this post was submitted on 23 Apr 2024
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Bullshit. I got four years out of each of my pairs and I used them several hours a day. Also replacing the battery when it does wear out is is something like 50 bucks. Sure, you can't do it yourself but Apple will give you a refurbished pair, and they will recycle your old battery.
And they provide free recycling for all their products — you're basically paying for it to be recycled when you buy AirPods and any that go into landfill that's entirely the customer's fault.
No wired headphones I've ever owned lasted even close to that long - the cable eventually fails with several hours per day of swinging around and being packed tightly into your pocket.
That said, I've switched to bone conduction headphones now, and will probably never own another pair of airpods unless they go down the same path.
This reads so much like Apple marketing talk. Just call any criticism bullshit and let the anectodes and fanboys circlejerk. Add "Apple also gives cuddly gifts to kids sometimes", and you're golden.
🤢
The recycling plug is a little silly, but they are correct about AirPods lasting longer than that article claims.
The first gen AirPods were absolutely ready for hospice after 2 years. But the new ones are much better. Anyone that’s used some Pro 2s or Gen 3s knows what I’m talking about.
This article’s claims are kind of outdated and they feel like they were written by someone who hasn’t used one of the models made during the last 5 years.
It's not marketing talk if you know 5+ people and noone has problems with their battery after two years.
5 samples is still anecdotal. There is no statistical significance there.
Sure, but then it's still worth more than this article lol
Mine are two years and they’re working really really well. I’ve noticed a capacity drop, but it’s far more than enough for my needs.
The batteries definitely need to be replaceable. This would be trivially easy.
With that said, I’m not so convinced they are designed to fail in less than two years either. Article strikes me as sensationalist with a grain of truth.
PS: mine even come with a feature to reduce battery aging by delaying full charge until the device is expected to be used. Why bother if planned obsolescence is your explicit goal?
I found one of mine developed a crackle after a year. It would eventually go away if I put it in the case and took it out a few times which seemed kind of silly.
They had (or maybe still have) an extended warranty / free replacement program for this issue
How would you compare capacity at purchase vs now?
Approximately 80% In my rough estimation. It’s fine for a workout which is my threshold for usability, but has begun to suffer on long flights. I use these while working out 3 to 5 times per week and on trips.
This seems generally in line with lithium ion batteries in smart phones.
This seems acceptable to me, though it may not be everyone's experience, based on the thread
It’s kind of hard to tell with my 2 year old Pro 2s. I treat mine like dog shit. They’re in use constantly for 8 hours of remote meetings, and I leave them in for podcasts at night. I throw them in the case at lunch and during dinner, but it’s not because I’m getting a battery warning. It’s because I’m stepping away from the desk. All in all, I hit these things pretty hard.
My guess is that they’re probably down to 4+ hours of audio and 3+ hours of call time after 2 years. Long enough that I’m likely going to take a break, and put them in the case before I hear a battery warning.
That said, my old non-pro Gen 1 AirPods were really starting to struggle after 2 years. After 2 years I needed to swap between right and left buds to get through an hour call. They made it about 45min with the mic on, and those didn’t have ANC and head tracking.
Lithium iOS is inherently unstable and that instability goes both ways. They designed it to only last 2 years, but there will be plenty that go beyond that, just as there will be plenty that die in , <2 years. The majority will die at about 2 years, as designed.
That being said,
What's that? I'm intrigued lmao
Edit: ion* lmao typo stays tho
Sound is vibration. We typically think of it as vibration transmitted through air (to get to your auditory canal), but it doesn't have to be. Sound vibration can be conducted through your bones (which your auditory canal is enclosed in) so you can hear without something being in your ears because the sound gets inside you through a different medium.
Do you have an electric toothbrush? Turn it on and bite down with your teeth on it. Notice how it gets MUCH louder? Thats the sound traveling through your jawbone (and skull) to get to your auditory canal.
I have a pair originally purchased for running but they've turned out to be useful in numerous situations where I wanted to listen to something without losing awareness of my surroundings.
$50 bucks? I bought two batteries for $4 each from China and they came with sealant to recreate the waterproof seal.
This only works when you can open the earphones and the battery is not soldered (my hands are not so steady not to fuck anything up)
I'm looking at waterproof bone conduction headphones to use in the hot tub, clearly you like yours, are they waterproof too?
I find it funny that people seek special overpriced "bone conducting" earbuds when they already normally do that when sounds vibrate your fucking ear drums.
The purpose of bone conducting earphones is that they don't obstruct your ears, so you can still hear everything around you with virtually no distortion.
Any good recommendations? I want to purchase a premium one.
I've only ever tried a pair of Aftershokz (though I think they're rebranded to just Shokz now), and they were pretty decent. I only listened to about 5 minutes worth of music, but the quality was pretty good, though it felt ever so slightly radio-y; not that I could hear static or anything, but just that there were some missing tones on the higher and lower ends, like I wasn't getting the full spectrum of sound that I should've been getting. But it's hard to tell if that's because I'm just so used to traditional earphones that go for sound isolation or if that's just expected fidelity loss through bone conduction, and I don't have any other experiences to compare that to, unfortunately. This was also quite a few years ago, so the tech may have improved since then, too.
I liked 'em, I thought they were pretty neat. If I worked in an office where I regularly had people come up for my attention or needed to clearly hear everything around me, I'd probably get a pair just for that purpose. Though personally, I still prefer earphones that offer some sort of sound isolation. The "openness" that you feel with the bone conductive phones is pretty cool, but I wouldn't want it for situations where I want to really focus on the music.
Replacing a single earbud is $49, and the case is another $49, so replacing all three batteries is $147, which at least for the regular model is close to buying new AirPods. It's pretty much a given that the repair costs more than the product is worth after a new model launches.
Apple also doesn't swap the batteries, they replace the earbuds completely, "recycling" otherwise fully intact earphones. Not sure about the case.
You're right that they probably last more than two years (that depends on a lot of factors though), and while features like adaptive charging hints that Apple doesn't want them to die quite as quickly, they still aren't designed to last and certainly aren't designed to be repairable.
I had to return my bone conduction headphones because it tickled my ears too much when I turned it up so loud that I could hear it over my bike machine. My wired headphones kept dying from my sweat, so I just ended up getting some waterproof-ish JBL in-ear headphones so I don't have to worry about destroying any of my wireless headphones.
My Gen 2s are 2 years old and I use them all day for meetings with a short charge around lunch. I don’t really pay attention to the battery and I’m using them for calls for about 6-8 hours.
Then I usually sleep with one in my ear and fall asleep to a podcast. I usually get a battery warning beep sometime between 3 and 6 am, and I go to bed at 10pm.
All in all, I treat these things like shit, I they’re in use for half the day, I leave the case on a hot ass MagSafe puck at night, and they’re still in really good shape. I just used them from a flight from CA to NY with no problems.
Like many, my first Gen vanilla AirPods were struggling after 2 years, but Apple seems to have figured out how to prolong these little batteries.