Reviews by Wiljen

A big thank you to Fiio for including me in this review tour. As I write this, the F9 Pro is waiting for the PO to head to the next lucky tour member.

Introduction

Fiio and I have grown up together. Some of my first audio gear had the Fiio name on the side of it. An E17 with an E09 graced my office desk for quite some time a few years ago. As Fiio has matured, so have their products. Their DAPs are now the standard by which any sub $500 DAP is measured if you look at all the comparisons they draw in reviews. Not too long ago, I was asked to review a first for Fiio, an earbud. They had added the rest of the equation to their product line as they had long had amplifiers, digital to analog converters, and digital audio players, it was time to add earphones. That initial earbud was a great listen and was a hint at things to come. First, they paired with Dunu to release the EX1, their version of the Titan. I skipped that one, as I already owned a Titan and did not see a need for another. Then came a brand new line the F series. The F1,3,and 5 are all dynamic driver based and as you go up in sequence the resolving power of the drivers also move up. I purchased the F5, which was an improved EX with a titanium diaphragm and improved extension on both ends. They did a good job of showing what Fiio had learned from the earlier generations. Next was their BA/Dynamic hybrid the F9. After having liked the F5, I wasted little time in placing an order for the F9 only to be a bit disappointed. While the F9 had good clarity, more than expected levels of detail and good extension, it also had a major problem. A treble spike in the middle of the lower treble range absolutely ruined an otherwise good experience. Therefore, the F9 sits in the drawer while I moved on to the Brainwavz b400. Then Fiio announced the F9 SE – which was a fixed cable budget version of the F9 with no other changes. Then I was reading one day and a Fiio representative had posted on the upcoming release of the F9Pro, which got my attention, as the change was the in-house BA was replaced with the Knowles TWFK-30017 BA. My immediate thought was “Will this fix the spike?” Luckily, for me, Fiio sent me a sample of the F9Pro as part of their review tour. Did they succeed – read on?



Accessories

The F9 Pro comes with a very complete kit. Starting with a premium feel to the packaging. The box has an outer cardboard box with typical western style product details and advertising.




Inside the outer box is a black pressboard case with an understated Fiio Logo. Opening the box reveals well-fitted compartments for the earpieces at the top and a pelican style hard case below it.


Tips are hiding under the earpieces and quite a selection is provided (three different sizes of four different styles of tips) (More on this below). Inside the Hard case is a soft case made of something close to sweatshirt material, and two cables. The hard case is well padded and is similar to the Dunu provided pelican cases, which may hint that a partnership between Dunu and Fiio is still lurking in the background.




While well designed to provide protection from water and abuse, the hard case is too large for pocket carry so the soft case is a much-appreciated addition to the accessory package.



A 3.5mm terminated single ended cable with a microphone and remote and a 2.5mm terminated balanced cable devoid of the mic/remote are provided and hiding under the tips. (Personal bias is for cables without remotes so I used that most of the time unless testing the mic/remote.)

Tips deserve their own conversation here as the tips provided are designed to do different things. Fiio provides a set of memory foam tips that have the typical effect of dampening treble a bit and providing great isolation. In addition to the foams, three styles of silicone tips are provided. One style provides a neutral signature while the other two enhance either bass or treble. All my testing has been done with either neutral or foams (I did not use the provided foams since this was a review tour).




Build


The F9 series all share the same 2 piece metal shell. It is well made with seams being very consistent and no major gaps or glue showing. All of the F9 variants with removable cables use an mmcx connector for cable attachment on the upper side of the housing. This does limit the design to over-ear cable wear with the provided cables due to the built in guides. After-market mmcx cables without a memory wire can allow cable down wear but the fit is sub-optimal, as the weight of the cable tends to pull on the upper side of the shell and cause problems with seal and isolation. There are two vents on the inside of the shell (one immediately behind the nozzle and one immediately beneath the mmcx base). These do somewhat limit isolation but wear in a noisy office or public transport is still very viable.


The mmcx connector is at a slightly greater angle than the F9 so cables with larger connectors (Veclan) now fit well. (On the original F9, you had to shave some connectors to get a proper fit). Red and blue markings exist on the body of the mmcx connectors with matching coloration on the tip of the cables for easy reference.

Cables themselves are well made with solid rubber housing around the mmcx with a colored ring to show left/right orientation. Plastic memory guides provide the strain relief, which is a much better arrangement than memory wires in my opinion. Gentle heat with a hair-dryer will allow for reshaping should it be desired. Cables themselves are supple and minimize microphonics well. There is no chin slider, which I’m sure will be a detractor to some, but I found it unnecessary as fit, was good without it and no issues with movement presented during use. The splitter is metal and colored to match the earpieces with the word pro in white lettering.



A strain relief is added at the lower side of the splitter. The cables terminate in a 90 Degree 2.5 or a 3.5mm jack.

The 2.5mm cable is braided all the way throughout while the 3.5 is cloth wrapped. Both cables have cable management ties made of soft rubber just above the jack. This is a welcome addition and I found the soft rubber was easy to ignore if not in use. For those that dislike them a quick and careful cut with a razor knife should have them gone in a matter of a moment.


The Mic/remote on the 3.5mm cable matches the color of the earpieces as well and is straightforward and simple to use. It is worth noting that the microphone is susceptible to movement noise due to its position on the backside of the remote where it will be directed toward your clothing during normal wear. A shirt clip would be advisable if you intend to use the phone while at the gym or other strenuous exercise to minimize this.

The color of the F9 pro is much closer to that of The X5iii and the A5 I recently reviewed so if that is something that concerns you, you can rejoice. The original F9 was a distinct mismatch in this department but was never a concern for me.

I found the fit of the F9 pro to be very similar to the original F9 with a slightly greater forward rake to the nozzle than the original. Isolation was good but very tip dependent, as they are not a super deep fit.



Sound

Let us go ahead and get it out of the way. Did they fix the spike? The answer is maybe. The spike has moved up the scale from the 7 kHz region of the original F9. My guess would put it at high 8 kHz / low 9 kHz range based on what EQ settings remove it. The great news is, it is much less obtrusive than the previous version to my ear and probably many others. The bad news is technically, there is still a spike and it still contributes to the overall sound signature. Having said that, I am very pleased with the improvements the Knowles drivers made to the F9 Pro and I think it is big improvement in the treble overall.

For me, I like a headphone/earphone to have a good sub-bass presence, moderate mid-bass with as little bleed into the mids as possible, slightly forward upper mids with good vocals, and enough air and sparkle to get my attention. I tend to lean toward bright signatures as long as sub-bass is present.

The F9 Pro nearly matches my preferred signature. It is nearly linear with a mild U shape with plenty of sparkle without being belligerent. Bass is enhanced beyond neutral, but not emphasized to the degree commonly seen in V shaped signatures. Mids are clear with lower mids being very slightly recessed but upper mids pushed slightly forward almost exactly in the presence region so vocals are well rendered and natural sounding.


Bass

I expected the F9 Pro to share the same bass as the F9. Let me say immediately, it does not. This may be a case of addition by subtraction as the change in the treble elements may have revealed more of the bass, but the Pro has a more pronounced sub-bass and lower bass without being bloated in the mid-bass region. The F9 Pro’s bass seems to have greater extension and retains the good punch and slam of its progenitor. The mid-bass is very slightly forward but bleed into the mids is minimal. My advice would be to avoid the bass enhancing tips as they only serve to bloat an otherwise very good bass.


Mids

The lower mids are slightly recessed or maybe it is because the upper-mids are slightly forward the lower range seems recessed. Female vocals benefit greatly from the slight push to the upper mids while Male vocals sound full and natural. I was particularly impressed with the rendering of Van Morrison’s vocals (One of my heroes). Guitars have a nice full-bodied tone without being bloated and while retaining great definition and detail. Although, not a warm signature, the mids do have some elements that produce a smooth, organic tone more typically found in warmer signatures.

Treble

I was not a fan of the original F9’s treble. Unfortunately for me, the spike at 7 kHz was in a range that absolutely fatigued my ears and ruined the experience in short order. I understand that others were not bothered by this and my wife was amongst them. She uses my F9 infinitely more than I do these days as a result. I borrowed them back long enough to compare and make sure my memory was correct. What I found was the Pro has a more domesticated treble with better table manners. The lower treble is more linear when compared to the F9 with a mild boost in the mid treble that leads to a bit of extra energy for cymbals. The tuning is enough better on the Pro that more detail is presented (probably addition by subtraction again) when compared with the F9 and extension is slightly better with a bit more air and sparkle.




Imaging and Soundstage

I found imaging on the F9 Pro to be quite good as directional cues are well presented and the pro does a good job of layering without losing those directional cues in busier passages. Soundstage is wider than it is deep and is above average for its class.


Amplification


The F9 Pro works well from my HTC M9 or I-phone 7 without an external amplifier, but I did find it scaled well and was particularly enjoyable using the Cayin N3 and a resistor modded Walnut F1 (18K Ohm in parallel with Muses op-amp to lower gain). I think the F9 Pro also is easier to pair than the original F9 due to a slightly warmer tone.


Comparisons

Fiio F9: The obvious aside (ergonomics etc. being equal), the biggest difference in the PRO is the sound signature. The Treble spike that intruded into listening is gone on the Pro and the whole signature opens up as a result. Sub-bass is more present, mids are a bit more forward, and vocals are natural and well rendered. The strident and sometimes sibilant nature of the F9 is resolved in the F9 Pro and makes the listening experience much more enjoyable.

B400: The brainwavz has been a daily driver for me, so the question is, can the F9 Pro unseat it? From a fit and finish prospective, the F9 Pro gets the nod, as its metal shell and finish are about as comfortable as the b400, but the peeling paint on the seams of the 400 are a reminder that the construction methods differ quite a bit. From a sound perspective, the two are very hard to compare as the b400 is near reference flat and the F9 Pro is much more U shaped. The b400 shows a bit warmer signature compared to the F9 Pro’s bright leanings. Both have good extension although the F9 may have just a hair better extension at the low end. That said the b400 definitely wins on speed. Attack and decay are tighter and details benefit accordingly. With these two, it is going to come down to preference and you cannot go wrong with either. I love my b400s, but will make a place in my routine for the F9 Pro as well.

AKG n40: The n40 is more compact than the F9 Pro but fit and isolation are about the same. Both are designed for over-ear cable wear and both use very similar designs to the shells with ports to the inside of the shell. The F9 Pro has more low-end slam, while the n40 has slightly better extension at the top end. Signatures are very different with the F9 being much more aggressive and the n40 being much more laid back. The n40 lacks some of the detail in the upper mids of the F9 and has slightly less sparkle in the top end but more air at the very top. The n40 provides a very non-fatiguing listening experience while the F9 Pro brings additional details to the surface at the expense of a slightly harsher listen. I think owners of the b400 or F9 pro may find the n40 a bit of a disappointment as it has little in the way of technical enhancements over the others at nearly double the price.


Magaosi K5: The K5 is nearly as resolving as the F9 Pro but suffers from a low-level hiss when paired with high-powered sources. When run from a source it pairs well with, the K5 is a bit warmer than the F9 Pro. Where the K5 really loses, ground is in bass extension. The F9 Pro has considerably deeper bass and much more sub-bass presence. Considering the F9 Pro has a suggested retail $30 below that of the K5 there is really no reason to consider the K5. The F9 Pro is a marked improvement over the K5 in nearly every category.


1More Quad: Build quality is a wash or a very slight advantage for the one more Quad. The F9 Pro has a big advantage when it comes to fit and isolation though due to the odd shape and weight distribution of the Quad. Removable cables are another plus for the F9 Pro. Signatures are very different with the Quad being warm and dark while the F9 Pro is brighter if a bit thinner. The Quad tends to have a bit bloated upper bass which can at times bleed into the lower mids. This gives the F9 Pro a distinct advantage in definition and clarity while the mids of the Quad can seem a bit cloudy or murky at times. The Upper end of the signature is also very different. The Quad is more laid-back while the F9 Pro is a bit more forward and aggressive on the upper end. Extension on the upper end is better on the F9 Pro which gives it an overall cleaner more transparent signature that presents more detail than the Quad. Technically, the F9 Pro is the better choice, its hard to knock the Quad though as while it lacks some of the transparency of the F9 Pro it has a very listenable signature. If you wear them on the go, the F9 is a clear winner as the weight distribution of the quad makes them tough to wear while moving and maintain a good fit.

Trinity Icarus III: I used an Icarus III with the green nozzles as my daily driver for a good while and with price points being similar (pre-order) I thought I would include them here. Cables – F9 Pro wins hands down. I much prefer the cable style of the F9 to that of the Icarus. Sound wise, the Icarus is much warmer compared to the bright signature of the F9 Pro. Even when using lean filters, the Icarus tends to have some bass bleed into the upper mids and suffers from lack of details in the mids because of being obscured by the bass bump. The plus for the Icarus is more bass slam and better bass extension. The Icarus can be a bass monster depending on filters while the F9 pro renders more detail and is much more neutral.


Conclusion

I had high hopes for the F9 Pro as the F9 checked a lot of the right boxes for me, but having recently purchased the b400, AKG n40, and the F9, I was reluctant to spend more to purchase the F9 Pro on the chance that it was enough improved when compared to the original F9 to warrant the purchase. Having now had the opportunity to use the F9 Pro for a week as part of this tour, I can say I should not have been reluctant to purchase the F9 Pro in the least. The F9 Pro easily ranks among the best in-ears I have tried in the sub $300 price range. The things the F9 did well are still there and some are improved. The things the F9 did poorly have been addressed and are no longer issues. Bravo to Fiio for listening to customer feedback and making the changes. Fiio has done what some would have said was impossible, gone from startup earphone maker to class-leading performance in less than 24 months. I cannot wait to see what is next from Fiio. Maybe an over-ear?

I was given the Mogco M10 by Gearbest in exchange for reviewing them. The thoughts here are my own and Gearbest has given me no instructions regarding this review (nor would I have listened if they had).

They are listed on Gearbest here


Package & Accessories

The packaging is really quite nice considering the sub-$20 price tag of the M10. Outside is a black fiberboard box with a paper wrap label that provides good detail about what to expect in the way of contents.




Once the wrap is slid off, the box opens from the side and has magnets built-in to make closure more secure. Inside is a plastic form fitted tray with the earphones displayed and under the tray are extra tip sizes, a shirt clip, and the manual.


A carry case would be a nice touch, but certainly not anticipated at this price point.

Build & Materials

The earphones themselves are plastic throughout. The housing is a transparent Red plastic while the cable and strain reliefs are black and provide a nice contrast. The cable is a dark brown as is the microphone / remote which acts as the splitter as well and adds red trim to accentuate the look.

I would have stayed with black through out as there is sort of an odd transition from the strain reliefs to the cable.


The 3.5mm jack is of the TRRS type with a 45 degree angle between the cable and jack. While better than a straight in a 90 degree with a shorter profile would be less likely to get banged around.

The cable is silicone coated and soft enough that microphonics are kept to a minimum. This would be good for gym use.


The earpieces are well shaped with the nozzle being on about a 30 degree angle upward from horizontal. The nozzles are 5mm diameter with a 4mm ID so standard tips fit. The combination of shape and tip angle makes them very easy to insert and get a good seal. I found them to be very comfortable to wear for extended periods.


The remote volume buttons work on both Android (HTC M9) and I-phone (7+) devices.


Sound:

Bass

Bass extension is not particularly deep but mid-bass is just huge. Bleed is quite pronounced. The bass might be good for those who love EDM but for the genres I prefer it was overbearing. I did find that the bass was somewhat source dependent and was a little cleaner with a good amp than when running off a cell phone or low-end dap. It was still thick and not very well defined but it gets down right murky when run off a cell or low powered source.

Mids

Mids are extremely recessed. They can be very hard to find due to the bass bleed. I used the EQ to remove bass from the mix to see what the mids could have been. With a healthy dose of EQ, the mids are allowed to shine through a bit. Even then, muddy, bloated, and sloppy are the best terms to define the sound.

Treble

The highs have an artificial tone that sounds almost metallic at times. Sibilance is present and the treble is both harsh and lacking extension at the same time. Sparkle and air are simply not in the description of this earphone.


In the overall, extension is not great on either end, detail is less than most and micro-detail is non-existent. Soundstage is quite claustrophobic, and instrument separation suffers as could be predicted. Sad news, considering the fit of these is extremely comfortable as long as they are turned off.

I’ve recently started reviewing several mid-fi iems on a journey to enlightenment. This has included the FLC8s, the venerable Shure 535, the Brainwavz b400, the AKG n40, Sennheiser ie80, and the LZ A4. Penon Audio graciously sent the new Magaosi K5 for review. This sample was sent to me with the understanding that I would send it along to Ngoshawk to review as well. As I type this, the box is in the mail on its way to him for further review.

I have received no guidance, advice, or suggestions regarding this review from Penon Audio or Magaosi and the thoughts represented here are mine and mine alone. I have tried to be as objective as possible as I see no benefit in a review if it cannot be trusted to be objective.

A short note about me: I am a music enthusiast, and audio hobbyist. I make no claim to have the level of experience of some here. I tend to be quite pragmatic and value oriented. I am a lover of blues, jazz, and rock music and listen to a very broad range as I am always interested in what is new.


Build Quality:


Wow, where to start! Let’s go with the positive first.



The earpieces are as close to a custom fit in ear as any universal I have tried. In-ear fit is simply superb. They are a clear acrylic with the BA Drivers stacked (one large under 4 smaller). The tubes between the BA Drivers themselves and the nozzle are clearly visible through the acrylic.



The nozzles are metal and also moulded into the body of the acrylic very solidly. Nozzles themselves are smaller than standard (3mm) with a flange to hold the ear-tips in place. The MMCX connectors are recessed into the body of the acrylic and should last for years with proper care as they are very solidly attached and not susceptible to being rocked loose in the medium as some others are. Plenty of provided tips means finding a good fit was a relatively easy proposition even with the smaller than usual size. (Your 5mm tip collection will not work, I tried).



I found I could wear these for extended periods with good comfort and not a lot of heat generated.






Ok, now for the negative. The earpieces are not labeled left/right that I could find but fit will tell you pretty quickly which is which. The cable is marked on the mmcx connectors but that brings us to our next point.
Throw the cable away. The wired cable is, simply put, the worst cable I have had the displeasure of trying to use in quite some time. The connections at the earpieces are so bad they suffered random cut-outs where one side or the other would suddenly be silent in the middle of playback even when seated while listening. Any activity would guarantee music would randomly cut in and out as the cable moved. If I were not responsible for sending these on to another reviewer, I would have the used the cable for some more suitable purpose like tying a garbage bag closed.



And the middle ground, the Bluetooth cable has definitely had more time spent on it than the wired cable. The controls are very straight forward and the weight is kept to a minimum while not sacrificing features. The AptX function worked well and cut outs were rare unless distances exceeded 15 Meters from the source. The microphone worked as advertised but due to its position on the rear of the remote it is susceptible to noise as it rubs on jacket collar or scarf etc.




