great. I'll use them if it
| gets noisier than my closed headphones can block.
|
| You can get the Seinhensser Momentum 4, wireless optional,
| but closed over-ear and still work without battery, for less
| than 200. Way better sound quality than the in-ears.
| elicash wrote:
| I hate untangling wires. The noise cancellation (including
| passive for the pros) is great. Easier to switch between
| devices. I can use them with the Apple TV when my wife goes to
| sleep (she's an early riser).
|
| The downsides you list don't apply to me personally. I don't
| have to "worry" about charging them; I just charge them. I have
| never lost them, I keep them in the same spot. I also
| personally think they look better than wired, but that's a
| fashion thing.
|
| I think it's fine to have a different preference, but I find it
| odd people can't even _understand_ the appeal of them. I don 't
| like wired, but I can understand why people have different
| preferences.
| testforge wrote:
| Wireless audio traded a trivial inconvenience (a cable) for
| multiple new inconveniences.
| mrkramer wrote:
| I use to have wired headphones for years but wires always get
| damaged over time and then headphones stop working. Now I got
| wireless headphones.
| Dwedit wrote:
| Audio delay for most Bluetooth headphones is downright atrocious.
| Yes, there are some out there which support low delay modes
| (under 40ms), but the vast majority of them do not.
| muddi900 wrote:
| How much of this is due to school phone bans?
|
| I know kids are switching to mp3 players because of that.
| epx wrote:
| Have had two Airpods. Great devices, but broke down after a year
| or so and I don't want to spend their price every single year.
| plagiarist wrote:
| I have never bought a wireless headphones and I never will. I
| bought a bluetooth adapter for wired headphones instead, for when
| I need that. The only thing I feel like I am missing is noise
| cancellation.
| w4rh4wk5 wrote:
| Are there recommendations on USB-C to 3.5mm adapters, preferably
| ones with input and output? My biggest complain with Bluetooth
| headphones is the astonishingly bad quality when doing voice
| calls.
| as367 wrote:
| See if Apple's USB-C to 3.5mm adapter works for you.
| w4rh4wk5 wrote:
| Thanks for pointing this one out.
|
| I am hesitant to buy Apple accessories like these as I am
| having quality concerns. Specifically the macbook chargers
| I've encountered are far less rigid than Lenovo Thinkpad
| chargers (at least before they switched to USB-C). I never
| felt Apple did a particularly good job with cables and
| connectors when it comes to longevity.
| ysleepy wrote:
| The samsung one is usually easier. On non-apple devices the
| volume is very limited, especially in the EU version.
| jhoho wrote:
| As usual, the Apple design is a great baseline:
| https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/r...
|
| It doesn't provide full volume output under Android, though.
|
| Otherwise, the CS43131 DAC powers some great designs. I can't
| comment on their durability, though.
| https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/j...
| dev_l1x_be wrote:
| One of the reasons is software quality. Incredible shitty
| experiences are pretty common.
| richard_chase wrote:
| My new bottom-of-the-line phone does not have a headphone jack.
| Did not realize that when I got it and now I'm bummed.
| xantronix wrote:
| Yes, this is a trend, but it doesn't seem like just a fad; a lot
| of people are choosing to return to "outmoded" things to embrace
| ritual and intentionality. As others have commented, it doesn't
| have to make sense to you; having options hurts nobody.
| letmetweakit wrote:
| "Bluetooth does not work," Kravitz said in a recent interview,
| and it's not just headphones, but Bluetooth connections in
| general. "It's ruining important moments. Imagine the amount of
| times that you're with someone on a date, you're trying to set a
| vibe, and then you have to forget the network. On a date!"
|
| The quote above makes absolutely zero sense to me, it's like
| ChatGPT 0.3a decided to write something about Bluetooth.
| ReptileMan wrote:
| On a date the only acceptable bluetooth usage is for
| teledildonics.
| nine_k wrote:
| That's when you _especially badly_ don 't want a sudden
| disconnect, or the battery dying.
