AirPods 2 review: Wireless charging + H1 chip = must-upgrade?

In this video we take a look at the brand new air pods - how do they compare to the first generation air pods should you consider buying them check out our full review right now thanks for watching nine-to-five Mack be sure to thumbs up click the subscribe button and then enable notifications with the bill icon so you won't miss any upcoming videos ok so first and foremost we're going to unbox our second-generation air pods and one thing you'll notice about the box is that it's pretty much the same as the original air Potts box outside of a few differences the front is exactly the same so you have the picture of the buds there of course you have an Apple logo on the side and if you opted for the top-of-the-line ear pods with wireless charging case it will actually say wireless charging case right below the ear pods text all right so let's get it unboxed inside you will see the design by Apple in California packet and right below that you'll see your second generation air pods so Apple sales two SKUs one with the wireless charging case for $and one with just the regular wired charging case for 159 but both contain these second-generation air pots Apple no longer sells the first generation model so inside the packet you'll find safety and handling details along with warranty details feel free to read those when you're having trouble sleeping here's the air pods a getting started guide which walks you through some of the basic functionality of the second gen air pods and sadly no Apple stickers I don't believe Apple stickers were included with the first gen models either guess it's price thing so let's continue our unboxing at the very bottom of the package you'll find a lightning to USB cable which is kind of nice to be honest I wouldn't have been surprised if Apple would have omitted the lightning cable just because it supports wireless charging on this more expensive model so take that all you Apple haters who claimed the company nickels and dimes its customers yeah they still nickel and dime there but you know all right so we have it all unwrapped here it is the air pots to with wireless charging case so one thing you're gonna notice right off the bat that looks pretty much the same as the original model obviously there are some key differences here and we're going to discuss those differences compare the original charging case with the wireless charging case compare the first chin earbuds to the second chin earbuds but one thing that hasn't changed easy pairing it doesn't get any easier than this you just simply open up your ear pots charging case and you'll see a little pop up on the screen and then you just tap connect and you're connected beautiful design Samsung tried to copy it but no they didn't do as good of a job now you'll find several settings you can rename your air pods you can change the double tap chest here for each bud so you can invoke Siri play Paul's next track previous track or turn off the double tap gesture so I like setting mine up like that you also have automatic ear detection so it uses a little sensor on the bud to detect when it's in your ear you can also adjust microphone settings now one of the really cool things about the iOS integration of the air pods is that it not only shows your ear buds battery status but it shows the wireless charging case battery status as well and there's a special battery widget which will also tell you the battery status of your ear pods again Samsung try to replicate this on the Galaxy buds in the Galaxy S 10 but they didn't do it as well another thing that I really appreciate about the air pods is that they sync together with iCloud so when you connect to an iCloud and evil device those air pods are available across all your iCloud connected devices so your Mac your iPad your iPhone etc they automatically recognize those air pods but really how do the first generation air pod stack up with this second generation airbox well for starters if you opted for the version with a wireless charging case you'll notice that the LED indicator instead of being placed on the inside of the case like on the first generator pots it's located on the outside of the case but most of everything is the same design wise for instance you still have the lightning connector on the bottom but on the rear you will find a slightly redesigned hinge without the mirror finish you also notice that the connect button on the air pots to you is placed slightly higher the side profile of both charging cases is exactly the same while the top down view with the case open shows the updated hinge and that the led that's inside the original charging case has been relocated to the front of the new wireless charging case but the cavity where your ear pods rest is exactly the same with the same charging contacts and the regulatory information serial number in battery info is still located in the top flap but here's what's really interesting the earbud design is exactly the same I mean there is nothing different between the old first generation air pots and the new second-generation air pods in fact you can't tell them apart outside of dirt or the ear gunk that may reside in the speaker cavity area thumbs up for gross Ness but as similar as the first generation and second generation air pods may be there definitely are differences let's discuss those right now starting with the wireless charging capability now technically this is not a second generation feature because you can buy a wireless charging case for your original ear pods if you wish but the $199 ear pods to sku includes the wireless charging case which allows you to charge your ear pods wirelessly which isn't groundbreaking but it's awfully convenient so it will work with any qi wireless charger like this one from nomad which allows you to wirelessly charge multiple apple devices simultaneously sounds a little familiar doesn't it but even with the inclusion of wireless charging lightning remains an option as a quick way to recharge your charging case but sadly the long-awaited air power wireless charging accessory that Apple reveal umpteen years ago is still m.i.a however we do think it is coming soon and apparently Apple does as well because they listed on the product packaging for the air pots and the wireless charging case so yeah I think it's coming real soon but the coolest thing isn't wireless charging the coolest thing is hands-free voice-activated Siri so no more of this what time is it in Chicago first-gen ear pods required manual intervention by means of a double tap on the bud to invoke Siri what's the