8 Things You Should Know About Apple’s $ 900 AirPods Max Earbuds

Apple’s new AirPods Max noise-canceling headphones are launching into a competitive market dominated by companies like Bose, Sennheiser, and Sony.

The $ 900 price tag is unapologetically high-end, as is the design and performance promised – Apple is introducing the AirPods Max as much more than just a couple of cans for frequent fliers.

If anything, it’s the ultimate expression of Apple’s embrace of music, which began in 2001 with the launch of iTunes and the iPod.

This also makes the AirPods Max pure bait for those who have already invested heavily in the Apple ecosystem.

With the AirPods Max on sale now, before they hit stores later this month, here’s what you need to know about Apple’s on-ear headphones.

Yes, they cost $ 900

The list price of the ‌AirPods Max‌ in the US is $ 549, although the sales tax increases immediately depending on where you buy them.

By the time they land in Australia and get our standard GST of 10% added, the decal rises to $ 899.

Of course, this is much more, even double the price, than equivalent high-end headphones from rivals.

Featured audio features

Naturally, Apple is breathlessly improving the audio quality and technology of the AirPods Max, so we won’t repeat that here.

Suffice it to say, the main features include similar active noise cancellation and ‘transparency mode’ like the AirPods Pro and competing headphones.

There is also ‘spatial audio’ which the company says “places sounds virtually anywhere in a space” to deliver “an immersive theater-like experience for content recorded in 5.1, 7.1 and Dolby Atmos.” of “Adaptive EQ” for real. Low and mid frequency timing adjustment based on the fit and sealing of the pads.

Prepare for a delay

Apple’s AirPods Max come in five colors: silver, space gray, sky blue, pink, and green. But the limited supply plus the popularity of the lighter, brighter colors will come into play if you hope to place them under the Christmas tree.

At the time of writing, the silver and space gray models will ship just before Christmas, but go for blue and you’ll see mid-January.

(Interestingly, for some colors, selecting the free engraving option moves the delivery date a few days earlier.)

Retro design

There will be no confusion between the AirPods Max with any other make or model of headphones.

The colors, the elongated large earcups, the stainless steel frame and telescopic headband arms, the lightweight ‘breathable knit mesh’ canopy that connects the earbuds, and the Apple Watch-inspired crown to control playback, calls phone calls and the invocation of Siri: it’s all Apple, amplified one notch.

In fact, if we were to guess, we’d say that the AirPods Max were created by Marc Newson, who previously worked at Apple and has now set up a store with fellow Apple design guru Sir Jonny Ive.)

Replacement ear pads

Heavy use of hearing aids can cause the ear pads to wear out, and in most cases this means too expensive a repair or resigning yourself to buying new hearing aids when the ones you have still work perfectly well.

The design of Apple AirPods Max incorporates memory foam ear cushions that magnetically adhere to the earbuds, making it easy to change on the track.

Replacement cushions are now listed on Apple’s website (though not shipped) for $ 99 in silver, black, green, blue, and red.

20 hour battery life, but with BYO charger

Apple claims the AirPods Max’s battery life is up to 20 hours “with active noise cancellation and spatial audio enabled.”

The supplied ‘Smart Case’ puts the earbuds in a low power state to conserve battery charge when not in use, though unlike smaller AirPods this case does not recharge the battery.

To do this, you will need to plug the supplied Lightning to USB-C cable into a non-supplied USB-C charger.

Any useful 18W to 20W power adapter will not only suffice, but it will also give you a quick charge boost giving you 90 minutes of listening time with just five minutes of juice.

Something else you’ll want to consider: At 384 grams, the AirPods Max are heavier than rivals from Bose, Sony, and Sennheiser, which weigh 227g (for the Sennheiser PXC 550-II), 254g (Sony WH-1000XM4). and 310 g (Bose Quiet Comfort 35 II).

Grams are small units, and a difference of, say, 100g won’t seem like much on paper.

But in your head, and for hours on end, it can detract from overall comfort.

Perhaps to counteract this, Apple says the canopy “is made to distribute weight and reduce pressure on the head.”

What the cut didn’t make …

The ‌AirPods Max‌ have been in development for some time, during which time it was rumored that they would be called AirPods Studio in a nod to their high-end audio features.

But it wasn’t just the name that was removed – several expected features that were previously reported are missing in this 1.0 version.

They included

• interchangeable headbands and helmets
• touch controls on the sides of the headphones
• Automatically switch the left and right audio channels based on how you use the headphones (no need to orient them for L and R cups, just put them on and let the technician do the rest)
• a cheaper ‘sport’ variant

Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman suggests that many of these were euthanized in order to release the headphones in the run-up to Christmas, saying that “it appears they made some changes to these to get them out the door, as deemed likely after various developments. setbacks in recent months. “

This points to at least some of those features appearing in a 2021 edition of AirPods Max‌.