[FIIO FA19] Flagship 10 Knowles BA IEM

[GroovyAudio]

After getting back and forth I've finally decided to order FA19 again. I've been using them for a couple of days now and I'm gonna share my impressions.
The fit is fantastic. When I opened the box and saw them all my worries about the fit dissapeard immediately. They are really not that big as I was expecting them to be. I'll share some photos comparing them with the Fiio JD7:

They are only slightly bigger than the JD7 so don't worry if you have small ears like me. This will fit you. I've been wearing them for 2 hours and no problems. I've tried them with spinfit 100+, dunu S&S tips and Kbear 07, all fit perfectly inside my ear. They are very lightweight at only 7g. Also, they are vented so no pressure building inside my ear which is a good thing for me.


Now about the sound. First of all I'm using them with the switch off. I tried 2-3 songs with the switch on and I was overwhelmed by the bass. Too much bass makes me fatigue so my listening impressions are with the switch off. I'll also wanna say that I'm actually glad they added this switch because it offers versatility. If you are a basshead I think you'll like this a lot. (More about the bass below)

I got to say the most outstanding feature of this IEM is the bass. I mean WOW, really. It's fast, precise and slams when the specific songs calls for it, very good quality bass that really feels like DD. I admit that FA19 has a better bass than my JD7 which has a DD. Now I know the price differents is huge between them but JD7 is the only iem that I have right now to compare.

Mids are very clean. Male and female vocals sound very good on this and no shoutiness.

About the treble I have to say is very nice. My JD7 has a polite or reserved treble emphasis but this FA19? Is my first time hearing how a good treble actually sounds like. It is very smooth, non fatique and I hear no sibilance.
I've listen to a lot of songs from heavy metal, rock, electronic, pop, trance... Everything plays very well. Oh, and also no hissing on Fiio KA5 and KA17. I prefer listening from my KA17 because of the d.mode switch which makes the sound a little bigger making the soundstage very big and wide.

After all I said, is the FA19 a very good iem? Yes, certainly! BUT... the price, that is my only problem. I share @Vamp898 opinion about FA19 being too expensive for what it offers. I admit that despite being a very good iem, I regret buying this at full price. If you're interested in this set wait for a discount or a sale from other headfi members.
Look @FiiO, I like what you have done with FA19 and I want you guys to succeed with FA line but I don't think charging 1000 usd on this is the way to go. Who knows, maybe this will sell like hot cakes and I'm gonna eat my words. I wish you good luck and looking forward to the FX17 launching in september hopefully.

 

[FiiO]

After all I said, is the FA19 a very good iem? Yes, certainly! BUT... the price, that is my only problem. I share @Vamp898 opinion about FA19 being too expensive for what it offers. I admit that despite being a very good iem, I regret buying this at full price. If you're interested in this set wait for a discount or a sale from other headfi members.
Look @FiiO, I like what you have done with FA19 and I want you guys to succeed with FA line but I don't think charging 1000 usd on this is the way to go. Who knows, maybe this will sell like hot cakes and I'm gonna eat my words. I wish you good luck and looking forward to the FX17 launching in september hopefully.

Dear friend,

Hi, thanks for sharing.
Though the price of FA19 is a little bit high for some users, its sound quality is good. To be honest, comparing with other big brand, the price is not expensive. Besides, the sound quality of FA19 is having high improvement comparing with FA9. You could also try to compare the FA19 with other similar headphones in similar price~

Best regards

 

[GroovyAudio]

@FiiO Thank you for your response. I would like to compare FA19 against FX17 when it will launch in september. If you could send it to my local store I'll be very grateful to you

 

[Vamp898]

Dear friend,

Hi, thanks for sharing.
Though the price of FA19 is a little bit high for some users, its sound quality is good. To be honest, comparing with other big brand, the price is not expensive. Besides, the sound quality of FA19 is having high improvement comparing with FA9. You could also try to compare the FA19 with other similar headphones in similar price~

Best regards

Dear @FiiO
the sound Quality is good, that is true.

