It’s cyclical, years ago, video quality improved dramatically, and then stagnated for almost 40 years as prices fell until it was economical for video quality to improve again. We likely won’t see a meaningful improvement for another 15-20 years, then prices will come down and then we’ll see another improvement.

Depends on what kind of ai and how much control you want over it. There are some consumer stuff like adobe or elevenlabs, but if a professional is using ai it’s likely either waves or izotope as they give way more control. Personally I use waves, their clarity pro plugins are amazing, but I know several people who use izotope as well.

The problem is doing it in real time and having it sound halfway decent. The only companies who have managed that is waves and Yamaha, the later of which requires hardware that costs $70k+.