HIFIMANEdition XS Stealth Magnets Planar Magnetic Hi-Fi Headphones +Headphone Travel Case-Black

The HiFiMAN Edition XS is an unusual headphone indeed among an already unusual range of headphones from HiFiMAN.Before we get to that though, the version of the product sold on Amazon differs from the version sold elsewhere in that it comes with a travel case. This case is provided instead of the usually included foam headphone stand insert (in fact the box is empty other than the case), so customers should be aware that you will need to purchase a headphone stand separately. The case is a clam shell design, very lightweight and easy to carry whilst feeling very sturdy with an included velcro pouch to store your headphone cable of choice that attaches to the inside of the case. This pouch isn't particularly large but seems a reasonable compromise as the case is simply large enough to contain these very large headphones and no larger. This decision has had some consequences, however.Many reviews of HiFiMAN headphones that you can find across the internet mention the poor quality cable supplied with the product, which apparently maintains its shape no matter how long it's been since you tried to uncoil it and is generally frustrating to use. The cable supplied with the XS appears to be a response to this criticism, as the rubber insulation used is very soft and malleable and effortlessly coils, uncoils and takes any shape as much as you like with no memory. Unfortunately it seems to be a bit too soft, as the cable tie provided with the cable was wrapped tightly enough to get the cable in the smallish pouch that it's managed to noticably dent the rubber. The cable is also not especially long (about 1.25m), presumably so that it can fit in the pouch. The cable works but it doesn't inspire confidence, looking and feeling cheap. Fortunately, I already had my own dual 3.5mm to 4.4mm aftermarket cable, so this has not been an issue for me. HiFiMAN use the same dual 3.5mm to X connection in all their latest releases, so a cable listed as compatible with the Sundara will work with the XS as it will nearly every HiFiMAN product still being sold. The fact that the cables are easily replaced makes this more of an annoyance than a dealbreaker. There is a sense that HiFiMAN are making a consistent attempt to respond to feedback and improve their product line, but also a sense that they know you'll replace the cable anyway. If you buy a HiFiMAN headphone, get a compatible aftermarket cable at the same time and check the cable provided with the headphone immediately upon arrival.None of this would matter of course if the headphone itself wasn't any good. As I said, the XS is quite unusual. The marketing refers to it as the latest update to the ~£1300 Edition X from 2016, startling for a product selling for around £480. This places it between the Sundara (£300) and the Ananda (~£650) in HiFiMAN's product stack whilst still being "ridiculously expensive" for those not familiar with the audiophile headphone market and how ridiculous prices can get. I have never tried the Ananda, but I owned the Sundara prior to purchasing the XS and so the remainder of this review will focus on what the extra £180 gets you over the Sundara. The Sundara can be summarised as a nearly perfect audiophile headphone for £300 with the biggest downside being the price - and you can get a lot worse for £300.The most controversial change is the headband design. There are as many people who strongly prefer the Sundara's faux leather headband strap design also used on the Ananda as there are people who hate it. The newly revised headband used on the XS and other more recent HiFiMAN products is a simple all-in-one padded headband with additional limited swivel on the earcups for extra flexibility and comfort. Personally, I find both headband designs to be equally comfortable and have no preference, which might actually be the most controversial take! The XS' headband is considerably larger than the Sundara's, however. I had to fully extend the Sundara's headband and it was still a little tight on my head, whilst with the XS I only extend them by one notch to fit them comfortably. That suggests that if the Sundara fits you comfortably, the XS will not and vice versa. This is the big dealbreaker for the XS over the Sundara, and if it sounds like the XS is simply too big for your head you can stop here.The most significant difference between the Sundara and XS is the earcup shape. The XS features the very large "teardrop"/"egg" shape that makes up the majority of their headphone designs and is their least expensive headphone with this design. It should cover your ear completely unless you are very unlucky. If you like the Sundara but the earcups awkwardly squash your ear cartilage, the Edition XS will not do that. The fact that the drivers are larger than your ears allows for much better vertical depth and imaging than the round cup design on the Sundara as well.The Sundara has yet to be updated with the Stealth Magnets (SMs) included in the latest revisions of HiFiMAN headphones, while the XS has been designed with them in mind from the outset. If you want a HiFiMAN headphone with SMs, this is the only model that is guaranteed to have them in every specimen other than the Susvara. The SMs are not merely a marketing gimmick and are designed to help your audio get out of its own way in a similar vein to open-back headphone design over closed-back and planar magnetic drivers over dynamic drivers.With closed-back headphones, sound bouncing back from the sealed back of the headphone travel through the next sound wave being generated and they subtly interfere with each other. This can be worked around but you don't need to worry about it with open-backs. Planar drivers are HiFiMAN's specialty and work by holding a tiny diaphragm in mid-air between two sets of magnets, the idea being that having nothing touching the diaphragm prevents interference