BLON BL-05S Review (3) – Third Oppoty’s The Charm, You Better Belief It!

Pros

Light and comfortable. Good fit.
Smooth and organic tonality.
Good technical performance for a budget single DD (though still won’t beat multi BA/hybrids in general).
Good timbre.
Fixes fit issues and midbass bloat of the BLON BL-03, fixes shouty upper mids of the BLON BL-05 (non S).
Quite all rounder for most music genres.
Above average isolation.
Good price to performance ratio.

Cons:

Gaudy coloured shells, takes guts to wear it outdoors!
Distorts with higher volume/overly robust EQ.
Same crappy accessories (stock eartips/cable).
May be overly safe in tuning, some may find it lacks pizzaz.
Bass is not the most textured.
Fares better with amping. May not be getting full potential with low powered smartphones.

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

It does take a brave BLON cultist to wear the BLON BL-05S down the street, due to the unconventional radioactive green shells. But don’t judge an Oppoty by its cover, this is one set with an excellent price to performance ratio, boasting an organic and coherent tonality, good technical performance and accurate timbre for a budget single DD set.

This third Oppoty’s the charm. You Better Belief It! After the false dawn of the BLON BL-05 (non S), which didn’t have the best reviews for overly shouty upper mids, the BLON BL-05S has tamed the upper mids of the BLON BL-05 (non S), and simultaneously fixed the midbass bloat and fit issues of the venerable BLON BL-03. I’m glad BLON “Never gave up” after the BLON BL-05 (non S) fiasco.

SPECIFICATIONS

• Driver Type: 3rd generation 10 mm carbon diaphragm (single dynamic driver)
• Impedance: 32 ohms
• Sensitivity: 108 dB/mW
• Cable type: 2 pin 0.78 mm
• Tested at $39 USD

ACCESSORIES

In addition to the IEM, it comes with:

1) Silicone tips.

2) Stock cable.

3) Sackcloth pouch.

Essentially the famous (or rather infamous) stock accessories of previous BLON iterations is here to greet us. This includes a barely serviceable cable and the usual BLON tips and lame sackcloth pouch. The familiar BLON box advising BLON cultists to “LET MUSIC BURN”, together with BELIEF and NEVER GIVING UP and OPPOTY greets us in a rainbow coloured hue.

Budget CHIFI companies need to cut costs somewhere, so as to pass down a cheaper price to the consumers, and accessories are usually the first area they target. Some CHIFI (cough cough TRN BA8 and TRN VX) retailing at more expensive prices may also have a similar dearth of accessories, so I won’t beat BLON with a stick for this and can close one eye. Anyway, what’s more important is the IEM’s internals and how it sounds, and I think those of us in this CHIFI hobby might have some aftermarket tips and cables lying about, so no biggie swapping the BLON BL-05S’s stock tips and cables out.

With regards to whether aftermarkets cables affect the sound on the BLON BL-05S, well that’s a big can of worms that is beyond the scope of this review. Suffice to say, I respect both camps. You save a lot of money in this hobby if you don’t believe in cables, while cable believers will have a new area in the audio chain to play with to achieve audio nirvana. Anyway, I think we’ll agree that most aftermarket cables will still be better asthetically and haptically than the stock one provided by BLON.

BUILD/COMFORT

The BLON BL-05S is very well fitting, similar to its BLON BL-05 (non S) older brother, it is very ergonomic and comfortable. It is much better fitting than the infamous BLON BL-03’s poor fit with stock tips/cables, due to the latter having a too short nozzle.

I didn’t find any driver flex. I liked that the BLON BL-05S came with a 2 pin connector, as I had tons of issues with MMCX connectors and their general longevity in the past.

The BLON BL-05S has a very garish radioactive green lick of paint. I tried wearing it outdoors and got a myriad of looks from passerbys, ranging from the disapproving to curious to disbelief (these heathen have no Belief in the BLON cult!). It was as though they were observing an alien device from another planet.

