If you’re outside with a smartphone, why do you actually need that though? If you call someone, their audio will be bad anyways, and when do you need playback and microphone at the same time? Outside multiplayer gaming, I don’t really know any application where high quality audio playback and microphone is needed at the same time.

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ssl-3 an hour ago | parent | next [-]

I can understand people just fine with the voice profiles provided by Bluetooth. Strictly speaking, I don't need anything better than that.

But it sure is nice to be able to make phone calls where people don't sound worse than they did with digitally-switched analog landline telephones in 1995. Bluetooth doesn't get there at all.

The losses of Bluetooth even compound generationally: The inescapable tin-can audio of Bluetooth at one end first gets transmogrified by at least one intermediate lossy codec for transmission across/betwixt the network(s), and then gets tin-canned harder when the far end of the connection is also using Bluetooth.

For perspective: 1995's phone calls were ultimately limited by the G.711 codec, which itself dates to 1972. I'm not setting the bar very high here at all.

	▲	echoangle 20 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		Calls on AirPods don’t sound worse to me than on the phone speakers, I don’t think the AirPods noticeably decrease the quality compared to the stuff happening on the phone network.

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michaelt an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

I think it's fairly obvious why one would want two-way audio on a telephone :)

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echoangle 22 minutes ago | parent [-]

As I mentioned in my comment, I don’t notice the worse Bluetooth quality on calls because the audio itself is already bad, so making calls isn’t really a reason to not use Bluetooth.

	▲	agentdev001 4 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		Your comment frustrates me! With that said, how about Discord? I have high speed internet 90% of my waking life, high enough for Discord to be high fidelity. I actively avoid using discord to join calls on my phone- because Bluetooth absolutely destroys quality. I use the same pair of headphones to use discord on my PC, with a separate mic, no problemo.

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smallmancontrov an hour ago | parent | prev [-]

Need? A committee of the dumbest software on your pc/phone will get together to tell you what you need, and they have decided you need tin-can audio quality so that the microphone can be active so that AT&T spyware embedded in the Taco Bell app can listen for off-hand comments about refreshing your phone to opportunistically target you with the spam-cannon.