All right, so I got through most of the

day one or the day two videos of the

AirPods Max 2. And quite frankly, I

don't trust most of the reviews I saw,

and I've definitely seen a few of those

Apple Focus channels say that this is

the best overear headphones that they've

ever heard. That is BS, straight up. And

I've heard some other reviewers say that

they sound the same. Some of them say

that they sound much better. So, I was

like, "Oh man, I just really need to buy

my own." So, let's just get right into

it. I did have the original AirPods Max

with the lightning cable, but those were

outdated, so I ended up selling them a

while back. So, I was kind of excited to

check these out. I do want to start off

with the comfort because these are more

lifestyle headphones than like audio

file grade quality headphones. They're

meant to be taken out and about and to

be worn for a long period of time. And

man, have I never felt a headphone this

heavy. I forgot how heavy the original

ones were. If you are not used to these,

they'll take a few days to get used to.

I think you'll need to develop some

muscles in the back of your head. So,

that is definitely something to keep in

mind. But, as I did mention before, they

are really comfortable. Once they're on

your head, they kind of disappear. I do

feel that because these ear pads are not

really breathable, my ears do tend to

get a little bit hot, especially in the

South Florida heat here when I take

these outside or even when I'm just

wearing them for a while. And another

thing too, typically because these are

so heavy, you would start to feel a lot

of pressure on the top of your head.

You'll get what's called hot spots to

where you'll start to feel some pain on

the top of your head. You never really

feel that. This headband, they call it

the canopy design, does do a very good

job with that. But what also really

helps is the clamping force is

incredibly tight on these. And because

it's so tight, it's actually clamping to

the side of your head. it's not relying

so much of the pressure of the canopy

headband to keep it on your head. So,

the two of those in conjunction helps

make this a lot more comfortable than

you would expect, even though it is so

heavy. But, I do find that the clamping

force is a little bit too tight and I do

tend to get fatigued after wearing these

for a while. All right, it's been a few

days and I spent like 6 hours wearing

these headphones all day long and I got

to say it's really starting to hurt

around this area especially. It does get

a little bit heavy, which I did mention

before, but these aren't as comfortable

as I was thinking they would be. I'm

glad I spent a little bit of extra time

before just posting this video cuz I got

a little cuz I got a little extra time

to deal with the comfort. And I don't

think I could use this professionally.

Like if I was going to be doing working

on some project for like 6 hours

straight, after like 2 3 hours, I would

like to take a break from wearing these.

So overall, comfort is good and it's

also bad. I don't want to waste any

time. Let's just get into the sound

quality because that's mainly what most

of us care about. Overall, these sound

good. I don't have the AirPods Max ones

to compare them to. I was thinking about

buying a used copy from Best Buy or

something just so I could compare them,

but the moment I started listening to

these, these sound much better than the

Lightning versions that I've had before.

The new amp is definitely on notice

here. It is improving the bass and it's

definitely improving the highs.

Everything sounds more rich and more

full than what I remember from the

AirPods Max originals. Overall, I think

the bass is a bit more elevated. So,

Apple used to have like a really good

sound signature. Everybody has like

their own like house sound signature.

Sennheisers tend to be a bit more veil.

Sony's tend to have more of like a warm

rich speaker sound. You know, I could go

on and on. They all have like their

signature sound. Apples was always

fairly neutral with an emphasis on the

highs, especially when it comes to the

symbols. What they are doing now, they

are going for more of a V-shaped curve.

So, the bass is more pronounced more

than I'm used to. If you've seen some of

my other videos, I mentioned that I have

been getting much more accustomed to

more of a neutral sound profile than a

lot of the Vshape boommy bass with the

shrill highs, etc. So, coming back to

this, when I first got it, I was like,

"Oh, man. The bass is a bit elevated,

but not too much. The mids are a little

bit scooped, a little bit more recessed.

That's coming back to the whole Vshape

that I mentioned, but it's done well.

Still able to hear a lot of fine

details. I'll get some more nuances when

I start comparing against some of the

other headphones that I have here. But

they are nicely presented. And the

highs, I might have hinted that earlier.

These are probably the best highs that

I've heard from like a consumer-based

wireless headphone with noise cancelling

that's meant to be taken outside.

