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.

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.

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.

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.

> 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).

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.

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.

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.

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.

> 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.

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.

Please, it's the one thing I miss on my Pixel 10

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...

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.

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.

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.

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.

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

>* 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.

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.