Disclaimer: This product was sent to me for free for honest review with no compensation.
Link:
https://www.oneodio.com/products/a10-hybrid-anc-headphones
Specs
Brand/Personal background
OneOdio but been in the market for years along many other chifi headphone brands such as Bluedio, Tronsmart and Mpow. This is my first OneOdio unit and I have personally owned Tronsmart and Mpow headphones as well.
Bass (4)
As expected of typical 40mm headphone (Dynamic) driver. The bass is clean and punchy and definitely unlike many headphones which goes for the boomy bass with very little texture. IMHO, those are really horrible tuning, all it gives is the overwhelming booms which often leads to bass bleed to the mids and everything just sound congested. In this headphone, you wont experience that, instead you have very good distinction across the whole bass region. With that said, sub-bass feels a little thin, adding another 3dB shelf 50hz down would probably give better layering.
Mids (3.5)
Surprisingly, I actually enjoy the female vocals (higher mids) more than male vocals (lower mids) in this headphone. The female vocals are more forward sounding and hit a sweet spot between over/under-whelming in terms of overall tuning. As mentioned, no bass bleed into the lower mids means clean sound but I have to say this region did not out/under-perform, simply average.
Highs (3.5)
This part is where I would say the headphone under performs. I can hear a very distinctive roll off which can be a good or bad thing depending on individuals. Personally, I'm very particular with wanting to enjoy the full spectrum of audio as it is such a complicated combinations of "love-hate" relationship of waves involved. It either compliments each other or destroy each other. In this case, I call it destroying. The reason is plain simple, many musical instruments has its resonance frequencies reaching as high as this region, cutting it off simply affects the air and accurate reproduction of the said instruments. However, some might like this as this typically make the audio sound more sterile, free from ringing, sibilance and harshness.
Modes
ANC: My favorite of the 3. Very good noise cancelling would give it a 4 here for the quality at this price range. ANC suppresses the mid bass a bit, making sub bass more prominent which is what I think was slightly lacking.
Transparent: Worst of the 3. Ringing and ringing picking up random noise, wind sound and making conversation sound weird. Reminds me of the customer service headset audio quality, echo and robotic.
Normal: Very safe tuning, nothing spectacular.
Summary:
If you are looking for a budget ANC headphone around this price range, this is a very good consideration for its safe tuning and relatively good ANC. However, if you are looking for an upgrade, this might not be the headphone for you, unless you dont mind doing simple EQing or changing the headphones pad (you need to tinker a little...)
Although the bluetooth does drop out, it is not very frequent and generally reconnects within a few seconds, which I think is fair enough. This is where the aux is handy for situation like this, not to mention you can use with your beloved stack for better audio experience. Generally amping would benefit the audio experience which in this headphone does benefit a bit.
If I really have to say what disappointed me, it is the bluetooth chip used. Although this headphone is hi-res certified, it only means that it can reproduce audio frequencies of at least 40khz. Unfortunately, the codec itself did not do the justice where it packs lesser data in each packet which simply mean less smooth audio experience. This headphone would definitely benefits from the common APTX variation codecs if not the HD and LDAC codec.