Driver configuration:
4 Sonion open-hole BA – bass
4 Sonion intermediate frequency BA – midrange
4 Sonion high frequency BA – treble
1 Knowles ultra-high frequency BA – treble
20-20kHz range, 112dB sensitivity, 19ohm impedance
Three tuning switches:
1: high frequency control
2: atmosphere control
3: low frequency control
Source: Shanling M8 (4.4mm, low gain)
Burn-in: 100 hours
Cable: stock (high-purity silver, 4 share high) / Tips: stock gray-green silicone tips
Genres tested:
world music, jazz, OST, electronic, ambient, folk, metal
The Legend was purchased at a discounted price in exchange for my honest opinion. Penon Audio have not had sight or say on the content of this review. All opinions are my own.
The Penon Legend can be purchased here.
Edited 20/01/2022: score increased from 4.5/5 to 5/5. Initial issues with the bass have subsided with prolonged burn in and what remains is an absolute killer IEM at its pricepoint. Paired with Final E eartips, 120 switch position and using the Cayin RU6 I have found my preferred tonality in an absolutely perfect state for my tastes.
Preamble
There’s no denying in the recent months I’ve become a Penon Audio convert and their 1DD 2BA Globe has stolen my heart. Penons tunings are refinement of a similar theme across various driver configurations. They value expression and romanticism but seem quite good at achieving balance along the way. Although my tastes are, to a degree, flexible, I know my preferences lie in those IEMs that open up the midrange in detail, bring it forward in presence and lean towards the warmer side of the spectrum with a solid tactile bass to support it and good definition in the lower treble. I’m not an ‘air-head’ but I do however, like enough atmosphere and room for instruments to breathe. This was well exemplified in the Globe.
If I had to choose between ‘musicality’ or ‘technicality’ – which is often the choice presented to buyers these days - I would choose ‘musicality’ every time. I want something that plays to the strengths of the musicians I’m listening to and expresses the dynamism and emotion in their performance. I very rarely seek neutral, flat or dry and coherence and accurate timbre are a must.
When I found out that Penon had a new flagship coming I was immediately interested. When I saw that it was 13BAs I was immediately concerned. When I saw that 12 of these BAs were TOTL Sonion drivers I was slightly reassured. It was a bit of a whirlwind! My past experiences with all-BA IEMs have not been especially successful. In the distant past I had a prolonged demo of the QDC Anole VX. It was my first real exposure to ‘TOTL’. I could not get on with it. At the time I didn’t know what my preferred signature looked like or why I didn’t like it but it just didn’t seem to have a heart that I could fall in love with. It was technically proficient but it wasn’t connecting me to the music. I didn’t end up purchasing it and ever since then I’ve leant towards hybrids or single DD transducers, avoiding all-BAs due to a naïve subconscious fear that they all carry the same inspiration.
Fast forward to over a year later and reassured by my trust in the tuners at Penon, I had the Legend in front of me. Full of nerves when putting them in for the first time, I pressed the play button…read on to find out how it went!
Accessories & Packaging
Accessories and packaging are great with this one. A nice zipper case and an assortment of tips – silicone, foam, Comply-like etc, wide bore, narrow bore etc – you’ve got them all! The blue foams are actually quite good and I wouldn’t mind purchasing some more. There’s also a cable shirt clip, a leatherette cable tie, a cleaning tool and a small tool to manipulate the tuning switches.
The standout part is the included cable. A beautifully made ultra-purity 4 share silver cable with great accessories/connectors. It is tied in a loose braid that keeps the cable relaxed and supple. It’s not especially heavy either which is nice. It feels expensive and very premium. Penon are primarily known for their excellent cables and it’s no different here. Aesthetically its great. Sonically it’s even better. As a ‘cable believer’ I played with various other materials paired with the Legend and the included cable (called Penon Flow) has the best detail retrieval and digs deep for as much of the technical information as possible (e.g. soundstage/layering etc). It’s a great pairing and I don’t find any reason to cable roll. The only negative is that the chin slider finds it difficult to travel and needs a lot of encouragement. Having said all of this, I have also heard great things about the Legend and Penon Storm pairing (Penons new TOTL cable) that may be worth looking into, as this IEM was built with consideration for the properties of that cable too.
