Genuinely top-of-class sound quality, great design and comfort
Engineering to this degree ramps up the cost significantly against the competition
In the years I've been reviewing high-end audio products I've made note of some favourites. Back in 2007 it was Shure's SE530s; after that Denon and Klipsch's flagship models always impressed; most recently I've been enjoying Ultimate Ears, in particular the latest UE 900s, as well as AKG's K3003s. So it's with a degree of excitement I review the Sennheiser IE 800s -- they may be the latest addition to my "all-time favourites" list.
It's important to understand who this pair of headphones is aimed at; they cost £600, which for in-ear headphones are some of the most expensive pairs on the market (although the AKGs mentioned above are double this). These are for audiophiles, and hardcore audiophiles at that. They are on sale now.
Design
Aesthetically the IE 800s have a distinct advantage over their competition in that they're very small. Much of the competition use multiple drivers or armatures in their earphones, and encase them in large bodies. The IE 800s are super small, incredibly lightweight and the least intrusive of all I've tested in recent years. They're closest in fit to the Klipsch X10s, which is no bad thing. They will suit small ears nicely, and the silicone tips in the box come in a range of sizes and offer excellent noise isolation and comfort.
Over the month I've been using these headphones I've worn them for hours on end and never found them physically fatiguing. I've even fallen asleep with them in comfortably.
To the rear are twin exhausts that contribute generously to the bass performance, which I'll come to shortly. Cabling is well engineered, with few tangling issues and suitably supportive casing around the areas the cable joins to the 3.5mm plug and to the headphones themselves.
Performance
Obviously the IE 800s sound good. They blow everything under about £200 out of the water. What Sennheiser seems to have attempted to do here though is engineer portable in-ear headphones with the same goals of its full-size headphones, such as its excellent-but-for-a-price HD 800s, that cost about a thousand quid.
The result is impressive to say the least. They're a remarkably open-sounding headphone, even for an in-ear model; they're breathtakingly clean and uncoloured in their tone, and with bass response deep enough almost to destroy buildings. On the high end, trebles sparkle -- almost glisten -- they're so bright and clear.
For listeners deeply concerned with finding a headphone that doesn't add colour to their audio, the IE 800s go to lengths to impress. That said, a little more warmth in the mid-range would have made me happier, personally speaking, as certain tracks from Amy MacDonald and Stevie Wonder did leave me wishing vocal presence was just a tad stronger.
Some dance and pop, such as Pendulum's bass-driven track
Slam, felt like they suited the natural sound of the IE 800s more than, say, acoustic did. The power of the bass, combined with the open sound of the high-end, gave me the feeling of being in the sonic sweet spot of a high-end London drum 'n' bass club, but without the smell of sweat and drugs. Yet the bass never gets boomy; the low-end is tightly controlled.
Throughout a tour of genres during testing, from dance and pop, through acoustic and classic rock, up to Norwegian black metal and the likes of Fleshgod Apocalypse, the IE 800s impress. There's no fatigue, physically or sonically. Even my current favourites, the Ultimate Ears UE 900s, are a tad fatiguing after four or five hours of listening. Not so with the Sennheisers.
They have a low impedance of 16 Ohms, so can be easily drive by portable devices. Their frequency response range goes from the crazy-low 5Hz right up to over 45kHz. Human hearing is around 20Hz to 20kHz, so safe to say the IE 800s have the spectrum covered for hi-res DSD audio, which I tested with the likes of Counting Crows to Nirvana, and doing so made my conclusion an easy one to write.
Conclusion
It's difficult not to admit the IE 800s are contenders for "best in-ear headphones I've yet heard", but it's equally tough not to admit they're so acutely engineered that they're priced too high, even for many of the world's most passionate music lovers. That said, they're a veritable bargain compared to the £1,200 AKG 3003s, with which I'd say they're on par with, performance- and design-wise. I'd certainly recommend buying two pairs of the Sennheisers over the AKGs, even if only to save one as a backup.
If money is no object, or if you're after the best without delving into four-figure price tags, the IE 800s get my recommendation. But if you're not a self-confessed audiophile and are simply looking to discard those Apple-made earbuds, you can reproduce a great deal of Sennheiser's sound quality here for half the price.
One for the elitists, then.
This article was originally published by WIRED UK