I think there is nothing to complain about the Sound Quality of the FA19, but i think when the price is the same as Shure, Westone or Sony, people will buy at Shure, Westone or Sony.

And i can understand that.

When there is a famous company trusted by many Bands with decades of experience, real local dealers (not just redistributors), most people buy at that company. They also offer some extras.

Just take the IER-M9 from Sony as an example. Sony developed all their drivers themself (from scratch. Not modifying existing drivers, everything from the start), manufacture them in Japan, have unique designs without sound pipes, the earphone is made out of magnesium and carbon fiber, they use self developed capacitors, a 5-way system.

Why should i take the FA19 for the same (or even higher price due to the weak yen) that has a 3-D printed resin shell and slightly modified off-the-shelve drivers with soundpipes on them.

Even if the Sound Quality would be the same, i would get the more expensive product using better materials from Sony for the same price. 699$ is a fair price for this IEM with which, i am sure, you still get enough revenue. 999$ is too much. At least that is my personal opinion. I am not here for giving business decision advice, i am just a customer who is not buying the FA19 because it is too expensive, even though i like it.

For comparison, the FiiO FT5, an Over Ear Headphone with an 90mm planar, costs 449$ (or 499? The prices differe from country to country), how can the FA19 cost 999$? It makes no sense to me.

FiiO had the reputation to offer products for a fair price unlike other companies who often rip off their customers. But the FA19 gives the impression, that this have changed.

 

[Vamp898]

The FA19 is now available for preorder in Japan

187'000yen, wow. That is almost the price of the IER-Z1R. An luxury Earphone that is Handmade in Japan out of zirconium... not sure what to say about that.

And yes, the IER-M9 is significantly cheaper

As well as the Shure SE846


I am sorry FiiO, but imho there is absolutely no way to justify that price. Sorry. There is no way you can buy some drivers from Knowles, put them in an 3D printed Resin Shell and sell them for almost the price of the IER-Z1R.

 

[MudEnjoyer]

There is no way you can buy some drivers from Knowles, put them in an 3D printed Resin Shell and sell them for almost the price of the IER-Z1R.

Hold my beer...

 

[frkasper]

The FA19 is now available for preorder in Japan

This is good news. With the distribution around the globe, it increases the chance of having a sale on these sooner. Looking at you summer sale. I have reduced my ceiling to pull the trigger on this one, by the way.

Patience, folks... We're the good customers kind...

 

[pong2541]

After getting back and forth I've finally decided to order FA19 again. I've been using them for a couple of days now and I'm gonna share my impressions.
The fit is fantastic. When I opened the box and saw them all my worries about the fit dissapeard immediately. They are really not that big as I was expecting them to be. I'll share some photos comparing them with the Fiio JD7:


They are only slightly bigger than the JD7 so don't worry if you have small ears like me. This will fit you. I've been wearing them for 2 hours and no problems. I've tried them with spinfit 100+, dunu S&S tips and Kbear 07, all fit perfectly inside my ear. They are very lightweight at only 7g. Also, they are vented so no pressure building inside my ear which is a good thing for me.


Now about the sound. First of all I'm using them with the switch off. I tried 2-3 songs with the switch on and I was overwhelmed by the bass. Too much bass makes me fatigue so my listening impressions are with the switch off. I'll also wanna say that I'm actually glad they added this switch because it offers versatility. If you are a basshead I think you'll like this a lot. (More about the bass below)

I got to say the most outstanding feature of this IEM is the bass. I mean WOW, really. It's fast, precise and slams when the specific songs calls for it, very good quality bass that really feels like DD. I admit that FA19 has a better bass than my JD7 which has a DD. Now I know the price differents is huge between them but JD7 is the only iem that I have right now to compare.

Mids are very clean. Male and female vocals sound very good on this and no shoutiness.

