[saldsald]

So how bad

They put a smile on my face, for how bad they are. (I also consider the 03 a bad IEM)
Well i only paid €15, so what should i expect lol. I will be giving these away.

I have to say though, the build quality is pretty nice and a big step up from the BLON-03

So how bad do you find them to be?

 

[RikudouGoku]

Got my new BLON BL01 from AK yesterday. Shipped on November 12 and received by me on November 26, here in Canada. Fourteen days via Aliexpress standard shipping (which was free) and I was able to track it the whole time. I think that's quite fast coming all the way from China. No complaints about this store at all.

Meanwhile my order hasnt been shipped (and I paid for dhl express) since 11/11!

 

[Benaudio]

What wrong with some people? Granted I'm just starting to listen to my newly arrived BL-01, but they are far from crap, irrespective of any price...
Still bass elevated but a bit less so than the 03. bass is a bit cleaner too.
However they definitely share the same ballpark of FR.
03 are very confortable for me, and so are the 01, but they are more bulky, less stealthy.
They're a tad more balanced than the 03, but not night and day difference, just a bit better in some areas.
They still have a natural timber with no huge oddity in response, but maybe have less of that "enveloping" feeling the 03 had.

Will have to test some more, but for around 20 bucks, they are stellar, and even better value than the 03

Bottom line, if you liked the 03 you will like the 01, if not, well you won't

 

[1clearhead]

What wrong with some people? Granted I'm just starting to listen to my newly arrived BL-01, but they are far from crap, irrespective of any price...
Still bass elevated but a bit less so than the 03. bass is a bit cleaner too.
However they definitely share the same ballpark of FR.
03 are very confortable for me, and so are the 01, but they are more bulky, less stealthy.
They're a tad more balanced than the 03, but not night and day difference, just a bit better in some areas.
They still have a natural timber with no huge oddity in response, but maybe have less of that "enveloping" feeling the 03 had.

Will have to test some more, but for around 20 bucks, they are stellar, and even better value than the 03

Bottom line, if you liked the 03 you will like the 01, if not, well you won't

+1 I personally think they play on a much higher level of sounding more mature for their price. Best value, IMHO!

 

[baskingshark]

So far there seems to be generally positive reviews for the BLON BL-01, especially in areas of timbre and tonality. Anyone can do some comparisons with some other single DD types (other than BLON BL-03) in the areas of technical performance (eg soundstage, microdetails, imaging, instrument separation)?

 

[cheewheol]

Got my new BLON BL01 from AK yesterday. Shipped on November 12 and received by me on November 26, here in Canada. Fourteen days via Aliexpress standard shipping (which was free) and I was able to track it the whole time. I think that's quite fast coming all the way from China. No complaints about this store at all.

Thats the thing, they are ok, at least until you hit a problem..

 

[Plumbus the Wise]

I'd say the 03 is more crap!
The 01 is better, reason being that they respond better to EQ than the 03, also although the 01 is heavier, the shape and fit are much better (they are comfy, at least to me)
Build quality on 01 is also a huge step up from 03.
Considering the 01 only costs €15, i don't think you can go wrong with them as a IEM to use as your beater set.
( You lose them, you don't care )

The build quality of the bl03s is fantastic what in the world are you talking about? It's an all metal build that has been extremely durable under heavy use for me. What's to complain about build wise?

 

[paulwasabii]

So sorry to hear that. I've only used them once, as I follow fellow headfier @paulwasabii on his YouTube channel and he gets alot of his stuff from them. Honestly, this is the first time I've used them to get anything and to buy the 01. I know he's been doing business with them a lot and he always has good things to say about them. That's why I decided to give them a shot. Not sure about the discrepancies. Maybe depends on where you live in the world?

Yes, I do work with them but I order from the lowest priced places on big sale days. ****, Missaudio,OPA, friendly and the official stores like KBEAR, TRN,CCA, etc. There is just no perfect store, I have had items never ship despite marked as shipped so I had to wait 60 days to file a dispute. I have had items returned to sender. I wish I could say AK is perfect but no matter what store I mention, someone has had an issue. I mentioned LuckLZ once and someone replied with their issue with them. They were supposed to send a T1 plus to me and never did, but I still ordered an EDX from them. My BL01 from AK shipped out early on 11-11 but hasn't arrived East coast US yet.

 

[saldsald]

So far there seems to be generally positive reviews for the BLON BL-01, especially in areas of timbre and tonality. Anyone can do some comparisons with some other single DD types (other than BLON BL-03) in the areas of technical performance (eg soundstage, microdetails, imaging, instrument separation)?

I kind of compared with the EDX and Tin T4. Apart from stage size, the other two are quite a bit better IMO.

 

[courierdriver]

Yes, I do work with them but I order from the lowest priced places on big sale days. ****, Missaudio,OPA, friendly and the official stores like KBEAR, TRN,CCA, etc. There is just no perfect store, I have had items never ship despite marked as shipped so I had to wait 60 days to file a dispute. I have had items returned to sender. I wish I could say AK is perfect but no matter what store I mention, someone has had an issue. I mentioned LuckLZ once and someone replied with their issue with them. They were supposed to send a T1 plus to me and never did, but I still ordered an EDX from them. My BL01 from AK shipped out early on 11-11 but hasn't arrived East coast US yet.

