Cleer Audio appears to have pulled out all the stops for its latest open-ear earbuds, the Buy at Amazon , like a charging case with its own battery, antibacterial UV lighting, and Qualcomm’s Snapdragon Sound, the Arc 3 add better water protection, voice control, and spatial audio with Dolby-powered head tracking. And the charging case now sports its own color touchscreen. The Cleer Arc 3 are available in black and pink color choices for $220 on amazon.com starting October 24. Cleer says additional colors are coming soon.
Design-wise, the Cleer Arc 3 use the same articulated, spring-loaded earhook as previous generations, and I’ve found that it offers a comfortable, yet secure fit. Cleer says the earbuds are now rated IPX7, making them effectively waterproof, even if fully submerged in water.
Battery life has been upped to a claimed 10 hours per charge, with the charging case providing an additional 40 hours. The case itself has undergone quite the transformation. You still get the UV-C light sterilization when the earbuds aren’t in use, but now the interior of the lid includes a mirror, while the exterior features a color touchscreen. The case can now be charged wirelessly, as well as via its USB-C connection.
The Cleer Arc II Sport introduced Snapdragon Sound, including the hi-res aptX Adaptive and CD-quality aptX Lossless Bluetooth codecs, but the Arc 3 take this formula further. You now get the option of using Sony’s LDAC hi-res codec instead, which is compatible with far more Android phones than Snapdragon Sound. Cleer says it has also improved bass response, however, its published frequency range for the Arc 3 seems to contradict this claim. According to its product page, the Arc 3 can reproduce 50Hz to 40kHz. The Arc II Sport go lower: 20Hz to 20kHz.
We’re beginning to see hands-free voice commands show up on new wireless earbuds. The Bose QuietComfort Earbuds offer an extensive list of available commands, as do Sony’s LinkBuds Fit. The Cleer Arc 3 also support voice commands, though they appear to be limited to just a few functions: previous/next song, play/pause, volume up/down, and pickup/reject call.
As with the Arc II Sport, six-axis sensors let you use head gestures to manage phone calls hands-free, and Bluetooth Multipoint lets you keep simultaneous connections to two devices.
Instagram is making its way to yet another screen, and this time, Apple TV is getting a taste of the Reels rabbit hole. The company has launched a dedicated Instagram app for Apple TV, bringing Reels, longer videos, and live shows to the big screen. So, if watching one quick clip on a phone somehow turns into an hour of scrolling, there's now a much larger screen for that.
Instagram brings Reels and more to Apple TV
Audio-Technica, a brand well known for making some of the best studio and professional headphones on the market, has just come out with the ATH-AWX7000, which the company itself claims to be its "finest headphones ever." The new flagship closed-back headphone has debuted at an eye-watering price of $3,799. It combines hand-finished Japanese woodwork with a newly developed 58mm driver.
The earcups are made from Kiso cypress, a prized wood historically used for Shinto shrines and Buddhist temples. Each housing is finished by hand with traditional Echizen lacquer, which brings out the grain and is expected to darken over time. The frame and sliders are finished in a deep navy kachi-iro shade traditionally associated with samurai.
This post is brought to you in paid partnership with Best Buy.
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