And this is the most dangerous thing about the green shells that I have to warn you folks about: your significant other will definitely notice that a new IEM has come in the mail, due to the obvious colour. And no, they will not be green with envy (no pun intended) seeing another IEM added to the collection. In fact, you might even be chased out of the house or have to sleep on the floor at night. There’s no excuse to disguise it as one of the other conventional black or silver coloured IEMs in your pokemon (gotta catch them all) collection of IEMs. Even my wife, who isn’t into audio, knew it was a new IEM from the colour. I took the Oppoty opportunity to try to disguise it as a preexisting Moondrop SSR (both had the radioactive green colour), but no dice, the Moondrop anime waifu box wasn’t present and it was just a lame mispelling of Oppoty and Belief on the box that let the cat out of the bag.

The radioactive green colour unfortunately doesn’t glow in the dark, so I don’t know what is the purpose of said colour, maybe to be radical and stand out from the cut throat competition at this price bracket? Perhaps for the local mainland Chinese who like jade, it might be an auspicious sign, but I got a feeling a lot of Westerners may not be willing to wear this colour outside. I hope BLON can consider producing the BLON BL-05S in conventional colours in the future, it shouldn’t be so difficult to do a new paint job isn’t it?

ISOLATION

At the risk of getting arrested by the police for wearing the garishly coloured shells out in the subway (for the sake of audio!), I found that the isolation of the BLON BL-05S is above average. As per most vented single DD sets, it won’t beat non vented multi BA types in this area.

DRIVABILITY/SOURCE

For the purposes of this review, I tried the BLON BL-05S with a Khadas Tone Board -> Fiio A3 amp, Khadas Tone Board -> Topping L30 amp, Shanling Q1 DAP and Tempotec Sonata HD Pro. The BLON BL-05S is drivable from low powered smartphones, but scales better in soundstage, details and dynamics with amping. I preferred warmer sources with it in general, to give a bit more heft in the bass.

Unfortunately the BLON BL-05S distorts with higher volumes or overly robust EQ, that’s one area of weakness in the driver. So for those that like to blast their music or fiddle with a lot of EQ, this might be one area that may be a potential dealbreaker.

SOUND & TECHNICALITIES

The BLON BL-03 was lauded for excellent tonality and timbre, but had an achilles heel of a bloated midbass that couldn’t keep up with fast/complex bass movements. Not to mention the BLON BL-03 had fit issues due to the too short nozzles (which necessitated most folks to buy aftermarket tips +/- cables) and it had below average technicalities to boot. The next BLON, the BLON BL-05 (non S), tried to fix these problems by lowering the midbass quantity and fixed the fit issues of the BLON BL-03, but was decried for having shouty upper mids/lower treble and a somewhat off tonality in the mids (probably a seesaw effect due to the bass reduction).

I’m glad to report that this third OPPOTY is the legit charm. The BLON BL-05S combines the best characteristics of both the older BLONs and irons out their major deficits. The BLON BL-05S fixes the midbass bloat and lowers the midbass quantity of the BLON BL-03, and fixes the poor fit of the BLON BL-03. It also manages to tame the shouty upper mids/lower treble of the BL-05 (non S) with a better balanced tonality in the mids. The icing on the cake, is that the BLON BL-05S is technically superior to both the BLON BL-03 and BLON BL-05 (non S) too.

The BLON BL-05S sports a mild V shaped tuning, rather consumer friendly and coherently tuned, it is quite all rounder for most music genres as such.

BLON BL-05S’s bass is just slightly north of neutral, more subbass than midbass focused. It isn’t a basshead set for sure. For a DD set, the subbass doesn’t have the best extension, I would have preferred more subbass quantity and extension actually, but the BLON BL-05S’s bass is faster than the BLON BL-03’s bass, though it’s not that well textured or accurate compared to some DD peers at the same price range. There’s no midbass bleed and those that found the BLON BL-03 too bass heavy might like this set in the bass department.

