Comment by pdabbadabba
3 years ago
> a home cinema will obviously deliver better sound.
Will it, though? Of course you could build a home theater with better sound, but I'd bet that the spatial audio built into AirPods delivers better sound that most peoples' home theater setups (which is generally just a TV with built in sound or a mediocre soundbar).
I don’t think we are at a point in human technology where any noise-cancelling headphones sound better than cheap wired counterparts… they feel amazing by rather deceptive engineering, but it only lasts until you go back to standard non-cancelling speakers.
Except those people who have "mediocre soundbars" can't afford buying a $3.5K VR headset. And those who have a spare budget of $3.5K to enhance their TV watching experience will invest the money on a better TV and a surround speaker setup.
I want an IMAX viewing experience with booming surround effects and I only have time to watch when the kids are all in bed. Compared with a house large enough to have a dedicated sound-proof theatre room, $3500 doesn’t sound too expensive.
Also not everyone lives in a house, I’m sure Manhattan condo owners can afford the price of the theatre gear, but cannot afford the space required for them to be used optimally. Wealthy people don’t all live in mansions.
You can't get a "booming" sound without a sub.
> Except those people who have "mediocre soundbars" can't afford buying a $3.5K VR headset.
There are many many people for whom money is not the limiting factor. It's because they don't have the space, the technical wherewithal to set it up, the motivation to make it happen, or some combination of all three.
I think you might be over-extrapolating your own POV. I have a mediocre soundbar and can afford the Vision Pro. I'm not likely to upgrade my soundbar anytime soon (I don't really care), but I'm very likely to buy a Vision Pro.
can't imagine people will only be buying it for movie watching.
For the price of a single Apple Vision Pro, I can buy a 65” 4K TV, a Dolby Atmos surround-sound system from Sonos, and still have a bit left over.
And you’ll need a Vision Pro for each person watching.
Like I said, "you could build a home theater with better sound." But most people haven't and won't. It requires time, technical expertise, and a lot of space. And with that you only get a home theater. And you can't travel with it (I love the idea of using one on a plane).
But I'm sympathetic to the social-watching issue. I don't love the idea of watching movies in a headset while my wife sits next to me on the sofa doing something else (or even watching the same movie on a screen). But I also don't love the idea of buying two. (And that's without even thinking about larger families.)
I think home theater will be a big part of the appeal, but it won't succeed if replacing a home theater is the only thing it does well.
There's also a physical limit on bass sound from small head speakers. Much of bass sound is felt in the chest as much as in the ear, and the little speakers on the device are limited there. iPods are the same of course, and they do okay with sound, but we accept a lot of limitations on portable devices.
Note that 65" is very different from 100" and most people's movie experience at home is far too small relative to the directors' intents.
The Sonos w/ sub + rear surrounds and an 85" OLED TV with these latencies will put you in the price point of this thing.
If you're apart, both people would need a room, TV, and Sonos system to share the experience. So each has that "need one per person" problem depending whether colocated or not.
I'm more excited to use this for games and VRChat. My Valve Index needs my whole gaming desktop to power it which is actually pretty much the price of an Apple Vision Pro.
Yes, but all you’ll have is a big smart tv. Visio pro does a few things a TV doesn’t.
If someone can afford the Vision Pro, I don't think buying a TV is going to be a problem for them, and they almost certainly already have one.
Can you take all that with you anywhere you go though?
Home cinema implies (to me anyway) a true surround setup and not some crappy soundbar.
You can’t replicate true surround sound with stereo headphones. You can with binaural audio but that requires specialized recordings. I’m sure spatial audio sounds cool but it’s not true surround sound.
And then there’s the problem of low frequencies. You can’t beat a subwoofer.
Of course it will. This is basic physics.
> Of course it will. This is basic physics.
But does everyone have the space/room dimensions to have a proper surround sound setup? Pesky physics restrict you here as well.
The average American or British living room with even a cheap surround system is going to run rings around anything in-ear or on-ear.
There's many reasons that people warn newbies not to mix or master on cans and to use speakers.
For people who care about going beyond stereo, budget is going to be a much larger problem for most folks than space or technical knowhow. And anybody who cares about going beyond stereo probably cares about quality.