One of the advantages of Apple Music is lossless playback of songs. Despite streaming with the format, AirPods Pro cannot reproduce audio without loss of quality, making it necessary to use a wired headset to enjoy the benefit. Now, the engineer from the acoustics team at appleEsge Andersen, explained the reasons behind the limitation.
The details were revealed in an interview with what hifi🇧🇷 During the conversation, editor Kashfia Kabir asked about the impossibility of listening to HiFi audios from the streaming platform with Apple headphones. And, on that point, I agree with her: this situation gets more complicated to understand with each new generation.
Andersen made no bones about the reasons behind the feature’s absence. To the journalist, the engineer stated that it is still possible to “make great progress without changing the codec”, even with a focus on quality. Later, he stressed that “the codec choice we have today is more about reliability”.
“So it’s about creating something robust in all environments,” he concluded. “We want to improve the sound quality and we can do that with many other elements. We don’t think the codec is currently the limitation of audio quality on Bluetooth products.”
Apple Music Lossless not working on AirPods Pro
The engineer’s explanation makes sense, but is not completely satisfying.
Apple really takes time to deliver some technological innovation. However, when this change is rolled out to products, the manufacturer usually implements it in a more robust way.
The iPhone notch is an example. The company took years to abandon it. But when he made that decision, he implemented Dynamic Island on iPhone 14 Pro🇧🇷 So Apple made use of an area of the screen that would otherwise be dead.
However, you need to consider two things.
First, there are already some codecs for HiFi audio via Bluetooth, such as LDAC, MQair and aptX Lossless, on the market. And Apple, so far, hasn’t brought any of them to its wireless headphones.
Okay, Apple can come up with its own standard. But here comes the second consideration: why is Apple Music lossless if I can’t use Apple’s own equipment to enjoy the benefit? And how am I going to use the HiFi outside the Mac comfortably?
In the end, not even the very expensive AirPods Max is compatible with the format🇧🇷
During the conversation, Andersen said that Apple is open to change. But the feeling is different.
Apple unveiled the AirPods Pro 2 in September🇧🇷 The new generation has brought some increments, but there are almost no changes from the previous model. In addition, the phone still does not support lossless, preventing the playback of HiFi songs through Apple Music.
Meanwhile, the competition has already started to improve their headphones. It is the case of Galaxy Buds 2 Pro, which brings the Samsung Seamless Codec (SSC) HiFi codec and battery for up to 29 hours of use. Of course, it’s still not very useful, but we can already say that it’s a product ready for this new market need.
https://tecnoblog.net/noticias/2022/11/25/engenheiro-da-apple-explica-por-que-airpods-pro-nao-tem-audio-lossless/