Thanks to my dear friend Srinivas Vignesh, I had the good fortune of auditioning and listening to the Aroma Jewel over the week. I received the stock cable, tips and the round case for the listen. Over the last couple of days, I have been listening to the Jewel on a variety of sources and cables. Below is a summary of my experience overall. Build and accessories The Jewel is an all resin build and is fairly lightweight. Packing a large number of drivers and also at the kidney replacing cost of the iems, I babied them for all the time that I was in...

Thanks to Henry and Michael Browne for organising the India tour of the Astral Acoustics cables (https://www.astralacousticscables.com). Astral Acoustics are based out of Hong Kong and have plenty of exotic cables (and materials) including silver, gold, palladium etc. Their cables are very nicely build and look the part of premium range of cables. A lot of the cables cost around the same or lower than other exotic cable makers (pw audio, effect audio). Since the review is for multiple cables, I will add cable reviews to this post as and when I have...

Rose Technics - Martini - Impressions Rose Technics - Martini is a premium single dynamic driver earbuds featuring a two-Way Air Pressure Management System. The impressions are part of a group review courtesy of Concept Kart (https://conceptkart.com/products/rose-technics-martini-wired-earbuds). No influence or compensation was paid for the review and is the personal opinion of yours truly! The Review unit came in a nice velvet lined plastic case that reminds of well made pen cases. The shell of the buds is Gold-Plated Brass and feature...

Burson - Supercharger - A quick review Thanks to Burson audio and =AZXXOzroGTfKhLDQvX_iYvvdc6qCUNRe95DSgIxyBdlkceoPU8RDqZam-vAVQlVKyoRWTY8tc_z3SY3k1mzgVYl4ZHt1sYoQTVZSHJ5rpphUFmHebxGR-hDQDtkjoc3CpYbCtljJsrhetak7kt7_ee8U&__tn__=-]K-R']Bhavneet Matharoo for the review unit of the Supercharger. The Supercharger is a power adapter that provides clean power from noisy power sources. Build and package : The supercharger comes in a nice box, with the super charger, and 3 adapters for the various power plug configurations across the world (australia...

Dunu Titan S - A short review Thanks to Concept Kart for a super quick delivery (https://conceptkart.com/). BACKGROUND Dunu as a company, have produced very well regarded iems in the audiophile community, and I have owned/listened to multiple iems in the past including DN2001, Falcon Pro and the Dunu Titan (v1). The Titan series have been single DD implementations that have been reference tuned. The Dunu Titan v1, which was also sold by Fiio as the Ex1 with a poorer cable, was semi open. With earbud like staging, the single DD still sounds...

Thanks to Hifigo (https://hifigo.com/products/kinera-urd-1) and gadgetgod (https://www.head-fi.org/members/gadgetgod.528602/) for organising the review tour of the Kinera Imperial Urd. The Urd comes with the following specifications 2 Sonions EST + 2 Titanium Crystal Diaphragm Coaxial DD + 1 Kinera Customize 11021 BA Impedance: 20 ohm Sensitivity: 107db±2db Frequency Response: 5Hz-50kHz Modular 6N OCC + OCC with Silver Plated + OCC with Gold Plated Cable BUILD AND ACCESSORIES The review unit came in a blue canvas case with adequate space for the...

Thanks to Concept Kart (https://conceptkart.com) for the review tour. The unit arrived in the iem case with what looks like a silver and copper hybrid cable, with the typical qdc tips (spinfits cp100 I think). It is available at the Concept Kart site (https://conceptkart.com/.../qdc-anole-vx-standard-wired-iem) FIT AND BUILD The QDC Anole VX is built like a piece of jewellery. Lots of silver specles in a clear shell, that looks very nice when worn. It brings in the bling very well. Those looking for an understated appearance, use masking tape The...

Thanks to Concept Kart and Pulkit Dreamzz for organizing the review tour of the Mext. The Mext is available at Concept Kart (https://conceptkart.com/products/unique-melody-mext-wired-iem) The unit is part of the review tour, and no compensation for the review has been received or entertained in exchange for the review. All opinions are mine. SPECIFICATIONS Headphone Type: Coil Bone Conduction + Dynamic +Balance Armature Air Conduction Frequency Bandwidth: 20Hz-23kHz Vibration Conduction Frequency Bandwidth: 200Hz-7kHz Sensitivity of Air Conduction...

Background I do own/have owned discrete(ish) devices (R2R dacs, Sapphire discrete amp etc) and loved the analog sound out. I primarily use iems and headphones and have done a fair share of opamp and tube rolling on dacs and amps. I had read up a lot of blogs about discrete opamps, and I wanted to see what the fuss was about. I had also read a lot of reviews calling out that the discrete opamps have more noise due to the design than tightly packed single die IC opamps. In order to satisfy this itch, I ordered the Sparkos dual discrete opamps from the...