| polishdude20 wrote:
| I use my wired sex toys usually. Ethernet works really well.
| prepend wrote:
| 10G Ethernet has improved their performance so greatly.
| bradford wrote:
| The quote resonates with me, even though I haven't experienced
| the exact "set a vibe on a date" scenario.
|
| I have multiple bluetooth headsets that I use with multiple
| devices. I have collected a series of tricks that I use when I
| can't get bluetooth to operate the way I want it to: turning
| bluetooth on/off, restarting the bluetooth device. "Forget the
| network" is not one of those tricks, but I wouldn't be
| surprised if others have learned to use it.
| mock-possum wrote:
| It's poorly written but painfully familiar. Even if it's two
| devices that have never known any connection but the single one
| between them... Bluetooth aomeyimes just inexplicably fails,
| requiring forgetting the previous connection, and
| reconnecting."
| dcdc123 wrote:
| "Forget the network" implies something to do with wifi
| though.
| randycupertino wrote:
| Connecting to bluetooth is annoying, period. It's needless
| friction that can be avoided just plugging in headphones.
| richstokes wrote:
| Agreed. What network are they forgetting here? Pretty sure I've
| only ever seen that apply to wifi. Are they trying to say you
| might need to re-pair a bluetooth speaker on a date? I don't
| get it.
| egorelik wrote:
| Back when I still thought all headphones were basically the same,
| I was writing some music and I could not understand why the cello
| lines sounded so much louder than the violin lines at the same
| dynamic. It was only years later that I found out that mainstream
| headphones are tuned to boost the bass, which is supposedly the
| mainstream taste.
|
| If your tastes in music are not mainstream (and mine definitely
| is not), mainstream headphones will ruin your music more than you
| realize - for years I just thought that was how recorded music is
| supposed to sound, and it wasn't very good. Trying a neutrally-
| tuned headphone can change your (musical) life. Unfortunately,
| very few wireless headphones are tuned that way.
|
| Edit: Part of why I never looked into it sooner, I had heard so
| much about "audiophile snake oil" over the years, I thought that
| was all there was. That exists, but there plenty of headphones
| marketed to "audiophiles" that are legitimate.
| swed420 wrote:
| Next up:
|
| "traditional speakers are replacing headphones"
| nephihaha wrote:
| A lot of people on public transport don't use headphones so
| true dat.
| agreezy wrote:
| for audiophile, wired is still king
| smetannik wrote:
| Back in the day when I was in school, I wanted to learn how to
| solder, so I started fixing my classmates headphones.
|
| This "service" ended up to be quite popular - broken headphone
| wires were a very common problem.
|
| I think the average lifespan of wireless headphones is definitely
| longer than that of wired ones.
| elophanto_agent wrote:
| my bluetooth headphones died mid-meeting yesterday and nobody
| noticed the quality improvement
| _DeadFred_ wrote:
| If you are on Windows don't forget to setup Equalizer APO matched
| to your headphones. On Android check out Wavelet. It can really
| bring music alive.
| heraldgeezer wrote:
| The article ofc focuses on girls instagram and not us gamers who
| have been using wired for decades.
|
| We are opressed. Unironically I am so annoyed. It was an "ick"
| before and now its cool again. Okay whatever.
| mock-possum wrote:
| I mean yeah - generally wired devices are better _in every way_
| ... except for the inconvenience of needing to be tethered to
| your device during use.
|
| My default is always to buy wired devices, and only consider
| wireless in situations where the convenience specifically
| outweighs the downsides - wireless earbuds while exercising or
| working outside, or while traveling light to listen to a podcast
| or work at a cafe.
|
| The rest of the time? Wired keyboard, wired mouse, wired
| headphones, wired controller, wire microphone, etc etc etc.
| nephihaha wrote:
| The other inconvenience is tangled wires.
| oohaba wrote:
| I'm not seeing anyone mention that there is a recent social media
| trend of people touting that AirPods emits "harmful" radiation. I
| only mention this because otherwise intelligent health-nut
| friends were trying to convince me of the same.
