Unpopular Opinion
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This is a bit of a mix of rules 4 and 5 to help foster higher quality posts. You are expected to defend your unpopular opinion in the post body. We don't expect a whole manifesto (please, no manifestos), but you should at least provide some details as to why you hold the position you do.
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I agree with the fact that I don't need one anymore. Bluetooth connections (MULTIPLE simultaneous connections) is great for me.
Why are you guys still using corded headphones on mobile? Is everyone an audiophile but somehow also using mobile phone as a primary media device? Allergic to charging? Too cheap to upgrade your gear? What is the use case that makes this an unpopular opinion? I'm not saying use USB C instead, I'm saying ditch the physical connections altogether.
Edit: If the answer is "I don't have the money" that's a reasonable answer. If it's "wired is just better" that's a questionable statement.
Because my car requires an expensive trip to the dealer to update the Bluetooth to be compatible with my phone.
I would love to ditch the wires. But I can't afford to.
If your stereo has an aux port, I use one of these in my car: https://a.co/d/gvwFs9y
I've tried something like that in the past and found them less reliable than the FM transmitters. But I suppose that was a while ago and maybe the tech has changed enough that the affordable ones work well.
Still not willing to spend twenty dollars on cheap plastic when that money could be spent on 2 days of food or something that I don't already have a cheap solution for. I paid less than $10 for this cord over a decade ago and it still works fine.
Yeah the Bluetooth is convenient, but I don't think forcing people to that platform is a solution. Also Bluetooth still has inherent issues. It's never 100%. My audio doesn't hiccup or start cutting out unless I unplug or damage my wire. I've never accidentally plugged the wire into someone else's speaker. I don't have to reset, or look up passwords for my wire before I can plug it in.
Oh, for sure. I use a wired connection everywhere I care about sound quality. You just said you would like to ditch the wires and I thought I would provide a semi-inexpensive way to do so.
So more specifically then the perspective is that if you had to choose between new phone and car Bluetooth you choose new phone yes?
Not being judgey but rather trying to understand.
I brought my stereo in the car with me back in the day that I couldn't do the upgrade from cassette built in to new CD player but we all have different preferences for sound I suppose.
In the previous car I used a cassette adapter to plug in my phone.
I live check to check. I can't afford a new phone, a trip to the dealer or a new stereo.
My preference for sound is that I would rather pay rent and eat food than waste money on technology to remove the wires. Sure it would be nice, but lots of nice things are just not affordable.
Fair enough.
It seems to me that, if money were no object, it makes sense generally to go wireless. We don't all have to agree on that point, which I guess is the whole topic.
Money IS an object and not everyone can full replace for every new technology, but in the long run audio tech has gone through several wholesale changes. The pace of those changes are driven by what is profitable I suppose, so really it's a question of how long to hold back. It certainly seems like we are on the cusp of a changeover.
Choosing isn't really an option for poor people. My phone was over 5 years old, unsupported, and the battery stopped charging. I was forced to get a new phone. I didn't choose to.
My car was what I could afford after my last car needed more work than it's bluebook value for the 3rd time that year. I had to get a 'new' car, and it's very used. I didn't get to look for a car that had great audio options. Hell it doesn't even have 4 working speakers.
My preference is for the highest quality.
My reality is that wired audio works all the time and it's affordable.
This is totally reasonable.
If the issue is money, we can just say "support aux bc a large population can't afford to swap," a lot of this thread seems to be poverty masquerading as purism. It's the purism I can't understand.
Sorry, but that comes off as a bit arrogant. There's still plenty of use cases for wired connections.
Older cars that either have aux or still need a tape deck adapter, that don't have Bluetooth.
Until recently, you couldn't use wireless headphones on planes.
On top of that, there's vanishingly few USB C to headphone adapters that also allow you to charge your phone, so if you're using wired headphones, and you need to charge your phone, you have to stop listening, in order to plug in to charge.
There's a lot of compromises and trade offs.
I'm not saying that one is definitely better or not, there's a thousands of ways to connect everything that works. Not every solution is going to work for every person and every use case.
I get what you're saying, but no. Just no.
