AirPods Max Review: An Audiophile's Perspective

Are Apple's new $550 AirPods Max any good? As reluctant audiophiles, we give the most in-depth review yet! iFixit made new TINY driver kits and they're under $20! https://ifix.gd/snazzy Buy AirPods Max - https://geni.us/fe9gB Buy AirPods Pro - https://geni.us/gAUVN4 Buy AirPods - https://geni.us/wCtapZr Buy Sony WH-1000XM4 - https://geni.us/24Wsq Buy Bose 700 - https://geni.us/Dj2Oqe Buy B&W PX7 - https://geni.us/VysPY Buy HiFiMAN Ananda-BT - https://geni.us/nC7VuTW Chapters: 0:00 - Background 0:49 - Comfort/Fit 3:40 - Controls 4:45 - Case/Portability 6:46 - Battery 7:42 - Repairability/Teardown 9:40 - The Good Stuff 9:56 - Active Noise Cancelling 12:22 - Transparency Mode 13:26 - "Off" Mode 13:48 - Bluetooth Codecs 16:48 - The $35 Cable 19:09 - Objective SQ 20:08 - Subjective SQ 21:44 - Spatial Audio 22:36 - Digital Signal Processor (DSP) 23:51 - vs Sony 1000XM4 24:10 - vs B&W PX7 24:30 - AirPods vs The Competition 25:08 - The Problem with AirPods Pro 26:09 - Should You Buy Them? Crinacle measurements: https://crinacle.com/2020/12/17/apple... LDAC’s problems: https://www.soundguys.com/ldac-ultima... Bluetooth headphone codecs: https://www.soundguys.com/the-ultimat... AirPods Case design interview: https://translate.google.com/translat... Subscribe to my podcast Flashback! - http://relay.fm/flashback Follow Snazzy Labs on Twitter -   / snazzyq   Follow me on Instagram -   / snazzyq   The Apple AirPods Max have been released to much fanfare. At a colossal $550, it puts itself way above the competition like the very popular Sony WH-1000XM4, Bowers & Wilkins PX7, and the Bose 700; however, it's still a bit shy of what the hi-fi market would expect in terms of pricing. Are they good? Yes. Quite good, in fact. But are they good enough to warrant their price tag? Watch our comprehensive AirPods Max review to find out.