Design, Build, Fit and Comfort
The typography of the Legend is
very Penon i.e. bold! A gold/orange font on an all-black background with carbon fibre detailing beneath. It’s quite a sleek look overall. The IEMs themselves have a reasonable weight to them, alluding to the amount of tech inside. They feel very solid. The shell is well contoured and comfortable. It has a small rear vent for the BA woofers and despite this vent, the isolation is above average from my experience. The shell has some depth to it, a necessity to fit all the drivers in, and a long nozzle. It sits well in my small-average ears, any bigger at it would be an issue. I size down on tips to get a deeper fit. Please see picture for relative comparisons of size with the other IEMs I have.
Left to right: UM 3DT, Penon LEGEND, Penon Globe, Oriolus Isabellae. The LEGEND is quite deep to the shoulder as you can see and has a longer nozzle, but not especially wide when compared to the 3DT (i.e. from antitragus to helix crus/cymba).
Sound
The Legend comes with several tuning settings as below.
Switch Position | Manufacturer Description |
100 | High Hz enhanced |
023 | Low Hz enhanced |
123 | Full Frequency enhanced |
000 | Vocal |
003 | Balance |
020 | Atmosphere enhanced |
120 | Transparent atmosphere |
103 | Transparent balance |
000 above
123 above
The frequency graphs are sourced from Penon and represent 000 and 123 settings. The most impactful change is heard with the low frequency switch (3) and the atmosphere switch (2). The low frequency switch giving the Legend a hefty bass lift across the board and the atmosphere switch seeming to place midrange further back through a frequency change I’ve yet to pin down.
The listening impressions below are on the 020 switch setting that I have veered towards since purchase. With this setting the majority of my music library is covered.
Bass – speedy, dynamic, pleasant impact, on 020 quantity and quality is well balanced, extends well into sub bass frequencies on 003
I should preface that apart from Traillii (now sold), and the historic VX demo, all my daily drivers are DD for bass frequencies. So the transition to BA bass here was quite an abrupt change.
My impressions within the first 10 minutes were that the bass was decidedly average in its quality but did have a very good balance with the rest of the FR. I was struggling to perceive fine texture in bass notes and I could appreciate some smearing of detail. Thankfully this disappeared over the course of a dozen or so hours after which I was treated to a very capable low end.
You can tell there are two dual BA woofers in these, they move a serious amount of air when needed, especially with switch 3 activated. It can produce more than enough rumble and impact for my tastes. Attack isn’t as abrupt or controlled as DD bass and this softens the leading edge of notes and provides a softer impact (more appreciable if switch 3 is off) but sustain and decay are very natural and does justice to world/classical/folk/acoustic music that I listen to. The bass has a lighter body compared to DD but not doesn’t feel weightless or detract from my enjoyment.
The advantage of having this BA bass is shorter potential sustain and quicker decay. It keeps up with the multi-layered bass of busy electronic tracks and it does this with ease. It handles all my library on switch setting 020 with this being my preferred setting for all genres, including electronic/ambient/DnB. With the bass switch engaged things become especially fun and engaging for short, sweet bursts. However, in my opinion this setting is less balanced and some texture is lost as quantity is increased.
Midrange – forward, highly resolving, warm and buttery smooth, no shout or sibilance
If you know and love other Penon IEMs then the chances are this is what you’re here for and to skip straight to the point – this is
crème de la crème of midranges that I have heard in IEMs. Smooth but not veiled, forward but not aggressive, transparent but at the same time embodied. The midrange is more forward than all of my other IEMs, both past and present, and that took some adjusting to but following that brief adjustment you start to understand why they are tuned the way they are.
The Legend wants to give you the midrange on a platter, well supported by the bass (020) and treble but unapologetically serving it up with as much space, imaging and detail that 4 Sonion BA can muster. It makes vocals a joy to listen to and the vast majority of instrumental music feels well ‘explored’ with fundamental and harmonic detail, no stone is left unturned and it manages it without feeling clinical. Male and female vocals sit happily at either end of the spectrum, well defined and unobstructed. Vocals and instruments have a warm hue and feel organic thanks to a healthy midbass bump. This IEM is definitely midcentric and it nails what it sets out to do.
