It was an unfair comparison of course, because I hadn’t done the same test at home. I played these two:įorever Young (Joan Baez) - Forever Young - Joan Baez - YouTubeīoth Sides Now (Joni Mitchell) - Joni Mitchell - Both Sides, Now - YouTube I didn’t have Netflix access there, and of course my music wasn’t on their floor model, so I tested with YouTube songs. It was noisier there of course, so it wasn’t a perfect comparison.Īnyway, I tested on the same model. I went over to Yodobashi Camera, the giant electronics store in Akihabara this afternoon, to try to compare speakers. It’s so nice and fast otherwise compared to my 2013 MBP. I really don’t want to return it at this point. I just want to confirm it’s not just my new MBP and then I’ll be ok with using one of the equalizers I guess. It all sounds fine on my iPad Pro 2021 but that might be because it’s less bass. I notice I can’t hear high pitch alert tones on my Watch so I have it set to haptic. Yes, I just wrote that might be the case. I’m going to try (if my dog lets me) to go over to an electronics store today and see if I can hear a store model. What I’m really curious is whether my MBP is an outlier, or if that’s just the way they are. So I tend to think it’s the speaker’s fault. Still… the songs and voices on videos all sound find on my iPad Pro. And I can’t really hear high pitch alerts on my Watch, so I set it to haptic. Somebody mentioned this might be due to loss of high frequency sensitivity with aging. I had my partner check with some Japanese song this morning and he thinks without eqMac it’s just slightly muffled in the voice, but nicer with eqMac.Īs mentioned, I’m having an issue with eqMac and Facetime, but the developer is looking at it on Discord. I find either Spoken Word or Vocal Booster do much the same thing. I guess sound clarity is a very subjective thing. I have it in the menu bar and will flick it on when needed but i doubt I’ll use it much. The Spoken Word setting simple pulls down the 32hz bass tone and slightly boosts the mid-high tones (500-2k). I found it closely reflected what I would have expected and have no issue with it. I downloaded and installed eqMac and set it to Spoken Word. On YouTube, the voice overs are perhaps a little too spacial - sounds like a bit of a gap in the middle field and the bass is a little heavy. This is particularly noticeable with the human voice but much less so with music.Ī piece of music can sound fine even though you might not be hearing all of the sounds being produced – you just won’t know which sounds you are missing – but not hearing the high frequencies of a speaking or singing voice can make it immediately difficult to understand and therefore “muddied,” “muffled” or otherwise unclear. The reason is that since over the years I am progressively hearing fewer high frequencies, the ones I still do hear are drowned out by the low frequencies, which sound more pronounced to me. I have the same problem with my MBP 16-in 2019, whose speakers sound much boomier than previous models. The fact that an equalizer made the speakers sound acceptable to you makes me think you may not be taking into account the possible effect of high-frequency hearing loss, which of course varies among individuals from non-existent to profound. I think I saw a review that said the 14’s speakers aren’t quite as nice as the 16’s (due to the machine size), but it shouldn’t make that much of a difference and should be worlds better than your ancient MBP.ĭon’t others find the new speakers muffling and annoying? Am I the only one? It could be yours is defective, except you did say using an equalizer fixed it, so maybe it’s just the way they sound to you. I don’t heard the muddling you talk about. So because of my use case I may not be the best judge of audio quality, but the new speakers sound fine to me – voices aren’t super loud, but they are clear. I generally listen to audiobooks when I use my AirPods or when I’ve driving. Though if I did, I’d probably use a HomePod or my AirPods. (I won’t travel with the 16" Mac – I have a lighter MB Air for traveling.) I find the iPad form factor better suited for movies, though a laptop could work fine if I didn’t have the iPad. I have a big TV for movies, though when I travel I’ll use my 12.9" iPad. The last movie I made I filmed with a Connectix QuickTake. (I’d love to do some video stuff, but I’m decades behind on that. Writing and software development, some graphic design. What do you use it for then? Just curious.
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