Beyerdynamic Aventho Wireless

I have an admitted headphone fetish.

 

I did end up selling the very good B&W PX headphones; they were good from an audio quality perspective, but just too heavy for their primary use, long-haul flights.

 

I decided to stick with the slightly dated Bose QC35’s; while the Sony WH-1000XM3’s seem to be the new king of the hill, the difference doesn’t seem to justify the price tag.

 

But I did end up buying a pair of Beyerdynamic Aventho (wireless). While the software app is a bit buggy, the audio quality out of these headphones is simply sublime. I really enjoyed the sound out of the T51i’s that I have, and the Aventho’s don’t disappoint.

 

They’re definitely a good pair of cans!

 

Bowers & Wilkins PX headphones

I have a headphone fetish. I know. Its a problem.

 

• AKG K550 - simply the best pair of wired headphones for sitting down, listening. Painful because they’re so damn big, but pure sonic bliss. Absolutely the best pair of “permanently connected to your amp” headphones for all kinds of music. Probably the nicest to my hearing.
• beyerdynamic T51i - simply the best pair of wired headphones for portable use. Awesome to use, awesome to travel with, but so damn expensive I’m scared to. Probably equal to the AKG’s in terms of sound reproduction, but the cable just gets in the way so it doesn’t get used as much as it should.
• Bose QC35 - simply the best pair of wireless headphones I’ve used. And the noise cancellation ? Sublime! My go-to for sustained listening while being portable to use, and nothing else will be used while actually wanting to listen to something while on a plane.
• Apple AirPods - my go-to portable headphones. No wires, sound isn’t totally rubbish, and the pairing is really easy and works well. Exceeded my expectations by a country mile.
• Klipsch X12i - I had a pair of X10i’s, and they just were overused. Amazing wired in-ear headphones, small and discrete.These used to be my go-to for portable use, but today are only used to provide background when on a plane to let me sleep.
• Bose Soundlink on-ear - not bad headphones, but nothing superlative either.
• Sennheinser RS180 - old faithful, used for those heavy TV / movie watching nights when I don’t want to disturb anyone else.

 

 

The newest addition is a pair of Bowers & Wilkins PX headphones. They’re well priced, and incredibly well presented and made. They just ooze quality, and look like they’ll outlast me.

 

I’ve only used them for two days, but some initial impressions;

• I like that I can adjust the level of noise cancellation (default options are Office, City and Plane) and the amount of vocal to let in (it can apparently tell if someone is speaking)
• I love the build quality and fancy schmancy case it comes with (although I would prefer a hard case)
• Bose has better noise reduction
• They’re very heavy
• USB-C charging is a plus!
• Battery life seems good
• Bass seems heavy and unrealistic (grr, catering to the Beats crowd)
• They do go louder than the Bose, but your ears feel more fatigued

 

I’m doing some travelling, so will put them through their paces to have a point of comparison; right now, the Bose QC35 look like they’re a better pair of headphones in terms of comfort and audio quality.

Amazon Fire TV stick

I've always struggled to find a decent media playing solution while on the move. I think I've cracked the problem, with an Amazon Fire TV stick.

By default, its locked to Amazon's Prime ecosystem of video and pictures. And this ecosystem is fairly decent and I consider it to be good value. But, because it runs Android underneath, and has access to Amazon's App store, you can quite easily and relatively simply dramatically increase its usefulness.

My suggestions on what to install and how to do this ?

1. Plex (from the Amazon App store) - access your home media library
2. AirPin (from the Amazon App store) - turn your device into a cheap AirPlay-compatible device
3. Sideload a bunch of apps - this is the frankly illegal stuff, so you can read up how to do it yourself
• Terrarium
• Put.io
• Popcorn Hour
• MX Player
• Kodi
• 1Channel
• Alluc
• Exodus
• Filmon.TV
• Gobble
• Navi-X
• Phoenix
• Stream all the sources

Once complete, Internet media streaming happiness ensues :-)

Beyerdynamic T-51i

I like the industrial look of Beyerdynamic’s products. And the T-51’s solved a particular problem I had. 

 

I bought a pair. And wow, they are impressive in build quality, presentation, audio performance and package contents. Its unusual to not find something wrong with a product, but this is one of those rare products;

• it does what its supposed to do
• its a fair price
• it comes with everything you need
• it looks beautiful
• its comfortable to wear
• it sounds bloody awesome

 

Get a pair!

Libratone Zipp speaker

Multi-room, mostly wire-free audio is a hassle. And its almost never seamless.

