Early AirPods Max teardown reveals massive drivers, strategically placed logic boards
Repair specialist iFixit on Thursday began its customary teardown of Apple's latest piece of hardware, AirPods Max, to find logic boards and large drivers fighting for space in crammed aluminum ear cups.
As with prior Apple device disassemblies, iFixit kicked the process off with an X-ray of the new headphone model. Conducted by Creative Electron, the resulting image reveals what at first glance appears to be a spacious interior with electronics arranged in each shell's outer periphery. Upon closer inspection, however, allotted space within the svelte aluminum cups is at a premium.
Apple opted to incorporate both battery cells in one ear cup. How engineers counterbalanced the added weight is at this point unknown. The X-ray also shows the drivers' massive dual-ring magnet motor, Apple's "revolutionary" ear cup positioning mechanism, an array of alignment magnets, circuitry and internal screws.
A look inside provides a glimpse at two discrete logic boards, one for each ear cup. The identification process is ongoing, but iFixit found a number of chips common to both boards including an FPGA as well as what appears to be the H1 chip and power management silicon.
Apple introduced the H1 with a second-generation AirPods model in 2019. In AirPods Max, the chip boasts 10 audio cores and is responsible for active noise cancelling, adaptive computational audio and Bluetooth communications, among other duties.
The repair company plans to continue its teardown over the coming days and will assign a "repairability" score when the process is complete.
Apple debuted AirPods Max earlier this month as a luxury over-the-ear headphone that pairs the company's trademark minimalist styling with cutting edge technology. Sensors and microphone arrays packed within the two ear cups inform the two H1 chips for ANC and advanced operations like Spatial Audio.
Priced at $549, AirPods Max is in hot demand for the holidays. Those looking to snag a pair before Christmas might find stock at a nearby Apple Store, though availability is scarce.
As with prior Apple device disassemblies, iFixit kicked the process off with an X-ray of the new headphone model. Conducted by Creative Electron, the resulting image reveals what at first glance appears to be a spacious interior with electronics arranged in each shell's outer periphery. Upon closer inspection, however, allotted space within the svelte aluminum cups is at a premium.
Apple opted to incorporate both battery cells in one ear cup. How engineers counterbalanced the added weight is at this point unknown. The X-ray also shows the drivers' massive dual-ring magnet motor, Apple's "revolutionary" ear cup positioning mechanism, an array of alignment magnets, circuitry and internal screws.
A look inside provides a glimpse at two discrete logic boards, one for each ear cup. The identification process is ongoing, but iFixit found a number of chips common to both boards including an FPGA as well as what appears to be the H1 chip and power management silicon.
Apple introduced the H1 with a second-generation AirPods model in 2019. In AirPods Max, the chip boasts 10 audio cores and is responsible for active noise cancelling, adaptive computational audio and Bluetooth communications, among other duties.
The repair company plans to continue its teardown over the coming days and will assign a "repairability" score when the process is complete.
Apple debuted AirPods Max earlier this month as a luxury over-the-ear headphone that pairs the company's trademark minimalist styling with cutting edge technology. Sensors and microphone arrays packed within the two ear cups inform the two H1 chips for ANC and advanced operations like Spatial Audio.
Priced at $549, AirPods Max is in hot demand for the holidays. Those looking to snag a pair before Christmas might find stock at a nearby Apple Store, though availability is scarce.
Comments
Remove the local tax and that's 648 USD.
AirPods Max at apple.com is rn: 549 USD.
If buying them from the Hong Kong store (no v.a.t.) they are 593 USD.
So, if you're in Sweden and need to buy enough Apple stuff (assuming it's not within like a corporation/valid business expense) you could get a "free" one week vacation in some other country simply by buying your stuff while there.
As a comparison you can look at the HomePod and the HomePod mini; which absolutely share a certain level of ancestry, but where the mini in no way simply is just a full HomePod with a few parts removed.
And from a business perspective a "much cheaper" (depending on any hyperbole in that usage, ofc) product simply doesn't fit with their current line of products. Unless we start to see a much clearer main/pro-divide (incl. in pricing) among the Apple sound products there's just no fit for a cheaper AP Max; and it makes even less sense in light of Apple still needing to devote full production to fulfilling the AP Max orders.
Even the current naming of their different AirPods would make it a bit awkward with a new cheaper OE option… like… we have the regular, the pro, the max, and… what?? AirPods light? (Which would make the "light" the second heaviest option.)
Unless Apple is willing to royally piss off all the AirPods Max buyers, by revamping the whole line within the first half of 2021, I don't see a cheaper OE option anytime soon.
(Personally I do think that considering the hints of where things are heading the internals of the AirPods Max might actually run at a risk of being a touch outdated for such a major launch of a, to the average buyer, expensive product; and I'm very curious to see what the lifecycle will be like for these, and how the hardware will fit in with their continuing work with AR. Like why the heck is there no UWB chip to help with exact positioning? Shouldn't they at least have slapped a U1 in there to future-proof them; or is there such a disconnect between the internal departments that AP Max users will find them obsolete, within the greater Apple ecosystem, after just a year? )
Apple has told use several times that they want to make technology "disappear". These have great battery management and it would seem pointless to have a clunky switch with little to no function. (Incoming Samsung ad mocking no on/off switch before copying themselves?)
I've gotten over the price of these things for a few reasons. First of all I see them as being sufficiently different than anything on the market, to the point of being a new product category - "smart headphones" with lots of bells and whistles. Secondly, I think Apple put a lot of thought into the pricing and didn't just pull a number out of their ass. Setting the price high puts the Max on a pedestal and conveys a sense of exclusivity and luxury that makes it an aspirational acquisition. This meant that the build quality and feature set built into the product by Apple had to be impeccable. Other than the derision about the appearance of the case, the product itself seems to be living up to the high expectations that Apple has created.
Finally, throughout Apple's history and with few exceptions they seem to be able to arrive at the price part of the 4P marketing mix on their products very well. In the past few years only the original HomePod comes to mind as a product that was probably priced too high out of the gate - and Apple permanently ratcheted the price down by 14% in response to something they must have learned from their sales data. Setting the right price on a product, especially one that is a discretionary purchase, is a very nontrivial exercise. It's not a case of simply applying a markup over cost to obtain a desired profit. The price has to factor into the whole marketing equation and the market that the product lives in. With a brand new and arguably market-defining product the price setting exercise is tougher still. But we can all rest assured that if Apple pooched this one, Apple, and all of us, will know about it pretty quickly. All signs so far are pointing to putting another one in the win column for Apple.
Unless we're talking a very rare reboot I don't even (manually) put anything into sleep mode; I simply just use my stuff, and put it down when I stop using it. At most I in a public environment lock the screen of my MBP (by moving the cursor to a hot corner) when leaving it.
People for some reason just have this irrational fear that headphones with a 20h battery will stop working midday if they don't fiddle with a switch when putting it down; and it's just silly. It's like fearing not having ended a modern smartphone phone call simply because you didn't physically put down a receiver on a physical rotary phone.