temperature right now in Paris France it worked but hands-free voice activation is just so much better so when you go through the initial setup of your ear pods and you don't have voice activation for Siri already enabled it will request that you do so you can set it up just by tapping this button right here doing so will allow you to interact with Siri hands-free using only your voice now you'll still notice that it will route all the data back to your paired iPhone or iPad however the conversation occurs on your ear pods so you talk to Siri using your ear pods microphone and Syria will talk back using the speakers in the air pods but most importantly it's all hands-free watch please what's the weather like tomorrow in Chicago so I'm having a conversation with Siri without using my hands I just talked and it talks back that's brilliant hey what time is it right now in Paris France and of course the great thing about using your ear pods is that no one can hear series response a3 play new music so this is all made possible by that new h1 wireless chip inside the new air pods it makes your interactions with Siri all the more personal and natural now here's something else to consider the voice quality of Siri on the air pods too is way better than a previous generation the sound is more crisp it's more clear and it's just more pleasant to listen to another benefit of that new h1 chip inside the air pots too is increased talktime the h1 is more efficient so that's going to give you up to three hours of talktime now on a single charge and up to two additional hours of talktime from a quick fifteen minute charge and the benefits of the h1 wireless chip doesn't stop there you also get faster device switching so let me show you what I mean here I have my first-generation earpods connected to my iPad right now now putting music so now I'm gonna switch to my iPhone just like that one one thousand two one thousand three one thousand four one thousand five one thousand six one thousand seven one thousand eight one thousand nine one thousand ten one thousand and now I can hear music after switching so let's go ahead and switch back start playing and again we're using our first-generation air pods for this test one one thousand two one thousand three one thousand four one thousand five one thousand six one thousand seven one thousand eight one thousand around seven and a half seconds to connect back so not terrible but it could be better right so what we're going to do is we're going to switch to our second generation air pods and test those out just to see if the performance is any better apple claims that the new air pods are twice as fast for device switching we'll see here so I'm playing music back on my iPad and now we're gonna switch over to our iPhone so let's go ahead and do that now one one thousand two one thousand three one thousand four one thousand five one thousand five one thousand and we're ready to go so five seconds that's about half obviously this is not a scientific test but you get the general idea so now let's go ahead and switch back one one thousand two one thousand three one thousand four one thousand five one thousand we go not bad obviously the performance is definitely improved let's switch back one one thousand two one thousand three one thousand four one thousand five one thousand six one thousand so about six seconds that time take it with a grain of salt my testing not scientific in the least but you get the idea Apple also enhanced the connection time for phone calls so here's my original earpods transferring to my earpods and that was very quick with the original and let's try the new air pods transferring the phone call and that seems about just as quick I didn't really notice any difference there to be honest but one thing I did definitely notice is the lower latency when playing games so when you press a button or you perform an action in the game that makes a sound there's less of a delay between the action on screen and what you hear in your air pods for instance as I'm bouncing on these little platforms here and doodle jump the bounce effect occurs almost immediately there's noticeable less lag when compared to the original air pods now we've discussed a lot of different improvements to the second generation air pods but to be honest one of the biggest reasons to consider upgrading is because the battery life in your original ear pods is downright terrible I mean Charles Barkley terrible yeah so obviously buying new air pods is gonna solve that issue because the battery is gonna be brand new and not to create it so what's my take on the air pots - it's a great product it won't be the cultural phenomenon that the originals were because I mean everyone's seen them already but the air pots to do bring meaningful enhancements and improvements to the original but I do find it a little disappointing that Apple didn't include the wireless charging case with the one hundred and $59 SKU instead they charge 40 extra bucks 199 dollars to get wireless charging to me that seems a bit short-sighted especially with air power on the horizon they probably could have recouped some of that money just from those sails along now if you already own air pods I wouldn't necessarily consider this a must-have update because the improvements are to be is incremental it's more like earpods not to mention that the fit and sell quality is exactly the same as its predecessor and that means that if you didn't like the way the original earpods fit in your ears or you didn't care for the sound quality of the original air pods then there really is no reason to consider the air pots - because they are exactly the same in those two areas but if you did like the original air pods the h1 chip brings small but noticeable enhancements to the table you get longer talk time faster connections less latency those are really nice features but most importantly the h1 chip delivers true hands-free Siri access so that means as long as you have the air pods in your ears Siri is at your beck and call and you don't even have to lift as much as a finger so know if I already own a pair of air pots I don't consider this an instant purchase however if you're like a whole lot of other people whose ear pods battery has seen better days then perhaps you should consider upgrading and when you do you're gonna get some cool new features thanks to that h1 chip along with that wonderful day one battery life what do you guys think let me know down below in the comments section be sure to subscribe for more videos like this this is Jeff with 905 Mac

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