 

A breed of Apple Airplay-compatible speakers has been around for a while, but they all tended to be quite ugly. I ended up liking the styling of the Libratone Zipp; classic Danish design, good reviews, solid sound from a wireless speaker with Airplay and Bluetooth built-in - sounds ideal!

 

Its not cheap; $320. And I’m sorry to say, its rubbish.

 

• Pairing it over WiFi is a disaster (can’t see the network, struggle to associate), and generally requires you to reset the speaker if you change the SSID or password
• The WiFi chip must be encased in solid lead, because even if its right next to the AP, it can’t connect
• Who builds a WiFi speaker that only has a 2.4GHz chip in it ?
• The audio quality is iffy at best, and is generally not memorable
• When you do miraculously get it powered, associated and playing music, it hardly goes 5 minutes without cutting out and requiring you to power it off and on again

 

On the positive side, its pretty, and the Bluetooth works well - but then I would have bought something else and saved $100. Sigh.

 

I am trying hard not to get into the Sonus ecosystem, but they’ve been around for a while, and it must be because they do things properly.

 

PS. Please don’t point to my WiFi network. I have RRD graphs that prove coverage and connection-rate density where the speaker was placed, tested and moved around are good

Audioquest DragonFly

I’ve been rediscovering the joys of audio. Helped by the ease with which you can now (legally) stream audio, I’ve been playing around with various output devices. My trusty default is a pair of Klipsch Image X10i’s, which are superlative but not value for money. They’re so good, I have a pair that is with me permanently and another pair that lives at home (both pairs were bought for some tech work I did for a friend, who insisted on paying me for it).

 

When I travel, I use a pair of Bose QC3’s, which do a great job of blocking out the outside world (mainly the droning that is inevitable on a plane). When I’m not traveling, I have started using a pair of wireless Bose Soundlink headphones instead of the wired Klipsch (technically in ear monitors) which are great, and I think my default for day-to-day listening. But I find something lacking with wireless headphones. They’re good for listening with half an ear, the kind of music that requires no concentration or is more to drown out the foreground while you’re concentrating than listening for pleasure as your primary activity.

 

So I’ve invested in a setup which I want to use at the office, a pair of AKG 550’s. I haven’t reviewed them yet because I haven’t listened to them enough to justify a review, and I don’t think they’ve been burnt in / listened in properly yet. But the second part of that setup is a Audioquest DragonFly USB DAC.

 

Holy moses, I’m not sure why I didn’t get a USB DAC earlier. Its one of those experiences that I can only compare to trying to tell someone who has only ever used Apple’s stock ear buds that there are better options. Its the same source music, playing with the same output equipment (at the time of writing, the Klipsch IEM's). Vocal’s are cleaner, there is more defined mid-bass, and I’m hearing a subtlety and widening of the stage that I didn’t think was possible with such an amateurish setup. Wow.

 

Get one, you won’t be disappointed. At all.

Bose Soundlink Color Bluetooth speakers

Its not often that I buy something, and have nothing bad or critical to say about it. The Bose Soundlink Color Bluetooth speaker is one of these products.

 

It does exactly what its supposed to do; it pairs quickly and painlessly, remembers up to the last 8 devices its paired to, tells you via voice prompt what its connected to and just does its job.

 

Sound quality is superlative, for a speaker this size. Its typical Bose, good for most people but annoying to audiophiles. I’m not one, and this sounds damn good to me. Its a little expensive, but unlike normal pricing for this manufacturer, only a slight premium over the frankly cheap and nasty equivalents. In this price range, its the best product that fits value/performance/size. Adding a microphone so that you could use it as a speakerphone would make this the obvious no-brainer. Something for version 2 ? 

 

As an aside, I think Bose have circumvented nuclear material proliferation rules. I have no idea how they are so efficient at battery power management. These, along with their noise canceling headphones, sip juice - I’ve not managed to get them to run out, no matter how hard I try.

 

There is only one thing that I find annoying about this; it falls into the same category as the dumb user who doesn’t switch off his car alarm and sets it off every morning. But this is a case of “stupid user” rather than stupid design problem. You have to push the power button lightly, once. If you hold it down, nothing happens. I’ve cursed the thing a few times thinking the batteries have died (usually after long periods of non use), when the light bulb goes off and I push and release quickly, and up it comes. Go figure. Stupid user.