The BLON BL-05S’s lower mids are a tinge recessed compared to upper mids, though the lower mids don’t seem as recessed as on the BLON BL-05 (non S). There’s a slight upper mids boost at the 2 kHz area, but it isn’t shouty at all (despite what the graphs would suggest). The BLON BL-05S can still on rare occasions get hot in the upper mids with boosted volumes (fletcher munson curve), but at moderate volumes, it is very tamed compared to most of the budget CHIFI out there. Female vocals are still more forward than male vocals, but not shouty. The upper mids/lower treble on the BLON BL-05S is much better than the BLON BL-05 (non S) in being not as harsh. The BLON BL-05S is more well balanced in tonality for the mids as such, and I liked that the mids were rather transparent. I would have preferred a bit thicker note weight in the mids, but this is just nitpicking.

Treble is quite well extended on the BLON BL-05S, with a good amount of details, but without sibilance/harshness. I’m treble sensitive and this treble actually falls on the safer side tuning wise, maybe trebleheads and those wanting a bit more pizzaz in their music might find the treble too tame actually. Perhaps for the cable believers, you can try using a silver plated cable with the BLON BL-05S and see if it does bring some clarity and details to the forefront.

Technicalities (in imaging, instrument separation and details) are better in the BLON BL-05 than the older BLON siblings. Against other multi BA/hybrids at the same price bracket, perhaps the BLON BL-05S can’t beat them in the technicalities department, as is expected of the limitation of a single driver. But for a sub $50 USD single DD set, I would consider it as having good technicalities for sure, with the driver being one of the faster single DDs I have heard at this price range. The BLON BL-05S’s soundstage depth is about average, but the width and height is above average. While the soundstage is not exactly classleading (my pick goes to the Final Audio E3000 at this price range), music never sounded congested on the BLON BL-05S for me.

Timbre is accurate for acoustic instruments as per its single DD roots. Note weight is moderate – it isn’t as thick as the BLON BL-03’s note weight, but isn’t as thin as that in the BLON BL-05.

COMPARISONS

I chose some common budget single DD sets to compare below. I left out multi BA/hybrids from the comparison as the different transducers have their own pros and cons, so it would be an apples to oranges comparison as such.

As per the above graphs, though the graphs of these 3 BLONs appear similar from afar, these sets actually sound very different (they do use different drivers too among the three and slight changes in bass/upper mids can cause a see saw effect in how the ears perceive the rest of the frequency spectrum). Suffice to say, the BLON BL-05S manages to fix the shouty upper mids of the BLON BL-05 (non S) and fix the midbass bloat of the BLON BL-03 very successfully.

VS the BLON BL-03:

The BLON BL-05S is different in tonality and tuning to the original BLON BL-03, so it is not a direct upgrade in a sense. Those wanting an upgraded version of the analoguish bassy warm tuning of the BLON BL-03 best look elsewhere. The BLON BL-05S has a tinge of warmth but is not as warm tuning wise compared to BLON BL-03. BLON BL-05S has a clearer treble but less subbass quantity, though subbass quantity on the BLON BL-03 is a bit tough to discuss among different individuals as most are using different aftermarket tips due to the poor fitting stock tips of the BLON BL-03. And different aftermarket tips give different isolation and bass amounts.

The BLON BL-05S has a more tamed midbass with minimal midbass bleed, with better technicalities (in imaging, clarity, instrument separation and soundstage and details). It fixes the slow and bleeding midbass of the BLON BL-03 with faster bass speed. I find it more balanced than the bassy BLON BL-03 actually.

The BLON BL-05S has better fit for sure, and better isolation, no need to mess with aftermarket tips.

Both have very legit timbre as per their DD roots, but BLON BL-03 has slightly better instrumental timbre in terms of timbral accuracy.

I feel they are complimentary sets, the BLON BL-03 having slightly better timbre and having a warm bassy analoguish tuning. The BLON BL-05S has better balancing in the mids and midbass, and it brings better fit and technicalities to the table. I think the BLON BL-05S has fixed the 2 main issues of the BLON BL-03 (ie crap fit and the midbass bloat), though it loses a bit of the warm analoguish bassy sound. One can consider the BLON BL-05S to be the BLON BL-03 MK2 that all BLON cultists are clamouring for, but the tuning is a bit different to really describe it as a direct spiritual successor, as bass forward music still has more midbass punch on the BLON BL-03.