Sound:

As mentioned at the top, I am a lover of blues, blues/rock, classic rock, and anything with good guitar work in it. For that reason, I use the following as my test tracks. (artist, album, track, thoughts)

Stevie Ray Vaughan – Texas Flood – Lenny (Guitar to die for but the thing I look for is the percussion.)

Lindsey Buckingham – Fleetwood Mac, Best of - Go Insane, Live (Probably the most complicated simple song you’ll ever hear, all about nuance and subtleties with this track).

Johny Lang – Lie to me – Lie to Me (Looking for tight bass, bleed over into the mids, and controlled sub-bass)

Tedeschi Trucks – Let me get by – I want more (Female Vocals, backing brass band)

The Blasters - Testament – Blue Shadows (Saxophone and piano with male vocals)

Vintage Trouble – The Bomb shelter sessions - Blues hand me down (Looking at attack speed and decay especially in bass and sub-bass. This track gets muddy quick if the equipment can’t handle it.)





Sound Quality


Sources: Due to the extreme sensitivity of the K5, it does its best work with a low power system. Plugged directly into a smartphone or portable DAP with a relatively low output power, the K5 did very well. The more power you add, the worse the background hiss becomes. As an example, the K5 did well with the Cayin N3 on low gain but when moved to high an audible hiss became present. When paired with the Walnut F1 the K5 was unusable due to the background hiss and impedance mismatch. This is a case of these might actually be a bit too easy to drive but the upside is for those looking for something to run directly from a smartphone, these are a great option as they do not require an external amp to perform.



Bass: The k5 has good mid-bass but does not have great low-end extension. Bass rolls off pretty dramatically below about 100hz and sub-bass presence is lacking. Here the K3HD has an advantage with its dynamic driver. The BA in the K5 just can’t drop into that sub-bass space as effectively as the dynamic. Where the K5 wins is in its control of the bass. Bleed into the mids and the mid-bass hump that were very present in the K3 are much less so in the K5. Overall, the K5 did well in the bass for the genres I listen too most but for lovers of EDM where the sub-bass presence can make or break a track, the K5 will struggle. I was particularly impressed with Vintage Trouble as Blues hand me down makes a lot of iems struggle as the bass is very busy and separation usually suffers. This is where the BA has an edge in that attack and decay are quicker than most dynamics.

Mids: This is where the K5 shows a huge leap over the k3HD. Mids are well defined with lots of detail and the veiled sound of the k3 has been replaced with good clear sound. Vocals are well represented but perhaps even more to my liking strings are very well rendered. I cannot say the K5 is mid forward but it makes large strides away from the mid-recessed nature of its predecessor.

Treble: The K5 treble is also a step above the K3 but that step is more about better control than enhanced presence. The K3 had plenty of treble as it was a very V shaped sound. The K5 makes that v a bit shallower (thus my capital V vs lowercase v). So while the K5 does not have as forward a treble as it predecessor, it does manage it better. Detail comes through well without coming across as harsh or metallic as the K3 sometimes could. Air and sparkle are still there, just only when really called for rather than being full force full-time.

Soundstage: Soundstage is good with a little loss at the very bottom end as previously mentioned. To my ears, the stage is wider than deep. Instrument separation is very good within the space although imaging may take a step backwards from the K3 as at times the mix of 5 BA drivers is not as cohesive as the earlier 2+a Dynamic of the K3.



Thoughts:

Would I buy the K5, yes. Would I be disappointed in the cable absolutely! It makes little sense that an earphone this good is being plagued by a cable this bad. In comparing this with some of the other mid-fi in my recent trials, I would say the b400 is more neutral than the K5. The K5 is perhaps a bit more fun with its V shape. The n40 is more laid back and musical, but the K5 produces a bit more detail in the mids. The Flc8s and LZ a4 give more tuning options but the fit of the K5 has the LZ beat by miles and the price point of the FLC is nearly double. Perhaps as should be expected, the other mid-fi in my stable I find is closest to the K5 is the Shure 535. They both are all BA arrangements with some of the same limitations and similar signatures. With the Shure 535 being as venerated as it is, putting the K5 in the same class is high praise indeed. For the record, the cable from the Shure 535 is a huge step up for the K5 and is available as a replacement part from Shure.

Most of the time, I audition sub $100 in-ears. With kids in college and veterinary school, I just can’t splurge on flagships. Lately, it has become common place to look for the giant killers amongst the low-price items and all too frequently we hear of things punching above their weight class, but without having auditioned numerous items in the upper weight classes, how can one realistically know if something genuinely competes with more expensive models or not? For that reason when I came into a windfall I wasn’t expecting I decided to spend it on a few mid-fi IEMs so I could better understand what is available at that price point. I purchased the N40 used from another head-fi member so no unboxing notes, I borrowed an FLC8s from another, and I purchased an LZ a4, a Brainwavz b400, and a Shure 535. Combined with the Sennheiser IE 80, the Trinity Icarus III and Phantom master I already own and the Magaosi K5 review sample, this makes up for a pretty good stable of mid-fi IEMs to work from.


I didn’t buy the n40 blind, as I had auditioned the n40 once previously and found that I really enjoyed its signature so when they came up on the sale forum here for roughly ½ of the msrp I couldn’t resist the temptation. I bought these as my daily driver and have been using them daily since purchasing them.



A short note about me: I am a music enthusiast, and audio hobbyist. I make no claim to have the level of experience of some here. I tend to be quite pragmatic and value oriented. I am a lover of blues, jazz, and rock music and listen to a very broad range as I am always interested in what is new.


Build Quality:

The earpieces are smaller than most hybrid IEMs and a mix of plastic and metal and are extremely lightweight as a result. They are designed for over-ear wear only as the MMCX attachment point is on the top of the earpiece and pointed due forward. Combined with the position of the nozzle, if you attempt to wear them cable down, the ear blocks the connector and makes it impossible to get a good fit. The good news is for cable over the ear wear, they are one of the most comfortable models I have tried as the size, weight, and design makes it easy to get a good fit without weighing you down. The cables do have a memory and they fit solidly and do not move during exercise. The design also minimizes microphonics as the cable is effectively isolated from the body of the unit and movements of the cable do not translate to the body of the iem unless you really jerk the cable.



The earpieces are clearly marked L and R and have blue and red dots on the cable and earpiece that align to make sure you have the cable oriented correctly.



On the other side of the housing the nozzle sports screw-in filters and 3 are provided. The filters are neutral, bass plus and treble plus. A nice metal plate with each pair of filters labeled is provided to keep from losing the filters. (Hear that Trinity Audio – Labels so you know which filter is which – novel concept huh?).



The cables deserve their own discussion. Both have the same construction except for the remote so I have described the cable with remote here (the other is the same cable sans remote). At the south end of the cable, a standard 3.5mm jack with a steel sleeve does the connectivity duties. The cable is cloth wrapped up to the Y where a stainless-steel strain relief splits the cable into two soft rubber cables that head for the earpieces.



An adjustable slider allows for fitting them snuggly under the chin.




On the left cable there is a remote with an Apple/Android switch, and a microphone on the front. The entire reverse is a rocker switch with up and down controls at the ends for handling volume or forward/back tasks. In the center sits a push button for play/pause operations.


At the North end of the cable is a rubber memory wire topped by a strain relief and standard MMCX connector. The memory wire is stiffer than the cable but does not actually contain any wire so fit is easier than some and they translate a lot less shock and microphonics as they are not nearly as rigid as designs that contain an actual wire in the over ear portion of the cable.



Microphone / remote:

I found that the remote worked as advertised with both an HTC M9 and an Apple iPhone 7 (once the switch is placed in the proper position). The mic works as expected but is somewhat susceptible to wind and noises in the immediate environment as are all lapel mics. Overall, I prefer cables without a remote but in this case, it was well thought out and very usable. Those looking for a cable with a good remote should take a look at this design as it is easily the best in my collection.





Sound:

As mentioned at the top, I am a lover of blues, blues/rock, classic rock, and anything with good guitar work in it. For that reason, I use the following as my test tracks. (artist, album, track, thoughts)

Stevie Ray Vaughan – Texas Flood – Lenny (Guitar to die for but the thing I look for is the percussion.)

Lindsey Buckingham – Fleetwood Mac, Best of - Go Insane, Live (Probably the most complicated simple song you’ll ever hear, all about nuance and subtleties with this track).

Johny Lang – Lie to me – Lie to Me (Looking for tight bass, bleed over into the mids, and controlled sub-bass)

Tedeschi Trucks – Let me get by – I want more (Female Vocals, backing brass band)

The Blasters - Testament – Blue Shadows (Saxophone and piano with male vocals)

Vintage Trouble – The Bomb shelter sessions - Blues hand me down (Looking at attack speed and decay especially in bass and sub-bass. This track gets muddy quick if the equipment can’t handle it.)


Sound Quality



Sources: When paired directly to a smartphone, the n40 struggles a bit. The treble comes through as a bit harsh and the bass can be a bit lacking. If I were going to use these straight from a smartphone, I would be tempted to use the bass boost filter if only to curb a bit of the treble. Once you move to a DAP or an Amplified source, the n40 really opens up and any harshness to the treble vanishes and bass becomes much more solid. While not necessarily very hard to drive, they certainly benefit from a bit of amplification.



Bass: The n40 has good bass depth with great detail retrieval and plenty of punch. Note, this is with the neutral filter in place. They cannot be considered a basshead design as the bass is very well proportioned to the rest of the signature. Control of the bass is very good with almost no bleed into the mids and a clear separation of instruments even in the bass and sub-bass space. The n40 comes across as slightly bass forward with a tonality that is very natural in the bass and sub-bass, but not at the expense of detail retrieval giving the n40 a mildly warm very musical signature.

Mids: With the slight forward push of the bass and treble of the n40, it would be easy to forget about the mids which would be a mistake. Mids are well defined with lots of detail. Vocals are clear and full and vocal ensembles are well rendered as differences in timbre between voices are realistic. While not mid forward, it is hard to define the n40 as recessed as the mids are only about ½ step behind the bass and treble and in as such really does not feel overshadowed or dark.

Treble: This is where the n40 really shines. Treble is very mildly forward providing just the right amount of brightness without becoming harsh or brittle. Extension is very good and seemingly effortless. Plenty of air and sparkle are present and cymbals are well rendered. For people like me that love a slightly bright signature with plenty of detail and air, the n40 does a very admirable job.

Soundstage: Soundstage is very good with the low end providing a bit of extra depth. The trade-off for that depth is that reverb doesn’t have a lot of room for decay which at time limits the soundstage a bit. Even with that limitation, soundstage remains amongst the largest and most evenly shaped I’ve heard in an in-ear.

Imaging on the n40 is simply brilliant. While it certainly needs amping to be fully realized, even without any additional amplification it is well above average. They make orchestral pieces fun as you listen to themes move through the different instruments.

Filters: The filters are easy to change, similar to the filters used by Trinity Audio, but have less impact than the smaller filters of the FLC8s. The trade for that ease of use, is that they don’t offer as much alteration to the signature as something like the LZ A4 or FLC8s and quite frankly, I find myself using the neutral filter and not worrying with the others. If you like a slightly warm signature with plenty of air and sparkle, the n40 does very well without the use of the filters. If you want something other than that, I’d encourage you to look elsewhere as the filters are not going to dramatically alter the signature.


Thoughts:

Describing the n40 is challenging. It is warm and bright, precise and musical, detailed and relaxed. The best single word description for the n40 is dynamic. The n40 is very good at becoming what it needs to be to deliver the music it is presented with. They have fantastic musicality while maintaining very strong technical ability. Extension is good on both ends while maintaining a very cohesive sound across the entire spectrum. For me the thing the N40 does best is take whatever quality recording you feed it and make it musical. Unlike most of the other mid-fi products I recently auditioned which are very source intolerant, the N40 does a great job of working with what you give it. If you collection is still a lot of mp3s, this may be the best mid-fi choice out there. The worst thing I can say about the n40 is they are expensive. Perhaps the best thing I can say is they are worth it.

First off, a heart-felt thank you to SmartOmi for sending me two of their latest in ears to audition. Both pairs were sent in exchange for an honest review and I have no affiliation with SmartOmi. I always appreciate the opportunity to try new gear and the Bluetooth market has been particularly active so it seems I have a steady stream of cool stuff to try out. I am truly blessed and I thank those who continue to make this hobby exciting and new.

A short note about me: I am a music enthusiast, and audio hobbyist. I make no claim to have the level of experience of some here. I tend to be quite pragmatic and value oriented. I am a lover of blues, jazz, and rock music and listen to a very broad range as I am always interested in what is new.


Review:

Packaging:

Having recently done a handful of reviews, I was approached by SmartOmi to review two of their new offerings. Both arrived in the same Amazon box a few days later. The outer packaging on both shares a similar color scheme and design but that is really where the similarities end. The package is very much a retail design. The front shows a picture of the earpieces along with the brand and model and that the box contains wireless headphones. The rear of the box lists stereo sound, snap paring, one-key operation, and 1year warranty. I would have preferred details of the expected battery life, frequency response etc. (As a side note pairing is misspelled and should be updated). When you lift the cardboard top, you see the buds in a plastic tray. Under the tray are the manual, and a charging cable and spare tips.

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Build Quality:

The earpieces themselves are a two-piece plastic shell with the bulk of the body being a dark copper color and the face plate in black. The design can be looked at as a box with a tube extending out the bottom right end. The box top has a single large rectangular control button with a mic hole in the left end of the button rather than being on the stationary case. The tube has the USB charging port immediately beneath the box and then the nozzle which is nearly a full centimeter wide. A soft silicone rubber combination earhook and eartip fits over the nozzle and positions the nozzle in-line with the ear canal but only the tip is in the canal. A small flap covers the USB port to prevent dust and dirt from entering but also was in an unfortunate position as the best position for me made the flap rub on my ear. I may at some point remove the flaps and see if that helps as it sticks up in order to allow a way to pull it loose from the USB port and I think they might be more comfortable without the flaps. The design is kind of hard to explain but easy to see in the pictures.


Firmware/Blutooth:

The Q5 uses Bluetooth 4.1 in low power mode so has a limitation of about 15 meters from the source. It does not support the AptX codec which would be a nice addition to future models. The vocal prompts are clear and easy to understand and pairing went quickly and easily as long as the recommended sequence is followed. Turn on left, pair, turn on right. If you pair the right first you end up with monaural sound as the left will try to pair independently rather than mate. The other thing worth noting is there is an audible signal each time a setting is changed. Fortunately, this does not include adjusting volume on the phone. Either deleting or at least lowering the volume of this tone would be appreciated as it is not adjustable via the volume control. You can have music playing at a very low volume and the alert tones are still at full volume when a phone call cuts in, which can be somewhat unsettling.




Battery:

The Q5 lasted roughly 110 minutes on a charge and charged from dead in about 40 minutes using the supplied Y cable. This brings up an interesting point. The Y cable, while handy, is actually detracting from the ability to charge the earpieces. With testing equipment attached at the base of the Y and at each arm, it is clear that the current being pulled from the hub or charger is being shared by both earpieces and is effectively doubling the charging time. With the Y cable I found the draw at he micro-USB port to be .29 Amp at 5.02 V on the left side and .31 Amp also at 5.02 V for the right. When using discrete cables plugged into different ports on the same usb charger, I was able to get results of .54A and .51A respectively. The utility of the Y cable and only needing to carry a single cable to charge is nice, but if you are in a hurry to recharge my advice is use 2 cables as they are a standard micro-USB connector type.



Microphone:

As mentioned earlier, both earpieces have a mic built in so either can be used independently as a Bluetooth earpiece when using the phone. The microphones did work as intended and the phone would let me select which earpiece the mono defaulted to when calls came in. Not sure if this is a feature of the phone the buds or a bit of both, but it was a welcome change for a leftie.


Sound:

As mentioned at the top, I am a lover of blues, blues/rock, classic rock, and anything with good guitar work in it. For that reason, I use the following as my test tracks. (artist, album, track, thoughts)

Stevie Ray Vaughan – Texas Flood – Lenny (Guitar to die for but the thing I look for is the percussion.)

Lindsey Buckingham – Fleetwood Mac, Best of - Go Insane, Live (Probably the most complicated simple song you’ll ever hear, all about nuance and subtleties with this track).

Johny Lang – Lie to me – Lie to Me (Looking for tight bass, bleed over into the mids, and controlled sub-bass)

Tedeschi Trucks – Let me get by – I want more (Female Vocals, backing brass band)

The Blasters - Testament – Blue Shadows (Saxophone and piano with male vocals)

Vintage Trouble – The Bomb shelter sessions - Blues hand me down (Looking at attack speed and decay especially in bass and sub-bass. This track gets muddy quick if the equipment can’t handle it.)

The Q5 is listed as an Premium bass sound on the SmartOmi website so I was interested to see if it could deliver that experience.


Bass: Bass is forward a bit on the Q5 as would be expected based on the advertising materials. Bass extension is not deep and sub-bass is minimal. I found pretty severe rolloff below about 100Hz. The Q5 does have a mid-bass elevation that bleeds into the lower mids a bit. It isn’t nearly as pronounced or as sloppy as the Syllable D9 so still gets points for that but its little brother the ACE is cleaner in this respect. I found the Q5 to fall into an odd space where it isn’t enough bass or sub-bass to make bassheads happy but it is a bit overly warm for someone seeking a reference signature due to the midbass.

Mids: The mids are somewhat veiled by the mid-bass bleed but carry on with the warmth found in the lower ranges. Timbre is good if instrument separation in the mids is a bit claustrophobic at times. Detail is only acceptable with its little brother again taking the lead in this respect.

Treble: Treble extension is minimal and could certainly use a bit of boost. The good side is this makes a very laid back warm signature that is non-fatiguing and can be listened to for extended periods. The bad news is that treble sparkle and air are lacking as a result.

Soundstage is cramped as is the soundstage. I found the stage to have some width but almost no depth with it being tough to tell if the piano was behind the singer or if the entire orchestra had been crammed in a mini-van to record the track. This is not uncommon. The Q5 can struggle to keep up on really busy passages like are found in blues hand me down.



Thoughts:

I have grown a bit jaded having recently tested a number of less than stellar products. The SmartOmi products were both a pleasant surprise. I recommended the ACE in another review and think the Q5 does take a bit of a step backwards from the ACE. This is not unexpected as the ACE is SmartOmi’s current flagship and the Q5 is one step below. There are some odd things about how the Q5 charges and fits that make it worth trying before you purchase. The sound signature is warm with a nice laid back tone and makes for a fun listen without fatiguing sibilance. They could use a bit more extension on both ends and a few minor tweaks and SmartOmi would have a real winner on their hands. As it is, they still deserve a good hard look as they are still in the top 5 I have heard in this genre and price range.