It seems to me that it is ALL tradeoffs but it's hard for me to see why people would have a preference for wired connection (EDIT: FOR MOBILE PHONES) except for financial constraints. If that's the motivator, the odds that you have an old, really nice pair of wired headphones that came with the stereo adapter for airplanes seems small. OR you fly so much that you bought the adapter to use your own headphones which also seems like not in the spirit. I suppose latency could be an issue in some cases, but that is constantly improving as bluetooth improves.
It seems like middle-man adapters (just like the tape deck adapter) and wireless charging are the answers here. Nobody wants to be the adapter guy, but the groups that we are talking about in these wired cases are becoming a minority position.
You can't still buy new cars with 8 track players, or with cassette decks, or for some makes even CD players. Not everyone can afford to make the upgrades, but does that mean we keep putting accessibility options for these things in new cars for the people who still use them? For a little while yes, but eventually no. And I think we're on the cusp of that. Outside of vinyl, it is strange to me to see vociferous opinions about phasing out particular technologies.
I can only give you examples from my thoughts when I was faced with this dilemma and what I did about it.
Simply: wired headphones don't need to be charged. Having "true wireless" (aka airpod style) headphones, you need to stop listening to charge your headphones, which seems unnecessary to me, and I'm worried it would happen at inopportune times; I'm pretty bad with keeping things consistently charged, I usually charge them, toss them in a bag then promptly forget about them for a few months until I need them, and with some stuff, that means it's dead by the time I pick it up again. Not a problem with wired headphones.
My car also is pretty old, not tape deck old, but the Bluetooth in the car is still Bluetooth 2.0, which isn't the most energy efficient.
So when I got a phone with no headphone jack, I set out to solve a few things. Among those things: if it's wireless, I need to be able to charge while listening, and output to my car's aux, and an unpowered/wired headphone.
My solution to the dilemma came in the form of a device from Fiio, the BTR5. Basically the BTR5 is a Bluetooth headphone jack. It just connects over bt and outputs to a 3.5 (or 2.5 balanced) jack. It charges by USB C, and can charge while listening and it's actually designed to do that. It has a "car mode" that will turn on/off the device depending on whether it is receiving power or not, so it will come on when you turn on your car by hooking it up to your vehicle semi permanently.
Now, I can charge my phone, and my BTR5 while I'm listening, giving me practically infinite use time. I have a small collection of IEMs that I can toss in a bag and it doesn't matter if my BTR5 is dead or not, since I can charge it with my battery bank that holds a charge longer than other battery powered things I have.
On top of that, the BTR5 can also playback via USB. Aside from that, I also picked up a USB C charge/listen dongle as a backup and that works with my IEMs, or any other 3.5mm headphone or aux connection.
I also have a direct USB C to headphone adapter that came with one of my smartphones. Between all of my options I have never needed to make any compromises on when I listen to music or how I want to listen.
I also have some fully Bluetooth headsets, my favorite is from trekz, which mainly makes bone conduction headsets; i mainly only use that one headset but I do have others that I don't pick up very often.
I find that most consumer Bluetooth headsets cannot be charged while in use. Even if you can physically plug in the charger while wearing them so it should be able to do both, I usually find that they will turn themselves off while charging. The trekz are not immune to this. I like them mainly for the bone conduction, but because of their inability to charge while in use, I tend to put them on the charger the night before I plan to use them.
I just throw my BTR5 in my bag with a few sets of IEMs, and my USB to headphone adapters. I have my power bank in my bag all the time as well (along with a USB C charger, which powers/charges my phone, laptop, power bank, BTR5, etc).
I don't know what other people's requirements are, but I found my solution. I won't throw any shade at anyone who has different requirements, nor uses their tech differently. My solution isn't your solution. I'm happy with my setup, and it works really well for me. I can put in my IEMs, wire up my BTR5 and listen as long as I like, when the BTR runs low on batteries I can stuff my battery bank in my pocket and plug it in to charge and have no interruption in my listening. I can also just plug the BTR5 into my computer by USB C and it will connect as an audio device over USB C and I can get my computer audio over my headphones without needing to unplug them.
I hope that fills in some gaps for you, I'm certain my use is not the only use cases that require a 3.5mm jack, and I know I have more significant demands than most (otherwise airpods wouldn't be popular). So I know I'm in a minority, and that's fine.
Let me know if you have any questions, or comments. Take care.
Wireless charging exists, but i still agree with you because that's still not a fully standard feature.