Posts Tagged → audio

AirPods Pro Beta Firmware Update Brings Improved Audio on Calls

When it comes to talking to my Mac, the audio quality for me is feast or famine. I’ve got a great podcasting microphone that I can turn on at any point and start talking to my Mac with very high-quality audio.

The flip side is that I’m using a Mac Studio, which does not have a built-in microphone. Neither does my Pro Display XDR, and I’ve never been particularly excited about putting a USB microphone on my desk when not talking into my podcasting mic. So, I’ve been solving this problem for the longest time by using AirPods.

If you put an AirPod in your ear, it records your voice to your Mac just fine. Well, let me make that sort of fine. The audio quality has never been anything worth writing home about. Making calls is particularly bad.

However, while making a call on my Test Mac running macOS Sequoia the other day (using AirPods Pro) I noticed the voice quality was much better. After a little sniffing around on the Internet, I discovered that this is thanks to a new beta firmware update on AirPods Pro.

Historically, the max audio quality would turn to garbage the moment you’re on a call using AirPods Pro’s microphones. But this latest beta firmware update allows for a sampling rate of up to 48 kHz.

I’m not sure how they pulled that off, but it is a vast improvement if you pay attention to that sort of thing.

Record Anything with Audio Hijack

With Audio Hijack, you can record any audio on your Mac. Save audio from individual applications such as Safari or Zoom, record from hardware audio devices like microphones and mixers, or even capture the audio output of the entire system. Whatever you need to do with audio on your Mac, Audio Hijack can help.

– Record conversations from Zoom, FaceTime, and other VoIP apps

– Create podcasts, both remote and in-studio

– Save streaming audio from the web

– Digitize vinyl

– And so much more

I use Audio Hijack daily. I don’t know how I’d be able to do my work without it. It’s powerful, stable, and constantly improving. If you want to do just about anything with audio on your Mac, this is the app you’ll need.

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