| skyberrys wrote:
| I never gave up on my wired headphones. I'm so bad I have to use
| a stretchy cord (ahla old phone cord) to tie my phone to my body
| just so I don't drop it. There is no way I can go wireless
| headphones just so I can lose half my sound. When my Pixel
| finally abandoned the headphone jack I was forced to get USBC
| headphones and I just don't like them as much, probably because
| of the ear shape more than the port but I feel like USBC port
| plug doesn't stay as secure as the old headphone jack.
| blackhaj7 wrote:
| I used wired headphones not only because Bluetooth can be a pain
| but because I hate noise cancellation and all bluetooth
| headphones seem to have it (even when it is turned off, it does
| "something" that messes with my ears)
|
| I am convinced noise cancellation is causing me tinitus and I
| don't seem to get it when I use normal headphones
| p0w3n3d wrote:
| I use Bluetooth every day however, playing games on Bluetooth is
| some mistake. Quality is noticeably worse, stuttering happen, and
| cable is the fallback when my BT headphones' battery die. So I
| really do not understand why the jack has been removed from major
| brands of phones
| NoLinkToMe wrote:
| This hyperbole is not really necessary on hackernews. Apple alone
| makes 20 billion on a single product: airpods.
|
| This article notes 2025 saw a 3% increase of 15m. That means
| _total_ sales are 0.5b, or 2.5% of Apple 's airpods product.
|
| In other words: tiny market with a growth in line with inflation
| after years of decline? Let's call that 'exploding sales' and
| farm some clicks.
|
| Yes perhaps there is some newfound interest, but since bluetooth
| headsets took off they keep getting cheaper to buy, easier to
| pair and connect, longer lasting batteries, easier to find,
| smaller to pocket, more varied, more comfortable to wear, and
| with better noise-cancelling. Plus every year fewer devices carry
| the headphone jack.
|
| It's on the way out, though it'll be a slow death. I have a pair
| of wired headphones, I prefer them on corporate laptops for
| meetings because corporate laptops suck with pairing. But that's
| about it.
| GlacierFox wrote:
| When I'm watching movies or playing games, I find the lag
| jarring so plug in my wired ones every time.
| guelo wrote:
| Wired were deliberately killed by Apple in order for them to
| make that $20 billion. We should not celebrate billionaires
| making the world worse so they can make more money.
| ghusto wrote:
| > It's on the way out, though it'll be a slow death
|
| At the very most, it's on its way out in the same way normal
| computers are on their way out for non-IT professionals. There
| are situations where wired is a must, not a preference (studios
| being the most obvious).
|
| Aside from that, wired offers the highest sound quality
| possible, plug-and-play, and all at a lower price. Wireless
| headphones don't appear to even be trying to catch up.
| uyzstvqs wrote:
| Wired and wireless will always co-exist. Your casual consumer
| prefers wireless. Professional audio equipment for mixing and
| critical listening will _never_ favor wireless over wired. For
| pros, $20-50 wired IEMs beat $250 Airpods every time.
|
| The same applies to pro gamers. Latency and empty batteries are
| a big no-no.
| elxr wrote:
| > This hyperbole is not really necessary on hackernews
|
| I've noticed that hyperbole is increasingly getting frontpaged
| as of these past 6-10 months.
| jwilliams wrote:
| I like to do walking meetings or meetings where I'm
| cleaning/emptying dishwasher/etc. It sounds strange, but I'm a
| lot more present than when I'm at my computer.
|
| Anyway. Somewhat ironically, I use a wired set of headphones for
| this. It's not just the speakers that are better. I often get
| people remarking how much better the audio is on their end too...
| i.e. the cheap inline microphone.
| manmal wrote:
| That has probably more to do with the microphone(s) rather than
| that it's wired. Voice is not a problem at Bluetooth bitrates.
| jwilliams wrote:
| I suspect it's mostly microphone position rather than
| anything else (the headphones I have are the basic Apple
| ones).
