Full disclosure: Divinus sent me samples of the Ostia for testing in exchange for my honest review. I am not affiliated to the company, and the opinions expressed in this review are entirely my own. South Korea is renowned for many things in the modern technology world, but dedicated audio products aren’t high on that list. You could argue that’s not exactly true, given South Korean giants like Samsung and LG have entire product lines dedicated to audio, but to be fair those aren’t the first products you think of when it comes to those world-famous...

Thanks to my Head-Fi partner in crime @xenithon for secretly acquiring and then loaning me his Isabellae for the purposes of this review. It’s not an IEM I thought I’d get the pleasure of hearing anytime soon, but now that I have, the pleasure is all mine. Introduction Much like the species it was named after, the Oriolus Isabellae is a curiosity in the IEM world. Sporting a uniquely-tuned dynamic driver, the likes of which was considered extinct at one point, the Isabellae is one of several single DD designs currently capturing the imagination of...

If you haven’t read my first impressions preview of the new Sennheiser IE 900, feel free to do so here. Preface The opinions expressed in this review are just that – subjective opinions, based on my personal music choices, listening preferences, and even my mood on the day. As such you should consider this (and really any) review as just another data point. If you have any questions about my preferences, the music I used, or anything else you’d like to discuss, feel free to leave a comment or PM me directly. Full disclosure: Sennheiser loaned me...

The HEDDphone was tested and reviewed at the premises of newly-launched South African online Head-Fi company, Lumous Audio. I was not incentivised to write this review, and the opinions expressed are entirely my own. Introduction I’ve been wandering around the cavernous headphone rabbit hole for more than four years now, experiencing many of the fascinating creations it has to offer, to the point where there’s little that genuinely surprises me now when I listen to it. That changed recently when I finally got to hear for myself one of the most...

There’s something about Chicago-based, European-made company EarMen that breaks the ice even before you’ve heard their expertly tuned audio products. Perhaps it’s the tongue-in-cheek naming (I mean, Donald DAC and TR-Amp, classic!). But beyond marketing smarts, the products themselves are designed to break the mold of tried-and-tested designs, especially at their price points, and the burgundy-red TR-Amp is no different. The portable DAC/amp market is a crowded one, and there are literally dozens of options for every wallet. But very few originate...

Bravado (bra-va-doh) – noun – a bold manner or a show of boldness intended to impress or intimidate. Empire Ears does nothing by halves, and that also goes for the naming convention of their IEMs. The Bravado MkII (which I’m going to call B2 for brevity) is everything the name suggests it is. That’s not giving anything away, though if reviews aren’t really your thing, you can just take the title at face value and be done with it. B2 is my second bite at the Empire Ears cherry, so to speak, the legendary Legend X being the first. And here’s another...

Introduction I’ve been thinking about how to best write this review for a while, ever since I first experienced HiBy’s new flagship DAP towards the end of last year. Since then, every other major Chinese DAP manufacturer has been playing catch-up with HiBy, and today the market for high-end ($1000-plus) portable music players is already getting crowded. Marketing 101 stipulates that, given a crowded market, the success of a premium product is directly related to how different it is, what unique features it offers, or even what it looks like, so...

Hot on the heels of its class-leading mobile DAC/amp dongle, the Sparrow, Chicago-based EarMen has made audiophile audio on the go even more accessible with the Eagle. Housed in the same glass-encased metal shell as its bigger brother, the Eagle is a step-down in terms of features and connectivity options, but not that much in terms of sound quality. Coming in at around half the cost of the Sparrow, that’s probably to be expected, but has it cut too many corners to appeal to more serious listeners looking for a cheaper, simpler alternative? In...

This is an abridged review. The full review can be found here. The EarMen Sparrow does not do wireless. It’s also smaller than most other ‘proper’ dongles (unless you consider Apple’s or Samsung’s headphone adapters proper dongles). So what makes this tiny device so enticing to make you pick it over the many other options available at or around its $199 price point? What you get The Sparrow houses a new all-in-one flagship SoC from ESS, the SABRE ES9281PRO, the first combination DAC/amp chip to offer built-in hardware MQA decoding. Made from...

UTWS1: has FiiO made the world’s best true wireless IEMs? 64Audio are not renown for their wireless products, in fact I don’t think they make any wireless products at all. Except thanks to Chinese audio giant FiiO, they now do. And by plugging my very-much-wired 64Audio U12t IEMs into FiiO’s new UTWS1 Bluetooth adapter, I may have found the world’s very best true wireless IEMs. Ok, so the headline was (only slightly) misleading, and this review isn’t really about IEMs. Except it is, but not just my IEMs – any IEM. The beauty of the FiiO UTWS1 is...

