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Seeking (non-technical) input on what I should do with my possibly faulty Google Pixel Buds Pro.
I bought the Pixel Buds Pro three weeks ago on sale for $150 (MSRP $200). It's been mostly satisfactory, except about a week ago, without any obvious cause (i.e. software update, drop damage, water damage), when I took them out of the case and into my ear to take a call, the right earbud suddenly developed continuous noisy crackling. I believe the left bud may have been affected to a much smaller extent. Cycling through the active noise cancellation on/off didn't do anything. The problem seemed to be with the buds and not a phone app, as Spotify and podcasts all had the same crackling issue.
I put the buds back into the case, closed it, and took them out. The problem immediately went away. Great. I thought it was worrisome that such new devices had issues, but hoped that it'd be a one-time thing.
Unfortunately, this morning the same thing happened again. When I took them out of the case ahead of a workout, the crackling returned, mostly in the right earbud. I cycled through active noise cancellation, disconnected and reconnected bluetooth on my phone, and even put it back in the case and closed it. Nothing did the trick. Neither did "forgetting" the device--the unconnected buds crackled while untethered to anything. I checked firmware and it was up to date.
It was only when I hard reset the buds in their case (press and hold bluetooth button for 30s etc.) and repaired that the problem went away.
So my question to The Motte is, what would you do now? Google allows free returns for refunds for up to 30 days, so I have less than a week to do so. Google also has a one-year warranty. I'd rather not bother with finding a box to package the buds, print a label, drop it off at Fedex/UPS, reorder a new pair etc. But I fear that not doing anything now out of laziness will mean the problem returns a week from now, or maybe a month, with me eventually stuck with a lemon outside of the return/warranty period.
Google (the search engine) does not return super obvious answers--i.e., this does not appear to be a super common software problem that will be fixed by a firmware update in a week, or a super common hardware problem that requires a return.
I realize this is a trivial question, but we make trivial decisions every day that have substantive consequences, so I'm hoping to improve my decision making. So what would you do personally if you're in my situation?
What I would do myself: I'd go "yeah I knew it, wireless earbuds are a stupid product" and go back to wired forever. I personally think that wired earbuds are just a flat out superior product and many times cheaper to boot.
I don't suspect that's on the table for you, though (else you probably wouldn't have bought them in the first place). So given that you probably want to stay wireless, I would stay the course for now. Maybe return them to Google if you feel you would rather get another brand considering the issues, but otherwise keep them and see what happens. If they do indeed start acting up again, don't try to fix them or troubleshoot, send them in for warranty repair/replacement. You aren't responsible for trying to fix their broken product, that's what a warranty is for.
Wow, this might be the worst take. Wireless earbuds were a shockingly huge improvement for me on headphones as a product. I spend an astonishing amount of time with one earbud in use cases where I couldn't use wired headphones.
I can't really conceive of wireless earbuds being an improvement, but hey if it works for you then great. For me, there's no advantage in them. Being wireless is useless to me because in the (very rare) case I am actually moving around, my phone is on my person. So for my own usage, there's no upside and considerable downsides in the form of needing charging/connection issues/can lose them easily.
Have you tried them? Genuinely having them changed my potential uses.
No. I'm not really in the habit of spending a good amount of money on something I don't have a use case for, after all. ;)
Get cheap ones. These are 25$ and seem closest to the ones I bought five years ago
So many uses I didn't think of that wouldn't be practical with wired buds. Like driving in a convertible or shopping in a store with one in for a podcast/book without losing awareness.
The car thing kind of confuses me, because cars already have sound systems. Who is using earbuds in the car?
As for the store scenario, I don't listen to things (as in have no desire to) while I'm out and about. So that isn't something I would ever do.
Good to know that cheap ones exist though. I at least would be willing to drop $25 to try it. Most likely outcome (imo) is that they sit in my car/drawer/pocket and get no use, but $25 isn't much of a loss.
Convertible, can't really make out a podcast on the car speakers over the wind on the highway. Which is something I never would have thought of before owning them, which is the thing: you'll find your use case after you own it.
Kind of like carrying a multi-tool. So many of the situations I use it in were things I didn't even notice before I was carrying it.
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