Impressions: AirPods Pro
I recently acquired these guys, and have a few comments.
There are plenty of reviews out on this aging product, so I leave it to others to go into the details.
Fit: Good in my ears with the largest tips, but one side doesn’t stabilize easily. I’ve found that pushing the little tail near my cheek does the trick. My other/older IEMs often fit better, to include my Sony WF-XB700 above in this thread.
Ear Tips: Apple uses a weird oval “Tupperware” snap on ring for the silicone tips. These create a much larger opening than a standard cylindrical IEM tube, but are quirky. When I swapped the factory M tips for L tips, one side came off easily. The other side required a lot of tugging, and I thought I’d tear the silicone. The proprietary design also prevents the use of my other tips.
Sound quality: “Good” and “typical” of Bluetooth products. They are clean and smooth, but suffer from common characteristics in this genre: not much high range, no feeling of space or openness, and excessive bass. I was surprised that the tone was pretty similar to my much cheaper Sony WF-XB700, not that different from my boomy over-ear Sony noise cancelling headphones, nor my very old BeatsX neck collar IEMs. Many manufacturers seem to be aiming for a mainstream, people pleasing, warm and thick, easy on the ears profile.
Noise Cancelling: WOWOWOW! These are really good versus my old generation Bose and Sony over ear airplane headphones. My older products do a good job with droning background noises, such as airplane hiss and train rumble, but not with isolated and distinct sounds. In contrast, these AirPods Pro do a decent job with voices…err…making my wife silent when speaking to me…err… The button on each tail toggles between noise cancelling and ‘transparent’ mode, which is useful when interacting with other people or when needing to hear oncoming traffic.
Apple Ecosystem: WOWOWOW! These pair with my MacBook Pro, iPhone, and Watch. It’s trivially easy to shift between devices, sometimes with no drop outs or just a second of silence. I’d never considered using IEMs with my MacBook before, but these make sense sometimes. [Apple Music is sometimes bonkers, but that’s another story.]
Charging Case: Good battery life and has wireless charging, but the rounded bottom makes them tricky to use. I want lay them down and stick in the IEMs…the case snaps shut on me. The round bottom doesn’t stand up and the flip top gets closed by a table/desk. Bad, obviously bad.
Overall: Good product for Apple users, and often on sale for <$175 now. There are rumors of a new edition coming out this fall, so do not pay full $250 retail.