First off, a heart-felt thank you to SmartOmi for sending me two of their latest in ears to audition. Both pairs were sent in exchange for an honest review and I have no affiliation with SmartOmi. I always appreciate the opportunity to try new gear and the Bluetooth market has been particularly active so it seems I have a steady stream of cool stuff to try out. I am truly blessed and I thank those who continue to make this hobby exciting and new.

A short note about me: I am a music enthusiast, and audio hobbyist. I make no claim to have the level of experience of some here. I tend to be quite pragmatic and value oriented. I am a lover of blues, jazz, and rock music and listen to a very broad range as I am always interested in what is new.


Review:

Packaging:

Having recently done a handful of reviews, I was approached by SmartOmi to review two of their new offerings. Both arrived in the same Amazon box a few days later. The outer packaging on both shares a similar color scheme and design but that is really where the similarities end. The package comes in somewhere between the typical Chinese warehouse packaging with no information, and the typical US packaging with all the details on the retail packaging. The front identifies the brand and model and that the box contains wireless headphones. The rear of the box lists stereo sound, snap paring, one-key operation, and 1year warranty. I would have preferred details of the expected battery life, frequency response etc. (As a side note pairing is misspelled and should be updated.



When you lift the cardboard top, you see the charging case, the manual, and a charging cable and spare tips.


Build Quality:

The earpieces themselves are a two-piece plastic shell with the bulk of the body being black and the outside face plate in a medium grey. On the outside, a small round button with a LED ring around the perimeter sits at one end of the oval shape. A small port in the middle of the bud is the only tip off that a microphone exists. On the inner side, the nozzles are shorter than some but the provided tips are all double flanged for a little extra isolation. Fit was good due to the small size of the buds and double flanged eartips. Also of note is the ear-pieces also have four charging contacts per side instead of the usual 2. The case is a metal shell in a matching grey with a smoked plastic lid. One great feature of the case design is the magnet that holds the buds in-line with the contacts and prevents the contact from being broken if the case is bounced around in a pocket. Having recently tested no less than 4 different charging cases with Bluetooth earbuds, this is easily the best design for maintaining the connection between charger and bud.


Firmware/Blutooth:

The ACE does not seem to share the firmware with many other of the inexpensive Bluetooth buds as pairing is accompanied by different prompts. Pairing went easily and range was found to be roughly 10 meters in clear space. Due to the low power mode of the earbuds, much over 7 meters is iffy. They do support Bluetooth 4.2 but do not have the AptX codec.

Battery:

The buds easily lasted 90 minutes on a charge and the case was capable of recharging them completely in between 20 and 30 minutes depending on the charge state of the case. With the case plugged in or recently charged the charging time was closer to 20 minutes. With a ½ discharged case, the buds took significantly longer to charge completely. A 3rd charge from the case without plugging in the case resulted in an only partial charge of the buds.

Microphone:

As mentioned earlier, both earpieces have a mic built in so either can be used independently as a Bluetooth earpiece when using the phone. The microphones did work as intended and the phone automatically switched to the left earpiece only then back to stereo when the call ended without any flakiness as has been evidenced on some other models.


Sound:

As mentioned at the top, I am a lover of blues, blues/rock, classic rock, and anything with good guitar work in it. For that reason, I use the following as my test tracks. (artist, album, track, thoughts)

Stevie Ray Vaughan – Texas Flood – Lenny (Guitar to die for but the thing I look for is the percussion.)

Lindsey Buckingham – Fleetwood Mac, Best of - Go Insane, Live (Probably the most complicated simple song you’ll ever hear, all about nuance and subtleties with this track).

Johny Lang – Lie to me – Lie to Me (Looking for tight bass, bleed over into the mids, and controlled sub-bass)

Tedeschi Trucks – Let me get by – I want more (Female Vocals, backing brass band)

The Blasters - Testament – Blue Shadows (Saxophone and piano with male vocals)

Vintage Trouble – The Bomb shelter sessions - Blues hand me down (Looking at attack speed and decay especially in bass and sub-bass. This track gets muddy quick if the equipment can’t handle it.)


Bass: Finally, a Bluetooth bud with decent but controlled bass. The Ace has good mid-bass and only a small hump with minimal bleed over compared to the other sets I have tested. Sub-bass is not present and bass extension does not go particularly deep although this is not unexpected for a 6mm driver. I did find that the bass did react well to EQ so those that demand more of a V shape have the option to go heavier than default. I don’t think these will ever make a basshead happy, but that can produce more bass than the default tuning is pushing.

Mids: The mids are more forward and are well rendered. Acoustic guitar sounds realistic with good timbre. Overall, much clearer than I have come to expect with more detail and depth than anticipated.

Treble: Treble extension is good but not great. Cymbals are a little sharp and metallic but the treble is sufficient to provide some sparkle and air in the top end. I did not notice any sibilance in female vocals and played a couple tracks that are noteworthy for producing sibilance in lesser designs just to make certain it was not the source material influencing my understanding.

Soundstage is reasonable but not huge as can be expected in a small, closed back design. Instrument separation is good although the lower mids can get a little busy and cramped on large orchestral pieces.


Thoughts:

I have grown a bit jaded having recently tested a number of less than stellar products. The SmartOmi products were both a pleasant surprise. I can recommend the ace for those looking for a small in-ear with good sound and a charging case. They have the best sound of those I’ve tested lately. The ACE is smaller than most sets I have tried with better designed tips and will fit a larger range of people well. They have good if not great Bluetooth connectivity although an upgrade to AptX would be a nice addition to the next model. Sound is a warm, well balanced sound albeit without a ton of extension on either end. They wont replace my beloved Akg40 anytime soon, but for a wireless device designed for use during travel and at the gym, they deserve your attention. You can spend a lot more in the Bluetooth bud market and get a lot less. I’ve done it myself several times now.

First off, a heart-felt thank you to George and Gearbest for providing these in ears. New gear is always fun and the opportunity to try out gear as it comes to market is indeed a privilege.

https://www.gearbest.com/earbud-headphones/pp_699680.html?

A short note about me: I am a music enthusiast, and audio hobbyist. I make no claim to have the level of experience of some here. I tend to be quite pragmatic and value oriented. I am a lover of blues, jazz, and rock music and listen to a very broad range as I am always interested in what is new.


Review:

I’ve recently started on a group of reviews of small Bluetooth in-ears and it seems that every time I finish one I get requests to do a few more. This started with the Syllable D9 (Bass heavy but good clarity), went on to a couple of Borofone models that are best skipped due to quality control problems, two Smartomi products that I am currently listening to, and the subject of this review, the Riversong AirX 2. I am not a huge fan of Bluetooth headphones but have to concede they do have their use cases. Those use cases all require that the ear-pieces stay in place during movement, and that they continue to operate within a reasonable proximity of the source.



The X2 arrived in a typical padded shipping envelope. The box is a departure from the average in that it is well labeled and does a good job of depicting the contents. It is designed to be hung on a display rack and is much more retail oriented than most I have received. The box has a couple of statements that need some clarification. On the front of the box it says “Intelligent Noise Reduction” which would lead to the assumption that they have active noise cancelling. This is not the case as no noise cancellation circuitry exists. The inner part of the box slides out the bottom to reveal the buds, case, and extra tips. A brief manual and a short usb to micro-usb cable is included for charging the case. The packaging is well laid out and eye catching.



The Charging case is similar to the D9 and other two-piece ear bud designs with two pins in either cavity that align with charging contacts on the earpiece. The earpieces will only fit one way and are held very solidly in order to maintain the contact between the earpiece and the charge unit. On the back of the box is a micro-USB female connector for charging. The case hides an internal battery capable of charging the formed tray that holds the earpieces there is a battery so the case itself can charge the earpieces twice without need for the USB connector.


Both earpieces have a mic built in so either can be used independently as a Bluetooth earpiece when using the phone. The microphones did work well and it seems that my phone automatically goes to right side mono only when using these buds to make and receive calls. I could force the left side to work with the phone only by turning the right-side earpiece off.

Firmware/Bluetooth:

These buds seem to share the same firmware as the Syllable in that the vocal instructions are the same voice for both. They also share an odd issue when switching between phone calls and music. When listening to music and receiving a phone call, the X2 automatically switched to right side only mono during the phone call and then switched back to stereo once the call was over. The issue was that the two earpieces were out of sync with the left being about a full second behind the right. I could only correct this by turning off both earpieces and then re-starting them.


Sound:

As mentioned at the top, I am a lover of blues, blues/rock, classic rock, and anything with good guitar work in it. For that reason, I use the following as my test tracks. (artist, album, track, thoughts)

Stevie Ray Vaughan – Texas Flood – Lenny (Guitar to die for but the thing I look for is the percussion.)

Lindsey Buckingham – Fleetwood Mac, Best of - Go Insane, Live (Probably the most complicated simple song you’ll ever hear, all about nuance and subtleties with this track).

Johny Lang – Lie to me – Lie to Me (Looking for tight bass, bleed over into the mids, and controlled sub-bass)

Tedeschi Trucks – Let me get by – I want more (Female Vocals, backing brass band)

The Blasters - Testament – Blue Shadows (Saxophone and piano with male vocals)

Vintage Trouble – The Bomb shelter sessions - Blues hand me down (Looking at attack speed and decay especially in bass and sub-bass. This track gets muddy quick if the equipment can’t handle it.)

The sound on the X2 comes across as overly compressed and it is very finicky about source material. With low quality source material, the X2 sounded like I was listening from the bottom of a pit. With other sources, the X2 sounded much more realistic although still a bit overly compressed. Not atypical for Bluetooth especially without the benefit of AptX. The addition of AptX and Bluetooth 4.2 would be a welcome change for the X2 as it might remedy some of the recessed sound.


Bass: The bass on the X2 is elevated with a lot of mid bass and very little (if any) sub-bass. The mid-bass is muddy and somewhat slow with a lot of bleed into the mids. I attempted some EQ changes but found very little change as a result. The X2 as a whole did not react to EQ.

Mids: The mids can be tough to find as the bass really hides a lot of them. I found a couple tracks that were extremely light in bass to listen to just the mids. The X2 still had difficulty delivering a solid vocal as male vocals in particular tended to sound hollow and distant.

Treble: Treble is more defined than the mids but does not show much extension or sparkle. Again, the entire sound signature is somewhat muted.

Soundstage is non-existent and instrument separation can only be defined at mediocre.


Thoughts:

I had initially expected fit issues to be what limited my listening time, but the sound signature made it difficult to test these long enough to prove the 2 hour battery life. I was able to, but it took discipline not to take them off and swap for something with a more enjoyable signature. Overall, I think these are best reserved for mono use for taking phone calls. The sound quality simply isn’t there for audio use.

I was loaned the FLC8s to audition before purchasing the b400 or LZ A4. I did not cover un-boxing or the accessory kit as I received the product without the box and with filters already mounted. I'd like to thank @Ngoshawk for graciously loaning me the FLC8s to try. I'll admit, I really don't want to return them but will have to buy my own soon.

Build
The 8s by FLC is a smaller than average uniquely shaped iem designed for over ear wear. The housing is all plastic which may turn some people off, but seems well enough put together. At first glance, I thought they might be colored aluminum shells due to the fit and finish. The housing feel solid and seams fit well with no obvious gaps or mis-alignments. I saw no weak points in the shell that I would worry about coming apart over time. The fact that 3 different filters fit into these small housings means that any slight misalignment or wobble during production and everything fails to work correctly. Filters themselves are tiny and with these being on loan, I was very weary of potentially losing one. Once attached, they stay solidly in place so no worries during use of the 8s but when changing filters, it can be a challenge for aging eyes and clumsy fingers.



The best news for me was that the 8s arrived with the upgrade cable already in place so I avoided use of the stock cable except to do some sound comparisons as Ngoshawk requested my thoughts on the cables. The stock cable is overly stiff and combined with my glasses was an uncomfortable fit. Were I to purchase the 8s, I would have to buy the upgrade cable as the option to go without glasses or without music is simply not appealing as both seem rather necessary. The upgrade cable still has a bit of memory and isn’t the most pliable cable but does make a vast improvement in comfort for me. Although I am reluctant to attribute any auditory changes to a cable, the silver single crystal cable did seem to make a bit of improvement particularly in the low end. The cables use the 2 pin UE connector type making it a little more difficult to find replacement cables and those who prefer a more supple cable will certainly have to do some looking at aftermarket options.

Stock Cable


Upgrade Cable


Fit and Isolation
The shape of the 8s combined with its lightweight and smooth surfaces made it very comfortable to wear although the nozzles do not have a forward angle as some other earphones do and may cause some problems with fit for those with small ear canals. For me, they fit well and when paired with symbios tips the seal was good although a bit shallow. With the ports in the earphone itself and the shallow fit, I can only describe the isolation as mediocre. If I had to guess, I’d say somewhere around a -12dB reduction of outside noise.

Sound
This is the hardest part of this review by far. The fact is: the 8s sounds like whatever you want it to. The filters really do work, you can tune the 8s to be a bass cannon if that is your thing, or head the other direction and create an absolute treble knife. Most will probably tune the 8s somewhere between those extremes and with 36 possible combinations a lot of middle ground exists. I’ve tried to make notes about the driver characteristics that come through regardless of how you adjust as well as notes on specific filters where they have a noteworthy impact.

In order to understand the sound options, you have to understand the filters. The inner port on the shell tunes the sub-bass frequencies, the outer port tunes the bass frequencies, and the screw in nozzles control the mid and high frequency response. The filters come packaged in an aluminum tube with a key ring adapter. This is misleading as changing filters on the go is certainly not recommended as the parts are tiny and the operations are tedious. I recommend changing filters only on a large flat surface (preferably light colored where the filters don’t blend in) with good lighting and perhaps a razor blade and set of angled needle nose pliers as the provided tweezers are less than helpful. Using a scalpel blade to get under the edge of the filters and lift is much easier than trying to get enough surface area exposed to use the tweezers. The housing ports are all pressure fit, so pushing the filters in requires precise orientation and gentle pressure. The nozzle filters are larger, screw-in and much easier to work with.




The following were things that I noted regarding the 8s regardless of which set of filters were installed. First and foremost, for a hybrid BA/dynamic, the 8s has better coherency than most. Unlike some hybrids, I would be hard pressed to tell you which frequencies were being produced by which driver in the 8s. Extension is great at the top end and good at the bottom. These have no large roll-off at either end of the spectrum. It didn’t appear to me that the lower mids were changed at all by the tuning filters. The upper mids and high frequencies were quite obviously shaped by the nozzle filters but if the lower mids were moved at all it so slight as to be imperceptible to me. Lastly, the level of detail and micro-details were better than expected and would have made me guess this was a more expensive headphone had I not known the price going in. Overall, I would say the 8s retains a slightly bright signature regardless of which filter set you choose.

Bass
The low-end is shaped by both the sub-bass filter and the bass filter and I found that I enjoyed the red sub-bass filters but needed to back off the bass filter by one level as the bass got a bit boomy and lost a bit of control when wide open. Stepping back a notch to the black filter did lose a bit of quantity, but gained a lot of quality so it was a trade well made. Overall, the sub-bass extension was better than I thought possible out of a 6.4mm driver and the bass was well rendered unless the wide open (filter less) setting was used. I would have liked to see a bit more bass quantity but not at the expense of quality. If you are a bass-head, this is probably not the earphone for you as it trades quality for quantity when you try and increase the bass in a way that is not pleasing.

Mids,
as noted the lower mids are not shaped by any of the filters so you have less options here. The good news is I didn’t hear a pronounced mid-bass hump and any bleed into the lower mids was very minimal. Instrument separation is good and male vocals are lifelike and ever so slightly forward. The upper mids are much more tunable with the filters and my favorite was a slightly bright filter that lifted female vocals a bit and brought a bit of extra air to the top end. I spent quite a bit of time trying the green and black bores, which are either medium mid and most high frequency or medium mid and high respectively. I came to the conclusion that depending on the track, I could continually swap these two filters and never resolve a single filter that I liked best so I settled on the black as a compromise.


Treble,
having just said I settled for the medium high frequency filter, I really enjoyed the sparkle and air the green filter brought to the table and with all but the most sibilant of tracks the green filter really did bring more life to the sound signature. For some reason though, I found the green filter a big more fatiguing than the black which dialed it back a notch. I tried to go without a filter as some recommended but found that was extremely fatiguing unless I dialed back the 6kHz and 8kHz by about 6dB.

Truth be told, none of the mid/high filters were exactly the combination I would have liked and a little EQ combined with the green was my best fit. If using a player that didn’t have EQ, the black was the best compromise.


Soundstage
I found the 8s to have a very wide soundstage if not quite as deep as it was wide. Imaging was good with instrument placement easily visualized and movement of singers on stage in live performance well rendered. The 8s is easily one of the best in-ears I have had a chance to audition when considering imaging and I suspect this is one category where the 8s punches well above its weight as I have had the opportunity to audition several other IEMs in this price range and none come close.


Conclusions
The FLC8s is one of the best IEMs I have had the pleasure to audition in quite a while. Admittedly, I usually shy from auditioning things too far out of my price range, so I cannot make the direct comparisons to flagship IEMs that I am sure others will. I can say that without any tuning tricks, the 8s is one of the best IEMs I have heard for coherency and performs with a natural ease to its sound that I haven’t seen in this price range before. With the filters, the tuning options open doors to all kinds of signatures. While I would love to see them decouple the mid and high filters to give even more tuning options, I have to say I was not displeased at all with Red, black, Green or red, black, black. Both of those cater to my tastes with good sub-bass, controlled bass, no bleed over into the mids and nice forward upper mids and treble. This takes an already good voice and tailors it nicely to my personal tastes. Give the FLC 8s a try and I’m sure you can find at least one combination of filters that suits your style too. As for me, now I have to find my own pair so I can return these to their owner who is already regretting being without them for 2 weeks while I had them. Thanks again to @Ngoshawk for introducing me to such a great IEM.

My first Fiio amp was an E17 with its desktop E09 cohort. Today their amps have taken a backseat to first DAPs and now earphones. I recently mentioned looking at a new amp and Ngoshawk was kind enough to send his A5 for me to audition before purchase. I also have a walnut F1, a topping Nx5, and an Ibasso PB3 on the way to compare. I have owned an E11 and an E12 in the past but skipped the e12a as I didn’t feel the need to upgrade at the time. Now that my usage pattern has shifted to mostly IEM listening, I am in the market for an amp appropriate to that. I debated getting an E12a as they are still available, but the A5 was supposed to be the best features of the E12 and the E12a so wanted to give it a shot. The thought of combining the power level of the E12 with the noise floor of the E12a is a great idea. The question is, did they pull it off?