VS the BLON BL-05 (non S):

I think most will agree the BLON BL-05 (non S) wasn’t that well received in view of the overly shouty upper mids, and its mids were off tonally wise, so the BLON BL-05S is a big improvement in this area. BLON BL-05S’s mids are more balanced, with the upper mids not being as hot (and the lower mids not being as recessed) as the BLON BL-05 (non S).

The BLON BL-05S doesn’t have as cold a tonality as the BLON BL-05 (non S), and timbre sounds more natural than the BLON BL-05 (non S).

Fit and isolation is similar between the two siblings. Technicalities are better than the BLON BL-05 (non S).

Overall I think the BLON BL-05S has made the BLON BL-05 (non S) superfluous. The BLON BL-05S is better in the 3 Ts: tonality, timbre and technicalities, no contest. So for those who are wondering between the 2, just skip the BLON BL-05 (non S). The BLON BL-05 (non S) will probably be a footnote now that the BLON BL-05S is in town.

VS the Tin HIFI T2 Plus

The Tin HIFI T2 Plus is a crowd favourite, sporting a U shaped tuning that is coherent and balanced, having good timbre and tonality. The Tin T2 Plus has a very inoffensive signature, but I find the Tin T2 Plus lacking a bit in dynamics and attack/bite compared to the BLON BL-05S.

The upper mids on the Tin T2 Plus are less boosted, with also less midbass punch/bass quantity than the BLON BL-05S. The Tin T2 Plus has slightly more extension/quantity in the treble and the bass is a bit more accurate than the BLON BL-05S.

The Tin T2 Plus also has poorer isolation, and has slightly poorer details and imaging than the BLON BL-05S when both are amped decently. Tin T2 Plus has better clarity and instrument separation. The Tin T2 Plus that I have unfortunately has a wonky MMCX connector on one side, and from forum reports it seems a few other users have been having MMCX issues from this model too and some of the older Tin HIFI MMCX ones (eg Tin T4, Tin T2 Pro). I think the penny has finally dropped for Tin HIFI and they are shifting towards 2 pin connectors in their newer releases (I prefer 2 pin connectors to MMCX ones for longevity any day). But if you are considering the Tin T2 Plus, it might behoof you to get it from somewhere with a good returns policy eg Amazon, in case an MMCX lemon comes in the mail.

Overall, just focusing on sound (and setting QC aside), I would consider the BLON BL-05S to be a sidegrade or at best marginal upgrade (if we were to split hairs here). Both are very good budget single DD sets, it may boil down to your sonic and music genre preferences. The BLON BL-05S has slightly better imaging and dynamics and edges it for me over the Tin T2 Plus most of the time. Maybe for classical genres, I’ll take the Tin T2 Plus for its more neutralish signature, though I personally find the Tin T2 Plus a bit boring and less dynamic for other genres, so it gets less air time for me, but YMMV.

VS the Moondrop SSR

The Moondrop SSR is tuned somewhat diffuse-field neutral with an upper mids boost, with a colder tonality and thinner note weight and poorer isolation. It has less bass and is much more sibilant than the BLON BL-05S. Moondrop SSR is shoutier at the upper mids/lower treble than the BLON BL-05S, especially when used at louder volumes (Fletcher Munson Curve). Moondrop SSR is the technical superior of the BLON BL-05S in the areas of better clarity, imaging, details and instrument separation.

I’ve said this before, but the Moondrop SSR actually sounds nice at low volumes, but by pumping up the volume a few dB, the 3 kHz area is shouty and is too much for me (Fletcher Munson Curve). The Moondrop SSR has very polarizing reviews, and I think this may be due to the different volumes all of us are using it at, and volume levels are typically not mentioned by reviewers or consumers. Not to mention the different sources, tips, hearing health we all have may affect our perception of upper mids/treble in the Moondrop SSR. After doing A/B testing using the same source, tips (and even cable), I’ll take the BLON BL-05S any day over the Moondrop SSR, as the 3 kHz peak and the sibilance on the SSR is a deal breaker for me.