Disclaimer : I am reviewing the Tanchjim Tanya as part of the Hifigo review tour. The opinions are purely mine and dont involve any cash or kind compensation (https://hifigo.com/products/tanchjim-tanya-7mm-dynamic-hifi-earbuds) Package and Cable The very excellently priced Tanya comes in a simple box with extra set of tips and a velvetty cloth pouch, something that much higher priced iems dont offer. The cable is very familiar looking, I think they were the same on some of the KZ iems with an added 2 pin connector. They do have a little bit of...

Disclaimer : I am reviewing the Moondrop Aria as part of the Hifigo review tour. The opinions are purely mine and dont involve any cash or kind compensation Overview The Aria (2021) has been a well hyped and received iem from Moondrop, featuring a Liquid Crystal Polymer based single DD in a beautiful anodized shell. It is a good overall performer across genre and does not offend anyone with its sound or pricing. https://hifigo.com/collections/moondrop/products/moondrop-aria-2 Package and cable The review package was the iems with the paracord...

Disclaimer : I am reviewing the Burson Playmate 2 as part of the Burson review tour. The opinions expressed are completely mine, and there was no gift/cash in exchange for the review. Packaging and Build The amp arrived in a corrugated box, with the retail box inside. It was in immaculate condition, so full marks for the packing and shipping straight from Burson. The kit consisted of amp, the power brick and a 2 pin power cable, a USB-c to USB-c cable and a Mic / speaker splitter adapter. The amp itself is a very sturdy metal enclosure with hex...

Disclaimer : This review is part of the Hifigo Review Tour (https://hifigo.com/)https://hifigo.com/ of the Kinera BD005 Pro. The opinions provided are mine only and have not been influenced in any way Kinera is a fairly well known brand with good iems (Odin, Norn etc). The BD005 Pro is a budget hybrid iem with 1 DD (Berylium) and a Knowles BA driver. Package and Build : The Review unit came in a iem case with a set of 3 sized wide bore tips. The shell is acrylic, with a medium-large nozzle. It feels well built and fairly light. So comfort is very...

Thanks to Amin Karimpour for organising the VE8 tour. Disclaimer : The VE7 is part of the Vision Ears review tour. The opinions expressed are solely mine. There are no exchange of gifts or cash in lieu of the reviews. As a part of the Vision Ears review tour, I received the VE7. And it was instant love with the sound. More on that in a short while. I thought I will start with the easiest and shortest of the review sections, mostly nitpicks and then get to the good parts very soon. Source I used them with the Hiby R5 mk2, LG V30+, iPhone 5s, Korg...

Thanks to Amin Karimpour for organising the VE8 tour. Disclaimer : The VE8 is part of the Vision Ears review tour. The opinions expressed are solely mine. There are no exchange of gifts or cash in lieu of the reviews. Since Vision Ears is well known, I will cut right to the chase. When I approached the iem, I was expecting a detail monster, with a very analytical sound. I expected a top of the line iem to be near reference tuning. And then I put the VE8 in the ear. And it hurt a bit (A little about it later). I started off listening to my...

Disclaimer: The VE6 XC was received as a part of the Vision Ears review tour. There is no compensation in cash or kind for the review. The views expressed are solely mine. YMMV The Vision Ears 6 XC was one half of the Vision Ears tour (EVE20 was the other IEM). It came in a simple oversized zipper case with a pair of stock tips. This review shall focus on the sound (no fluff, yay). Technicals . 6 BA drivers on each side doing duties . 2 pin SE ended cables. Stock cable is very thin and light, and remids me of the old Westone 3 cables. Very robust...

Disclaimer: I auditioned the Austrian Audion Hi-X55 as a part of the review tour. There was no compensation in cash or kind as part of the tour. The opinions are solely mine. As a part of a review tour, I auditioned the Austrian Audio Hi-X55. Austrian Audio, as most will know, were a bunch of engineers that quit AKG when Harman took over the company. Box and Accessories The unit arrived in a slightly lesser than new condition during the review. However,a new box looks very good. Interesting use of Velcro bands to hold the box together.This is a...

Disclaimer : I auditioned the EVE 20 as part of the VE review tour. The opinions are solely mine and is not in exchage for compensation in monetary value or kind. A soothing balm over the madness that is the pandemic! I was fortunate to be part of Vision Ears' review tour featuring the EVE20 and the VX6C (in another post later). I will talk about my impressions of the EVE20. There is much that has already been said about the iem, and I will add another to the list. TLDR : VE EVE 20 is a multi-BA IEM that is still relevant in the realm of 10+...

Disclaimer: a. I am in no way affiliated with Fiio b. The X1 audition was a part of a world tour audition. c. There is no monetary or in kind gain due to the audition.   With the disclaimer out of the way, I will focus on the device performance with 2 considerations: 1. Look and feel, functionality 2. Device performance with various earphones/headphones   1. Look and feel, functionality I have not owned a Fiio DAP in the past. I do own a couple of Fiio headphone amps and can easily summarize that all of Fiio products are build very well...