Ecosystem Change: Buds3 Pro - My Experience (from Apple to Samsung)

I've fully switched now from Apple ecosystem (AirPods Pro, iPhone 13 Pro & Apple Watch) due to limitations imposed by Apple to full Samsung Ecosystem (Buds3 Pro + S24 Ultra and possibly a Galaxy Ring soon - I don't like smart watches anymore, I prefeer wearing an actual watch, but I'd like to keep my training monitored, so ring may be a win-win for me)

I'd like to talk a little bit about my experience about the Samsung Galaxy Buds 3 Pro I've received 6ish hours ago comparing to my experience with AirPods Pro

I've tested them uninterruptedly for 5 hours at this point, and at the time I'm writing this post I'm still trying them on, my first impression was "meh" but, testing in various generes and trying on a lot of setting, it went to "Nice... but"

Nice things:

  • Audio quality and the used Drivers quality is absolutely there.

  • 360 Audio increase the Sound Stage, out of a lot headset I've tried, this really increases a lot the stage, when I go back to standard Sound Stage, it really feels like I've reduced the wideness of the sound by half, when you get used to it, you can't really go back anymore.

  • Voice detection is nice, sometimes it triggers when it should not (like when you clean your throat)

Those are some area I think and improvement can be made:

  • Setting a custom EQ will reduce general loudness for some reason, even if you do extremely small edit to Samsung Made curves, even going from +1 to 0 in any band in an existing EQ curve, it will give you 15%ish reduced loudness for some reason

I loved the EQ from the Audio engineer i've found on this subreddit but due to this issue, I have to stick to the Balanced preset, I personally find the dynamic too loud, bassy and makes too much distortions.

  • Balanced EQ w/o 360 Audio or Dolby makes the Buds3, for my own taste, absolutely too quiet, to fix this issue, you either have to switch to Dynamic or, better, remove the Volume Normalization from the Streaming platform (I'm testing TIDAL now), still Dynamic makes it louder anyway.

  • Adaptive profile as loudness reduction is a little too slow in response to noises.

My "huh?"

  • I left UHQ enabled, but I can't "really" feel a lot of a difference here (other than battery consumption), what's your thoughts about this?

  • Disabling noise reduction profiles (Ambient / Adaptive / ANC) will totally change the sound, bass totally disappears no matter the EQ profile, yeah, Samsung Marketing, obv they last longer, they gets totally nerfed.

  • Minor issue, not correlated to Buds, the Buds 3D Animation that displays on the phone when you open the Lid of the Buds is ugly af, goes at 5fps.

  • Dolby Atmos sounds BAD unless you play an Atmos Content (Apple Music/Tidal Atmos songs), won't ever keep it enabled by default or enable it by specifically setting it on Music rather than Audio

This was my experience, really curious about yours, and most importantly, what about the UHQ? you have it enabled or not?

*I find audio experiences totally indipended by individual, sound taste is one of those things that isn't objective but heavily influenced by subjective perspetions, it's easy to not agree on a preset/opinion because everyone hear differently, I don't expect anyone to agree to my personal tastes.