I switched to AirPods (Pros and Max) and a lot of my issues dissapeared.
Honestly it's a shame because the audio quality on the XM3 was better than the Airpod Pro but the software is just not there.
The AirPods aren't perfect either of course, but it's a night and day difference between the reliability of them vs the Sony.
I found the Sony was extra bad when there was either a busy area or if I took out just one ear. Often I'd start dropping connectivity to one ear and then they'd just crap out altogether till I reset them.
The only issue I had with them was that I recently tried to connect them to a Mac that wasn't in my iCloud. It is possible to do a non-iCloud paired direct bluetooth connection with them and this worked. But ~1 week later they suddenly disappeared from my main iCloud account. I'll not try that again.
The one thing that really does piss me off about the XM3 is that the buttons are too sensitive - if I'm wearing a hood, the slightest brush against the headphones acts like a push of the button. I have to remember on rainy/windy days to turn the buttons off completely.
That said I’ve gone back to plugging in the XM3s in an attempt to take advantage of Apple’s lossless music.
[0] Unless you try to make a call using the microphone, when it switches to a low quality codec, but are there any Bluetooth headsets that don't have this issue?
Yes. The recently released Bose QC45 headphones do not have this issue. I don’t know what they did to stop it, but it’s not present.
It’s very solid in mine
I also guess they have tested it on many different persons but not my type of ears.
(I see many people with same ethnicity as me complain about it ;-)
The Headset profile's audio codecs are hot garbage. Any time your device uses the microphone it switches to this and audio quality turns to mud.
Until they come up with a high definition profile for mic and audio, wired headsets will always have a place.
I sometimes really struggle to understand others when they are using wireless units. It is AM quality at best, like 5 to 8Khz bandwidth.
That is not so bad frankly. But, couple it with cell phone call audio codecs and it is a mess.
Unless Apple or Samsung is using a proprietary protocol between their headsets and handsets, they pretty much are. You'll even notice the degradation of quality if you use your Mic on a Mac or PC.
I've never seen a Bluetooth device that simultaneously supports two active profiles so you could stream audio over A2DP and capture mic over the headset profile. Even if such a beast existed, I doubt devices would know how to handle it.
Sounds like they are broken. I have XM3s. The batteries last for a very long time, something like 12h with noise cancellation on. I've never had an issue with the speakers turning on or off individually.
> Always have trouble with voice quality on calls too.
Their mic is their biggest weakness. It's pretty bad.
I don’t know how good they’d be for your use-case, but definitely worth considering the mx4 as distinct from the mx3.
edit: xm4 not mx4. Shows how little I care about headphones :-D
I have a good pair (WF-1000XM3) because my phone doesn't have an audio jack and they are always a pain. They connect to the wrong device frequently, the battery life is barely a few hours and the sound quality is ok. Always have trouble with voice quality on calls too. Often only one headphone will turn on but not the other. They are supposedly easier to carry because no cords, but they are harder because I need to carry two things (case + headphones) most of the time instead of one. Given how low the battery life is, carrying the case is essential
In contrast, my wired headphones are 100x easier - i plug them in and they work. It takes less time than fiddling with bluetooth and they are 100% reliable.