| wartywhoa23 wrote:
| For me, wired multi-driver armature IEMs (in-ear monitors) are
| the best thing to happen in the audio field since the arrival of
| neodymium magnets.
|
| For a fraction of price of professional monitor speakers, you get
| the closest thing to direct hardware-to-brain audio transmission.
| It's precise and fast transient-wise.
|
| No reflections, no phase problems, nada. You can choose exactly
| the type of frequency response you need: flat, V-shaped,
| U-shaped, bassy, bright, whatever. There are even models with
| switchable curves.
|
| No need to invest much more money than your speakers cost in your
| listening room, installing wool/foam pads/draping/soft
| furniture/bass traps/carpets etc to reduce the amount of
| reflections and bring frequency responce to anything resembling
| flat.
|
| That said, there is a huge number of IEMs produced these days and
| they range from absolute trash to stellar. And to navigate this
| vast ocean, I find Crinnacle's resourses utterly useful:
|
| https://crinacle.com/rankings/iems/
|
| https://list.hangout.audio/iem
|
| (disclosure: I'm not affiliated in any way, I just adore this
| guy's dedication!)
| highpost wrote:
| Apple Earbuds cost $19 while AirPods Pro 3 cost $250. If one of
| the pods flies out of your ear on the Fremont Bridge, it's a
| pretty bad day. I should get over it.
|
| You can also load your hearing test results (from either an
| audiologist or a hearing test app like
| https://mimi.io/products/mimi-hearing-test-app) into Apple Health
| and then use them with your Earbuds.
| arjie wrote:
| > _After 5 years of sales declines, which culminated in a $42M
| drop in 2024, wired headphones rebounded in 2025, growing 3%
| (about $15M). The trend really gained momentum in the second half
| of 2025, with sales surging 10% between July and December.
| Multiple brands and price points are seeing sales growth, a
| signal the trend is widespread. In the first six weeks of 2026,
| wired headphones revenue is up a whopping 20%!_
|
| This is a Circana Retail Tracking Service content-marketing
| piece. Like the x% of Americans live paycheck to paycheck is a
| LendingClub content-marketing piece. 3% being $15m indicates this
| is a $500m market. Airpods themselves are a $25 b revenue
| product.
| gosub100 wrote:
| I would love to hear the Bluetooth engineers battle it out. I
| know BT isn't the only reason people want wired, but it's got to
| be one of the aggravating factors.
|
| Is it the specs fault? Hard to believe if they have gone through
| at least 5 major revisions. Is it those stupid engineers that
| didn't implement the spec? Is it the chipsets? I want to see a
| "who made Bluetooth suck?" Showdown
| matricaria wrote:
| There is no way I'm going back to wired headphones. I always
| hated them. Cables lasted a few years at best leaving the
| headphones unrepairable. And when using them while moving I could
| only here my own steps. Plain awful.
| everdrive wrote:
| Wireless headphones have always been stupid.
|
| - Disposable
|
| - Small-but-not-zero fire risk inside your backpack or your ear
|
| - Pairing woes
|
| - Expensive
|
| - No user-replaceable batteries
|
| Someone's going to come and say how much they like them, but you
| need to remember that "needing to deal with a cable sometimes"
| does not actually qualify as inconvenience. When the washing
| machine was invented, 10s of hours of labor were freed up from
| people so they could either get more work done or pursue leisure
| and enjoy life. What did wireless headphones do for people?
| Prevent them from needing to exercise the tiny amount of impulse
| control necessary to to run your cable?
| phil21 wrote:
| I used to think Bluetooth was nearly unusable both in audio
| quality and annoyingness.
|
| Then I moved to the Apple ecosystem including iPhone, Airpods,
| and MacOS. It Just Works(tm) 99% of the time. The last 1% is a
| little annoying, and almost always has to do with device
| switching.
|
| I also haven't had a problem with third party devices for many
| years now. My car does wireless Carplay just fine, and before
| that worked nearly as well with Android Auto. Rental cars the
| past few years even work - although pairing them the first time
| is roughly as annoying as digging through my bag for USB cable I
| suppose.