Bose Soundlink on-ear wireless headphones

I’m a fan of Bose products; and having been a happy QC3 owner, I was quite keen to get a slightly cheaper, wireless version. Enter the Soundlink Bluetooth headphones.

 

Once again, Bose has gotten it right. The headphones use a human-friendly concept of talking you through the Bluetooth-pairing process (something I first experienced with Plantronics headsets).

 

Audio quality is typical Bose-fair; balanced, good mid-range, possibly a little muddy bass, but overall very pleasant for daily use. Volume levels are lower than I’d like, but probably safer. Battery life is outstanding; I’ve not gotten them below 40% even in all-day use. When the battery does die (apparently it does), you can use the included cord to still use the headphones - very smart and something I wish the QC3’s did.

They come with a carry-case (very useful) and seem quite durable. I’m not convinced on how the headphone foam squishes when in the carry case, but I suppose thats what a manufacturers warranty is for.

 

Get a pair - that way, you too could be as cool as this stock-image hipster.

Bose QC3 headphones

Its very rare that you buy something that does exactly what its supposed to do, and does it so well that it blows all your expectations away. One such device is the Amazon Kindle; does what its supposed to do, and consistently. I'd like to add another to that (very short) list; the Bose QC3 headphones.

 

Yes, they are very expensive at $350. Yes, they only work when they're powered (i.e. the proprietary battery is charged). But oh yes, they are gorgeous and comfortable to wear (even for hours at a stretch). And oh yes, they sound amazingly neutral (which is rare these days). And oh yes, that battery lasts for ever (more than 16-18 hours). 

 

It comes in a beautiful hard case (which frankly doesn't look like it'll last very long if you don't care for it), an airline adapter (for those stupid airlines that don't have a standard headphone jack), a charger and a set of "world" adapters that will make the charger work just about anywhere. The only fiddly bit is the cable, which comes either as a standard wired cable, or as an Apple-compatible control set of buttons. On the plus side, its detachable, and on the minus side, they really should consider making these things wireless. Cables, while great for quality, really suck in real world use.

 

It really is surreal how the minute you put these on and switch the button (there is mercifully only one button on the whole thing), it sounds like all the air has been sucked out of the room and its eerily quiet. On the audio quality front, I can only reference these to the Klipsch Image X10i's in terms of quality and trueness to the recording; if anything, these are slightly bass heavier, but not distractingly so. Mid's and trebles are fairly treated, and overall quality is sublime. They don't get terrifically loud, but because of the design seem to focus the sound into your ears as opposed to bleeding out. And they're open backed, which means a much more neutral sound that doesn't eliminate external noises if they're loud enough.

 

Are they worth the price tag ? Audio quality and comfort are so subjective, its hard to comment without real-world comparisons. These are so good that comparisons are only for academic purposes, not necessity. it would be interesting to compare these with a pair of AKG 490NC's, which are roughly a third less. The Harmon equivalents that I have tried were so bass heavy (as were the Monster and Beats equivalents), whereas the AKG's are more supposed to be more neutral.

 

But these Bose; awesome! 

Popbox V8

I have waxed lyrical about the Popcorn Hour range of players before, but they're all too large to carry on extended holiday or business trips. I went to go buy a Popcorn Hour A-400, and spotted the Popbox V8, a small media player which, upon testing, delivers very good video playback performance and relatively good stability in a small, compact package.

 

And the codec support / playback performance is as good / great as its bigger brothers. Small enough to travel with, will be testing it out in the field next week. I suspect it will do quite well.

Popcorn Hour A-400

I've always been a fan of the Popcorn Hour devices, ever since Geoff Rehmet mentioned them to me and said these look awesome. I ordered the Popcorn Hour A-110, and when it was time to replace it, bought the C-200 (original product page) and then the A-200 (original product page). Nice devices, good physical build quality but very ropy software builds, which improved over time.

 

My C-200 died, and the A-400, I had hoped, would get around the rough beginnings of previous devices. I had skipped the A-300, having no need of a media player. While the interface is prettier than the previous generations, the software bugs peek through as soon as you do anything other than playback media. And the new video-wall style interface is notoriously buggy. It has crashed and corrupted itself literally every day I've tried to use it; I've removed my photo collection to see if that makes a difference, which I suspect it will - ok, maybe these things are not built for 120GB photo collections.

 

The device has significantly more horsepower while navigating than its predecessors, and it chews through MKV playback. Also, the picture quality is notably better than the previous units, so I'm quite happy with the raw performance. But the video wall interface needs a lot of work still, in its DB maintenance / generation.

