So as fate would have it again, reality always brings me back to earth. I was truly riding high with the Sundara for weeks before recent events. These events changed everything for me. I got Hifiman’s XS edition for starters. Yes, the one that everyone keeps talking about like it’s the latest coming of Jesus( not really but you get what I’m saying). People are going crazy over these headphones. Rtings gave it an amazing rating of 87 over the previous 84 that the Sundara’s got. Even high respected YouTubers like Josh Valour called it a must-have and the best $500 headphone… possibly even under $1000. I personally didn’t trust that they were that much better than the Sundara’s. So I decided to throw in the money to get them to test. (spoiler …I was wrong).
So the problem with comparisons is that they almost always destroy contentment. So I went into this with very narrow-minded views; determined to not be wowed simply because everyone else was. So when I played my first video comparison for vocal assessment I found something that I didn’t want to experience again. The XS was dead-centered split and spacious in every way it should be (with only 2 minutes of listening). I didn’t have to over listen, or carefully listen …it was very precise and great in its vocal placement and timbre. But when I went back to my Sundara’s I found unbalanced driver centering. The vocals that were placed dead center on the XS were now placed with the majority on the right side of my listening zone. So I stopped, unplugged the cables, and replayed the video. The same conclusion happened again. So I went back to the XS and once again dead centering …pinpoint placement and balance everywhere. Went back to the Sundara in horror just to be sure my nightmare was there again and it was. This happened to me before with the Sundara’s and I didn’t sense these were like that until I had something that was correctly balanced in comparison. Basically, this is the third pair of Hifiman Sundara’s that I own and it is now the last pair. I was so hurt and disappointed that I didn’t want to finish the comparisons. I really didn’t see the point for a while because I was so upset with Sundara’s issues. But I went through with it…
Obviously, the imaging and soundstage are better when you are perfectly centered and balanced out the way you should be vs off-centered results. But what shocked me more was that the XS was supposed to be harder to drive but with my L50 and E50…I found no such thing. I didn’t have to adjust the volume at all to get the same results I had from the Sundara in volume. But easily what others have said about the bass does exist. This unit’s bass is much more impactful and powerful than the Sundara on my same EQ settings. Of course without EQ neither…I wouldn’t say it was all that powerful in bass. But with it, the XS is a flat-out Beast. If I was to rank them in bass alone …the Sundara=7 ….XS=10. Not a 5 to 10 victory but a big enough difference to notice right away. The scale of the music was the next thing I notice. Just a bigger and larger music floor is present on the XS. It truly does feel exactly like Josh Valour discussed in his video( and I thought that he was just overhyping). Then finally, the Vocals and Timbre were better and more unique and distinctive compared to the Sundara, who was very good but not this. And that seems to be the theme. Everything was just Bigger Scaled.
So where is the bad stuff about these headphones? Well, that’s just it. I don’t see anything outside of the overall Size. Some people claim that this had a V shape signature…which I wouldn’t prefer, but it doesn’t in my opinion as the mids are very present and joyous. Then the biggest thing people claimed was that the clamping force was so weak that the headphone wouldn’t stay on your head when you turned your head or looked up and down. Not at all sure where that comes from or if it’s something that happens over time but this was not the case for me. The headphone just sits on my head perfectly comfortable. No hotspots or pressure at all. I can turn my head in all directions and it doesn’t fall off. So these things showed that the difference in the prices come to past in performance and that’s a great thing.
Finally, we have an upgrade to a headphone that at least tries to justify its price difference over its previous version. But even though I see all of this…I can’t say that I would have kept this over the Sundara if they actually didn’t have this driver balance issue because I’m not a fan of the size of the head pads. I’m not even sure if I should trust Hifiman at all at this point even with this XS working good and beating out the Sundara overall. In fact, is one of very few headphones that I believe are totally worth the cost. So many things are up in the air right now and I need more time to process this disappointment in my Sundara’s and allow myself more time to appreciate the totality of the Edition XS. The final review coming….
Tech-N-Things 