Just because it uses the same Beryllium material as the Utopia, don't expect the same resolve. I'd say the detailing is similar level as the Elex.
No, I have to disagree. The Stellia has more resolve than the Clear. It is closer to the Utopia than Clear as far as clarity and detail. The Elex does not have accurate resolve, it is an Elear for all practical purposes. The Clear is a great HP, but it is not a Stellia or Utopia and not meant to be.
Hi mixman and SilverEars,
maybe both of you are right, as this may depend on the different kinds of music being listened to
, see below.
BTW my Stellia has now 250 hours of burn-in (and I usually listen at low levels).
You hit the nail on the head. I only listened briefly last night, but so far not overly impressed (In fact, I’m a bit disappointed with the performance to price). Switching back and forth with the HD820, I feel the HD820 has its flaws, but it manages to sound more authentic to me in terms of timbre, spacing, clarity/presence, and staging. HD820 has that annoying split for me between low bass and mid-bass (it impacts precise localization of instruments that run across thise ranges), but what can you do...
Like for the Elegia, burn-in has a stronger effect and is more important for the Stellia than for their open siblings,
due to the higher stiffness of the suspension of the driver for these closed-back models.
I mean, it is even more important to make sure that they have enough burn-in, as they do improve a lot with burn-in.
For me the Stellia, like the Utopia, is faster than the Clear,
and then for superfast and complex metal (melodeath, power, black, etc.) the pure beryllium driver of Stellia will keep better (vs the Clear) pace with the extreme speed, complexity and aggressive dynamics of the instruments and voices, outresolving the Clear with such metal subgenres. This would rejoin mixman.
When achieving to represent all of this complexity, it misses however something compared to the open Utopia, some "air" (I don't know how to explain this). I mean while it can depict everything happening, at the same times this may betray that there is some space missing, which I don't feel with less demanding musical genres (I am surprised to find the soundstage feeling instead quite fine for genres like dark ambient, for which I find soundstage to be very important).
For other (less intense) musical genres than these extreme metal subgenres ,things may be different, and then the open design of the Clear may give the edge in resolution to its lesser aluminium-magnesium driver.This would rejoin SilverEars and Jude.
In any case the Stellia does not resolve as much as the Utopia, and does not feel as having so much "ease".
I prefer the general tonality and also the bass of the Stellia to that of the Utopia.
So going from the Utopia you may loose some things but you gain others...
Despite these differences the Stellia feel akin to the Utopia.
They are both different excellent headphones for me, if I had to keep a single headphone, it may still be the Utopia, but it would be very difficult for me to prefer one over the other, I like them almost as much.
However I don't feel hesitant in preferring the Stellia to the Clear.
BTW, according to Focal the Elegia as a closed-back version of the Clear (thus not of the Elear),
(see
https://blog.son-video.com/en/2018/...charge-de-projet-et-developpement-chez-focal/)
but I think with more compromises compared to the Stellia (like when the compromises re. the Elear, compared to the Utopia).
I agree with those who see the "distance" between the Elegia and the Stellia as much larger than the distance between the Clear and the Utopia.
A few more thoughts:
- I think the Stellia should appeal to those who didn't like the Utopia because of its tonality, because of its resolution (which was too much for some), because they felt it was too "demanding", too intense.
- the change of connectors (on the headphone and on the cable) has the advantage of lowering the price
(the Utopia's Lemo's connectors being very expensive)
- Focal has developed a robotized production starting with the Elegia (
https://blog.son-video.com/en/2018/...charge-de-projet-et-developpement-chez-focal/ ), I assume they would have done the same for the Stellia, this would help in lowering the cost compared to the open-back siblings (the more so considering the luxury packaging for the Stellia and its cables!).
- it seems to me that with the Stellia, Focal has done in the world of closed-back headphones at least at much a breakthrough as they did in the world of open-back headphones with the Utopia.
Have anice weekend,
bidn