#Onyx hotel boston review full
#Onyx hotel boston review plus

Cymbals can be heard quite clearly against the rest of the song in the intro. 4/6 points here for decent sibilance control.ĭream Theater’s “The Alien,” is the highs test song I use to see if the cymbals/high-hats/snare drum can be clearly heard and distinguished from the rest of the music (also good for instrument separation.) There’s surprisingly good treble on the Onyx. To test sibilance on headphones I use Panic! At The Disco’s “High Hopes.” Yeah, there’s some sibilance here, but it’s relatively controlled and certainly above average. The low-mids sound fantastic here with the bass-cello and the drums taking the front, but it leaves the piano and the mid-cello lacking without turning up the volume to uncomfortable levels. To test classical instruments in the mids, I’m using The Piano Guys' “Code Name Vivaldi.” While this song sounds quite good and has plenty of the motion ‘m looking for here with this song, the mids come in too recessed to really bring this song to life. It’s a fantastic presentation here with all of the details I look for in this song. The vocals are great, the guitars are great, the soundstage feels intimate, but still large. This song is a great example of how that is presented. The Onyx really has an amazing ability to present music in a warm and inviting manner that a lot of more expensive IEMs can’t do. Staind’s “Something to Remind You” has clean electric guitars and wonderful vocals – this song tests vocal quality and background noise. Still, the overall is really quite good and it earns the Onyx 5/6 points here. That raises the volume of the lows as well and makes them a bit more present than I’d like on this song.

#Onyx hotel boston review full

The downside again is that you have to crank the volume to really get the full presentation of the mids. There’s a really warm, full-bodied presentation here. The intro guitars are nice and clear with some really good dirty guitars. Weaving The Fate’s “The Fall” is my test song for clean/dirty guitars and vocals with background instruments to see how clearly the vocals can be heard. It’s a really nice and full-bodied presentation here, though the recessed mids are not to my preference. Still, the bass doesn’t really overwhelm the mids here and it’s a good overall presentation – again, for the price. You really need to crank the volume here to hear the mids well – that’s thanks to the massive mids dip on the tuning. Up next is Demon Hunter’s “I Am A Stone,” which I use to test whether the bass is too strong and overwhelms the mids as that is just as important as how strong/good the bass is. It’s slightly above average, so it earns a 6/10 here – great quantity, ok quality. These have some really solid bass for the price, but it’s not at the quality level I expect from a more expensive IEM. The sub-bass has some really good body to it, though it’s pretty fuzzy. I’m starting off with the Mid-bass/Sub-bass test I’m using David Guetta’s “I’m Good (Blue).” There’s some really ghood impact here, but it does feel pretty thin compared to some, admittedly, much more expensive IEMs.

#Onyx hotel boston review plus

I’m using Tidal Hi-Fi Plus to power it with MQA on. That’s really good for a 3.5mm unbalanced connection – bravo Earsonics. I’m driving these off of my new Cayin N8ii DAP on solid-state with medium gain at around ~35/100 volume. I included the Andromeda 2019 I just got as well since it's probably the close I have here price-wise, though they graph like polar opposites.

The highs are nice and tapered off, which might help or hinder the Onyx on the songs below. So, the Onyx has some solid bass and sub-bass, but not mind-blowing, and somewhat recessed mids according to the FRG. The closest thing I have is the Kiwi Ears Orchestra Lite and while it’s not too far off, it’s still pretty different – not to mention the price difference. I don’t much that is in the $6-700 range. 9/10 points here.Ĭheck out the below to see how these compare to…well…nothing really. The weight can get uncomfortable after long listening sessions, so it’s something to consider. The all-metal design makes them pretty heavy and they are pretty thick and somewhat large – not Ronin large, but still bigger than almost anything from Campfire Audio for example. The comfort is good, and these are designed really well, but they’re not the smallest or lightest IEMs ever. The black Anno on these feels durable and my used copy came with no scratches or blemishes, which is how IEMs should look, but my Mentor somehow managed to pick up a scratch on the “gold” trim despite how careful I was with them, so this is really nice to see. The design looks really great here as well – someone went to design school.

This is an all-metal IEM and makes stuff like the $5k Jewel or the $6.6k Traillii look like a cheap toy.

Holy crap, they built these like a friggin’ tank.