Anyone in to the Chi Fi scene? I think my Galaxy Buds+ is getting a little long in the tooth. Still works fine but I looked around to see there was anything better sounding for the same price, or less.
Got introduced to the Moon Drop Space Travel and the Tanchjim Mino. But I know the scene for ChiFi is huge and saturated so there's probably tons more good options.
I don't know if 1More counts/counted as ChiFi, even though I bought the triple drivers online from Costco, of all places. But those were solid too, but I think I've misplaced them.
Trying to stick to wireless, despite its caveats.
I'd probably look into the Buds 2 Pro on a sale, since the Buds 3 are out now. Well, they were announced, though the issues and delays seem to be preventing them from properly hitting the stores.
That said, the Buds+ are still excellent headphones if you don't need ANC. I honestly can't tell much of a difference between these and any newer buds, except that the Buds+ are more comfortable than anything Samsung launched since then due to the wingtipped design. Samsung knows too, since they brought it back in the FEs.
Chi-fi is almost never worth the time and little money they cost. They're not going to be in any way, shape or form as good as the Buds+. With the exception of Xiaomi/Redmi buds, which are DEFINITELY worth the asking price, but at a fifth/eight the price of proper Galaxy Buds they clearly aren't as good either.
Speaking of, I just came back from an extended trip to Taipei that started with the Computex. I honestly love what brands like Xiaomi are consistently doing. If they were allowed in North America, they'd overtake our local brands immediately, and with the big bastions of Apple/Samsung dominance overtaken, they'd quickly finish dominating global market shares. The Xiaomi stores are a bit like the Apple stores in the US, except there's more of them, and they are now selling products across a far wider range of markets. The quality isn't quite there, but it's 80% there, at like 20-40% the price. As a souvenir, I got myself their $15 hair drier that performs 80% of the way of a $500 Dyson. Also, for an increasing number of product categories (like air purifiers), Xiaomi is becoming a leader with some of the best products around, still at a fraction of the price of old market leaders.
Xiaomi's latest foldable phone looks MUCH better than Samsung's, even if the software polish is also a bit behind. It's slim, light, and overall feels really sleek, and costs quite a bit less than Samsung's, while also including a periscope camera that Samsung said they can't fit in their (thicker) folds. If I were Samsung, I'd feel a massive pressure to do much better ASAP, as Xiaomi suddenly released a device that feels like they're two generations ahead in hardware design. Seriously, the Galaxy fold feels like an old brick next to it. I hear that this made Samsung panic and rush out some sort of a "Fold Slim" to ready and launch asap.
I've got the S23 Ultra, and while it's a very reliable phone that I like, I can't help but feel that it symbolizes a frustrating lack of innovation from the big established brands like Samsung that once excelled at innovating. And I really can't help but see the Chinese brands as an inevitable breath of fresh air and rapid change, while the western brands are stagnating, and charging way too much for too little improvement. I don't think it's going to take long until tariffs and sales bans are no longer enough to contain the flood of simply cooler products at better prices coming from hundreds of companies that aren't bound by the same self-imposed boundaries, red tape and restrictions that we've got in the West.
This is because while we've still got the more skilled talent, we're regulating ourselves out of progress and cool things, while someone out there in China is quickly pushing cool products out unrestricted by anything but the laws of physics and their current ability to their will. And we can't compete with that for long.
And it's not just technology. With products, businesses, events and cool things in general popping up the moment an idea crops up in Asia, it's so clear that western countries are regulating and red-taping themselves out of having new cool things anymore. And things that take a few weeks to get done in China, take months or years of costly work just to get the paperwork cleared over here.
