Great review Sean!  I hope to hear the Utopia one day myself.  Did you get a chance to check out the HE1000 V2?  I have been quite impressed by them actually.  

Great impressions! Stellar pictures!

You have too much money... wish i did
 
Nice review.

@purk Sadly, I don't own nor have any Hifiman headphones on loan to compare. I did listen to them briefly at the Fujiya show but I was more smitten by the Shangri-La. Again, at least for me, when not compared side-by-side in real time, it's hard for me to critique properly - I have a 4 second memory .

@harry501501 sadly the Focals aren't mine. I am trying to find a way to justify buying them though with the missus, trying to "consolidate" (offloading the TH-900/HD800S) for a more expensive single pair of cans. Can't touch my Stax though, that'll be buried with me.

Mm..the Utopia + Chord Dave is a must-listen. The WA8 pairing is also very good. Useful comparison. With TH 900 and HD 800S. In terms of overall ranking: Utopia, then HD 800S and TH 900. Nice review.

@raypin I did hear the Utopia along with the Dave at the Tokyo International Hifi Show and at the Fujiya Autumn Headphone Festival. Without a doubt, an impeccable combination would be the peak of almost everyone's combo dream. The only thing I would disagree is that the Utopias need a high end DAC/amp driver for it to shine. It shines well already with the likes of average DAC/amps as the headphone is already doing most of the work. Sure having a high end DAC/Amp would add a polish to that shine, but I woudn't deem it a necessity.

One side note which I forgot to mention on the review. I personally would not pair the Utopia to a current driven amp - I heard it with the Re-Leaf E1 DAC/Amp (This is a $20,000 -> $50,000 DAC/Amp depending on the JP local version vs international version) and it was way too bassy. I told Focal's Romain Vet about it but it was the end of the Fujiya Show and too late for them to do anything about the demo configuration.

Mm...in your review, very near-Stax performance without need of a dedicated amplifier, hence desk-bound, appears to be a key strenght of the Utopia. That highlight is good news for some of us not yet into Stax. I don't have a Stax set-up and have no plans of getting one because of the Utopia.

Very nice review. This is really what i thought, even though i only had a listen with focals playlist, that there is still a small gap between the Utopia and the Stax 009. Still the Utopia seems superior to the likes of HD800, LCD -4 and the HE1000

"It shines well already with the likes of average DAC/amps as the headphone is already doing most of the work"

While I'd agree with this I would also say that they are certainly capable to reveal the qualities/benefits of TOTL upstream gear, which makes the pairing with a high end system worthwhile, IMO. The efficiency of the Utopia makes it easy to pair with average gear, but the technical performance deserves a top notch source, again, IMO.

Mm....out of the ak380 cu and cu amp, it sounded flat, unengaging and boring. Back to the review, which mode did you use on your Utopia/WA8: 2 or 3 tube?

@x RELIC x , my fear of statements such as this ("deserves a top notch source") makes it sound the Utopia is _only shines_ with top end gear and at least to me, that's not true. I don't feel one doesn't need to spend that much on supporting gear to enjoy the benefits of the Utopia. Naturally it scales up with top end gear but one reaps the benefits of the Utopia with average gear too.

@raypin I used 3 tube on the WA8.

A great informative review.