Yeah, I think you summed it up nicely with this post. I've had similar experiences with some of the Aliexpress stores you mentioned and I've mostly had good experiences with them all. Only had an issue with DD Audio store where my Urbanfun ISSO14 came 3-4 months late, and I didn't even get the beryllium version. I got a refund so all was good in the end. I guess the thing with Aliexpress is: you just gotta be patient and bide your time. Me, personally; I know when I buy something from there (at usually a much lower price than on Amazon) that it's gonna take some time to get to me, so I buy with my mindset being "I saved a substantial amount of money; therefore I must expect to wait longer to get it". Not a problem for me. I generally don't mind waiting longer as long as it's reasonable. For me, reasonable is 4-6 weeks...because that has been the timeframe for my purchases to get to me, for the past 2 years that I've been buying from Aliexpress. Sadly, the COVID situation has screwed things up a lot; so that's something else folks need to take into consideration. Maybe I'm just more patient than others; but the way I see it, I lived without the new toy before it came out, and can continue to do so until it comes. Only when a company lies and says they shipped it (when they really didn't), I get peed off. So far, I've only run into that once and was promptly refunded.

 

[countryboyhk]

What wrong with some people? Granted I'm just starting to listen to my newly arrived BL-01, but they are far from crap, irrespective of any price...
Still bass elevated but a bit less so than the 03. bass is a bit cleaner too.
However they definitely share the same ballpark of FR.
03 are very confortable for me, and so are the 01, but they are more bulky, less stealthy.
They're a tad more balanced than the 03, but not night and day difference, just a bit better in some areas.
They still have a natural timber with no huge oddity in response, but maybe have less of that "enveloping" feeling the 03 had.

Will have to test some more, but for around 20 bucks, they are stellar, and even better value than the 03

Bottom line, if you liked the 03 you will like the 01, if not, well you won't

Unless someone reveal what iems are used to compare, all he said are crap !

 

[noobandroid]

to me there is no bad iem, just unsuitable iem or unsatisfying iem flavor

 

[tgx78]

So far there seems to be generally positive reviews for the BLON BL-01, especially in areas of timbre and tonality. Anyone can do some comparisons with some other single DD types (other than BLON BL-03) in the areas of technical performance (eg soundstage, microdetails, imaging, instrument separation)?

Test track: #3 and #4

Blon BL-01 ($23) vs Tanchijim HANA ($160)
Tonality wise Blon and Tanchjim is really similar with both targeting mild V-shaped response with emphasis on their bass and treble region. Timbral accuracy is comparable as well with Hana portraying more lush and fuller instrumental tonality vs Blon’s cooler, neutral and slightly more accurate acoustic tone. Overall Hana sounds bit smoother while Blon sounds textured when you quickly a/bing between the two but my brain quickly adjusts to their signature after few minutes and they both sound quite natural. Soundstage is both wider and deeper on HANA, but Blon has slightly better forward projection (out of head) as opposed to more enveloping HANA. Resolution is bit higher on HANA- especially in Mids and Lows. However Treble details are about par on both. Imaging is slightly better on HANA due to darker background and excellent ambient que. Female vocals are similarly nice on both. No sibilance detected. Male vocals are slightly better sounding on Hana.

 

[tgx78]

Test track: #1

Blon BL-01 ($23) vs NF Audio NM2+ ($149)
Tonality wise NM2+ is more neutral and brighter sounding. To my ears, timbre is bit better on the NM2+, but honestly BL-01 is so close that some might find Blon more convincing. NM2+ is easier to drive and picks up EMI noises so careful volume matching was needed. Overall resolution is noticeably better on the NM2+ especially in Mids where NM2+ surgically separated every instruments where BL-01 muddied up a little in busy passages. Soundstage extension is better all around on the NM2+ and imaging is also more accurate. Easily better performance by NF Audio here.

 

[tgx78]

Blon BL-01($23) vs Sony IER-Z1R ($1,690 on BF sale)

Tonality wise Sony is mild v-shaped with a bass boost. Z1R is coherent for hybrid setup but BL-01 with a single DD sounds more cohesive. High string timbre is more accurate on Blon where as low stringed instruments sound tonally more correct on Z1R. Woodwinds also sounds bit more accurate on the Bl-01. Now keep in mind I am just casually comparing the two out of my iPhone tonight; not on my dedicated DAC nor DAPs. Technicalities are not as a wide gap as I thought for the classical music. I feel Z1R’s depressed upper Mids really take away many textures from violin section where Blon has no problem extracting and showcases all here. This in turn evens out some of BL-01’s resolution deficiencies. Z1R sounds bit distant compared to the BL-01 as it’s not properly driven. Imaging is much better on Z1R even on my phone and instrumental separation is noticeably better. Musicality wise both are equally enjoyable.