Build:

The A5 has an all steel chassis and feels very solid in the hand. I can’t find any size difference between the A5 and the older E12 visually and it is a perfect mate to the X5 as they stack nicely. The finish with its sandblasted titanium appearance is a bit of an upgrade to the flat black of the original E12. It looks higher end than the original as the buttons are well mated to the recesses and the volume knob is lower profile than the earlier model. While better looking, the knob is not quite as easy to grip due to its smaller size. It should also be noted that the A5 has either chrome plated or stainless Jacks as compared to the copper style used on the E12. I’m not sure if this was a simple cost savings (plated) or a durability improvement (stainless), but I’ll hope for the latter. Either way durability should be improved as the jacks have an outer ring that fits 100% snug to the frame to reduce any possible flex or shift.

Ports are as expected – the top has the volume knob, the 3.5mm single ended (TRS) input and output ports, and the gain switch.

The right side has the micro-USB charging port and the bass boost switch.

Labels are in white on the titanium finish and can be hard to read in some lighting. The left side panel and bottom of the unit are both smooth with no ports. The front face of the amp has 2 LEDs in the top left in line with the input port. The top LED is blue for power the lower is red for charging.

Charging:

The A5 lists an 880mAh lithium cell battery and has a suggested run time of 12 hours. Based on my tests, I think the suggested run time is reasonable using low impedance headphones without the bass boost circuit engaged. Using 150 Ohm or higher headphones or using the bass boost heavily (although I cannot fathom why you would want to) will result in considerably shorter run times. Either way, once depleted it takes 2-3 hours to recharge using the micro-USB port. This is less than the reported runtime on the E12a but better than the original E12. The only amp in the ones I mentioned initially with better runtime is the PB3 with a rated time of 20 hours and a realistic time of 14-16. It should be noted that the A5 retails for $129 while the PB3 is $199. $70 should buy more than a battery in my estimation but that will have to wait until I have time to review the PB3 to confirm.

Sound:

The original E12 did well with 50-150 Ohm Cans but was a little too much for sensitive IEMS. Then came the E12a with a lower noise floor, better energy efficiency and better THD, but it lost the ability to power bigger cans. Fiio makes some impressive claims about better power than the e12a (-80mW) and better THD <.002% (1kHz). They also claim to have improved the SNR although hard numbers on this are a bit tougher to come by.

Based on these numbers, I expect the noise floor to be very low even with sensitive IEMs while providing enough power to run 150-300 Ohm headphones. I’ll try my 600 Ohm Beyers but expect they will only be listenable volume at best and not particularly well driven.

First off, the noise floor is indeed as black as expected. The same in ear that had a noticeable hiss when used with the X5iii was perfectly quiet when attached to the A5. With no source connected, I could turn the volume up to roughly 60% before hearing any noticeable hiss. With the Senn HD6xx I could not notice a hiss even when turned up to 100% with no source connected. On the downside, super sensitive IEMS will get very loud very quickly as you turn the volume knob and it will be likely that even on low gain you will have less than 20% usable range on the volume knob. Bottom line, if you have a super sensitive IEM, you are probably better off plugging it directly into the source than into the A5 unless it just needs ridiculous amounts of power.

As for power, the A5 drove the HD6xx well better than the X5 alone and left plenty of room on the knob to increase the power and volume well above the comfortable listening level. The T50rp Fostex was also driven well with less headroom than the HD6xx but still enough to listen at any sane level. The Beyer 600 ohm as expected was not as well driven and while listenable, I had to nearly max out the amp to reach a good listening level and even then, it wasn’t as full bodied a sound as I know the Beyers are capable of. Driving the Beyers also pretty seriously decreased the battery runtime as well which is another sure sign that this was pushing the amp beyond its comfort zone.

The A5 has a mostly neutral presentation with a little warmth. This is not unexpected as the Muses Op Amp is often categorized as being slightly thick in the low-end and perhaps a hint on the warm side. I think Fiio took the natural tendency of the opamp and buffer used and enhanced them slightly to give the amp a bit of extra low-end push and a slightly warm leaning signature. Details are well presented and extension on both ends is quite good. Soundstage is deeper than it is wide although this is common of most portable sources too so it is hard to judge whether the total characteristic is that of the amp or its source. The first thing I noticed was that the treble is a bit forward of where it was on the original E12. Treble extension also seems improved. Not drastically but enough to tell it is there. This gives the A5 a bit more air than the E12. Midrange is well resolved but instrument separation is not spectacular and the mids are mildly recessed when compared to the bass and the slightly forward treble of the A5. The Bass on the A5 is well defined, tight, and well extended unless one enables the bass boost circuit. The bass boost takes too wide a cut as it grabs seemingly everything below 150Hz and amplifies it too much to be reasonable. To my ear the boost bumped the low-end up a good 6db. The bigger problem is that the boost doesn’t return to 0 db until well into the mids. The bass boost creates exactly the situation most of us try to remove: Mid bass hump that bleeds into the mids. Bass-heads may find this wonderful, for the rest of us, I think you will find the bass well composed with the switch off and likely ignore the bass boost circuit entirely as I have chosen to do once I listened to what it did to the sound signature.

Reading this, it would be easy to think this is the most colored amp you’ve ever seen reviewed. I don’t think that is the case at all. It is hard to discuss an amp without specifying its vices as in a perfect world the amp would introduce none of this coloration. All of the coloration I have noted is minor and depending on what source you introduce; the source tendencies will be far more apparent than those of the amp. I used the Schitt Modi2 Uber with my laptop as my source for testing as I am well versed in the signature of the Modi but even at that it can be difficult to determine what characteristics are produced by the amp and what is source or headphone introduced.



Conclusion: The A5 will really appeal to those who want a portable amp to run full sized over-ear headphones, or those with IEMs that require above average power. Those considering the A5 for use with IEMs need to audition the A5 first and know how much of the volume range is going to be usable. Some may find this acceptable, others may find the lack of usable volume control to be a deal breaker. The upside is the A5 is a very well built, good sounding amp with good battery life. In the overall, the A5 seems like a much more refined version of the original E12 with one glaring exception (the bass boost). I would love to see Fiio create a version of the A5 without the bass boost as it does not live up to the quality of the rest of the amp and with a negative gain for use with iems. That way more of the volume range would be usable for IEMs while retaining the ability to power full sized cans.

Ngoshawk generously loaned me his Fiio X5iii to compare with my other DAPs including previous generation X5s. I was not compensated in any way for this review and the player goes back to Ngoshawk when I am finished with it and the other toys he sent. Also, worth noting, I don’t have notes on the unboxing or accessories as I did not unbox a new player.


I knew before the X5iii arrived that it was a complete departure from the previous versions so direct comparisons would not be possible. The New X5 is an android based touch screen controlled DAP. Gone are the scroll wheel and simplified music-player only IU of the gen 2. To be sure, at $399, I expected a big change from previous generations as the price tag has inched up higher with this generation of the X5.


Build:

The X5iii is a solid steel chassis with solid heft. I could find no detectable flex in the case or screen. The corners are smoothed for pocket carry with a slight raise on the left side to protect the volume knob. The new 4” touchscreen looks to be exactly the same screen used on the X7 and is a huge improvement over the previous generations but well behind most android phones. (See screen discussion for more on this). Inside, 32gb ram (26 usable) gives the player enough capacity to use without having to purchase Micro-SD cards for basic users if they intend to use the Music Only mode. If you intend to use the full android interface, I’d suggest saving the internal capacity for application storage as it runs out pretty quickly and most phones these days have at least 64gb if not 128 internal. While 32gb is great for a DAP, it is only mediocre when comparing to other android devices. Same goes for the processor, the use of a Cortex-A9 is a big increase over previous generations, but is a step below most current android devices. The A9 is a 2014 chip and its age shows when compared with modern snap dragon processors.


Controls:

My first thought when I looked at the X5 was oh no, another touch screen dap but I am happy to report that nearly all the controls can be handled by physical buttons. This is huge to me as I commonly use a DAP in a pocket and adjusting volume and switching tracks without having to look at the dap is a requirement for me. If I have to stop what I am doing and look at the DAP, it is a huge distraction and time waster and not something I can tolerate. The buttons on the X5 are tucked in nicely so at first glance one could miss them. Playback controls split the volume knob on the left panel while the right panel has a single button that operates as a power button, a screen on/off button, and a charging indicator. The power button is recessed to avoid accidental contact. Gloved hands may have some problems as the button is fairly small and there is no tactile click when operating it. Dual Micro SD slots sit below the power button on the right side.

The top is clean with all inputs and outputs now on the bottom of the player. Again, with me using my DAPs in a pocket a lot of the time, I prefer all the I/O to be on one end or the other rather than some on both as cables become a problem when using an external amp. The X5/A5 combination with the stacking kit and a JDS Labs micro 3.5mm cable between the two is a nice convenient package for in pocket use.


Screen:

I mentioned earlier that the screen was a big improvement over previous generations, and it is. Unfortunately, that doesn’t mean it is great. I don’t think it is all that much of a stretch to expect an android digital audio device to be able to playback music videos with reasonable quality. Between the aging processor and 480x800 pixel resolution, the X5 is no match for even last generation flagship telephones like my HTC M9 and the iPhone 6s. Both phones sport a 1080x1920 hi-res display that makes watching videos a lot more realistic. I would expect the next generation X7 to sport a 1920x1080 display since this X5 now has the same display as the current X7. The positive points on the screen are: it does have a good viewing angle and excellent color. The screen is clearer than a lot of capacitive touchscreens and doesn’t have the milky appearance of some tempered glass screens used on recent tablets and phones.



Battery:

The X5 sports a 3400mAh lithium polymer cell that is not user accessible. The math suggests this should provide 9.6 hours of battery life but in practice I was only able to get about 7 hours. This may be in part to how the backlight is configured, which apps are running in the background, use of Wi-Fi or Bluetooth. My guess is the 10-hour claim is when used in Pure player mode without Bluetooth enabled. Realistically, I’d expect 6-7 hours which is still quite respectable for an android device. It is worth noting that the battery type used in the X5 does not develop a memory so is best charged after each use rather than running the battery all the way down between charges. Expect the battery to last between 500 and 1000 charge cycles before needing replacement. Deep discharge will result in that number being lower while shallow charge/discharge cycles may prolong it beyond 1000 cycles. Watch for heat as a sign of battery decay and the need for replacement. The X5 does offer rapid charging which is nice for those on the go but will also result in fewer charge cycles before failure of the battery. When not in a hurry, it is best to charge at the standard 1A rate rather than opting for the quick charge.

Inputs and Outputs

The bottom of the X5 has a 3.5mm stereo unbalanced headphone output on the far left, a 2.5mm balanced output immediately to the right of the unbalanced output, and a 3.5mm fixed line-out/coaxial output on the far right. In the center is the micro-USB port. As most tablets, phones, and laptops move to USB C, Fiio again opted for the last generation Micro-USB. The good news is USB C is backward compatible to micro-USB and cables are cheap so no great loss. Wireless outputs are provided by Bluetooth 4.0 with aptX. Pairing is standard android and works as expected.


The X5 Wi-Fi works well but appears to be 2.4ghz only as my 5ghz networks were not detected by the X5. This limits the speed of the wireless to Class N as AC is not implemented. The good news is this opens up all kinds of streaming options to X5 users. Tidal was installed on the X5 I tested and it worked well. DLNA is also an option if you install an android app and would let you use your X5 connected directly to your music library. For those with a NAS and an internet connection this gives you the ability to connect to your library from anywhere. That alone may be enough to sell the X5 to some users.


Software:

The android version on the X5 is android 5 so it is a couple generations behind current flagships but it should be noted that few phones are actually running the most recent version of android and that being at least one generation behind is commonplace even for flagship devices. Android 5 does provide a stable well tested environment with good application compatibility. OTA upgrades to applications and the OS itself make upgrades much easier than earlier versions and hopefully Fiio will maintain a common codebase between the X5 and X7 so changes to applications will be pushed down to the X5 as newer versions are released for later products.

I’ve mentioned a lot about android in this review but it should be noted that those who don’t want to fiddle with android the X5 sports two shell options. I have seen other comments on the X5 that speak of multiple boot modes but this simply is not the case. The Kernel is android regardless of which mode you choose, the difference is the shell loaded over the top of that Kernel. One Shell is the typical Android, the other is called Pure Music Mode.

If booted to pure music mode, the system hides all other applications and runs only as a music player. Users of previous generation X5s like myself will find this a bit comforting as it is old home week. Controls on the screen mimic the previous generation X5 and the learning curve is dramatically reduced. The downside to the Pure Music Mode is several times I noted marked lag in operations. For what is supposed to be the streamlined music only mode, the player does not appear to be optimized for the hardware and simple pause / resume play operations should not take multiple seconds to process.

For those who have previous experience with Android players, switching modes to Android gives you the ability to download USB Player Pro, or Neutron etc... from the Fiio Store (very limited options and more of a suggested apps page). The downside was that a lot of the Fiio Store is in Chinese only and limited my ability to find the applications I might have wanted to install. The good news is the google play store is readily available and most audio apps should have no problem running on the X5s hardware.


Sound:

With dual AK4490 DACs, one should expect much. This is the same dac as used in several other higher end players and a couple of the Astell & Kern models. The question is, is it as well implemented here as it is in some of those high-end players?

The X5 gen 2 with its Wolfson Dac was quite warm and rich, but was often criticized for lacking detail and dynamics. The new generation is still going to draw comments about being warm as it does have a bit of warmth although to my ear not as pronounced as the previous generation, however, that is where the similarity ends. The new X5iii brings more dynamic range and more detail to its delivery than the previous versions while still retaining excellent manners. The X5iii is a pleasant experience with excellent extension on both ends without being boomy at the bottom or harsh at the top. Soundstage is seemingly deeper than it is wide with good instrument separation and imaging. Power seems to be a bit of a conundrum. I did notice a slight hiss with my most sensitive IEMs as the noise floor is not quite low enough to use super sensitive IEMS. At the same time, the X5 was not able to really drive the HD6xx or Fostex T50rp to their fullest extend as I had kind of expected. For most headphones and iems between the notably hard to drive over-ears and the ridiculously sensitive IEMS the X5 did well with no hiss and ample power to fully fill out the sound.

Bass:

Bass is full bodied but tight with good articulation down into the 40Hz range. It does seem to suffer from some sub-bass roll off below 50Hz. Above that point, texture is good and detail was better than most in my experience. Neutral to slightly bright headphones will pair nicely with the Bass of the X5 as it does not bleed into the mids so a mid-forward headphone is really accentuated.

Mids:

The mids are smooth and natural sounding making vocals particularly well voiced. The timbre and texture of the upper mids makes female vocals particularly clear but not cutting or sibilant.

Treble:

If the X5iii has a weakness, this is it. Treble is a bit too laid back. It is neutral and very well behaved but lacks a bit of sparkle. I’m not sure the treble has less detail than the previous generation but it is definitely less treble forward than the X5ii and can appear a bit less detailed as a result. On the plus side, the treble on the X5iii does have a more natural sound to it than the X5ii.


Options to alter sound profile:

Good news, if you don’t like the sound of the X5, change it. A 10 band Graphic EQ is standard and accessible via the Pure Music Mode. If in android mode, plenty of EQ and DSP effects are available for download.

On top of those, the X5 includes VIPER. VIPER is a pre-packaged set of alterations to the sound profile that include bass enhancement, tube sound, Clarity options (enhanced Treble) and several others (15 in total). For some reason, you have to have Wi-Fi on for VIPER to work, not sure why but now you know as I found out the hard way. While I found most of these to be little more than EQ presets, a few were of interest as they did make a pronounced difference. If you are a bass-head, Setting the Viper Bass will bring the bass a bit forward and a bit more aggressive than stock and may make the X5 more to your liking. I was a fan of Clarity as I prefer a slightly bright signature.



Conclusion:

A well-mannered DAP in the mid-fi range. Better as a pure music player than as an Android device as it lacks memory, screen real estate and resolution, and processing power to really compete with top end devices. If you want a single do all device, you are probably still in the market for a Flagship phone. If you are looking for an easily upgradable music player with good sound, great features and good expandability, then the X5 makes a solid choice. The X5iii competes on a near even footing with the Cayin i5 which runs $100 more.

I was provided the Crazier R3 DAP by Gearbest in exchange for reviewing it. I mentioned to George that the Crazier appeared to be a rebadged Nintaus x10 and that I wondered if the firmware was improved on the Crazier. I was hoping for a Benjie / Agptek type relationship where maybe Crazier had improved upon the firmware foibles of the original x10. George kindly sent me the Crazier R3 to compare.

The Nintaus x10 was a pretty good DAP in the $60 price range mostly due to its all-metal construction, line out, built in EQ, DSD support, and weeklong battery life. While the DAP is fairly basic as far as features are concerned (no Bluetooth or USB DAC functions), what it does, it does well and cons are usually things like, No dedicated volume buttons, and typical UI issues as is common with most low-end Chinese made DAPs. My hope was that maybe Crazier had accounted for a few of the later with the R3 version.

Unboxing:

The R3 came in a simple black cardboard box with Crazier in English and Chinese printed in silver. As is typical, the box did little to show what product was inside and did not have pictures or specifications on the exterior of the box. This packaging is obviously not for retail sale from shelf as it would be difficult to tell what was in the packaging.

The R3 was well padded and well protected from the cable and manual as it sits on a shelf in a foam surround with a small padded bag holding the R3. In the layer below the R3 is a manual and USB charging cable. Sparse, but really all that is necessary. (This is the first departure from the Nintaus badged product as the x10 came with a 16 GB card and a silicone carry case that was not in the Crazier package)




Build and use:

The R3 has a solid aluminum chassis and overall construction is very good. Edges are smoothed for pocket carry and buttons are well laid out. The 2 inch screen has a resolution of 320x240 and while certainly not the highest resolution we have seen it does a reasonable job of displaying album art and it certainly is readable enough even at strange angles. Beneath the screen are the controls. First a row of four buttons all of equal size that are (left to right) Previous, next, menu, back. Below the previous and next is a larger scroll wheel; while below back is an enlarged play/pause button and then a single volume button below the play.

The buttons are metal, but the scroll wheel is plastic albeit with a metal outer banding. The scroll wheel has a ring around its outside edge with a series of three raised dots at each of the cardinal positions for added grip. My guess would be that machining the backside of the scroll wheel was too costly so the injection-molded part was used to cut costs. It does not look out of place and breakage does not appear to be a big concern, just interesting from a design decision standpoint as all the rest of the buttons are metal and silver in color while the scroll is black with a silver outer band. The biggest plus to the controls for me is that tactile response of each. The buttons are crisp with no noticeable slop or looseness in the frame while the scroll wheel has an audible click (not loud just enough to know it is there) to its movement that is present in the hardware as the behavior works even when the player is not powered on. This is a nice touch and something the more expensive DAPs with capacitive touch screens could learn from. The top of the player from left to right has the 3.5mm single ended output and 3.5mm line out jack followed by the power / screen button to the far left.

