Even though I haven't heard the Voltage yet (hopefully one week later), I would say from the review, it is hard to compare Voltage with most of the TOTL I know. Almost all of the multi-kilobuck TOTL IEMs have their special sauce to put some uniqueness to the TOTL level of everything else. Otherwise, it is very hard to convince people to spend that much for them.
It seems to me that Voltage possesses at least very close to TOTL level of competency without any apparent weakness. On the other hand, while it has some strength in Mids as portraited in the review, it does not have a special sauce that immediately turns you on (or in some case or for some people, turns you away).
I will give you example for high school graduates applying for Harvard. Most of the applicants are close to perfect with 4.8 GPA, tons of AP courses while also participated in tons of other extra-curriculum activities. However, those who got admission typically have their special sauces, as the indicators for the potential of being the future leaders.
I would guess Voltage is one of those close to perfect applicant, but apparently, still has something missing to safety slap a multi-kilobuck price tag.
Of course, this is purely my guess since I am still waiting for mine to ship out.
To preface I don't collect IEMs, thus the unicorn I'm after is an IEM that does everything. I need a transparent and textured low end low end for acoustic and low strings and an upper midrange and treble that is exciting and defined but not fatiguing for more aggressive genres. I need an IEM that I can lift the volume on and it remains inoffensive and only grows in musicality. I want to feel like I'm not missing out, something that flatters all my music. That's my special sauce and I've yet to find an IEM that does that, probably the closest was Traillii JP but it had a softer image than I preferred and had BA bass.
Sometimes the TOTL 'special sauce' comes from a tonal contortion that doesn't sit well with me on longer listening. The tonally balanced and exceptionally technical is what I'm searching for. If the Voltage low end is as textured and revealing as the impressions suggest, maybe this will be my unicorn?
Either way, I'm excited. In my experience Penon does not release sets to introduce redundancy into it's line up. They tune purposefully and I'm really interested to see the purpose of Voltage emerge through discourse and impressions.
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