Symbols, I'm a sucker for crisp sounding

symbols on recordings, and this does

amazingly well, and that's something

that the AirPods Max one did as well,

too. The new amp is overall helping. I'm

not sure how much the H2 chip might be

helping with the processing, but it does

seem like it's doing a better job. But

maybe the H2 chip is helping with the

sound stage, which is what I want to

talk about next. And what that

essentially means is how open do these

sound? Do they just sound like they're

coming from headphones, or do they start

to sound like they're expanding beyond

that to where you could actually feel

like they're getting like a surround

sound effect? And thankfully, the sound

stage is incredibly wide on this. Among

the best that I've heard from a

closedback wireless headphone, which is

good because a lot of people will be

connecting these to like their MacBooks

or their iPads or even their iPhones to

watch like Netflix and movies and TV

shows, etc. This is a multi-purpose

headphone, not just for music. So, I

think Apple tuned these more to have a

more open and wide sound stage. And if

you know audio products, you might know

that the wider the sound stage usually

means the worse the overall sound

signature is. And while I won't say that

this suffers too much, I definitely feel

like Apple prioritize that more than

audio fidelity. All right. Wow. I hope

that didn't take too long cuz I need to

start comparing these to some of these

other headphones. Like the king here is

a Sennheiser HDB 630s. These kind of

came out of nowhere last year. without

sugar coating it. The Sennheisers are a

lot better. I was listening to them both

side by side on Bluetooth and both with

an iPhone, too. So, the Sennheisers are

already at a disadvantage cuz if you do

have Android, then you have access to

Qualcomm's Appex codecs. But because I

was only testing it on an iPhone,

because this is an Apple product, most

people will only be using it on Apple

products. But I also tested USB audio.

And once you start listening to it,

there's a lot more detail on the

Sennheisers from the bass to the mids.

The mids especially, that's when you

notice it the most. And even the highs,

I think they take the crown for being

the best overall sound quality for

general use headphone that's meant to be

taken out and about with noise

cancelling, etc. The overall bass is

much cleaner on this. This, like I said,

gets a tiny bit muddled. Not much.

Before I continue, let me just say that

these do sound good. And if you were

buying these as your only headphone,

you're into the Apple ecosystem, you're

going to be happy with these. But when

you start comparing to other ones and

you start really listening, you'll

notice the difference. So yeah, the

overall entire sound signature is better

on the Sennheiser. Sennheisers go for

more of a veil sound. So if you like

crisp highs, then these don't have it.

But this does have an EQ that you can

mess with. Apple doesn't use EQs, which

is okay with me because I don't mess

with EQs because I mentioned in previous

videos, if I start messing with EQs, I

will never stop. I'm just like

inherently a tinkerer. Okay, so next,

the Sony's. I think these Sony's, not

only are they cheaper, but they are

better in every way in terms of sound

quality. And the Sony's are a lot

better. These have like a warm like

speaker-like sound. It just makes me

feel good listening to it. It's just a

lot of fun to listen to. The overall

bass presentation is deep. It's

definitely tuned for the masses, not the

audio files, the Sony's I'm talking

about, but it's just handled better. The

the the mids sounds so much better. I

was listening to this song today and I

was comparing both the Sony's and the

AirPods Max 2Os's. When you listen to

the vocals, there's like a throatiness

to his voice that the Sony's are able to

pick up that the AirPods just quite

can't. And there's some cool pans with

the guitar that are going left and

right. and I can just pick apart the

guitar a little bit better on the Sony.

So, I don't know. I don't want to spend

too much time. The Sony's are better.

The Sennheisers are better. The AirPods

Max is not competitive in 2026 with some

of the best out there. So, if you only

care about sound quality, I probably

already lost you. Thank you for stopping

by. But, and I also compared it to some

of my other gaming headsets. Like, this

is a gigantic headphone. This is not

really meant to be taken out. But, some

of these game sets these days, man, do

they do a good job. These are the

Odyssey Maxwell 2. So, if you're going

to be using your headphones more for

like indoor use video editing or just be

going to be connected to your MacBook

and you're not going to be taking them

out and about, I would I would

definitely recommend something like the

Maxwells 2 cuz you get a USB dongle. You

just plug it right into your laptop and

you get lossless audio wirelessly. And

then another thing too, let me just talk

about the pricing really quickly. $549

for this. These are some new headphones

by ASUS and co-designed with Hi-Fimen.