|
| I've lost more pairs of wired earbuds than I have Airpods so far.
| I thought for sure I'd lose Airpods once every few months due to
| how often I forget things, but for whatever reason I find them to
| be easier to keep track of - the case fits perfectly in the "key
| pocket" in jeans, and it's become third nature to pat that pocket
| whenever I leave just like I do for keys/phone/wallet.
|
| Not dealing with the annoying cable is great. I get a phone call,
| and I just grab the earbuds out of the case from my pocket within
| 10 seconds and I'm good to go.
|
| For at-home PC use it's a different story, although I don't
| really find myself using my wired high-end cans much anymore.
| It's either airpods for day to day Zoom calls, or full on high-
| end speaker setups if I actually want to listen to something or
| game. Even high end cans cannot hold a candle against moderately
| decent speakers. The difference is night and day.
| butterNaN wrote:
| I can attest to this. I gave away my Sony WH-1000MX and my EUR80
| Soundcore earbuds stopped charging. Headphone emergency! I got
| myself EUR30 AKG USB-c IEMs off a local shop. The sound quality
| is far, far superior to even the EUR350 wireless Sony headphones.
| I'm not even an audiophile, it's just noticably better. I had
| forgotten all the little details from the music I regularly
| listned to.
|
| With your popular wireless headphones, you're really paying for
| the computer with ANC (and branding, packaging, depending on
| which version of the series the latest model is on).
|
| The wired IEMs don't have an ANC but I realised I don't need it
| as often as I thought. I'm certainly going to look for Wired
| over-the-ear ANC cans next, but honestly I'm not sure if I need
| them.
| Hadriel wrote:
| Bluetooth headphones with mics are absolutely trash at connecting
| to a pc.
| macleginn wrote:
| With a 0$ Bluetooth-3.5mm jack dongle from AliExpress one can
| have best of both worlds, or at least continue using wired cans
| with a phone where the charging port stopped working.
| hetspookjee wrote:
| I bought a bunch of wired cables as switching devices and making
| sure Teams is able to work with the device never worked smoothly
| with Bluetooth. I only miss wireless when i get snagged or the
| wires are entangled but both are easy to prevent and all the
| benefits of wired far outweigh the wireless setbacks
| prepend wrote:
| $20 iPhone white headphones are great. They last forever. The
| battery never dies.
|
| Sustainability is good.
| alpaca128 wrote:
| One thing I don't see mentioned about wired & wireless is volume
| limitations.
|
| With wired headphones the number of steps in volume - or if there
| even are discrete steps - is only dictated by the device driving
| the headphones. With wireless I can usually only choose between
| "a little too quiet" and "a little too loud". To this day I am
| puzzled why devices are arbitrarily limited in that way.
|
| Not to mention some wireless headphones are simply too quiet even
| on max volume and there is no way to change that. The
| manufacturer decided you can't have loud headphones and so they
| never will be, too bad.
| nephihaha wrote:
| I use them because they don't need to be charged constantly
| antfarm wrote:
| I love both my Beyerdynamic DT 770 PRO and my Apple AirPods. They
| complement each other perfectly.
| TightFibre wrote:
| Dreadful piece. I have my partner's broken Bluetooth overheads.
| They need fresh pairing every time, and as they are closed back
| they are a bit exhausting. The pairing is a pain point. I have a
| decent open back pair of two, one the head band died (plastic
| fatigue). I have gotten through so many wired ear buds as I like
| wearing them in bed and drifting off to music or podcasts. So the
| wire is an enemy and it often tries to strangle you. Surprisingly
| you may have a better DAC in your headphones than your laptop or
| phone accessible over wireless. And conversely one phone I have
| has a better soundstage than all my computer gear. Different
| tasks and combos require disperate gear. I am going to buy some
| more wired buds. One plus about a wire and amp combo is that you
| can at least crank up the volume. The EU apple USBC to 3.5 is
| capped at 50 percent.
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