 

I don't regret buying it (my old unit packed up), and it does what its supposed to do. I'm just annoyed that I have to fight with it to enable the "new" features. Overall, a worthy buy which does what it promises, but still with some rough edges.

 

PS. For raw video performance and network speed (even at 100Mbps), it still kicks the Apple TV's butt.

Unotelly (or how to watch Netflix and Hulu Plus in South Africa)

So cool devices like the Apple TV and many other embedded / TV devices support services like Netflix, Hulu Plus and BBC's iPlayer, but getting them to work without lots of hackery with VPN clients (services like Hidemyass) is near impossible.

Until now.

I signed up for a trial with Unotelly, a DNS-resolver / cache-based solution. They claim its VPN free, but the only way I can see it working is that they redirect the supported list of channels through to their own application proxies, which then mask you from the content provider.

Who cares; it works well, its relatively cheap, easy to install and I had it up and running on my home network in minutes. And best of all, works equally well on laptop, tablet, smartphone, etc. Neat!

Sonic nirvana

I had reviewed the B&W C-5 headphones earlier, and mentioned I was disappointed in the overpowering bass; not what I was expecting from Bowers & Wilkins. I mentioned that I had ordered the P-5's, and was hoping that it wouldn't have the same problem. I am ecstatic to report that they don't.

 

Clear, faithful sound stage, vocal reproduction, an easy to use case and the ability to switch between iPod-compatible (controls for volume and ability to advance / rewind from the lanyard) and standard audio cables make this a winner! Highly, highly recommended! On top of that, they're extremely comfortable, feel well made and look like they're going to last. Its in the same league or superior to the Sennheiser RS-180's in terms of comfort. Being closed though, you get no leakage which is good for the other people in the room :-)

 

I've partnered them with a FiiO E7 headphone amplifier, with the EQ set to bass boost +1, and its amazing how neat the sound is. Highly recommended combination.

B&W C-5

I am a bit of a headphone / audio junkie; I have a very good pair of headphones, but was intrigued by B&W's foray into headphones. So I went and bought the C-5's, which feature an interesting "secure" loop design to keep the headphones in place. For those of you who are interested, its on special in South Africa at the moment. Very attractive, well weighted and incredibly comfortable to wear.

 

 

 

The attractive Apple-esque packaging also doesn't hurt matters. So how do they sound ?

 

I'm afraid that while the sound stage is very wide (impressively so), and the volume is good, the excessive bass response vs mid-range bass relegates these to iPhone / iPod use in cars, planes and the like. I'm afraid they are nowhere near the Klipsch's in terms of truthful reproduction of the music. It appears that B&W has tuned these for exactly that MP3 generation of music lovers. Not a bad thing, but not what I was looking for.

 

I have also ordered the P5's. Lets hope they don't suffer from the same problem.

 

PS. These cans come with the most rubbish carry case I've ever had the displeasure of using. Fiddly, without instructions and very easy to screw up. Fail!

Apple TV 2

Apple describe the Apple TV as a hobby project, which begs the question of why they are bothering with it. And the reason they're bothering is because to not have a toe in your lounge means giving up a large segment of your media spend; video. Apple relatively recently refreshed the 1st gen device with a newer, sleeker, smaller version. I had the old one, and am now busy playing with a 2nd generation version.

 

The 1st generation device had a hard drive in it, and you could either stream your content to it from any computer running iTunes (the devices all have built-in WiFi), store the content on the device and have no computer running or purchase content from the online store (or, as was usually the case, all three).

 

The new generation device is smaller, black and not white and is functionally more useless than the first one. It has lost the hard drive and now has flash storage. Great if you're in an environment with very fast, always-on connectivity. That is not true of SA. Its also lost its USB port, and has the same miserable compatibility in terms of media playback (i.e if its not in iTunes, it won't play it).

 

So why buy it ? Because, if you've gone to the effort of sorting out your media so that it plays and looks great on your iDevice, you want it available in your lounge in the same way too. And yes, you could dock your device, but thats dorky. This at least can be controlled by remote, makes that big TV useful by displaying album art and can drive 5.1 sound through its TOSlink output (the HDMI audio out seems to be of inferior quality).

 

Oh yes, this new gen device also supports Airplay; that is quite cool. Imagine you have a pic or video on your phone; you can get it onto your TV simply by selecting the Apple TV as your output screen - neat! That is a cool trick. And shifting the price point too was smart - $100 is reasonable and fair for a hobby, the old one at $300+ wasn't.