The midrange alone is a selling point for this set but not the only thing the Legend has going for it. As I’ll mention later the tuning of the midrange is supported by incredible technicalities. Given that the tuning is very forward the psychoacoustic effect on presentation is that it feels intimate (but still extending beyond ear). Despite the intimacy the space occupied by the sound is very large and is incredibly dimensional, being far from flat and overwhelming. The midrange is presented with great height and depth in space and this produces a realistic and palpable image. These qualities further improve with burn-in that became noticeable beyond 50 hours of use, or thereabouts.
Treble – excellent definition, no vocal sibilance, some might want more air
The treble here is well tuned and
not dull with plenty of definition and detail throughout the whole range. It is far from bright or edgy but gives you all the clarity you could want. There is no sibilance in sight. Some listeners (especially those not familiar with Penon house sound) might want more air but I found it suited my tastes as, once again, the underlying tuning is supported by technicalities that act to enhance the sense of space anyway. The treble takes a backseat to the midrange but does its job really well, allowing the midrange to shine and decorating the sound with definition and elements of detail while continuing the overarching theme of warm musicality that Penon do so well.
Technicalities
Soundstage – the sound stage was initially quite deceiving (and slightly disappointing). With the forward midrange it was harder to appreciate the totality of the space. Over time (about 50 hours) the midrange fell further back, whether by brain or driver burn-in, and soundstage truly opened up. Listening to Yosi Horikawa ‘Crossing’ there is no denying how large the stage is. There is great lateral extension and I was particularly impressed by the height. Forward projection is less impressive (as with most IEMs I’ve heard) but still good. Soundscapes and ambient are truly enveloping. Llyr’ Biome release is a good example of soundscapes, in this case captured from jungle field recordings. On the Legend you can hear birds/bats etc in the trees/caves above your head. From slightly disappointing OOTB to exceptional, it was quite a whirlwind ride with a definite ‘bedding in’ period.
Imaging, Instrument Separation & Layering – imaging was excellent out of the box and as close to ‘holographic’ as I have experienced on my IEM journey so far. There is true dimension to sound on all axes. Instrument separation isn’t the strongest at this price point, owed to the large size of its centre image, the more intimate forward projection and underlying midrange emphasis. However, all elements can be identified as distinct and it doesn’t become congested or incoherent with great layering and sense of space. I don’t consider the Legends instrument separation to be a weakness as it copes with all of my music library with no loss of enjoyment. As example, in my experience with the MEST MKII it had excellent instrument separation on the soundstage but this felt overemphasised creating space that most music could not fill – and this
did detract from my enjoyment.
Timbre – Instrument timbre was a big concern for me going into this purchase. What would an all BA set up sound like? Would it be ‘natural’ enough for me or would it have the dreaded metallic or plastic timbre of some BA IEMs? Thankfully, my worries were unfounded. The midrange and treble has excellent instrument timbre thanks to an astute tuning and choice of drivers. There is a light touch to note weight that I attribute to BA drivers but attack, sustain, resonance/decay are all great here. I am usually more sensitive to the timbre of BA bass that can rob instruments of life. The Legend does have the character of BA bass in its softer attack but it’s far from egregious in this respect and has a very natural tail end decay. With the third switch on (003 – low frequency enhanced) BA bass characteristics are more noticeable hence why I’ve stuck with 020 in most instances.
Conclusion
I went into this with a fear of multi-BA IEMs, after a long streak of DD/hybrid purchases, and largely driven by the allure of better technicalities often seen in multi-BA sets…did I find what I was after? Yes. Undoubtedly.
The Legend is where technicality and musicality meet. None of my other sets have achieved this balancing act as well as the Legend does. It is not a perfect IEM (is there such a thing?) - I still miss the DD bass – but the fact I’m willing to sacrifice that at every turn is proof enough for me that the Legend does so much right and so very little wrong.
Penon have made an very strong value statement to the kilobuck market. The Legend is a contender that exceeds, at least in sheer personal enjoyment, others at this price point. Penon know what they do best and they have executed well. If you’re looking for a versatile IEM that can handle your library with equal measures of technical proficiency and musical romanticism, the Legend should be on your radar.