Full disclosure: I was sent a sample of the iFi iPurifier 3 by way of @iFi audio and my local supplier, the ever excellent Francois at AudioExchange, in exchange for my honest opinion and review. This is the first in a series of reviews and articles on audio noise and related gear. If you're sending audio from your computer to DAC using USB, chances are your sound isn't as clean as it could be. Now in its third revision, the aptly-named iFi iPurifier 3 is a small device designed to sit between your digital music source (typically a PC or Mac), and...

Full disclosure: I received an IMR R2 Aten in exchange for my fair and honest opinion, with no expectation of a favourable review. The views expressed are my own, based on my personal sound preferences and taste in music, which may well vary from your own. The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different outcome. It appears that IMR’s Bob James isn’t insane, because at the third time of asking, he’s created one of the best looking, best sounding dynamic driver IEMs I’ve ever had the pleasure of using. Based...

I was fortunate enough to be included in the Rai Penta World Tour, and special thanks goes to @MezeTeam and @Andykong for sending them my way. If I'm not mistaken, this is probably the first time a Rai Penta has been seen in South Africa, and I'm honoured to be the first to experience it here. Other than asking for impressions to be posted to Head-Fi, there were no demands or expectations made of me, and the views expressed below are entirely my own. As a designer and photographer, if I was to sum up my first impressions of the Rai Penta, Meze’s...

The FH7 is FiiO’s new flagship in-ear monitor, combining the best of the various technologies we’ve seen in their previous IEMs with a new filter system that lets you tweak the final sound to your preference. At $495 the FH7 is also FiiO’s most expensive IEM – twice the price of the FH5. But unlike most flagships that exhibit only incremental improvements over their predecessors, the FH7’s performance not only justifies its price, it represents even better value for money on a dollar-for-dollar basis. Frankly, the combination of FiiO’s M11 and FH7...

Full disclosure: I received an IMR R1 Zenith in exchange for my fair and honest opinion, with no expectation of a favourable review. The views expressed are my own, based on my personal sound preferences and taste in music, which may well vary from your own. Introduction I’ll admit this much: I’d never heard of IMR Acoustics, or its founder and owner Bob James, prior to reading about the R1 Zenith while asking Google to find me wide-soundstage IEMs. The Zenith is, in fact, a revised and refined version of IMR’s debut effort, the R1. It shares...

Full disclosure: Dekoni sent me the complete set of Elite HD800 pads to test and review on my own system with my own pair of HD800 headphones, without fear, favour or any expectation for preferential treatment or specific outcomes. The views and notes below are my own, and entirely reflect my own hearing, taste in music and sonic preferences in sharing them here. It took me many years to warm up to the genius that is the Sennheiser HD800. Coming from unashamedly ‘basshead’ roots, the HD800 always seemed to me to be an over-hyped, overpriced...

When FiiO first teased a new DAP in the lead-up to their ‘Spring Launch’ event in March this year, it seemed as if we were about to witness the world’s first submergible music player with phone functionality and some sort of otherworldly power source. As it turned out, the DAP in question – the FiiO M11 – wasn’t quite all that, but in a market split between inexpensive barebones music players and a number of increasingly pricey, premium devices, it somehow still managed to be different enough and affordable enough to make many people rethink the...

Disclaimer: @DekoniAudio provided me with samples of their Bulletz tips in different sizes in exchange for my honest and unbiased review, with no expectations or conditions as to the outcome of the review, good or bad. Thanks again to Tal Kocen and his team for being so responsive to my questions and supportive in their efforts to get their products in front of a broader audience. Introduction My first exposure to Dekoni products was almost as an accidental response to my shock at the poor quality of cough-crazy-cough-expensive pads that shipped...

I was first introduced to Dekoni Audio products when the fabric earpads on my newly-acquired Focal Elear fell apart. Little did I know at the time that replacement earpads made from genuine sheepskin leather could not only make the headphones sound better than the original pads, but also cost half the asking price of new Focal pads. In fact, the Dekoni pads impressed me so much that I was surprised to find they weren’t featured in the Head-Fi showcase (fixed that), and that they hadn’t been reviewed before (fixed that too). Then this happened: the...

It’s not often that one gets to meet a real celebrity; someone whose fame cuts right across cultures and households. In the real world, names like George Clooney and Julia Roberts come to mind. In the head-fi world, few are more famous than Utopia. Focal’s flagship dynamic headphone has only existed for about two years, and yet ask most headphone devotees to name the headphone that sits right at the top of the tree and many, if not most, would say Utopia. That’s partly a consequence of the hype train that rolled into town when the French audio maker...