The bottom panel has the micro-USB charging port and the micro-SD slot.
The rear and sides of the player are clean. The micro-SD card slot shows a top capacity of 128 GB but I had no trouble getting the R3 to read a 200 GB card I have been using. (YMMV of course).

Battery:

The R3 spec shows a 1500mAh Li-poly battery pack with a rated playback time of 60 hours. It is worth noting that the rating is based on FLAC playback at 30% volume and most headphones I tried needed closer to 50% volume to be listenable. Even with this increase in volume, I was still able to go an entire workweek without a recharge. This is stellar performance and something many other DAPs could learn from. If you are a camper or hiker this alone should put this dap at the top of your list as the player and a single 10000mAh battery pack could literally give you over a month of use time without having to find a power outlet. That is amazing in an environment where it is common for DAPs to need a recharge before the end of the business day.



UI:

Boot time on the R3 is roughly 25 seconds and menu movement is quick with no discernible lag. The only real delay experienced is the about ½ second delay at the start of each track while loading album art. I attempted to test files with and without album art and did find that the omission of album art reduced that delay but did not entirely eliminate it.

The main screen on the player has a series of icons for settings, play settings, favorites, equalizer, folder view, classification of music, and music. I will hit the highlight of each icon in order but will not be attempting to cover every option available. I will pay particular attention to areas where differences exist between the R3 and the x10.

Under Set (the Gear icon), the first big difference is the number of languages supported. The x10 came with English, Chinese, and Russian. The R3 shows 28 languages including Simplified Chinese, Traditional Chinese, English, Japanese, Korean, French, German, Italian, Portuguese, Brazilian Portuguese Spanish, Swedish, Czech, Danish, Polish, Russian, Turkish, Hungarian, Romanian, Arabic, Hebrew, Thai, Bahasa Indonesia, Greek, Norwegian, Slovak.

The backlight timer and off timer are both customizable. The system firmware lists revision 1.1 and a firmware update option exists but no newer firmware was available at the time of review. The only odd thing under settings is the create playlist option which would be better housed under the Classification of music or the Favorites Icon in my view.

Under play settings, we have shuffle, repeat, default volume, and line level. All are self- explanatory except for line level, which has three options. The options are 0db (true line out), -6 dB (reduced line out) and volume Sync which allows the use of the players volume control and allows for the connection of a 2nd set of headphones.

Favorites simply lists favorite playlists for quick access.


EQ has six presets but unlike the x10 firmware, it does have custom option for tuning the EQ to your liking rather than only the presets. This takes the EQ from being an afterthought to being a useful tool and is definitely points in the R3 favor. This alone may be worth the price difference in the cheapest x10 on ali and the Gearbest asking price for the R3.


Folder view is exactly as expected.

Classification of music lets the user select by Artist, Genre, or Album in addition to all songs.

Finally, Music would be better titled “Now playing” and shows a wealth of information about the current track.

One other feature of the UI worth noting is that the x10 prompted for resume on every startup. The R3 simply starts where it left off with no such annoying prompt. Another point in the R3’s favor.

The only remaining UI issue from the x10 is that to get to Home from Now playing takes 4 presses of the back button. It would be a welcome change to see the shortcut to home.

Volume on the other hand is accessible from any screen by pushing the volume button. This brings up the volume display and the scroll wheel is used to adjust volume from zero to 100. Realistically about 25 up is of use. A slight channel imbalance is present below about 15, which is common for inexpensive daps. Once you set the desired volume clicking the volume button a 2nd time returns you to the original screen with the music still in progress. The lack of physical volume buttons does prevent in-pocket adjustments and will be a deal breaker to some.


Sound:

The R3 is rated at > = 80mw output, respectable for a pocket DAP. The R3 has native support for MP3, WMA, WAV, APE, and FLAC. Unlike the Benjie K9, the R3 was able to play my entire FLAC library without having to down-convert some of the higher bitrates. The chip is a WM8965 and at first some might confuse this for a Wolfson product based on the naming convention but it is actually a chip made by Wisdom/Xinzhihui. The op amp is a TI TPA6530. This pair works very well to power IEMs but can struggle a bit with full sized cans. The line out is also a bit under powered as volumes on my paired amplifier had to be increased when compared to the line out of the Cayin N3 or Fiio X5iii. It should be noted that the Cayin itself is a 1V output as opposed to the normal 2V so this is a substantial weakness in the R3. The R3 would not power the Fostex T50rp to listenable levels without an additional amp. Not surprising for a pocket dap, but worth noting if, this is your use case.

The sound profile is slightly warm leaning with good bass thump and extension. Mids are polite and well detailed but instrument separation is not huge and soundstage can get a bit crowded. Treble is well rendered without being harsh. Enough sparkle and air are present to keep this player from seeming a bit dark. These are exactly the same comments I made about the original x10 as I found no changes sonically between the two. This is a good thing as the x10 was a darned good DAP for its price.

Conclusion:

The R3 shows all the pluses that made the NiNTAUS x10 a great value in the DAP market and has gone most of the way toward correcting the biggest complaints leveled against the x10. Languages are now much better. The EQ has a bonafide custom option that allows tweaking, and the annoying resume messages are gone. If you are looking for a good sounding DAP with ridiculous battery life, take a look at the Crazier R3.

First off, a heart-felt thank you to George and Gearbest for providing these headphones. New gear is always fun and the opportunity to try out gear as it comes to market is indeed a privilege.

A short note about me: I am a music enthusiast, and audio hobbyist. I make no claim to have the level of experience of some here. I tend to be quite pragmatic and value oriented.. I am a lover of blues, jazz, and rock music and listen to a very broad range as I am always interested in what is new.


Review:

The Syllable D9 is quite a departure from my normal listening. I am not a huge fan of Bluetooth headphones as I think they all too often solve a problem I don’t have at the cost of sound quality. That is further complicated when dealing with in ear models as the weight of having to have the battery and circuitry present in the ear itself far too often makes them uncomfortable. So when George at Gearbest offered the D9 as a trial, I accepted with some trepidation.

The D9 arrived in a typical manila padded envelope. The box is a small almost cubic tan box with very little if anything descriptive on the outside. This is definitely not a retail packaging as it doesn’t give any specs or details of what is inside.



Once opened, the box contains another small box wrapped in protective plastic along with a usb cable and a bag of tips. All the larger surfaces are coated with a plastic protective peel-off film as seen in the photos. This is a nice touch to protect the metal surfaces.



The little box hidden in the plastic turns out to be a really neat design. The bottom is metal with a smoked transparent plastic lid that shows the earphones and lets the user view the LEDs at a glance when charging. Inside the box is a form fitted tray that holds the earpieces in place solidly and has charging contacts visible in the upper outside of each cutout. The earpieces will only fit one way and are held very solidly in order to maintain the contact between the earpiece and the charge unit. On the back of the box is a micro-USB female connector for charging. Interestingly, under the formed tray that holds the earpieces there is a battery so the case itself can charge the earpieces up to 4 times without need for the USB connector.





Build Quality:

The earpieces themselves are a mix of metal shell on the outside and plastic inner shell. The plastic has a built in ear-hook and was very comfortable for me but may be an issue for smaller ears as it is not removable or adjustable in any way. The tips are typical silicone and are provided in 3 sizes. The entire back of the shell acts as the on/off button or for answering phone calls.




Microphone:

Both earpieces have a mic built into a lower projection so either can be used independently as a Bluetooth earpiece when using the phone. The microphones did work well and it seems that my phone automatically goes to right side mono only when using these buds to make and receive calls. I could force the left side to work with the phone only by turning the right side earpiece off.

This brings up the first odd issue. When listening to music and receiving a phone call, the D9 automatically switched to right side only mono during the phone call and then switched back to stereo once the call was over. The issue was that the two earpieces were out of sync with the left being about a full second behind the right on the playback. I could only correct this by turning off both earpieces and then re-starting them. I had thought I was losing it when it first happened but subsequent phone calls proved this to be a consistent issue.



Sound:

As mentioned at the top, I am a lover of blues, blues/rock, classic rock, and anything with good guitar work in it. For that reason, I use the following as my test tracks. (artist, album, track, thoughts)

Stevie Ray Vaughan – Texas Flood – Lenny (Guitar to die for but the thing I look for is the percussion.)

Lindsey Buckingham – Fleetwood Mac, Best of - Go Insane, Live (Probably the most complicated simple song you’ll ever hear, all about nuance and subtleties with this track).

Johny Lang – Lie to me – Lie to Me (Looking for tight bass, bleed over into the mids, and controlled sub-bass)

Tedeschi Trucks – Let me get by – I want more (Female Vocals, backing brass band)

The Blasters - Testament – Blue Shadows (Saxophone and piano with male vocals)

Vintage Trouble – The Bomb shelter sessions - Blues hand me down (Looking at attack speed and decay especially in bass and sub-bass. This track gets muddy quick if the equipment can’t handle it.)


Bass: The bass on the D9 is obviously a focal point. It is huge. Unfortunately, it isn’t particularly good. The bass is muddy and over-stated pretty badly. Sub-bass on the other hand doesn’t exist as any changes to the EQ below the 60hz band are just completely ignored by the drivers. I found the following settings to be the best at leveling the sound signature and even with this dialed in, these have a fairly bass heavy signature that would still be defined as V shaped. Every band below 250Hz is reduced by 6db, 250 is reduced by 5db and 500 is reduced by 4db.

With this tuning, the D9 becomes very listenable without the over-powering bass that detracted from the sound signature.

Mids: Once the bass is cleaned up a bit, the mids become a bit easier to find. The D9 still suffers from a mid-bass hump that bleeds into the mids. The upper mids are recessed and take a back seat to the bass and treble leading to a U shaped profile.


Treble: Treble is more refined than the bass but does not show super extension or a lot of sparkle.

Soundstage is small due to the closed back design and instrument separation suffers as a result of the tuning and stage size.

Overall, the sound on the D9 is tuned much more for my teenage children who prefer an extremely bass heavy signature than they are for me. The kids all found them to be fun and liked the sound (although most did say they had a bit too much bass).


Thoughts:

I had initially expected the 2 hour specified run-time as a limiting factor to the usefulness of these headphones. I found that I rarely listened to them for 2 hours straight and when placed back in the case they charged quickly enough that when pulled back out, they were again ready to use for extended periods. The factory specs show the case charging the earpieces 4 times before the box itself needs a recharge – I found this to be closer to 3 times than 4 but still pretty admirable for a box the size of a mini Altoids tin.

I had also questioned the comfort of the plastic built in earhook but found these to be one of the most comfortable IEMs I have used. That is saying a lot when these have the extra weight of a battery in each earpiece to contend with.

Once the bass is accounted for, these have a pretty consumer friendly sound signature that will sell well amongs't those who prefer a V shaped sound signature.

Overall, the D9 is real cool tour of what is technically possible in a Bluetooth, micro device. With a bit of work on the sound signature, Syllable could really make these shine as they have all the right features to make a great gym or travel earphone.

KZ ZS6 review



First off, a heart-felt thank you to George and Gearbest for providing these headphones. New gear is always fun and the opportunity to try out gear as it comes to market is indeed a privilege.

A short note about me: I am a music enthusiast, and audio hobbyist. I make no claim to have the level of experience of some here. I tend to be quite pragmatic and value oriented. This means KZ products are quite familiar and fit well in my usage patterns. I am a lover of blues, jazz, and rock music and listen to a very broad range as I am always interested in what is new. I have purchased the Zs5, Zst, ED12, Ed9, and the ATE v2 (most of them from Gearbest) along the way but was given the Zs6 in exchange for this review.



Review:

The Zs6 arrived in a typical manila padded envelope. The box is similar to the familiar KZ box with the black cardboard back and the transparent front but is a bit more upscale. It is now white with a slide off cover with graphics on the front and specs on the reverse as shown below. The transparent front displays the earpieces and a large KZ logo in a display tray with the cables etc. hidden behind. The display shows a very good-looking earpiece with three screws holding the side plate on instead of the normal glue. At first glance, the build quality seems a step above the expectation for KZ.




Accessories:

In a word, typical. Again, those of us that have bought KZ before will know the typical what comes in the box. It consists of a cable, 3 sets of tips in small, medium, and large, and a brief manual. While this has come to be expected, I had hoped with the step up in the IEM itself for KZ, the cables etc. would receive the same upgrades. This does not appear to be the case as no additional tips, cables, or accessories are provided in the box.




Build Quality:

Build quality is definitely a step above what I have seen from KZ before. The aluminum is anodized evenly with no visible gaps or discoloration. The screws are all snugged tightly but easily broken loose to dismantle them should you so desire. If there is a complaint on the build of the earpiece itself it would be that the screen on the barrel is pressed in rather than fitted. I am sure the glue will hold fine, but a machined part with the screen held in place would have been preferable (and probably a lot more costly).




The cable on the other hand, is the same cable we have seen KZ use on all their removable IEMs to date. The wires themselves seem to be coated in an almost plasti-dip rubber coating which does help keep noise down but also is borderline sticky. The two pin connectors are well marked L and R although the front and rear pin position (in phase/vs backward) is less immediately identifiable. They also retain the overly stiff memory wire from previous versions which I usually go about removing with a needle nose plier and a razor blade. The Jack is a 90-degree L shape and is a welcome sight as it is my preference vs the straight model.





Microphone:

The microphone worked well for making calls and didn’t pick up a lot of extraneous noise. It did suffer from the same issues with wind and rubbing on clothing as you walk that pretty much all in-line microphones do. My personal preference is for cables without the microphone but I’m sure others will find it useful.



Sound:

As mentioned at the top, I am a lover of blues, blues/rock, classic rock, and anything with good guitar work in it. For that reason, I use the following as my test tracks. (artist, album, track, thoughts)

Stevie Ray Vaughan – Texas Flood – Lenny (Guitar to die for but the thing I look for is the percussion.)

Lindsey Buckingham – Fleetwood Mac, Best of - Go Insane, Live (Probably the most complicated simple song you’ll ever hear, all about nuance and subtleties with this track).

Johny Lang – Lie to me – Lie to Me (Looking for tight bass, bleed over into the mids, and controlled sub-bass)

Tedeschi Trucks – Let me get by – I want more (Female Vocals, backing brass band)

The Blasters - Testament – Blue Shadows (Saxophone and piano with male vocals)

Vintage Trouble – The Bomb shelter sessions - Blues hand me down (Looking at attack speed and decay especially in bass and sub-bass. This track gets muddy quick if the equipment can’t handle it.)


Treble: I put treble first in this review which is not my usual sequence but it is the first thing you notice on the Zs6. The treble is over-stated pretty substantially in the 8-10kHz range. I find that I need to adjust the graphic EQ on foobar down 6db at 8kHz and 8db at 10kHz to help tone down what can only be described as a hot treble. Once tuned a bit, that extra treble does have good extension and plenty of sparkle. Cymbals are lifelike and well detailed and the flute on Jethro Tull’s pieces was very well rendered. Without the EQ adjustments, the cymbals tend to take on a metallic sound and the flute loses the softness Ian Anderson was known for. Those who love a treble forward IEM will truly revel in the Zs6. Those who like good treble extension and lots of detail will enjoy the Zs6 too, it just may take a few attempts to get the EQ setting where you want it.

Mids: Once you get past the treble, you are rewarded with what I think is easily the best sounding IEM KZ has made to date. Mids are well rendered. Instrument separation is good, and presentation is more open than most. Soundstage isn’t huge, but isn’t claustrophobic either. Vocals are particularly susceptible to poor recordings and it would be easy to blame a lot on the IEM if you are not careful in selecting well mastered and well recorded tracks. The Zs6 is not particularly forgiving of poor source material.


Bass: This is where I think the Zs6 really shines. It is not the typical consumer oriented, bass boosted, beats-esque pattern we hear so frequently. Bass is tight and present in proportion to the rest of the sound signature. Again, it would be easy to say these didn’t have good extension or slam if you chose the wrong source material as they don’t seem to add to what the recording presents. I had to listen to some older EDM to really test out the bass as a lot of the predominantly guitar tracks I listen too didn’t provide enough bass-line to really study what the Zs6 was doing. The walking bass line at the start of Duran Duran, A View to a kill became one of my test tracks for this reason. Sub bass is present in good quantity and is controlled better than expected as it didn’t tend to get sloppier as volumes increased as is a common problem.



Thoughts:

My first thoughts were that the piercing treble was going to keep the Zs6 from being something I could listen to for very long, but once EQ’d a bit, I must admit the Zs6 has enough detail and balance that I found myself coming back to them. They are really very good, except for that one treble spike. So, I began to look for ways to correct it.

First came the cable upgrade. I went to one of the silver replacement cables available on amazon as I had read from another head-fi member that he suspected the cable might be at fault for some of the issues with the sound. I can say that I don’t believe the cable made a bit of difference in the sound but I do like the microphonics of the new cable better so it will stay.




Next came tip rolling. I tried JVC Spiral dots, Comply Foams of two types, Rebound foams, spin-fits, and a mix of other KZ tips I had from previous purchases. All made some difference and when coupled with the EQ adjustments the Comply foams gave the best combination of comfort, isolation, and sound signature. The worst went to the spiral dots which actually managed to make the Zs6 sound even brighter than it already was.


Then the Ostry tuning tips (OS-100, OS-200, OS-300) I had ordered to test with arrived from amazon. This series of tips going from blue to red to black introduces a filter in the barrel of the tip that cuts sound in certain ranges by as much as 6-7 db as seen in the chart below.




To my ears, the OS-200 tips allowed me to make the same correction I had previously made with the EQ with the tips and for those who are extremely treble shy, the OS-300 really brings that spike down. My go to tip for the Zs6 is the Comply foam or OS-300 as I think it does the best job of leveling the sound signature and gives the Zs6 a very natural presentation. It doesn’t hurt that the size large Ostry tip is a bit smaller than the size large KZ tip too and is a better fit for my ears.



It should also be noted that the Zs6 is low enough impedance to work when run directly from a phone but to really get the most out of them, you really need to amp them a bit. I ran them on a Schiit Magni 2 Uber, a Millett Starving Student (Poor impedance match and not recommended), a topping NS1, and Fiio E07k amps. When I attempted to use the Zs6 with the Millett SSH, I had a low level hiss in every track that was extremely distracting. Since I don’t usually test IEMs with this amp, I traded out a few other sets and found that most likely it is an impedance mismatch for anything below 32Ohms as it produced that same hiss with several 16Ohm high sensitivity IEMS. The Schitt Magni was a good pairing with the Zs6 and really helped open up the mids.

Comparisons:

Inevitably these are going to draw comparisons from the other products by KZ as well as other products in the similar price point. I have attempted to compare them with some of the other IEMs I have in my collection that fit one or the other of these criteria.