Different strokes for different folks though, I know a lot of our friends like the Moondrop SSR, especially those that use it at lower volumes. The Moondrop SSR actually has better technical performance than the BLON BL-05S, but unfortunately it isn’t my cup of tea in terms of tonality, and I’ll take tonality over technical performance as my first priority.

VS the iBasso IT00

The iBasso IT00 is a U shaped set that comes with better accessories but unfortunately has driver flex. The iBasso IT00 has better extension at both ends (subbass/treble). The iBasso IT00 is more basshead, and is warmer sounding with a thicker lower mids. Upper mids are less boosted on the iBasso IT00. Technical performance is about thereabouts between the two sets.

The BLON BL-05S distorts with higher volume/overly robust EQ, and may lack a bit of dynamics compared to the iBasso IT00, but overall I would consider them sidegrades, with the iBasso IT00 perhaps better for bassheads/bass forward music and those that love a coloured and thick lower mids frequency.

VS the HZSound Heart Mirror

The HZSound Heart Mirror is tuned neutralish bright with less midbass quantity and is less “fun sounding” than the BLON BL-05S, especially when bass foward music is involved. The HZSound Heart Mirror sounds a bit more analytical and colder. Timbre and technicalities are better on the HZSound Heart Mirror. Both sets have fast drivers for a single DD but the HZSound Heart Mirror wins in transient response speed. The BLON BL-05S has lesser upper mids boost than the HZSound Heart Mirror and is generally less fatiguing for longer sessions than the HZSound Heart Mirror.

Isolation is better on the BLON BL-05S. The HZSound Heart Mirror is $10 – 15 USD more expensive, and this may be explained by the better accessories on the HZSound Heart Mirror. Both sets do better with amping, but the HZSound Heart Mirror scales much more with amping. Unfortunately, the BLON BL-05S driver distorts with higher volumes/EQ, so that’s an area of weakness when pumping up the volume compared to the HZSound Heart Mirror.

I see the V shaped BLON BL-05S and neutralish bright HZSound Heart Mirror as complimentary sets with different tunings to suit different music genres/preferences. The HZSound Heart Mirror is superior in vocals and instrumental timbre and technical performance (though this is with amping), but is a bit thinner in note weight and colder in tonality. For bass forward music or for something warmer and less analytical, I’ll still pick the BLON BL-05S. If one has no powerful source available (eg just a low powered smartphone), then go for the BLON BL-05S instead, as the HZSound Heart Mirror needs amping to sound good.

CONCLUSIONS

The BLON BL-05S succeeds in fixing the main issues of the BLON BL-03 (ie poor fit, poor technicalities and bloated midbass) and the BLON BL-05 (non S) (in the shouty upper mids), and also adds better technicalities to the mix. It has one of the better technicalities in a budget single DD set, with fast transients, though multi BA/hybrids at the same price bracket will generally trump the BLON BL-05S in this department.

Timbre on the BLON BL-05S is good, the tuning is rather coherent and smooth with no major peaks/troughs in the tuning. It has good price to performance ratio and should be a good all rounder for most music genres. Crap accessories aside, the BLON BL-05S does distort with higher volumes/overly robust EQ, so that’s one area to take note for those that like to blast their music or fiddle with EQ. The colour of the shells may be a potential deal breaker too, though I would take a weird/ugly looking yet good sounding earphone over a beautiful but lousy sounding set any day.

The BLON BL-05S isn’t a direct successor to the BLON BL-03 in my opinion, as it loses the analoguish midbass heavy sound signature of the BLON BL-03 to pursue better balance, speed and technical performance. Otherwise, the BLON BL-05S is a set that lives up to the name “price to performance ratio”. So this third Oppoty‘s the charm. You can Belief that and I’m glad BLON Never gave up after the BLON BL-05 (non S) fiasco. Let music burn!!!!

MY VERDICT

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DISCLAIMER

I would like to thank Wooeasy for providing this review unit. The BLON BL-05S can be gotten from the Wooeasy Earphones Store! at $39 USD.

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