B&W MM-1's

B&W is an old-school speaker manufacturer, and they've applied the same skills and history to computer speakers - the MM-1's.

 

These have been extensively reviewed, so here are the salient points;

 

• externally powered
• USB sound input (which utilises the on-board DSP)
• cabled output in case you want to run headphones
• a remote control (which integrates into iTunes)

 

They are phenomenally clear, with powerful bass which is amazing given the lack of a satellite sub-woofer. They're also attractive and fit in well if you're running any Mac.

 

A good purchase indeed.

Klipsch Image Audio X10i in-ear headphones

In-ear headphones are great; they're discrete, sound is generally good because its right there (no dispersion loss), and your skull is an awesome natural amplifier. Problem is, there are so many different varieties out there, its hard to tell which ones are decent.

 

I had a pair of Sennheiser CX-300's for a long time, and they were awesome. I had an opportunity to try something different, and ordered a pair of Klipsch's. These headphones are bar none the best in-ear headphones I've tried. They're ridiculously priced, but the audio quality is unparalleled. The controls on the cable are also very convenient, esp. when you can't reach your device to control pause, increase volume, etc.

 

Due to their design, they do attract quite a bit of gunk quite quickly (ew), but they include a fancy paper clip to clean them, so guess I'm not the only one.

 

Highly recommended!

 

PS. The provided case, while very pretty, isn't very durable and certainly won't last in a backpack filled with other stuff.

Sennheiser RS-180 wireless headphones

I'm a little fussy about the headphones I use; I've always been a fan of Sennheiser, and bought my first pair of over-ears from them - the PX200's. Besides for coming with the most ridiculous case, they are pretty good, and currently serve use as the resident bedside headphones.

 

They're light, relatively inexpensive and let enough noise in without affecting audio quality - useful for night-time listening. I had a pair of canal-ear style CX300's (excellent value for money) and CX400's (not worth the price difference and far too short a cable), but needed something for the office (see here for the current portable cans). I bought a pair of HD515's, but found the cord a real PITA on a desk; wires everywhere, too long, too short, etc, etc.

 

So I bought a pair of RS-180's for use at home; its sat on the shelf for a year, but the cord hassles at work forced me to try this out; I am truly amazed! These headphones are not only comfortable and attractive, but the cradle looks like a piece of art, and thanks to the Kleer technology in use, audio reproduction and quality is amazing.

 

Range is pretty good too; I can go for about 50m line of sight before encountering artifacts. Highly recommended!

 

PS. Price wise, they're outrageous. But so are good hearing aids ;-)

Popcorn Hour A-200

A while back, I bought a Popcorn Hour C-200, which is a very fancy (and big) media player.

Fast forward to a new house, another TV (32" Sony BX300), and a requirement for another media player. My desired device was the Popcorn Hour A-200, and first contact with the local agents was that the device would be R4500! That was a bit steep, so I decided to go buy a Mede8er, which is actually a cool device; its better than the Popcorn Hour in that the interface is cleaner / easier to use, the preview features are awesome (compared to the lack thereof on the PCH), and the device is nice and small.

Unfortunately, it irritated my wife to no end that the user interface was different, and there was a different mechanism to view the same content as the C-200. It also didn't help that it suffered to playback some really good quality large MKV's across a gigabit network. I phoned the local agents again, and discover they had made a mistake with the price of the device, and it would only be R2100, which is what was paid for the Mede8er; I promptly sold the old device and bought the new one.

There isn't much to say, other than it does the same job as its bigger brother, in a much smaller form factor. And the wife is happy too :-)

 

PS

 

My home network is a gigabit Ethernet network, with Apple Airport Extreme base stations for local access, and wired access to a MacBook Pro which has a Drobo connected to it via Firewire 800 for storage. A desktop PC running pfsense protects the environment. It works quite well.

 

PPS

 

The new TV (46" Sony EX700) is being installed tomorrow. Watch this space for a review!

Popcorn Hour C200

I used to use a Popcorn Hour A110 as a media playback device at home. It worked well, but when the upgraded C200 was announced, I had to have it; there was no rational reason or justification.

Well, I got it, and its even more awesome than the old one; its just a lot bigger. Think old-school video machine! Pity I'm watching it on my old rubbish TV; time to get an LED/LCD.

PS. While I was looking at this, I also investigated a Mede8er. It looks pretty cool, but I'm more confident in the development and codec roadmap of the Popcorn Hour team.