**** DT - the **** fits the class as it is a dynamic/BA hybrid with a sub $50 price tag. The **** suffers from some of the same issue as the Zs6 in that it needs EQ to do its best. Unlike the Zs6, that tuning is pretty heavy rather than just a slight dip of the treble knob. The Senfers also suffer from bass bleed into the mids and just cant muster the level of detail or the bass extension shown by the Zs6.

Mee Electronics M6 Pro - These fit the comparison only in that they are roughly the same price point. The M6 pro is a single dynamic driver with what I have to call the most analytically correct but boring sound signature of the lot. If you want an absolute analytical piece of equipment – the M6 pro is for you. If you are looking for a sound signature with any sparkle and life to it at all, you’ll find the Zs6 way more interesting. The Zs6 also seemed to be able to pull more detail out of the same DAP and flac file when compared to the M6pro.

KZ ATE - This is probably the headphone in the KZ line that started it all for most of us. The ATE was super hyped as punching way above its weight and being priced at sub $15. While some of the hype was just that, a lot of the praise lauded on the ATE was deserved. Unfortunately, the ATE has now been through a series of manufacturing changes and may or may not be the same model people came to love. On its best day, the ATE is still not capable of the treble extension of the Zs6, nor does it render detail nearly as well. As much as I love the ATE and it is still one of my recommended cell phone replacement headphones, it isn’t going to compete with the sound signature of most multi-driver in ears.

KZ ZST - KZs first dual driver IEM. The Zst has become a daily driver for an awful lot of us and is an extremely good value. That is not to say it is without flaws and a treble that is over-stated is one of them. The Zst manages to provide a very nice sound signature if a bit treble forward but does not have the sparkle, depth of sound stage, or bass extension of the Zs6.

KZ Zs5 – My Zs5 is the Version 1 with a single BA driver in the nozzle. I state this up front as my musings may not apply to version 2. The Zs5 has a similar signature to the Zs6 once the EQ has been applied to the treble on the Zs6. Having said that, similar doesn’t mean same. The bass clarity is not quite as good on the Zs5 and the extension on both ends is lacking when compared to the Zs6. Soundstage is a bit more crowded on the Zs5 as well. This is not to say the Zs5 is a bad headphone, it is far from it, just when directly contrasting it to the Zs6 it begins to show the evolution of the design.

Urban-fun hybrid - The urban-fun has been my recommendation for a good near neutral sound signature in the sub $35 range. I still think these are a solid recommendation in that space and they do have a more neutral signature than the Zs6. They don’t present the level of detail of the Zs6, nor do they have as good treble extension. Bass quantity also goes to the Zs6 as the urban fun just cant muster as much slam on bass heavy tracks.

One More Quad - Ok, so these don’t fit the price comparison. I add them here as this is another story of a company bringing out several headphones that punched above their weight (Pistons anyone?) and then creating a more upscale branding and product. I think we can draw plenty of parallels between the Xiaomi/One More and KZ when we look at Pistons vs the ATE and then the One More triple and quad vs the Zst, Zs5, Zs6 line. Granted the two brands are at different points on the curve, but we can see enough parallels to suspect we might know where KZ will go next. The Quad is a big deep V sound with good extension on both ends and a lot of detail in between. The Zs6 is a bit shallower profile but lacks a bit of the refinement in the sound signature of the Quad. If there is one thing the Quad could learn from the Zs line, it has an un-natural transition between the dynamic and the lowest of the BA drivers that can result in an incoherent sound. It doesn’t show up often, but when it does, it can’t be ignored. Truthfully, I don’t think the Quad is $150 better than the Zs6 and with that being the difference in asking price, I’d be hard pressed to recommend the Quad when you could buy 4 pairs of the Zs6 and have one of each color and a spare (or a few extra cables and tips) for the same money.



The Zs6 is an evolutionary step from the Zst and Zs5 and won’t surprise people who are familiar with the line. It does some things better, which shows KZ is learning and listening and it hints at things to come. At this pace, the Zs9 might just be ready to compete with the Shure 846 and the Westone w60. That is possibly the best news of all because it means price competition in the market and we listeners are the ones who win. In the mean time, if you haven't listened to a KZ lately, give them a try. You'll be surprised how much sound quality $50 will buy these days.



PS> Had a question on which Jethro Tull tracks I used - Hunter Girl and Locomotive Breath.

I would like to thank Mixcder for sending me the HD601 in exchange for reviewing them. I thoroughly enjoy getting to try new gear and review samples have made it possible for me to do more of that so I am appreciative of the opportunity. That having been said, I will give an honest and fair review.

Review Proper:

The HD601 was offered to me by Mixcder after reviewing a handful of other Mixcder products. I have been impressed with most of their offerings as they have done a good job at creating products I think consumers will want. This is not an easy task in any field and less so in audio than some others. Having been impressed with their last Bluetooth offering the MS301, I jumped at the chance to try this new one. The HD601 is targeted squarely at the Beats crowd as it has a bass boost circuit and very Beats-esque styling cues. MSRP is $100 with a street price of roughly $65 US.

The Hd601 arrived in a brown box with the smiley face on the side only this one looked like it had been sat on by a 1000lb gorilla. The contents made the journey intact but you can see evidence of their travel misfortunes in the box front and box side photos.





Inside the box are the headphones, the manual, two cables (one Usb and one 3.5mm male to male about 1 meter in length), and a coupon reminding me to register my Mixcder product online to double the warranty. Luckily I haven’t had to use warranty service on a Mixcder product yet, but the added coverage is certainly welcome. The cardboard and plastic is pretty utilitarian and a pouch to protect these would be a nice add-on as many of the other sets I will compare the HD601 to later in the review do come with some form of case.



Accessories:

All the Bluetooth headphones I have tested have come with basically the same kit. A 3.5mm cable for using them as wired phones, a charging cable, a manual, and some have come with a carrying case of varying quality. When going back through my notes I found it telling that the models with $75+ price points came with carrying cases, below that point it isn’t offered so shouldn’t be expected.



Build Quality

The HD601 is predominantly plastic with steel reinforcing the band and the adjustments. The HD601 do not fold up as some others do. The cups on the Hd601 swivel 90 degrees in one direction and about 15 degrees in the other to allow for better fit. The pad and driver has about 15 degrees of movement on the horizontal axis inside the outer cups to allow for better comfort and fit. These should fit most people with a little adjustment of the band. The headband and pads are pseudo-leather and are well executed. The headband provides enough padding without being oversized and the cups are fairly shallow without feeling like they are suction cupped to one’s head due to excessive clamping force.



Controls

Controls are simple. On the left cup we have the USB connection for charging at the bottom and then a red LED toward the rear of the unit to show charging and completion. On the right cup, we have three buttons and a 3.5mm jack. At the very bottom is the 3.5mm jack, then as you travel up the rear face you come to the power/pairing/bass switch (yes that is all 1 button), then up to the volume decrease and finally to the volume increase button. The LED that shows blue when powered on or blinks for pairing is located immediately above the multipurpose button. There are no external hints that the microphone exists.

The multi-function button deserves some discussion as it is unique to this headset. A quick push of the button turns the power on or off and is announced in the headphones as power on or power off. When off, a long press of the button will turn on the phones and place them in pairing mode. Again, both the power on and the ready to pair are announced. The other function is a double tap of the button switches modes between normal and bass boost. This can be a bit tricky as too slow and it is interpreted as on or off. Unfortunately, this is the only function that is unannounced so you have to listen to something to know which mode the phone is currently in.

One complaint I did have at this point, because of the materials used, every button push is translated into the right earpiece and it is impossible to adjust the volume or bass boost on the unit without hearing it inside the cups. Any touch of the cups is translated into the earpiece so it seems no damping was used in the cups.



Battery

Mixcder lists these as charging to full in 2 hours from drained and working for 22 hours. The battery is listed as a 500mAh lithium ion cell. I tested the cell in mine and it measured 462mAh which is not atypical for a cell nominally rated at 500. I was able to average about 9 hours of use before the HD601 needed recharging but it should be noted that heavy use of the bass boost does reduce that substantially, and the bass boost works less well as the battery drains (more on that in the sound segment). While a 2.1 Amp charger would charge the headphone in 2 hours, it would be wise to use a slower charger and preserve the battery as quick charging will result in shortened usable life.

Bluetooth

The Hd601 is one of a very few headphones on the market that supports the latest Bluetooth standard (4.2) with AptX. Pairing is made even simpler with NFC. I was able to use my HTC phone with NFC to touch the hd601 and instantly pair them. I was able to use the headphones within 50 feet of the Cayin N3 or HTC source without a single hiccup and no interference from other devices. I can say openly that I have not had this kind of coverage with any of the non-4.2/AptX Bluetooth models. Some are better than others but none have performed as well as those using AptX. Mixcder has done a good job on the Bluetooth implementation and I suspect that they have re-used the excellent design from the ms301 as it worked exactly the same way during pairing and use.


Isolation

The Hd601 is a closed back design and isolation is as good as expected in such a design. It should be noted that some advertising material states that the hd601 has a noise cancelling microphone and some will misread this as the headphone has active noise cancelling. It does not have any active noise cancelling for the drivers. The microphone does resist wind better than some but again I suspect the noise cancelling mentioned is passive and due to the fact, the microphone is not exposed.

Sound

I paired the hd601 to my HTC m9 with USB Audio Player Pro, my Dell laptop using Foobar, and to a Cayin N3 with current firmware (Huge N3 fan, if you haven’t tried one, you should). Listening was done with mostly Flac with a few 320bit Mp3s thrown in for good measure. Once I had done my Bluetooth testing, I tried both devices with the provided 3.5mm cable to see if the sound was different when wired than when on Bluetooth.

I am a lover of blues, blues/rock, classic rock, and anything with good guitar work in it. For that reason, I chose the following as my test tracks. (artist, album, track, thoughts)

Stevie Ray Vaughan – Texas Flood – Lenny. (Guitar to die for but the thing I look for is the percussion.)

Lindsey Buckingham – Fleetwood Mac, Best of - Go Insane, Live (Probably the most complicated simple song you’ll ever hear, all about nuance and subtleties with this track).

Johny Lang – Lie to me – Lie to Me. (Looking for tight bass, bleed over into the mids, and controlled sub-bass)

Tedeschi Trucks – Let me get by – I want more. (Female Vocals, backing brass band)

The Blasters - Testament – Blue Shadows (Saxophone and piano with male vocals)

Vintage Trouble – The Bomb shelter sessions - Blues hand me down (Looking at attack speed and decay especially in bass and sub-bass. This track gets muddy quick if the equipment can’t handle it.)

Steve Earle – Copperhead Road – Title track. (I added this one as it builds more and more bass into each successive verse and seemed appropriate to headphone specializing in bass and sub-bass).

2 Unlimited – Get Ready - Get Ready for this. (When testing a bass cannon, why would you not?)

New Order – Blade Soundtrack – Confusion (Again, this is the music these were designed for and it is just fun).

The sound without the bass boost is a Deep V shape that is solidly on the warm side. I had hoped these would be a more neutral tuning of the ms301 with a switch to add back the V shape if you wanted a more consumer sound profile. Instead these have a solidly V shaped signature with bass boost off and an absolutely cavernous bass with the boost enabled. The first time I put the Hd601s on, I thought I had mistakenly enabled the bass boost. Then when I did hit the button twice to enable it, it absolutely boomed.

Bass: This is certainly the target of these headphones, and they annihilated the target. These can be thought of as Bass+ and Bass+++ depending on the boost circuit. Good bass extension and lots of sub-bass make these as close to a wearable subwoofer as anything I have tried. The bad news is, the bass isn’t perfect. It has a fairly large mid-bass hump and bleed into the mids is prominent. With the bass boost enabled, bass gets very loose and muddy. I found that they do react well to equalizer, and was able to tighten up the bass quite a bit without losing much of the low bass or sub-bass impact. These definitely are not a neutral tuning, nor can they be made into one. If you are looking for something close to neutral the ms301 comes a lot closer. For something fun to listen to with lots of bass push, these are a more consumer friendly tuning.

Mids: Even with the mid-bass hump and the bass bleed are well presented. I found them better when wired than when in Bluetooth mode. With a little EQ, to remove bass one is able to focus on the mids. Once EQ’d to my liking, vocals and instrument separation are good but I kept having an issue with female vocals being veiled. This is partially due to a pronounced 5k spike that I EQ’d out. Without the eq, the vocals were less veiled but the 5k spike was annoying. With the spike eq’d down, upper range vocals took a hit commensurately.

Treble: is rolled off pretty substantially. This profile makes long listening sessions easy as they cannot be classified as bright or sibilant. I tried a few vocals that are often piercing and the laid-back sound on these had no problems with sibilance or strident treble. I found myself using the EQ to push the treble a up a bit to get a bit more life and air in the sound. It does respond to EQ to a point, but at the upper end the driver just doesn’t have the extension to do much. I didn’t find a lot of sparkle and cymbals were not as well rendered as on the Ms301.

Soundstage is pretty typical of a closed back design and can feel a little claustrophobic.


Call Quality

The headphones worked well for making and receiving calls. The microphone was less sensitive to wind and outside noise than some others I have tried.

Comparisons:

With an asking price of <$60 on Amazon and an MSRP of $99, I decided to compare the hd601s to other Bluetooth headphones I have in my stable of similar pricing. I ended up with the Edifier W855BT ($100), The Cowin E-7 ($79), the Meelectronics Matrix 3 ($109), the Mixcder ms301 ($99), the Syllable G700 ($84), the Bluedio T4 Turbine ($50) and my daughters Zealot B5 ($36) as my sampling to compare the Hd601 with.

Let’s start with the Zealot B5 and get it out of the way. Other than having a built in Micro-sd card slot so you don’t need an external player the B5 has nothing going for it. The sound quality was poor as was the battery life. They were uncomfortable as they overheated my ears very quickly. I tried to play Flac files directly from the player but it does not support them or any card over 16gb so really is not a viable option. If you like your music to sound like it is coming from the bottom of a pit, grab the B5, otherwise look elsewhere. (In fairness, I knew this going in but some will buy the cheapest thing they can find and these are it.)

On to the Bluedio T4. Unlike the Hd601 the T4 does not have AptX and showed extreme issues with latency. They were ok for music with a similar Deep V profile but were unusable for gaming or theater due to latency. I also found the on-ear style of the T4 to be less comfortable and overly hot on ear and extended listening sessions were simply not possible. Bluedio does advertise the T4 as having active noise cancelling but isolation was not noticeably better than the Hd601. Again, the Hd601 easily outclassed the T4.

The Syllable G700 was a very similar experience to the T4. Deep V shaped profile, poor battery life, uncomfortably hot pads and excessive clamping force. The lack of AptX again showed its ugly head in the form of latency and gaming or theater use would be problematic. They do sport ANC but with it enabled, there was an audible hiss which made it less than usable.

Next up was the Cowin E-7. These have good active noise cancelling. For the first time, I can say I could tell a positive difference with the ANC enabled when compared to without it. The bad news is that was the only positive on these. They have a large mid-bass hump and no treble at all. These made me rethink some of my initial comments on the Hd601 as the 601 is definitely bass heavy and treble light but the Cowin is bass heavy and treble non-existent. The E-7 also weighs more than double the Hd601 but only offered comparable battery life. Again, I’d easily take the Hd601 instead of the E-7 given the option.

Next up is the Meelectronics Matrix 3. As the most expensive headphone in the comparison, you would expect them to do well and in many ways, they are similar to the Hd601. Both have AptX, both have 40mm drivers, both are bass heavy, both sport good isolation, both have similar construction. The Matrix 3 has a sound profile that can best be described as a \ shape. The V with the treble half cut off. To me, the matrix suffers the same issue as the E-7 and didn’t respond as well to EQ as the Hd601 did. While the two share many similarities, the Matrix has less treble and costs twice as much – I give the win to the Hd601 on those two points.

Next up is the Edifier W855Bt. To me, this is the biggest competitor to Mixcder with good bass and a shallow V profile. They ship with a nice carrying case, they run Bluetooth 4.1 with AptX so latency isn’t comparatively different. The w855bt tuning is definitely a shallower V than the hd601 and I found it does not respond as well to EQ in the lower range. The Hd601 can be tuned to be either an absolute cannon or a milder V with a very consumer friendly profile. The W855bt could not be made into the cannon as it lacks the extension in the low registers and doesn’t have the bass punch even with EQ maxed out. The other issue I found with the W855 was weight. The hd601 was more comfortable to wear for extended periods due to its lighter construction.



Conclusion: Mixcder now has two solid offerings. While my tastes lean to the sound profile of the Ms301, I can see the market for both products. The Ms301 is the more balanced premium market product and the construction and price reflect that. The Hd601 is the more consumer market product and when compared with the products in the Beats line, it should compete well. The 601 has similar styling cues with the red and black design, a similar sound with the Bass forward tuning, and a price tag of a little less than half of most Beats products. If you are in the market for a wearable subwoofer that reacts well to EQ in the low and middle registers and has very ear friendly treble, these are certainly worth a look. For me, they won’t replace my top picks, but when the EDM or Techno stuff comes out, boy are they a fun listen.

I would like to thank Mixcder for providing me with the TR008. Mixcder was kind enough to send me the Tr008 as part of a contest.

The TR008 is a device that is tough to categorize. I’ve had a couple small Bluetooth receivers that I bought for my kids to use their phones as source to older home gear that didn’t support Bluetooth with varying degrees of failure. Some didn’t work at all, others worked some of the time but were subject to drop outs and noise. I have not had the opportunity to tryout a box that provided Bluetooth transmit capability so was interested to see how this would work. (If not at least a bit skeptical).

Packaging:
The box is well laid out, has all the specs printed on the back, and contains a good mix of cables, the TR008 itself and a manual. Cables are housed in a 2nd compartment to keep the device from getting scratched up in transit. Overall, well done. I must remark about two things that struck me immediately upon looking at the packaging, First off, it was so light I thought I might have been sent an empty box. Secondly, when I opened the box I was shocked to realize the TR008 itself takes up less than ½ the overall size of the box. To say it is tiny is an understatement.




Build:
The housing is plastic and roughly 2 inches square by 1 inch thick. I suspect that the same device could be made in a larger, heavier, brushed aluminum case and sold for a good bit more money but Mixcder chose to make this as compact as possible. When you realize this has a battery in it along with all the connectivity options, it really is amazingly small. The left end of the box has the Transmit/receive switch along with the pairing button. The front of the box has the 3.5mm Jack, an Optical Jack, the USB Port, and the power button. Indicator lights are positioned over the switches on the top of the case. Cables include a USB Charge cable, a 3.5mm male to male cable (3 foot) a 3.5mm Male to Male adapter 2 inches for direct connect, a 3 foot optical cable, and a RCA Male to 3.5mm female adapter stereo adapter. This provides a ton of connectivity options and is a huge plus as it doesn’t require secondary purchases to be ready to use.