About the treble I have to say is very nice. My JD7 has a polite or reserved treble emphasis but this FA19? Is my first time hearing how a good treble actually sounds like. It is very smooth, non fatique and I hear no sibilance.
I've listen to a lot of songs from heavy metal, rock, electronic, pop, trance... Everything plays very well. Oh, and also no hissing on Fiio KA5 and KA17. I prefer listening from my KA17 because of the d.mode switch which makes the sound a little bigger making the soundstage very big and wide.

After all I said, is the FA19 a very good iem? Yes, certainly! BUT... the price, that is my only problem. I share @Vamp898 opinion about FA19 being too expensive for what it offers. I admit that despite being a very good iem, I regret buying this at full price. If you're interested in this set wait for a discount or a sale from other headfi members.
Look @FiiO, I like what you have done with FA19 and I want you guys to succeed with FA line but I don't think charging 1000 usd on this is the way to go. Who knows, maybe this will sell like hot cakes and I'm gonna eat my words. I wish you good luck and looking forward to the FX17 launching in september hopefully.

I agree yours and @Vamp898's opinion on the FA19. Although I had limited testing between the FA19 and my Soundrhyme SR8, so take my opinion with a grain salt. Anyways, here's what I found:

-FA19 has better subbass than the SR8 but mid bass sounded the same for both.
-Vocals for FA19 are slightly less forward and less sparkling than the SR8. I found the FA19 to be relaxing whereas the SR8 more energetic/dynamic.
-Treble sounded similar for both although the FA19 has a slight edge in the treble extension.
-FA19 is comfy to wear just like the SR8.

Ultimately, I agree with the general opinion that the FA19 is good but not "$1000 good" if that makes sense. For context, I recently got my SR8 at a discount for $540 so yea...kinda hard to justify the price difference for a side-grade at best. Hope this comparison helps despite my limited testing.

 

[GroovyAudio]

I agree yours and @Vamp898's opinion on the FA19. Although I had limited testing between the FA19 and my Soundrhyme SR8, so take my opinion with a grain salt. Anyways, here's what I found:

-FA19 has better subbass than the SR8 but mid bass sounded the same for both.
-Vocals for FA19 are slightly less forward and less sparkling than the SR8. I found the FA19 to be relaxing whereas the SR8 more energetic/dynamic.
-Treble sounded similar for both although the FA19 has a slight edge in the treble extension.
-FA19 is comfy to wear just like the SR8.

Ultimately, I agree with the general opinion that the FA19 is good but not "$1000 good" if that makes sense. For context, I recently got my SR8 at a discount for $540 so yea...kinda hard to justify the price difference for a side-grade at best. Hope this comparison helps despite my limited testing.

You're spot on. I regret buying FA19, period. It's a good iem undoubtedly, but I can't believe that I've actually spend $1000 on this. Maybe I should've bought the FX15 instead, it was at a good price at $645 discount, good deal in my opinion and I would've been a lot happier with it but I really had that itch to buy the FA19 because I was waiting for a whole year. "sigh"
I guess I expected to be blown way by the sound but I should've remembered that this hobby will cost you a lot and you only get maybe 5% improvement when you go above $500. Diminishing returns, folks. For me personally, I don't think I will ever spend more than $500 on a iem and right now as the competition gets very tight every manufacturer will bring better technology and sound at lower price to compete.

 

[pong2541]

You're spot on. I regret buying FA19, period. It's a good iem undoubtedly, but I can't believe that I've actually spend $1000 on this. Maybe I should've bought the FX15 instead, it was at a good price at $645 discount, good deal in my opinion and I would've been a lot happier with it but I really had that itch to buy the FA19 because I was waiting for a whole year. "sigh"
I guess I expected to be blown way by the sound but I should've remembered that this hobby will cost you a lot and you only get maybe 5% improvement when you go above $500. Diminishing returns, folks. For me personally, I don't think I will ever spend more than $500 on a iem and right now as the competition gets very tight every manufacturer will bring better technology and sound at lower price to compete.

Damn, sorry to hear that man. Hope you get to sell it off at a good price soon. Also, I agree with you about diminishing returns as $500 seem to be the tipping point of sound quality to price to technical performance ratio. Especially when you can get a good discount like the Soundrhyme SR8, 14 BAs each side in a 4 way crossover.

