as promised time for a small review of the lab 2. i have my pair since november and wanted to wait for some time to settle my impression.
first a big thanks to the distributor of final audio in switzerland, after writing them they told me that a pair is in poland on tour and he checks if he can bring this pair to switzerland. three weeks later they waited for me at the k55 in zurich. that is a first class service.
short version: i know i buy them after 1 minute play, only a few audio gear left me impressed like this.
i own the piano fort x-cc and allways loved them, the cold feeling you lay them in your ears is the start and after they heat up you didn't realise that something is in your ear. you don't have any kind of pressure on your ears. i love the wear of the piano forte x-cc, these earphones a completely open, not for running around or noisy places. i often grab them in summer when its hot, better than any iem oder headphone. the lab 2 have the same design but even more open in construction, the titan casing is not cold when you lay them in your ears like the piano forte x-cc. due the little stiffer and heavier cable you have the feeling that they stay not as secure as the piano forte x-cc in your ears - the earphones in contrast are a little lighter.
the piano forte x-cc sound special, they are colored and the frequency range is limited on both ends, they are for me specialist for vocal jazz and small combos surely not for any genre and often a try and error game. when the recording fits the sound it is superb, extreme natural and intimate, extreme good resolution, wide soundstage.
for me the lab 2 are a miracle, how in the hell they produce such a bass with this complete open design? the back oft these earphones are open, you can see thru. and what magic sauce they took for this wonderful wide, deep and holographic soundstage? i can't compare this earphones to other earphones or iem they compete for me with the best open headphones i know. i stand for my word when i say that these earphone produce the best the best out of the head experience i ever heard (and i had a meeting with the orpheus last week). i can best compare the lab2 with some very expensive smaler monitor loudspeakers - the only thing that is not here is super deep bass - but like small monitors a superb homogenous sound. in contrast to the lab2 they are not colored, maybe a little pronounced mids and a the magnifier is a little smaler then the fiano forte x-cc in this part. they deliver a natural sound out of the most sources i have and are easy to drive. that's beside the soundstage the second best part, a natural sound with a extreme fine timbre without the need to fine tune. they play fine loud or quiet (often a problem with electrostats, important point for me, i often listen very moderat), don't expect a pressure feeling on your ears (don't like that, grab some closed iem when you like that). they are not as speedy as the noble katana/k10 but speedier than the ak t8ie. the lab2 have a extra nice decay that ba iem have often so struggle to deliver/reproduce but in contrast to the piano forte x-cc in a good neutral sense (piano forte x-cc are lovely here but more in the sence of a nice extra echo like a old opera house or smaler church).
but other gear can do parts better, a sr-009 delivers more details and pinpoint exact soundstage, the focal utopia are more linear down to the deepest bass, but only a tad better in resolution. what the lab2 shares with the utopia is the complete package, wounderful, natural and dynamic out of the box but also upscaling with the source/amp (the lab2 cable delivers this woundful soundstage, with a silver litz cable the soundstage gets smaller but a tiny bit exacter and the resolution benefit from the cable, i use the orginal cable). one thing was a bit special at the beginning - in contrast to other headphones i had the feeling to sit in the loge, looking down to the stage, so the earphones comes with his own placing (but only a bit
), you easily forget this after the first tone. and ok, for speedy edm you need the deepbass, have a second pair of iem for this but when the piano forte x-cc are for 30% of all music the lab2 can do 95% easy. much better then i hoped for after owing the piano forte x-cc.
do you know the moment you put some new gear out of your ears and stare at them? i had this moment not once but again and again with these earphones.
they are expensive, around 4000 eur, that is sad, my biggest wish is that this technology (3d printed titan with mechanical equalizer, super thin diaphragm) comes widely avaible. are they worth the money? for me without any doubts, they are the sonus faber guarneri evolution of earphones.
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