Battery:
The battery is a tiny lithium ion cell of roughly 500mAh capacity. The good news is that the system will run while charging and that if plugged in via the USB cable the system will continue to draw current from the USB side and not drain the battery. I found the battery to have limited utility as it lasted between 4 and 5 hours in transmit mode and slightly longer in receive mode.

Pairing:
Pairing is a fairly smooth and familiar procedure until you get to adding a 2nd device which adds a new wrinkle. Luckily, pairing the 2nd device is as simple as pairing the first and this gives the device great utility when used in transmit mode. Use with Dual Devices is great for watching TV to two sets of headphones or gaming as all controls are handled at the source (pause, mute etc) or at the endpoint (volume) so no need for controls on the transmitter. I found the device to have good range and easily support connections up to 35 feet when the device being paired was up to the challenge. It should be noted that while this device supports AptX 4.2 that it does require the other end of the connection to support it as well and will drop back to lesser standards when both devices don't support AptX. I found that best connectivity was indeed to other devices that supported the most recent standard which should come as a surprise to no-one.

Connections:
The optical connection is limited to PCM only so avoid pairing it with DTS or Dolby Digital sources. That said, I was able to connect the TR008 using the Asus Xonar optical Out to the optical in on the TR008 and enjoy listening to my MS301s while roaming around the house. Interestingly this combination even worked while I was on a different floor than the transmitter which I had not expected since cordless phones have trouble with the same task.



I connected the 3.5mm input on the TR008 to the 3.5mm output on the Xonar and found no audible difference between that and the optical connection.

The most fun I have had with the TR008 came when setting it up in receive mode. I attached it to an older Kenwood Ka-9100 amp and a pair of Yamaha outdoor speakers to use by the pool. The kids love the ability to pair a phone and play music off their phone or from Pandora or Spotify directly to the outdoor system and still have the ability to keep the phone poolside for the obligatory text messaging that most teens do. The TR008 easily allowed for switching of paired devices by simply pressing the pairing button and during the week we had it outside we paired it with no less than 5 different makes and models of phones (Iphone6+, Samsung G6, HTC M9, Google Pixel, and LG G6). None of the phones were problematic and pairing went smoothly with all the different makes.

I also tried the TR008 in receive mode to connect my laptop to my main system and found that it worked well for that purpose as streaming from my laptop was smooth and uninterrupted even with considerable distance and traffic in between the devices.

If the device had any coloration or impact to the sound profile, I was unable to detect it.

Conclusions:
This is the first Bluetooth receiver I have used that worked and worked consistently. In over two weeks of heavy use, I have not had a single problem out of the device in either transmit mode or receive mode. It even has worked at distances at which all other receivers I have tried failed miserably. If you are in the market for a Bluetooth receiver or transmitter, the TR008 should be on your short list of models to tryout. My daughter has eyes on mine but she is going to have to buy her own. Luckily Mixcder has priced them so everyone can afford one.

After reviewing a couple other players, Ngoshawk and I got to discuss the AGPTek Rocker and he volunteered his for review. I am grateful to him for the chance to try out this interesting little DAP. I am not associated with AGPTEK or Benjie and received no compensation of any form for this review.

About Me:
I live in the budget audio world as kids in college and Vet school demand most of my income. As a result I really enjoy finding great products in the market that anyone can afford. Sure, I’d love to be in a position to relax and listen to my new LCD-X or Zeus but for most of us, that just isn’t reality. Finding things that sound great, work well, and fit in my ever decreasing budget is more of a challenge than simply spending more to get more and it is a challenge I not only accept, I enjoy. I try to keep my reviews practical as no one really expects a $99 DAP to compete with the top-end AK.



Packaging:
The rocker comes in a fairly plain black box with the player mounted in an insert and the cable and manual in the space under the insert. The packaging did a good job of protecting the player and was well laid out. The box does little to show the user what lurks inside though. This is the first in a series of contradictions that define the Rocker. The box while well put together, and even a bit upscale looking, does nothing to advertise the product or even suggest what it contains. If you saw this on a store shelf, you could easily pass it up for lack of any details on the packaging.



Build: The player has a nice solid feel with all corners rounded enough to not snag but still very square in shape. The Screen is large for the size and price point of the player if not super hi-resolution. Graphics are well displayed when album art is enabled. Below the screen is the common 4 button wheel. The wheel does have 4 distinct buttons at top, bottom, left, and right and does not operate as a scroll wheel. A fifth button in the center of the wheel operates as the primary play/pause control as is very typical for this style of player. The left side of the player has the power button and the Micro-SD card slot arranged from the top. I found that the micro-sd card slot would recognize all of my cards up to and including 2 different manufacturers 256gb cards. This is great compatibility as I have seen problems with the larger cards on several smaller players. The hardware limit of 15,000 songs really isn’t a problem with only a single SD slot and the use of lossless files. My 256 currently houses roughly 2700 titles so the limit was pretty much immaterial to me, ymmv. The right side of the player has volume up and down buttons also arranged on the top 1/3 of the player. The top is devoid of any controls or ports and the bottom contains a 3.5mm jack and the micro-USB port for charging and loading music. The control layout is very similar to many other players and works reasonably well. If I had one gripe at this stage it is that none of the controls on the main face of the player work when the screen is off. This means that you have to hit the button once to turn on the screen and then a 2nd time to actually make the desired change. A firmware change could easily alter this and would be welcome as I often change songs with a player in my pocket and having to pull it out and make sure the screen was enabled was a definite drawback.




Battery Life:
The battery life was excellent and the little player could handle the pretty much all day listening sessions that are my average work day. Charging time from near dead was roughly 2 hours so the charge rate is about as fast as possible without really hampering cell life. I did not intentionally run discharge tests on this unit as it was borrowed and I did not think to get express permission to do so. Deep discharge always has some risk of harming the cell so I decided to forego this test under the circumstances. If the player is left sitting inactive for any length of time it goes into a standby or better defined as sleep mode. Waking it from its slumber is not instantaneous and is perhaps a bit more involved than I would have preferred.



Features:
FLAC, DSD, Mp3 and wave covered my library but it was nice to see apple lossless, WMA lossless, and OGG on the list of supported formats as well. Support for 24/192 gives me all I need for pretty much all of my sd card tracks as I tend to use hdtracks or other flac sources at 24/192 when available and 96 when I can’t get the higher resolution files.

A true 10 band EQ works well once you get used to the controls and made enough difference to be able to adjust some of the brightness out of the Grado 60s and add some bass to the Fostex T50rp I paired with it to test.

Bluetooth AptX 4.2 functioned smoothly. Pairing was easy and no drops or disconnects were registered unless I strayed more than 30 feet or so from the player. I must say that these new Bluetooth players are starting to have sound quality that will make you consider the use of wireless. I don’t believe they are 100% there yet, but boy have they improved since the early days and I can see a day soon when wires are a thing of the past.

The USB dac function worked nicely when placed between my laptop and a Schitt Magni2 to drive the Fostex t50rp. The Magni definitely has more umphh than the internal amp on the Rocker but the Rocker was still quite capable even with these notoriously hard to drive phones.

I was also glad to see gapless playback was easy to enable or disable for listening to symphonic works.



UI:
As already mentioned above, (Screen bug) the UI on this little player is truly a conundrum. It has the typical 3x3 layout of icons on the main screen and you would expect the sub-functions to follow suit but they don’t always. It sports more features and functions than most players at twice the price point but it does so in such a poor arrangement that you either can’t find them or it takes an advanced degree to operate them when you do.

As an example, the first thing most of us do when we get a new player is plug it in to charge and set the power options. Ok, so plug in the USB, go to the gear icon (setting) and the options are in no particular order. It takes some sifting through to find what you are after and even then I wasn’t sure if I had found all the available settings or if others were hiding elsewhere. As an example to this day, I am not 100% sure that the setting to enable the buttons with the screen off doesn’t exist somewhere, I just couldn’t find it.

So, I’ve got it charged and the power options set as best I can, now to add music. I pop in the micro-sd card and begin looking for the “Scan music library” function or whatever this version calls it. Again, no such function exists at the top level and it isn’t even evident from the top level naming which option it is under. After consulting the manual, I found the option 3 layers deep in sub-menus. For such a critical and common function, I had expected this to be at most 2 clicks away.

Once you have the music loaded, the UI does a good job of allowing sort by artist, album, title, or to a lesser degree genre. Playlists are relatively straight forward to work with and playback functions are fairly simple to surface.

This is the problem with the Rocker, it is simply not intuitive or consistent. For those who take the time to learn it, the good news is it gets better from here. For those who want a simple intuitive player that does it all – take a look at the Cayin N3 as the extra money definitely buys you a much more polished UI. I can’t help but feel that this player could be really good with some attention to detail on the UI. Maybe rockbox?

Sound:
This is where the Rocker works and why I say it is a conundrum. For those willing to put up with the UI issues, the reward is a good sounding, reasonably potent DAP. Sound profile is fairly close to neutral with a distinct roll-off at the treble range. To my ears, the roll-off starts at about 3.5kHz. This does mean that treble sparkle is somewhat decreased and it makes the Rocker a good pairing with bright headphones that need a bit of taming. For phones that are more laid back a bit of EQ may be needed to bring that sparkle back. I think many inexpensive products try and bring treble forward so it is nice to see a more natural if slightly rolled-off presentation. With my most sensitive IEM, I did notice a slight hiss. With less sensitive phones the noise floor was not noticeable but this may be a concern to those with really high sensitivity phones. I am unaware of anything in the budget price range that would normally be paired with this DAP that is likely to suffer from this issue, but none the less it is worth noting. On the other end of the spectrum, the Fostex t50rp could be driven to usable levels with the Rocker but the sound was definitely thinner than with a more potent amp and the pairing was at best mediocre. When paired with things more to its liking, **** DT2+, KZ ZST, KZ ZS5, or the Denon ACH-300 the music comes through and the only noteworthy spikes in the sound profile are those native to the headphones. Sound was full with a nice vocal presentation and the DAP paired particularly well with the Denon for the genre’s I listen to most. I hesitate to comment on soundstage as I tend to think this is much more a function of phones than DAPs but I will say at the very least I don’t think the rocker did anything to detract from the soundstage which is all I could hope for.

Conclusions:
A good little player if ranked on sound quality alone. A great player for the price point if ranked on sound quality and feature set. A poor design if rated based on UI navigation and menu options. An average player if rated in overall. The good news for AGPtek is the issues seem to center around the firmware and could be corrected if desired. At $149 better choices exist, and $99 it is much more competitive and at $49 it would be a solid choice as an outdoor player with good sound quality that isn’t a great loss if it gets wet or damaged. If AGPtek does revamp the firmware, I would happily give this another look as I think it has the beginnings of a really solid player.

BACKGROUND: I was given the MS301 by Mixcder in exchange for writing a review. I appreciate the chance to try new things and always look for the positive. Most of my income goes to putting kids through college so I have a particular interest in the budget-fi category of products.

I resisted Bluetooth headphones for a long time as I thought they cured a problem I didn’t have. Seldom has the biggest concern in my life been the wire between my phone or DAP and my ears. To me the trade-off wasn’t worth it. Give up sound quality in order to lose a wire, not a good trade. Here lately though it seems everybody has a new Bluetooth headphone and after the first few attempts to resist I grudgingly agreed to try out a pair. One of my pet peeves is giving anything a pass it doesn’t deserve so I categorically refuse to say “this is good for a Bluetooth headphone”. Either it is a good headphone, or it is not, how it connects to the source shouldn’t change the nature of that discussion. Having said that, let’s look at the MS301.



Packaging

The Mixcder MS301 is their premium offering at roughly $90 retail and the outside of the packaging reflects that. The Black and gold is elegantly understated and yet makes sure all the pertinent details are there right up front.



The inside of the packaging doesn’t measure up to the same standard. A spartan plastic tray holds a small box and the phones. The manual hides underneath the tray and that is the entire kit. A travel bag to protect the headphones would be a welcome addition to the kit and maybe a velvet coating on the plastic to give it a bit more of a premium feel would be good. The small box contains a micro-USB cable for charging and a 3.5mm cable for wired use.





Build / Fit


Build quality is good with aluminum cups supported by stainless steel that attaches at the 12 o’clock position. The Hinges are metal on metal so no plastic contact points to wear. The headband adjustment is plastic as seen below but is backed with a stainless band and is solid. The pseudo-leather cups and headband are well padded and quite comfortable without being hot after extended wear. Kudos on that as few pads can both isolate and not overheat. This is definitely points in the MS301s favor. The cups rotate 90 degrees one way and roughly 15 the other to allow for a comfortable fit, and the pad and driver has about 15 degrees of movement on the horizontal axis inside the aluminum cups to allow for better comfort and fit. Again, well done and these should fit most people with a little adjustment of the band.



The pads can be removed by twisting them roughly 1/8 turn counter-clockwise as they lock into the driver housing using 4 clips. The drivers themselves are damped as seen below and are in a separate chamber from the Bluetooth circuit board and battery which are contained in the outer portion of the aluminum housings.





Controls


Controls are simple. On the left cup we have the USB connection for charging. On the right cup we have the 3 buttons. The topmost is power/ pairing. Then we have an LED that shows blue when powered on or blinks for pairing. The bottom two buttons are volume increase and decrease followed by the 3.5mm jack for wired use. The microphone isn’t labeled and two pin holes (one in either cup) are the only hint it exists.




Battery


Mixcder lists these as charging to full in 2 hours from drained and working for 22 hours. The battery is listed as a 500mAh lithium ion cell. Based on my usage, I found the times to be realistic if maybe a tough optimistic. I was able to average about 16 hours of use time before it needed recharging. While a 2.1 Amp charger would charge the headphone in 2 hours, it would be wise to use a slower charger and preserve the battery as quick charging will result in shortened usable life.



Bluetooth

The MS301 is one of a very few headphones on the market that supports the latest Bluetooth standard (4.2) with AptX. Pairing is simple and quick with nothing unexpected. I was able to use the headphones within 50 feet of the source without a single hiccup and no interference from other devices. This is better than the experience I have had with most other Bluetooth sets which have had problems with range and lots of interference when other Bluetooth licenses are in use. Mixcder has done a good job on the Bluetooth implementation as it worked exactly as advertised and is indeed a premium experience compared to the average device.



Isolation

Under normal circumstances, I wouldn’t give isolation a heading by itself but the MS301 warrants it. Due to the design, these have elements that would lead one to think they were open back as the housing is 2 pieces. Closer inspection shows the drivers are isolated into a chamber and it behaves like a closed back where isolation is concerned. They have a small amount of leakage but would be very usable on a plane or in travel situations. The only place I found I could not use them was in bed as my wife was annoyed while trying to sleep. The good news is that small amount of leakage is enough to create a headphone that sounds a lot more like an open back than it does a closed back. So let’s get to what everyone came for, what does it sound like?


Sound

I paired the headphones to my HTC m9 with USB Audio Player Pro. Listening was done with mostly Flac with a few 320bit Mp3s thrown in for good measure. I then paired to an I-phone 6S+ and did the same tests. Lastly, I paired them with my Fiio X3 using the 3.5mm cable and my Xduoo X3 using the same. I had a little overlap with a review tour of the Cayin N3 so tried the MS301 paired with the N3 via Bluetooth.

The sound is a shallow V shape that leans a bit to the warm side.

Bass has good extension and good punch. While elevated, the bass is not bloated or out of proportion and is much cleaner than some others I have tried. Sub-bass is present but not prominent and a mid-bass hump is present but not overwhelming. Overall, the bass on these is a good mix of quantity and quality. With a bit of EQ, the bass can be toned down and the MS301 becomes a very good balanced headphone. With a bit of EQ in the other direction, these can become a bit of a bass cannon for those that prefer that signature.

Mids are good. I mean really good. These do not suffer from the typical recessed mids seen on so many V shaped consumer headphones, nor do they have massive bass bleed into the mids as is also common. Male vocals are clear and potent and female vocals are well rendered, and lifelike.

Treble is controlled but does have some sparkle and airiness without sibilance in the female vocals. Again, treble responded well to EQ and could be used to flatten the response curve to produce a very analytical sound from a headphone that started out a more commercial V profile.

Soundstage is better than expected and sounds much more like an open back than a closed. Instrument separation was good and width of soundstage was very good. Depth of the sound stage is somewhat limited but less so than I was expecting in a low powered closed back design.


Call Quality

The headphones worked well for making and receiving calls. The microphone was sensitive to wind and outside noise as is typical with cup mounted microphones.


Overall

The Mixcder Ms301 represents Mixcder’s premium offering in price, style, features, and sound. Did Mixcder succeed in creating a premium experience? Yes! These remind me a lot of the Sennheiser 598SE in a Bluetooth design with better styling cues. These are easily the best Bluetooth headphone I have tried and deserve to be called a good headphone. Not good for a Bluetooth design, just plain good. These compete with wired designs of similar pricing on an even footing. If you are looking for a good headphone in the sub-$100 category, these deserve a good hard look. For those of you who have been waiting for a Bluetooth headphone that gave wired designs a run for their money in the sound quality department, your headphone has arrived and it’s called the Mixcder MS301.

Thanks to Andy and Cayin for setting up the Tour. I have thoroughly enjoyed my time with this little jewel.

It started simply enough, a nondescript little white box arrived at my doorstep. Inside was a well labeled box with an interesting layout. The packaging contains a small box with the accessories and manual and a slide out tray that holds the device itself. Well thought out, with cloth tabs for pulling the tray out as well as lifting the device out of the padding. The packaging is well engineered to protect the device and if put in so the device is facing the center between the accessories and the outer packaging, it should take a pretty severe blow to harm it.


At this point, I have now referred to the N3 as “the device” twice. Let me explain why right up front. Calling it a DAP is inadequate. This device goes so far beyond what most entry level DAPs are capable of, that to call it simply a DAP seems derogatory. In my week of using the N3, I found it to be a DAP, a wireless DAP, a headphone amp, a USB DAC, a Bluetooth DAC, an external hard drive, and once I made a USB to Coaxial cable using Andy’s instructions (I’d advise buying one but, since I only had the sample for a week, time did not allow) a very good little transport for either USB or Coaxial output.

Construction:

The device is solid and uncluttered. The case feels strong and showed no flexibility. With 2 buttons on left, the top being power the lower being a volume rocker, and 3 on the right being forward, Play/pause, and back (top to bottom) most of the functions you need can be handled quickly without looking once the initial playlist has been chosen. For initial setup it does have capacitive buttons below the screen that make sifting through the menus fairly straight forward and intuitive.




The screen is crisp and clear and the album cover art is well displayed albeit not entirely square. The corners are still pruned somewhat but overall a very usable display. I would advise backing off the display brightness to somewhere between 75% and 50% as this still leaves it very legible but improves battery life considerable. (As a side note, this is not a touch screen but at $150 not to be expected).

The screen did come with one small scratch on the review sample and a screen protector still in the box so I would recommend using same. I understand that others dislike screen protectors so I did not mount it but would certainly do so were the device my personal one.