 

[Vamp898]

You're spot on. I regret buying FA19, period. It's a good iem undoubtedly, but I can't believe that I've actually spend $1000 on this. Maybe I should've bought the FX15 instead, it was at a good price at $645 discount, good deal in my opinion and I would've been a lot happier with it but I really had that itch to buy the FA19 because I was waiting for a whole year. "sigh"
I guess I expected to be blown way by the sound but I should've remembered that this hobby will cost you a lot and you only get maybe 5% improvement when you go above $500. Diminishing returns, folks. For me personally, I don't think I will ever spend more than $500 on a iem and right now as the competition gets very tight every manufacturer will bring better technology and sound at lower price to compete.

This statement is not generally true. You can get a much bigger improvement for 1000$ than 5%, but not with the FA19 (which is the whole issue to begin with).

The first important thing is to understand, why do many IEM have Multiple Drivers covering the same range. And that might sound silly, but the reason is volume.

An traditional All-BA IEM start to distort already at around 100db and higher. So with using multiple drivers for the same frequency range, you can get up to 120db distortion free sound.

Do you listen at that volume? If no, all you do is wasting money buy buying a lot of drivers you don't need. And thats the biggest issue.

The FA19 is very expensive because it has 10 drivers, but there are IEM with 5 drivers that are better. Not at 120db Volume, but at listening volume (<=100db) That is very typical ChiFi, numbers on papers have to be big and you pay for those big numbers (no matter if there is a real improvement in sound).

FA9 was already tough priced at 550€. It was good, but 550€ was tough. I think it would have been better priced at 499€, that would be an fair offer. At the end of its lifetime, it was sold for 349€ which was an very good deal i recommended to a lot of people. I think a lot of FA9 have been sold just alone by my recommendations Why was it 550€ in the first place? Because it had 6 drivers. It was a 3-way system, but 2-drivers per way.

The Issue is, for roughly 350€ you can get the Westone Mach 30 (An 3-way system, just like the FA19), for 500-600€ you can get the Sony IER-M7 or Westone Pro X50 and the IER-M7 already outperforms the FA19 with 4 drivers.

Thanks to the weak yen (that is a but unfair, yes) the IER-M9, one of the best IEM that ever existed and easily outperforms the FA19, costs ~900€ (including shipping and taxes). An realistic price for the IER-M9 is around 1300€. But even for 1300€ it is still worth every cent.

So you can get better quality, you just have to be careful what you buy. Quality over Quantity. 5 good drivers in an well made 5-way system over 10 Drivers in a 3-way system where more than 2/3 of the drivers play the exact same sound and so are basically just for lower distortion at insanely higher volume. So don't give up on high end IEM yet, just be more careful what you buy and check exactly what technology is used and what exactly is this technology used for.

 

[GroovyAudio]

@Vamp898 Thank you for your explanation! I'll definitely be more careful in the feature. Take care!

 

[Vamp898]

@Vamp898 Thank you for your explanation! I'll definitely be more careful in the feature. Take care!

As i am interested in Sound Science, Driver Technology, Capacitors and all that stuff, if you want to buy anything and you're unsure what exactly is the technology behind the thing, is it marketing or is there really a benefit, feel always free to hit me up.

I can not tell you if something sounds good i never heard myself, but i at least can tell you if the technology inside is worth the money (and that is often already a good indicator).

 

[FiiO]

FIIO FA19 Photo by: AudioTop

 

[PROblemdetected]

Damn, sorry to hear that man. Hope you get to sell it off at a good price soon. Also, I agree with you about diminishing returns as $500 seem to be the tipping point of sound quality to price to technical performance ratio. Especially when you can get a good discount like the Soundrhyme SR8, 14 BAs each side in a 4 way crossover.

Soundrhyme SR8 is not a good example for BA iem.

Maybe the sa6 is a better example of good performance/price ratio