Penon Impact received today from
@Rockwell75 as part of the tour.
First impression was the weight. They seemed a fair bit heavier than my Bravado 2. The cable is very supple and seems of very good quality.
These are very comfortable in my ears. Despite the large looking nozzles, with Spiral Dot ++ these have less pressure on my ear canals than the Bravado 2.
Listening was an interesting journey from an initial uncertainty to being very impressed.
But first a quick note of reference: I'm 53, a carpenter/joiner who often works in noisy environments and have done for some time. I have some age and occupation related hearing deficits in the high freq. but have what I consider to be a very good ear having played instruments my whole life. Having been in the audio hobby for about 25 years through 2 channel and headphones/iems I have heard/owned more gear than I can possibly remember, and been down most rabbit holes..
So... my listening started with NIN "Still" album as that has been in heavy rotation for a few months. I have no idea how that album slipped past my attention but it did until about 5-6 months ago and I have listened to it so much since then.. Anyway, suffice to say I know it pretty well.
@DanielListening had texted me earlier in the day about my impressions but I didn't have the Impact until after work so when I first heard it I texted him...
I was using the Lotoo PAW6000 on high gain. My first impressions we not positive. I described it as "weird... Very detailed but it's kind of slow. Like the transient attack is blunted, even though there's tons of detail everything feels thick." I compared to the Bravado 2 and sure enough, the B2 seemed quicker and more nimble but thinner overall in the timbre with less overt detail but "it's something about the leading edge of notes." Vocals sounded very real after the fact and pianos were nice in the decay but not the attack.
That got me looking at the layout. I have pretty much avoided all info on the Impact, so on the site it lists the ESTs as for the super high freq, with BAs for the highs.. Compare that to the Bravado 2 which uses an EST for the super highs and one for the highs, with the BA for the mids..
That made sense. I remember very well the Vision Ears tour with the Elysium and the VE8. As soon as I heard the EST treble of the Elysium, the VE8 lasted less than 5 minutes in my ears. ESTs ruined BA treble for me. Now I suspect that might have to do with my age/etc as mentioned above but for me BS treble has a kind of echo'ey quality, a slowness that ESTs completely cure and just sound "right"..
The Lotoo is pretty new to me and people referencing the Impact as Traillii on a relative pauper's salary, I tried the Burson amp as even though I didn't have it with the Trailli, it's proven to be a very good sounding amp. Way too much hiss to use balanced so I switched to SE.
Things started to get interesting. The staging was much less "in my face". Imaging and size of the stage improved. Even the timbre and tonality improved.
I went to a couple of my favourite lute recordings by Rolf Lislevand, "La Mascarade" and "La Belle Homicide". Now these really started to sound good. I still wouldn't say I was getting the magic "je ne sais quoi" of the Traillii but there was the some beautiful timbre and the detail had me listening deep into the playing.
So, I thought maybe it was the gain setting on the Lotoo that was throwing things off for me. So I went back to the Lotoo on low gain and things sounded much much better.
I tried Eva Cassidy "Fields of Gold" from Live at Blue Note and it was up there with the best I've heard it. Oddly, the detail was so good that I've never heard that damn out of tune guitar playing the solo sound so out of tune before. It was impressive but also kind of made me wince. Damn that guitar...
Then I went to Olafur Arnalds "Árbakkinn" from Island Songs. I haven't listened to this song in a long time as it was a "test" song back when I was buying and selling way too often but this sounded so good that I forgot about that "function" and just listened again to how beautiful a song it is.. I had chills..
So in my last text to
@DanielListening I joked (sort of) how I could really see owning these and hatched a quick plan to sell the Diana's, the Burson, the Lotoo to get a better DAP and still keeping the Bravado 2 because of the bass.
So after a relatively brief session my impressions were that I find them very balanced. The bass is deep and textured. They don't have the visceral quality to the bass of the Bravado 2 but frankly EE, to my ears, has the best bass. The mids are very detailed and maybe slightly warm but in good way. The treble was troublesome at first but that is a touchy area for me in particular and maybe a little "brain burn" helped. I noticed the same thing when I first tried the Socrates cable on the Bravado2, that I though the treble got a bit thick and smeared but after 20 minutes I could hear the inner detail within a warmer more robust sound.
This all took about 45 minutes then I had to sort out supper so I'm excited to see how more listening goes.
Overall an excellent set and joking aside, I may actually upend my system to get these. I really do like them..