I confess to being more stoked than usual to receive the latest from Blon, whose surprisingly refined, $30 BL03 has fully lived up to its massive hype and whose $42 BL05, while something of a sidegrade, also had its considerable virtues.

Enter the Blon A8 Prometheus, whose flamboyant design and $85 price tag suggest a company teeming with moxie. Its  metallic, open-holed shells (consisting of  14 irregular sides around a sealed cavity containing the single DD driver) looks like something out of the Terminator’s eye socket.

I have serious doubts if the open design actually has any sonic benefit, but it is certainly creative as hell. Packaging is minimal, and the burlap case is sorta useless, but the stock silver cable looks and feels premium.  I did find the Prometheus to be lighter and substantially more comfortable than its egg-shaped predecessors, although isolation is still sub-par and a lot of outside noise will intrude.  

At 32ohm/115db, the Blon A8 Prometheus seems like it would be pretty efficient, and it does get very loud with just a mobile. However, it improves considerably with amping, with better coherence and, in particular, more articulate reproduction of drums and percussion. The difference is so significant that I would not recommend these without an amp (I used the Cozoy Takt-C dac/amp for my observations below).

Unlike the Harman-tuned, generally polite and warm-sounding BL-03, the Blon A8 Prometheus opts for a bold, bright W-shaped  sound—forward and energetic, with added  (over)emphasis on the 5-10 kHz midrange area. Note texture is noticeably thicker than its predecessors and soundstage is wide, if somewhat low-ceilinged.  

Performers are well-separated, fairly accurately placed on stage and there’s an uncongested, airy quality to the presentation. They do have a bit of a clinical quality, in the sense that your ears get drawn to the prominent mid-frequencies rather than to a seamless whole, though overall clarity is excellent.

The Blon A8 Prometheus surprises with its bass quality—tight, well-sculpted and wholly free from bloom and bleed, with adequate but not massive  subbass throb. Mids are very forward and full—female  vox in particular sound forceful but also overamplified and  a tad shouty.  

Note 1: switching from stock silicon tips to foams does attenuate the midrange glare, but makes the bass boomy. I got the best results with Symbio W (silicone/foam) hybrid tips, which better controlled the low end. 

Note 2: these might adapt well to micropore taping or other nozzle mods; EQ would also help, though I’m generally too lazy to EQ.

Treble is crisp and very detailed but not especially smooth; some sharpness is presented on piano keys but drums have nice snap and sparkle. 

Timbral quality is the polarizing factor here. Compared to the cheaper BL-03, the Blon A8 Prometheus (seemingly by design) go for a more vivid,  amped-up tonality which works better for rock and techno and less well for acoustic fare—these sound more like an $85 hybrid than a DD.

While a palpably exciting listen, you don’t transcend the feeling you’re hearing a digital recording as opposed to a live performance Competitors at its pricepoint like the Tin T4 and Moondrop Starfield sound less digital and colored, especially at the high end, while the KBear Diamond is smoother, more cohesive and  more “live” sounding.

However, the Blon A8 Prometheus has tighter bass than the above, presents more microdetail and sounds “larger” and more expansive overall.  Moving up in price class to something like the Shozy Rouge or Simgot EN700 buys you better coherence and staging and more accurate reproduction, although rockheads may still prefer the gutsier presentation of the Prometheus.

So should you buy it? On its musical merits, it’s not audiophile-accurate but is still a lot of earphone for the money. Ultimately, though, it is as ear jewelry that Blon really scores and I would not be surprised if they sell tons of these to the fashionistas among us.  Kudos to them for designing something really different.

DISCLAIMER

These were provided to me gratis for review purposes by keephifi. I’ll pass ‘em on to the notoriously style-conscious Durwood for his opinion. 

Get the A8 from KeepHifi

Our generic standard disclaimer.

You find an INDEX of our most relevant technical articles HERE.

Contact us!

