I'm got my pair of PSB's today, and just have a short time with them, so this will be a shortish review that I'll come back and edit to update as I am able to try out each feature. I'll start with 2 things, the batteries, and the triple mode feature of the headphones, and then some general observations.
Based on the YouTube video's Tyll had posted last year, where Paul Barton introduced these headphones, I was going to get the HP70's. Then I found out that the PSB used AAA rechargeable battery, and they are user serviceable. In a pinch you could just carry extra rechargeable batteries, or even some Duracell’s if you ran out of juice. That's awesome, but even better is the lack of obsolescence of the headphone due to battery failure. We all know, any BT headphone is going to die. Period. Will these manufacturers make replacement batteries 10 years from now? I'm betting on the AAA battery still being around. There must be 250 million TV remotes that use AAA's. This was a brilliant move by PSB. When I read the manual today, it did appear this was also a feature in the M4U 2 as well, but I was unaware of it.
I listened to these for a few minutes out of the box via Aptx (not HD) from my Moto X Pure. I've been using a Sennheiser 4.40 BT also Aptx capable.. These sounded a little more fleshed out right out of the box vs. the 4.40, but I'll update this write up with more details on sound after I get to use them a few days. A primary use of these will be listening to podcasts via BeyondPod app on Android. I played a few minutes of one of my typical shows, and these are going to be fine for voice, no sibilance and not boomy on male voices. Most of these podcasts are 64k MP3 Mono, so there is not a lot of quality there, but so far so good.
USB Volume issues:
In addition to the Bluetooth and eventual AptX HD capability, I was interested in these for USB to a PC, and not having to have an outboard DAC/AMP. I'm a Jriver user, which always seems to be a good thing for one reason or another. The internal DAC in these is limited to 48/24. So, any higher rez files will need a transcode in Jriver to play. I configured Jriver to play native for 44.1 and 48k, and all others resample down to 48. I configured playback with WASAPI, and it’s WAY WAY too loud. As in, you get about 70-75 DB at 2 out of 100 on the volume. 10 of 100 would damage your hearing. I experienced this exact same problem with Dragonfly Black on Windows. I'm not sure what the deal is here, but to address it, in Jriver, I enabled the volume leveling (R128 - Replay gain) which will reduce most of my music down 5-10 DB. I also enabled the equalizer as FLAT, but only to use the preamp function to reduce the volume another -10DB. With those two settings, I could use about 0-50 on the volume control and have nice range.
Similarly, on Android (7 in my case) I enabled developer options and used the "Disable absolute volume" setting to unlink the headset volume control from the Android system volume. This way, you can usually set the Android volume to 100%, and then you get steps from the volume control on the headset. I find for podcasts, I could never make it quiet enough at night to listen, so I end up using both the volume on the phone, down 3-4 clicks from 100%, along with nearly zero volume on the headset. Even if you did not disable Absolute volume, these can be set to not blow your ears out, but you may find getting low listening volumes difficult.
My wife does have an iPhone, so I see about trying it out there and see how the volume works. In general, Dragonfly Black included, my experience was the volume control was much better matched to the way iOS works.
From what I've been able to read, it looks like only B&W's PX also support the ability to run as a DAC/AMP via USB, not sure if they use the same SoC as PSB for the DAC/AMP, so it may have the same volume issue.
So, Jriver is super cool right, and I can fix this volume issue, but if I wanted to use Spotify's app, it may be very difficult to get a low listening volume. Or control sound from some other music app. We'll see, I'll try those out soon.
Bluetooth range:
Seems very good. My house is roughly 20' x 40', a two story, with a basement. My test is to put the phone in the middle of the house, and then I venture to all the extremes. Upstairs, basement, no loss of signal. Solid performer!
Miscellaneous:
Packaging was nice, the case is nice, cabling, build quality, nice, nice! And they come with an EXTRA set of ear pads!! That's cool.
One other small point, that Mr. Barton highlighted in the video, the inside of the ear pads are beveled, so it makes for a good seal, and leaves more space inside for your ear so you don't get pressure points. Nice!
I'm off to cook some Chili, I'll come back later in the week and update this post with some additional usage cases, like the hardwired listening via my Oppo Ha-1, and hard wire to my phone. More to come...
First Update:
They do work via OTG USB cable on Android. They do seem to be charging off of the phone when running in this mode. Using UAPP as the player, you get excellent bit perfect playback.