from a voice coil attached to the diaphragm directly contributing to the overall sound like in a dynamic driver design. The Stealth Magnets extend this idea by preventing the magnets holding the diaphragm in place from interfering with the sound instead. This is achieved by making the magnets a very specific shape that lets the sound pass through with minimal bounceback or splash. While quite complicated in design, the end result is simple - your sound is reproduced at a consistent volume reliably without unexpected peaks and dips across the frequency response. The XS provides a more consistently smooth sound profile as compared to the Sundara, as apparently all SM revisions to other HiFiMAN products do compared to earlier versions without them. You can check out the measurement comparisons online to see the difference in more detail.Another effect of SMs seems to be that it is easier to reproduce accurate bass as well, and this is where the XS starts to significantly pull ahead of the Sundara in sound quality. The Sundara begins to roll-off noticably at 40Hz and under, while the XS doesn't roll-off until well under 20Hz - although the bass isn't exactly prominent either, being a consistent volume from 20 - 250Hz. Both headphones respond extremely well to EQ if you want the bass to extend cleanly to 20Hz and under or simply want to boost it, but the XS has less work to do to get there and is more accurate to begin with. Neither headphone is very bassy by default, but you can make them that way if you so desire.Going in the other direction, the XS has a very airy quality to its treble, extending very loudly and clearly past the point I can hear it normally and to a degree that frequencies I can't usually hear start showing up again. For me this is a major plus, but if you can't stand a bright-leaning sound signature then you probably don't want to buy a HiFiMAN headphone, as this is part of their house sound. The treble is noticably more prominent than the Sundara which already gives the treble and air regions lots of focus in its signature.In-between the two extremes, the Sundara and the XS are roughly the same, with the HiFiMAN house sound calling for a dip between 1000-3000Hz that is a deliberate tuning decision seen across their entire product range and not a shortcoming of the driver technology. Therefore, if like me you dislike this part of the sound signature, you can EQ it out quite easily. The XS has a more extreme dip than the Sundara, which is overall the more balanced sound of the two without EQ at the cost of rolloff at both ends of the audible spectrum.The XS runs rings around the Sundara in terms of imaging and soundstage, and the Sundara is no slouch on either front. The difference is most obvious on sound hard panned to the extreme left and right so that only one channel is producing the sound in mono - on the Sundara the sound will start to appear more muffled the farther from the centre it is which makes it feel quite imprecise and fuzzy to listen to. The XS on the other hand has barely any quality degradation no matter how hard you pan the sound in any direction, and this is likely the biggest contribution to how open and spacious it sounds on your head. You will be able to pick out detail on the periphery of a track in a way the Sundara cannot do as well. However, the very clean and clear centre masks this on both headphones. Gamers and people listening to binaural audio will likely notice the biggest improvement, and this is the true dealmaker for the XS. The perceived larger space on your head allows for more precise imaging as well and locating sound should be no trouble on the XS.There is one caveat to this, however. You will probably get better imaging performance out of a HiFiMAN headphone at any price point if you feed it with a "dual-mono" source. This is a form of audio reproduction that keeps the left and right channels completely separate - the channels use separate amp circuits and never have any chance to mix by mistake at any point in the chain. If you do not do this, you may experience a "deadzone" of sorts in the centre image, where sound lightly panned less than ~15 degrees in either direction is artificially snapped to the centre channel at 0 degrees. This can subjectively make music sound more coherent in the centre but could be quite disorienting when gaming. The iFi Zen DAC v2 and the FiiO K7 are both dual-mono amps and you need to use the balanced 4.4mm connection on these amps to keep the channels truly separated, which will require a specialised aftermarket cable that you can find right here on Amazon.If all that sounds hokey to you, then a balanced input to your headphone will get you an extra 6dB anyway and make it easier to get to a listenable volume so it's worth a punt. While the Sundaras reach a listenable volume quite easily without an amp, the XS is that little bit harder to drive to the point that you'll struggle to get as much out of it without an amp.The Edition XS and Sundara are similar enough that you don't need both. The Sundara is undeniably the better value buy for most people. The XS is never explicitly worse than the Sundara at anything but costs £180 more. If however the features that the XS outclasses the Sundara in are worth the extra money to you like they are to me, then you will find yourself extremely satisfied with your purchase of the Edition XS. I would happily recommend the Sundara to everyone willing to spend the money, but not so the XS, and headphones only get more specific and niche past this price point. At under £500 though, I struggle to see how you could improve on these headphones in a meaningful way.EDIT: It's been about eleven months since I originally wrote this review and it's already a little outdated. I've left the main body unchanged for integrity reasons except to correct an inaccuracy - balanced connections typically provide an extra 6dB of volume, not 3! - but on top of that an addendum is required.First, I stand by what I said in the original review. Eleven months enjoying these headphones have reinforced my approval and enjoyment of them. They are definitely not for everyone - no headphone is. In fact, I now have a "4 in 5 Rule" - no matter how good a headphone is, 4 in 5 people will rave over it and 1 in 5 will wonder what the fuss is all about. Keep this in mind when purchasing expensive headphones, and try before you buy whenever possible. I thought they were worth £480 so of course I think they're easily worth £375! 