[echineko]

wonder how xelento compares to vega

I also have similar findings to the others who replied, tried the Vega and Xelento for extended demo sessions at my local dealer here. I'd previously heard them both at Canjam NYC and Singapore, overall wasn't really a fan of the Vega.

You'd have to account for personal preferences, but the Vega seemed to over-emphasise bass, to the detriment of the overall coherence of the sound. The Xelento seemed to me more detailed, balanced and enjoyable overall.

 

[batracom]

Has anyone tried xelento with fiio se1b balanced 2.5mm cable?

I did, and went back to stock. Both for comfort reasons and sound - on my DX200, there seemed to be no benefit at all from the switch. But there were no dropouts or sound connection issues during my test.

 

[bluelavender]

I did, and went back to stock. Both for comfort reasons and sound - on my DX200, there seemed to be no benefit at all from the switch. But there were no dropouts or sound connection issues during my test.

Thanks. Was wondering if i should change to that to benefit from onkyo balanced connection.

 

[tienbasse]

Thanks. Was wondering if i should change to that to benefit from onkyo balanced connection.

You won't hear much of a difference with the Onkyo balanced output.
The soundstage benefit of the balanced output is more obvious using an Opus #1 or Cayin N5, I couldn't hear detect any significant change when testing the Onkyo or the FiiO X5-iii.

 

[bluelavender]

You won't hear much of a difference with the Onkyo balanced output.
The soundstage benefit of the balanced output is more obvious using an Opus #1 or Cayin N5, I couldn't hear detect any significant change when testing the Onkyo or the FiiO X5-iii.

Thanks again man this make up my mind to keep using xelento using its original cable.

 

[twister6]

And just like that, Beyer Xelento Wireless, just announced:

http://www.beyerdynamic.de/index.php?id=54&tx_ttnews[tt_news]=1849&L=2

Wish they would make the cable universal with mmcx connectors, similar to Westone BT Cable, to use with other iems...

 

[zeddun]

Thanks for the info Twister6! I've emailed my contact at Beyer North America to see if I can purchase the Bluetooth cable separately for my Xelento Remote which I might be interested in doing. Wish they would have included support for LDAC Bluetooth streaming as Sony recently made LDAC public so there is no fee to Sony for incorporating LDAC into your product. To my ears LDAC is the best Bluetooth protocol currently and my ZX2 Walkman supports it.

 

[twister6]

Thanks for the info Twister6! I've emailed my contact at Beyer North America to see if I can purchase the Bluetooth cable separately for my Xelento Remote which I might be interested in doing. Wish they would have included support for LDAC Bluetooth streaming as Sony recently made LDAC public so there is no fee to Sony for incorporating LDAC into your product. To my ears LDAC is the best Bluetooth protocol currently and my ZX2 Walkman supports it.

There is not a single mentioning of Xelento wireless cable being detachable, so I don't think they have this wireless standalone cable yet, but certainly would be great. It would be similar to westone BT cable.

With Sony, they always try to push their own standards, LDAC and 4.4mm balanced At least with 4.4mm balanced it's a new standard anybody can use, but LDAC requires a licensing fee to Sony and compatibility with a source to support it. Don't know how many companies, other than Sony, have LDAC encoder in their smartphones or daps...

 

[zeddun]

Yup Sony seems to like their proprietary formats and format wars (Betamax, Memory Stick, Mini Disc, Blu-Ray) are a few recent ones that come to mind. Sony finally won one by having Blu-Ray adopted over Toshiba's HD-DVD. I can hope LDAC is incorporated into more products in the future. Doubt we'll see it from Apple as they seem to be stuck on their AAC Bluetooth codec for iOS devices even though their laptops support Apt-X.

 

[zeddun]

Also if you look at the product page for the Xelento wireless under "Supplied Accessories" it mentions detachable MMCX cable so I'm hopeful that the bluetooth cable will be sold separately.

 

[kms108]

As LDAC is the future to high quality sound through BT, and at present the only one.

I heard that Sony has provided the source code to google for free to add LDAC as standard to android. Google might have this on the next version of android but companies to add LDAC to speakers and headphones will have to be licenced, a smart way for Sony to make business.

 

[csglinux]

These are pretty much a standard U shaped signature rather than the V that people here seem to claim...

If we're going to argue over letters to describe the frequency response, the Greek letter \nu (sorry, headfi doesn't have that font option) is a much closer fit than a U. Look at the measurements I posted a few pages back:

https://www.head-fi.org/f/threads/beyerdynamic-xelento.827372/page-15#post-13453252

The low end clearly rolls off, not up. Depending on your likes/dislikes, this either creates a little bit of a fuller sound or a little bit of mid-bass bloat. That's the only thing I'd change about the Xelento's sound, if it were tunable. Compared to my favorite headphones (KSE1500 and FLC 8S), I find the mid-bass can be just a tad too prominent on some tracks. I'm splitting hairs though. This is a tiny nuance. The Xelento is fairly close to my ideal sound signature.

shure 846 is the only iem that I achieve perfect seal with no hassle what so ever, so you are right on that point about design, wonder how xelento compares to shure 846

I agree with your experience on fit with the SE846. I'm starting to get used to the Xelento, but I still have to struggle a bit each time to get the Xelentos to fit properly on account of the short nozzles. To my ears, the Xelento sound clearer than the SE846. As I mentioned above, the Xelento can sometimes be a little too much around the 100-600 Hz range, but its treble extension is better than that of the SE846 (even with the brown Knowles damper mod, the SE846 starts rolling off significantly before 9 kHz). I'm not selling my SE846 just yet though - they fit perfectly and easily every time and are properly isolating; the Xelentos are ported, so they're never going to be my first choice for a noisy plane ride.

 

[twister6]

Also if you look at the product page for the Xelento wireless under "Supplied Accessories" it mentions detachable MMCX cable so I'm hopeful that the bluetooth cable will be sold separately.

Damn, good eyes!!! You are right, its listed as detachable, yet not a single picture to demonstrate it. Strange... That actually raises the value of it!

 

[obsidyen]

Such a pretty wireless cable design! Most wireless cables are ugly.

 

[echineko]

And here I am waiting for my regular old balanced cable to get here Still, I wonder how well this wireless cable would work with other MMCX-terminated IEMs, if one were so inclined. It does look like a well designed accessory, looking forward to reading impressions once people get their hands on production units. Also 99% sure it will be sold separately, doesn't make sense not to, really.

Don't know how many companies, other than Sony, have LDAC encoder in their smartphones or daps...

I'm not an expert by any means, but I always understood LDAC to be decoding/encoding software, that was transmitted over standard Bluetooth radios, and didn't need a dedicated chip to support it. I believe that's why it was able to be added into the AOSP as a software addition to the OS. I'd figured instead it's on the receiving end (headphones, speakers) where some sort of firmware update would be needed to receive and decode the LDAC information from the phone/DAP etc. But maybe this is more suitable for PM