The post BLON A8 Prometheus Review (1) – Bring On the Bling, Beeyotch appeared first on Audio Reviews.

However, such background situation made my curiosity even more vivid when an opportunity developed for me to audition a pair of BL05s, a few weeks ago (my article here), and a pair of BL-01 now.

Also “pushed” by a couple of friends literally digging them I spent quite some time with my BL-01 sample in the past month or so, and I can easily say I’m impressed – both by the pros and the cons…

At-a-glance Card

Full Device Card

Test setup

Sources: Apogee Groove / Questyle QP1R / Sony NW-A55 mrWalkman – Radius DeepMount eartips – Nicehck 16core High Purity Copper cable – lossless 16-24/44.1-192 FLAC tracks.

Signature analysis

Technicalities

Physicals

Specifications (declared)

Considerations and conclusions

So as I mentioned in the beginning I found goods and bads with BL-01.

The two main negative aspects might be deal breakers (indeed the first one sadly is for me) : fit and source requirements.

About fit: I couldn’t possibly find a way to fit BL-01’s housings into my outer ear without resulting either in an unfirm grasp or in an uncomfortable one, or both. The housings are not shaped properly for me, and they are too “fat”. Add that their nozzles are infuriatingly short (sadly in good company there… Oxygen anyone?).

Long story short: if I “push the housings in” I do get a better seal a stability, but in less than 30 minutes I feel my outside cartilages aching; if I adopt longer eartips to compensate / avoid that, housings stay too much outside, don’t get properly “grasped” by my antitragus and antihelix, and normal head movements make them wobble, repeatedly loosing the seal.

I tried with all different tips I have (and I have quite a few), the sole ones that “reduce” the issue for me are Radius DeepMounts. The usual “YMMV” here is not enough: you really need better luck then me at compatibility with their shape.

About source requirements: from the electrical standpoint BL-01 fall in the “supereasy drive” class – 16 Ohm, 102 dB a piece of cake for any phone or whatever. However, major differences apply based on the source’s amp quality.

A lower end amp (stage) will make BL-01’s highmids glare out very soon, mid-bass transients longer & bloaty and the device will lose most of its layering / separation capability. The good amp for BL-01 needs to have great treble and bass control, and a clean power delivery.

Examples of counter-recommended amping sources: Fiio X3, BTR5; Hiby R3, R3Pro, R5; Meizu Hifi DAC Pro dongle; iFi ZEN CAN, Nano iDSD BL, and more. Examples of recommended amping sources, where the 3 issues go away : Sony NW-A55, Apogee Groove, Questyle QP1R, iFi Micro iDSD BL, Monolith Liquid Spark, Lotoo Paw GT.

On to the up side now.

When ideally paired – and if you are lucky enough for your ears to physically accept them for you – BL-01 are monumentally good all rounders.

Presentation and technicalities are on Ikko OH10‘s direction, surely less perfected but hey, at 1/5th of the price! And this by already factoring in the absolute need to swap BL-01’s bundled cable and tips with third party ones, otherwise it’s more like 1/10th!

Another very significant comparison is with their siblings BL-05s. Very simply put, it’s kinda like BL-05s is a BL-01 “shifted towards the trebles”. Both drivers show great technicalities, and a well calibrated presentation, with a very pleasant overall timbre and tonality.

BL05s fundamentally lack sub-bass, and deliver more attention on the high end; BL-01 the other way around. BL-05s do benefit like BL01 from higher quality amp pairing, but technicality delivery degradation when downscaling the amp is less dramatic on BL-05s, these are more indulgent so to say.

Finally, aesthetics apart (some do hate their color!), BL05s is indeed “almost easily” wearable for me, unlike their siblings, but… at twice the price.

Disclaimers

I got this pair of WGZBLON BL-01 as a review unit from my friends at KEEPHIFI (www.keephifi.com).

Our standard disclaimer

The post BLON BL-01 Review (2) – Give Me A Quality Source And I’ll Shine appeared first on Audio Reviews.