These are excellent. And again, the the

these are completely open back. These

are meant to be taken out. The reason

why I'm bringing this up because this

has out of all of these here, this has

the best sound signature for only $300.

And then you need an amp. You can get

like the full. I didn't swear

that's the name of the company. That

combination might cost as much as this.

And you'll get a much better sound

experience. I think $549 for these are

really expensive. But people don't buy

AirPods just to listen to music. you'll

you'll be watching a lot of movies or

maybe TV shows on this too. And I think

these this is where these shine because

one reason like I mentioned is that

wider sound stage and the Dolby Atmos

sounds immensely better than the AirPods

Max one. I found that to be unusable. I

think the H2 chip is really coming in

handy here. That better processing is

able to better decode Dolby Atmos. So,

it's actually usable now and it sounds

really good. You could go on Apple Music

and listen to a few Dolby Atmos tracks.

They're mostly trash. Dolby Atmos needs

to be mixed properly. So, there are a

few good examples out there. Apple has a

made for spatial audio playlist, and I

hate to say it again, most of them are

bad. So, the thing is though, good Dolby

Atmos recordings can sound amazing, but

bad mediocre ones sounds worse than the

actual tracks in just stereo. One of the

coolest ones you need to check out is

Thriller by Michael Jackson. And make

sure you get this little Dolby Atmos

logo on it. And also make sure you go to

the settings by just tapping on the

volume on the control panel. And then

make sure spatial audio is set to

headtracked. And just kind of keep the

phone in front of you when you're

listening to this. So, the beginning of

Michael Jackson's thriller, there's you

can hear like a door opening and closing

and there's like things going all around

you and it really does create a 3D space

like it's coming from all around you and

it's quite surreal. It's not as good as

like something like the Sonos Aeros 300

which is like dedicated speakers for

Dolby Atmos but it sounds good and

there's like wolves howling and a whole

bunch of stuff and you can actually hear

it all over you and the AirPods Max one

did not do a good job representing that.

So, and also by nature movies are

incredible with these. And I've been

gaming with these as like a dedicated

gaming headset. And this is one of my

favorite ones so far. I mean, 549 is one

of the most expensive ones out there.

But because the noise cancellation is so

good, when I'm using my gaming laptop,

I'm not hearing the fans anymore. All

right, so here's a microphone test of

the AirPods Max 2, that sounds pretty

good. And I can hear there is some side

tone that is kind of just replicating my

voice through the actual headphones. So

it doesn't sound too muffled, so it

sounds a little bit more natural. It

doesn't sound too natural though. It

still sounds a little bit artificial.

This is something that I've gotten

pretty good at being able to pick up by

covering so many gaming headsets. This

is a pretty good site tone, but I won't

say that it is class leading. So this is

how it sounds on Windows. I wonder if

you're still getting that same pretty

good mic quality as you would on Apple

devices. And this is what it sounds like

on my iPhone. So clearly that amazing

mic quality only seems to be working if

you're using an Apple product. And next,

I just tested these working out. I went

to the gym. I wanted to go for a run,

but it was raining today, so I just went

on the treadmill. And what I like to do

is test over the ear headphones when

running to see if you hear like that

thumping thud when your feet are

touching the ground. And I didn't hear

any of that once I had the noise

cancelling or the transparency mode on.

There's not much over the ear headphones

that I could run with. And because the

build quality is so good, I'm not

hearing any creaking or any clanking or

anything when anything um high impact on

these with like some other headphones

where you would hear like different

parts of the headphone like jamming

together. And because the clamping force

is so high, you can lift weights on

these and without them falling off. I

mean depending on how big your head is,

but I think that most people will be

fine because of that strong clamping

force. So great for working out even

though this is not IP rated. So, you

know, use it at your own risk. But yeah,

there's a billion of videos of these

AirPods Max 2 already just after 48

hours of coming out. So, if you got

anything useful out of this, feel free

to hit that like button, leave me a

comment or subscribe, etc. I appreciate

you