there are certainly environments and use cases when self-powered headphones would be convenient.
But there are also many many circumstances where the last thing you want is self-powered, radio-driven, digital headphones.
Some of the concerns that would make this not work for me, personally:
- integrated rechargeable batteries (nonremovable)
- radio interference with sensitive recording paths
- de facto compression
- the necessity of integrating your amp into a miniature form factor
Sound recording and review and critical listening in environments where you don't have plug-in ('mains') power on hand, possibly for months at a time, and need absolutely uncolored access to your recordings, often with high quality amps...
...these are very different from consumer convenience listening e.g. while commuting or sitting at a desk.
There's room for both in the marketplace happily...
...and need for both.
So I am among those who think a trend towards dropping analog microjacks is truly terrible.
The case for phones is 'OK' but the more they become both a model e.g. for light-weight laptops, or laptop replacements themselves (e.g. in 'phablet' or pad format) the more risk there is of innovating us into a very limited corner (in which a lot of battery life is spent on mandatory DRM no less...)
But you could always use an analog-to-lightning adapter. Or buy a phone with an analog jack. Dropping the jack on one phone doesn't equal to not being able to use wired headphones at all in the future.
And DRM is irrelevant as long as an analog adapter exists.
there are certainly environments and use cases when self-powered headphones would be convenient.
But there are also many many circumstances where the last thing you want is self-powered, radio-driven, digital headphones.
Some of the concerns that would make this not work for me, personally: - integrated rechargeable batteries (nonremovable) - radio interference with sensitive recording paths - de facto compression - the necessity of integrating your amp into a miniature form factor
Sound recording and review and critical listening in environments where you don't have plug-in ('mains') power on hand, possibly for months at a time, and need absolutely uncolored access to your recordings, often with high quality amps...
...these are very different from consumer convenience listening e.g. while commuting or sitting at a desk.
There's room for both in the marketplace happily...
...and need for both.
So I am among those who think a trend towards dropping analog microjacks is truly terrible.
The case for phones is 'OK' but the more they become both a model e.g. for light-weight laptops, or laptop replacements themselves (e.g. in 'phablet' or pad format) the more risk there is of innovating us into a very limited corner (in which a lot of battery life is spent on mandatory DRM no less...)