1 in 5 of you will disagree with me, however.Since this review was first posted I have learned that planar drivers are more delicate than dynamic drivers - a side-effect of the diaphragm actually being lighter than air in order to work correctly, so keep this in mind and be careful handling them. The fact that XS packages from Amazon and elsewhere seem to not be correctly marked as fragile is probably contributing to the unfortunate large minority of dead on arrival units reported here and elsewhere. I personally have had no issues with my specimen other than infrequently having to remove hair from the earcups. Note that hair can also cause the sound to distort so should be removed promptly if you find any in yours. Additionally, it has been discovered that the XS/Ananda driver has a shortcoming between 4-6KHz that may cause it to distort in your specimen. If you're affected or just want to avoid the issue, you can resolve the problem with EQ as it's an underdamping problem; the driver is resonating too much on very specific frequencies which should have been corrected by the acoustic chamber of the headphone but wasn't properly. You may never notice it, or you may find it very obvious - everyone's ears are different. In general, I recommend EQing a headphone anyway, so this doesn't affect my opinion of the product other than making me suspect it's the reason they're not charging £1300 for it!There's one major change since this review was published: the Ananda Nano was released. I have started seeing this for £500 and under, so I guess that's an improvement on the XS for under £500! The Ananda Nano has had the diaphragm replaced with the newer (even lighter and more delicate) design used in the Arya and HE 1000 - a driver upgrade is a massive difference! I have not felt the need to upgrade so I cannot provide a comparison of the Nano to the XS, but if you're having consistent distortion issues, consider this new revised model instead. The Ananda Stealth on the other hand is the Edition XS with a different headband at this point - the v3 Stealth uses the XS' drivers. The v1 and v2 Ananda are no longer sold new so you won't find them here. If the headband is a problem for you on the XS but you enjoy the sound, consider the Ananda Stealth instead - they are now selling for very similar prices in most places.

First thing is first, in terms of sound quality these things are incredible for the price. I've been fortunate enough to own all of the 600 series of Sennheiser headphones and these are easily right up there with the best of them and if I'm being completely honest I prefer the sound on these over all of the 600 series but your mileage may vary obviously.Be wary though:Hifiman Seem to be quite notorious for not having the best quality control and I discovered this with this headphone. The first pair that I received, The right ear cup just straight up didn't work, But thankfully Amazon sorted me out and had a replacement out to me pretty much the next day. It's one of the reasons I chose to buy it from Amazon as opposed to buying from Hifiman directly.The second pair Work perfectly and the sound is stunning. I purchased these along with the Topping DX3 Pro+ and I was not disappointed. These are the first headphones that I have not had to EQ, And although I'm no "Audiophile", I appreciate my sound and I do like and recognize the difference good sound quality can make.Vocals are wonderful and crisp not too sharp and very clear. At first I thought that the bass I was a bit lacking but after a while I realized that my preference was the thing at fault and it had been drowning out a lot of the clarity. These headphones made me understand just how important it is to have a balanced all around sound and that's exactly how the bass sounds on these they sound just right. Thumpy enough to make you feel it and enjoy it but not overbearing or muddy. You do need a good amp and dac combo to get the most out of these I would say but once you do you really are in for a treat.In terms of comfort the Sennheiser's have these beat easily out of the box, If you have a big head and big ears you'll have no problem with these but the headband isn't the best and although they are light they just aren't as comfortable as most Sennheiser headphones.This is easily fixed though with an aftermarket comfort strap and I would highly recommend you Google search Capra Audio And get the comfort strap For these headphones because it really is a game changer and makes these headphones infinitely more comfortable especially for longer listening sessions.All in all at this price point I don't think there's any other headphones that come close.

For the price this headphone is punching well above its weight. The soundstage is nice a wide while the signatature is a nicely tune Planar driver. Has great sparkly detail in the trble without being too sibilant and the bass it impactful enough to make most bassheads happy. Comfort is great too but if I being critical can be a tad loose. The headband is also comfortable but ai had to use a cover with extra padding so it fit on my head as these were clearly designed for large headed people. But once I put the cover on I was super happy with the result and now this headphone is my daily driver. A fantastic release that could easily be endgame material for most people. Music and movies both sound great. It would get 5 sdars if not for the slightly loose fit.