The bottom of the unit has a single 3.5mm jack and a USB-C/Spdif port (you can read more about Cayin’s proprietary use of the unused pins in USB-C to handle the coax output duties elsewhere). The only fault I can find with this is that the USB-C port on the test unit was just slightly off-center. This did not cause any issues and was merely a cosmetic issue.

Cayin rates the battery at 2500mAh and my testing came out to 2350mAh measured so the runtimes suggested in their literature are pretty much spot on what should be expected although I suspect they had tuned the device to get a full 12 hours out of it. (screen off or way down, Bluetooth off etc).

UI:

The UI is obviously based on Hiby Music as is commonly the case in this tier of Chinese DAP. Once you know where the controls are in Hiby, it is pretty straight forward to get everything setup as you wish.

I would advise changing the power saving/sleep functions right away as they are disabled as factory default and the device is prone to parasitic drain when not in use if the sleep function is not enabled.

Gain settings offer 3 levels of gain, the EQ offers several presets along with Custom. One drawback is the custom EQ is a bit of a learning curve to get setup as it isn’t the most intuitive process with the button arrangement on the front of the player. Once set though, it did an admirable job of remembering those settings.

The media management on the device is easily one of the best I have used. The ability to load a music library quickly from an SD Card is much appreciated and with my 64gb card it took less than 30 seconds to read files in and be ready to use. Way better than the Hidiz I tested last. The category titles make for quick sorting of music as does the genre drill down feature. I found playlists to be about as expected and navigation between artists and tracks was simple and straight forward.


Cases and Caveats:

The device came with a little slip over silicone rubber case. While good for protecting the device back and sides, it does basically nothing for the front and it does leave the buttons exposed. This lead to hitting the wrong button while trying one handed operations as I often hit the forward/back/pause when trying to adjust volume or the reverse when trying to switch songs.



Toward the end of my week with the N3, a leather case arrived. The device slides in from the top with a gentle effort. The leather case provides recesses for each button and the screen as can be seen above. While not covering the screen, the recess does provide some protection for it. The good news here is the recessed buttons mean your fingers sit on top of them rather than pushing them when doing the same one hand operations I mentioned previously. The issue with hitting the volume or track change button while trying to adjust the opposite was nearly completely cured by the leather case. I would strongly advise purchasing the case to go with the N3 or even better would be if Cayin would bundle the Leather case in the package. It would be worth a few extra dollars to keep from having to go back and order it separately.

Bluetooth:

Pairing was smooth and simple. The CSR8811 does a good job of the Bluetooth duties and use of headphones 40-50 feet from the device was not a problem. Very good overall implementation of Bluetooth as presented fewer hiccups and other problems than I have grown to be accustomed to when attempting to use Bluetooth headphones. Notably the battery of the device did not seem to drain notably quicker with the Bluetooth enabled which is a great thing. Far too many of the inexpensive devices (phones included) drain the battery in ½ the time when you enable the Bluetooth features so seeing the power management on this was a nice surprise. The other cool feature was the ability to pair the N3 to a phone and use it as a DAC/Amp for streaming Spotify and tidal through the phone. That is an impressive feature which makes the N3 a potential Chord Mojo competitor at ¼ the cost.

Sound:

This is the hardest part for me. Trying to discern what coloration is being added by the DAP and what is caused by the rest of the system means putting in a lot of time and really knowing every piece of equipment in the chain. For that reason, I have a list of tracks I always use, and a handful of headphones/earphones that always get used as I know their biases and can then use that information to tell what is being introduced by the player. For the N3 the two words that come to mind are Neutral and Clear. To me, this is about the best thing you can say about a DAP. I could not discern any coloration that was imparted by this player. It might lean just a touch to the warm side, but again this could well be my other choices rather than the player itself. Clarity was better than expected with micro-detail being well rendered. (Admittedly this was evident mostly when using the device as a DAC into my home system). I do think perhaps the DAC chip is slightly better than the opamp it is paired with for earphone listening as I could pick out more detail when using the N3 as transport or DAC with the USB to coaxial than when listening directly from the 3.5mm output.

Probably the most interesting thing to me is that the AK4490’s digital filters are very audible. The UI offers sharp, short delay sharp, slow, super slow delay, and short delay slow. Differences in the later three are very subtle if audible for me. Differences in the first 3 listed are clearly audible.

Sharp is great when paired with a planar like the Fostex or Alpha Dog. Very fast attack and decay with lots of treble sparkle and good slam. Probably the least musical of the filters and the most obviously “digital” sound signature but quite possibly my favorite of the bunch.

Short delay sharp is a bit more laid back, slightly smoother around the edges but retains some of the sparkle and edge of sharp.

Slow = smooth. All the sharp edges are gone and what is left is thick and warm. Might be best paired with a headphone that tends to get a bit harsh as it smooths out a lot of roughness. Unfortunately for me, it also masked some of the detail and was probably my least favorite.

Comparisons: (Battle of the 3s)

N3 vs Fiio X3ii
Soundstage - N3 (much larger than X3)
Power Handling - N3 (but not by enough to make it a huge difference)
Sound – N3 – Clarity, more neutral and better dynamics than the X3.

N3 vs Xduoo X3
Soundstage – N3 but not by a lot. Pretty close to a dead heat.
Power Handling – Xduoo X3 – the N3 has to use the high gain setting to drive earphones as strongly as the X3 can at lower gain setting. It should be noted though that the N3 has a much blacker noise floor when compared to the X3 and is a better choice for highly sensitive headphones.
Sound – N3 – easily a clearer more detailed sound from the N3.


Conclusion:
Since keeping the review sample was not an option, I am left with no choice but to purchase a Cayin N3 and the optional leather case, as should anyone who wants the most versatile and useful DAC/DAP on the portable market for $150. While the N3 isn’t perfect, it does an awful lot of things very well. You might even justify buying more than one as you could have a portable machine for on the go, a USB DAC/amp for your laptop, and a transport for your home system all for less than $500. Name me one other device that can do all those things well and still cost you less than a good set of headphones?

First things first, I split the cost of the 1st pair of ShareMe Pro headphones with MixCder in exchange for an honest review. I bought the 2nd pair outright and with no coercion of any kind as I felt the best use of these was in pairs. Thanks to Mixcder for continuing to make excellent products available for review at reduced costs. I always enjoy seeing the box coming from amazon and knowing that another interesting product has found its way to me to try out.

Without further ado, The Mixcder ShareMe Pro:

Packaging: They ship in a rather plain box with a plastic insert that holds the headphones. The charging cable and 3.5mm cable along with the instruction book are hidden underneath.

The box doesn’t do a great job in conveying the idea that these can be used in tandem as it wasn’t immediately apparent to most at my office that the red and blue were supposed to represent 2 different sets of headphones. They thought it was just decoration. The reverse doesn’t do much better.




They have specs in 7 different languages, but no information about the Bluetooth sharing capability. Without a doubt, they need to repackage these so people know more about what is inside the box.

Build Quality: The cups are plastic while the band is metal sandwiched between two layers of plastic. The cups swivel vertically about 35 inward at the top as well as having the ability to rotate 90 to one direction and 15 the other on the horizontal. Controls are found at the bottom of both earpieces with power and volume on the left and track forward, back, and play/pause on the right. The microphone is on the left side while the right has the 3.5mm jack for wired use.




Comfort: Comfort is good due in part to excellent pads and in part to the modest weight and swivel of the earpieces. I was able to wear them for extended periods without issues of overheating or discomfort. Since attaching them to the ps4, the kids have used them pretty constantly and none have complained about them.


Battery Life: I was able to get an average of 16.5 hours of life per charge on both sets when used in tandem and a little over that when used as a single device. Recharge time was roughly 2 hours using a 1A charger.



Sound:

Bass: lots of it. These are not V shaped, they are a V that somebody broke the right leg off entirely. Bass, Bass, and more. These need an EQ or the mids and highs are completely dwarfed by the lows. Bass is a bit loose and dominated by upper bass with modest extension. Once EQ’d the treble can only be described as a bit dull. The good news is I think it might be impossible to make anything sibilant on these so if you are super sensitive to high frequencies, this might be a plus. The tuning also makes these very forgiving of poor recordings so they will play well with the top 40 lovers and the like. No amount of EQ is going to turn these into a super resolving audiophile headphone (hint if you are looking for that in a Mixcder Bluetooth set, consider the MS301). The good news is the tuning is very popular and many will like them in spite of a very bass heavy signature.

Soundstage is a bit crowded as is expected in a closed back headset but isolation is not fantastic. I tried listening in bed but got told to turn those things off so SWMBO could sleep.

Sharing:

At this point, if you are guessing these were not my favorite headphone, you’d be correct. So, I did what any other sane person would do, I bought a 2nd pair. The single biggest calling card for these is the Sharing feature so to give them their due, I had to see if it worked and if it was enough to change my rather low opinion of them. When the 2nd pair arrived, I paired them to the first running both off my HTC M9 phone. While it didn’t change the sound profile, it did work flawlessly. No lag even at beginning of tracks, no break up due to movement unless the headsets were more than about 20 meters apart. If you were in the same room, they worked well together. Inserting a concrete wall between them reduced the 2nd pair to earmuffs so know that you cannot use them in different rooms when paired together in most cases.


Now I got to thinking, what to use them for.


1.) Back of the van with the I-pad playing movies for the kids - yep works fantastically and SWMBO and I can carry on a normal conversation again. This alone was worth what I paid for them.

2.) Watching TV at night while others sleep. As previously mentioned this was a bust when in the bed next to someone, but worked quite well when one person wanted to doze while others wanted to watch TV. We paired both sets to the TV and I no longer had to listen to pretty little idiots. Again, well worth the cost of purchase.

3.) Gaming, we attached them to the PS/4 and again, works great. The only drawback here and it isn’t the fault of the headphones is now the kids yell at each other because they can’t hear themselves during gaming. If they could come up with a way to use the Mic in addition to the phones with the gaming console so in-game chat went through the headphones this would be a real coup.


Overall:

This is going to be one of the strangest comments made on head-fi. I would not buy a single set of these for use as I think there are better headphones in the same price range for listening by oneself. I would however buy two pairs. The utility of having two pairs connected to the same source is a fantastic option for parents with children and the price is not so ridiculous that purchasing 2 or more pairs isn’t possible for most. If you have now heard Frozen for the 4000th time and would dearly love to regain some of your sanity, I highly recommend these. No, they aren’t for most head-fi members, but for their children or maybe parents who like to watch late night TV at a volume that can be heard from the next county, these are just the ticket.

Please note, my eval was for 3.5 Stars but the new site does not allow 1/2 values.

Archeer approached me about doing a review in exchange for a sample set of the AH07 headset or the AH225 bluetooth speaker. I don’t own any Bluetooth speakers and really don’t have a lot of opportunity to use one, so I declined that review sample but gladly accepted the AH07 headset. I’d like to thank Archeer for the AH07 and their trust in me to do an objective review.

A short note about me: I am a music enthusiast, and audio hobbyist. I make no claim to have the level of experience of some. With children in college and Vet school, my budget is pretty limited so my dabbling is rather low end. Luckily for me, now is a great time to be a frugal audio enthusiast as great equipment can be had at very reasonable prices. I tend to be quite pragmatic and I don’t expect $35 products to sound like $10,000 products so my reviews are always tempered by that viewpoint.


Will the AH07 be the Bluetooth headset that finally convinces me to use them instead of a wired model?

Review Proper:

The AH07 arrived in the typical brown cardboard box with a neatly fitted black box hiding inside. Graphics are good, well laid out, and explain what is inside well. Inside the box, it is pretty spartan. When you first open the box, all you see the headphones sitting in a plastic tray as below.



The Phones fit snuggly between the box lid and the plastic insert and the insert is fitted well enough that little movement is possible and damage during transit doesn’t seem likely.


Accessories:

If you didn’t think to lift the plastic tray, you would miss what little else comes with the AH07. That being a thin manual, a 3.5mm cable, and a usb/charging cable.




In fairness, the only thing I think the package is really missing is a carry bag for the phones themselves and the charging cable (maybe a side pocket for the cables – more later). The manual is complete enough to make getting the AH07 up and running easy and after charging the headphones overnight it took less than 2 minutes to have them paired with my phone and listening to music.



Build Quality:

Build quality was an interesting mix of great and ordinary. Particularly impressive is the hinge between the metal portion of the headband and the upper plastic portion. When I first unboxed these, my thought was “Ok, so how long is that hinge going to snap in place as the plastic wears”. Good news, Archeer thought of that too and the hinge is reinforced with metal inserts so no plastic on metal contact is present. I must say, that is in impressive piece of engineering that shows good attention to detail and was not something I expected at this price point.







L and R are clearly marked on the inside of the headband just below the hinge (as shown above) and the controls are behind the ear on the right side. Being a lefty, I would have liked them on the left side but knowing that I am in the minority I understand the reasoning.



Controls are simple but effective. Volume Up/Down and a Phone/On button divided by a multi-colored LED. Long pushing the phone button turns on/off. A quick touch of the same will answer an incoming call. Buttons offer a tactile response as well as beep codes to let you know you have reached min or max volume or as the device is switched on or off.

On the ordinary side, both the plastic earcups and the metal band are subject to scratches and within a couple of days, both were starting to show. A simple lined carry bag in the package would go a long way to preventing some of these and would be a welcome addition.




Battery:

Confession time, I am an electronics nerd and have a serious battery testing setup (West Mountain Radio CBA) so I took advantage of it. I couldn’t find a mAh rating for the battery anywhere on the packaging but the test shows full discharge at 500Ma takes roughly 5.5 hours and equates to 1100mAh cell. The tester also registered the cell as a Li-ion type with a full charge voltage of 4.2 and a fully discharged voltage (when the headphones cutoff) of 2.9V. This is fairly deep discharge in order to extend usage time and may result in the battery lasting fewer cycles than a milder discharge curve would produce. For this reason, I would recommend not running the headset until it quits. I found that I could listen for 4 hours and then recharge without dropping the cell below 3.4V which is a much more battery friendly recharge slope and should make for a good long cell life. I don’t think the 14hour listening time is exaggerated based on these tests but I do think doing so repeatedly will limit the lifespan of the headset as Li batteries generally react poorly to that deep a discharge.


Microphone:

The microphone worked well for making and receiving calls. This was probably the best headphone mic I have used on a headset that wasn’t purpose built for phone use. It didn’t pick up a lot of extraneous noise and didn’t suffer from issues with wind noise. If sound quality on phone calls is a big issue to you, this is a headset seriously worth consideration. Voices were clear and plain and the microphone works very well. This was a pleasant surprise as the microphone on most of headsets is an afterthought at best.



Sound:

I am a lover of blues, blues/rock, classic rock, and anything with good guitar work in it. For that reason, I chose the following as my test tracks. (artist, album, track, thoughts)

Stevie Ray Vaughan – Texas Flood – Lenny (Guitar to die for but the thing I look for is the percussion.)

Lindsey Buckingham – Fleetwood Mac, Best of - Go Insane, Live (Probably the most complicated simple song you’ll ever hear, all about nuance and subtleties with this track).

Johny Lang – Lie to me – Lie to Me (Looking for tight bass, bleed over into the mids, and controlled sub-bass)

Tedeschi Trucks – Let me get by – I want more (Female Vocals, backing brass band)

The Blasters - Testament – Blue Shadows (Saxophone and piano with male vocals)

Vintage Trouble – The Bomb shelter sessions - Blues hand me down (Looking at attack speed and decay especially in bass and sub-bass. This track gets muddy quick if the equipment can’t handle it.)


(it is worth noting that I tested with both the Bluetooth and the 3.5mm cable to determine if I could hear a difference in the amplifier built into the headset and using a different amp to run just the drivers.)


Bass: HUGE, Just massive, enormous, bordering on gargantuan. To say these are V shaped is an understatement, these are canyon shaped with the bass canyon wall being about a mile deep. Not much below 80hz, but at frequencies between about 100hz and 200hz these have immense punch. I found myself with a rather heavy EQ with dropping everything below 250hz by 8db in order to be able to listen for the mids as they otherwise vanish behind the bass. Bass gets a bit loose when not roped in using an EQ but for a design who’s motto is “Massive Sound” and “Impact” they hit that on the nose.

Mids: If you can find them, the mids do a good job with instrument separation and vocal clarity. In order to find this, you will need to EQ the bass and treble down between 6 and 8 db. Once EQ’d this can be a good listening experience and didn’t have any trouble with the speed of Blues Hand me down that can get muddy. I really like the sound of these once EQ is applied.

Treble: The other side of the canyon wall. Exaggerated, somewhat shrill treble is very revealing of poor source material. I was not particularly sibilant, but was tough to listen to for extended periods without EQ. Again, with a quick adjustment it brought them into a much more listenable range. Treble extension was not fantastic, but was on par with most other headsets in its class that I have had the opportunity to tryout.

Soundstage: Somewhat claustrophobic as most inexpensive closed back designs are. Separation is acceptable but it still feels a bit like you tried to cram the brass section into the backseat of a Beetle.


Wired Notes: The drivers do react well to amping and when run through the Magni 2 on my office desk, I find better separation of a bit clearer sound than with the Bluetooth. Not unexpected as Bluetooth does impose limits that the wired version does not. We also have to remember that weight and battery life are trade-offs being made in order to get a comfortable headset that works long enough to be useful.


Gaming: Not being much of a gamer, I handed these off to my daughter’s boyfriend to tryout with some of his games. He uses an Alienware laptop and found pairing to be a breeze and thought they performed well. He made note that without 5.1 or 7.1 some sounds did not place themselves as cleanly as he would have liked, but said for a headset not specifically designed with gaming in mind they did well. He particularly liked the comfort as he was able to wear them for an extended gaming session (6+ hours) without his ears getting overheated or battery life becoming an issue which I gather are both common problems from his comments.


Overall Impressions:

I am not generally a huge fan of Bluetooth headsets, I think they usually cure problems I don’t have. Most of the time, a wire between my source and my headphones is not my biggest problem. Having said that, I really do like the utility these provide for moving around an office or the house while cleaning etc. I can see these being nice for travel, if I spent a lot of time in the air, as they isolate well and battery life (even with my caveat) is enough for most flights.

For those who love a bass cannon, this should be a headset you look into. For those looking for an analytical marvel, these will require heavy EQ as they are definitely aimed at the consumer V-shaped market. I think these do a solid job of hitting the target market, Big bass, V-shaped, easy pairing and use with Cell phones, good battery life, good call quality when paired with a phone, and looks.

I think an accessory bag to protect them would go a long way to preserving those looks and making them an even better value. Not sure why I worry about that as my daughter has now swiped them and they may never come home again. That alone is probably the best review I could give, teenager approved and in constant use amongst her friends.

My review sample was shipped from: http://amzn.to/2olA81T