Bolt Head Reads Atc- M20 -12.9 What Does It Mean

: Neat build quality. Detachable cable. Great control throughout. Reasonably easy to drive.

: Headband tension is a little stiff.

Introduction

As planar magnetic technology becomes more widely adopted the benefits trickle down to the consumers in the form of more choices and lower prices. Now I'grand not going to become into particular well-nigh how planar headphones piece of work hither or the pros and cons every bit there's plenty of information on the internet for those curious to acquire more.

Acoustic Research has just released their commencement ever planar magnetic headphone and they're calling it the AR-H1 and that'due south what nosotros'll exist looking at today.

About Audio-visual Research

Acoustic Research was founded in 1952 and has a long history of innovation in Hello-Fi speakers. In 1983 it was acquired by VOXX International Corporation, a Global manufacturer and distributor of lifestyle products. Since 2011 the company has had a "Renewed focus on High-End and Digital". In 2015 they released their 2d generation G class How-do-you-do-Res sound role player and USB-DAC. 2016 saw the introduction of the M20 equally the tertiary generation Hi-Res player. The company says they take:

A long term commitment to excellence" and wish to "go along to honor the vision of the founder and to build audio systems that most truthfully reproduce the information they receive from recordings.

Disclaimer

This sample was sent to me for the purpose of an honest review. I take no affiliation with the company and all observations and opinions hither are my ain, based on my feel with the production.

The Acoustic Research AR-H1 has a suggested retail cost of $599 and will be available for purchase soon directly from Acoustic Research'south website.

Like most people on this blazon of site I'grand a lover of music. In my younger days I spent several years every bit a hip-hop DJ (using real vinyl and turntables) as well every bit producing a diversity of music on computer using a combination of MIDI and live instruments. I did a Home Studio Sound Certificate at the Milton School of Audio Engineering in Brisbane, Queensland which covered the setup of audio for playback and recording in a studio environment along with other bones engineering principles. Nowadays I prefer to merely listen to and savour music.

My gustatory modality in music has inverse a great deal over the years. For a long fourth dimension my simply involvement was in rap and hip-hop music. At present though I listen to all kinds of music including jazz, classical, stone, psytrance, folk and ambient. I listen to music everyday using portable gear consisting of a DAP and mostly IEMs or simple desktop setup consisting of a laptop and DAC at work and my desktop setup at dwelling house which is based effectually my PC or Shinrico D3S with a DAC, frequently but not always including a tube amp and total-sized headphones or speakers.

My preferred sound signature is fairly counterbalanced with slightly elevated mid-bass and deep well-extended sub-bass, clear and resolving midrange with a touch of warmth and make clean, airy treble. I'm non offended by brighter sounding gear but dislike any sibilance. The bulk of my music is sixteen/44.1 flac files equally I stopped using physical media (CD/vinyl) many years agone and prefer the convenience of digital formats.

I often list a number of tracks or albums that I have used for testing a specific production in my reviews and they usually relate to things I've been listening to at the fourth dimension of the review but notation that during all my testing there are a number of Additional standard tracks that I utilise for testing diverse aspects but exercise not list these in my reviews.

Specifications
- Open dorsum circumaural design
- 86mm planar driver with NdFeB magnet assortment
- Genuine leather headband
- Depression resilience ear absorber
- Interchangeable headphone cable
- Frequency response: 10 to 60kHz
- Sensitivity: 99dB/V
- Impedance: 33 ohms

Packaging and accessories

*Please notation that this is the pre-production box and the concluding retail version may vary slightly. Yet the headphones themselves ARE the final production version.

The AR-H1 arrives in a big box covered in a matte blackness sleeve. On the forepart is a glossly black outline of the headphones with some of the features listed. On the back is merely printed "TRUTH IN LISTENING" in white print.

Removing the sleeve reveals the box itself which is once more a matte black with the AR logo embossed in silvery on the front. The pinnacle section of the box opens up like a book cover and inside yous run into a flat black console with a ribbon pull-upwards attached to the bottom. Lifting this up you're presented with the headphones held securely in a soft black foam. On the underside of the flat panel pullout is a layer of protective foam with a small box attached at the top which is conspicuously labeled "ACCESSORIES". Inside this is the cablevision and a grayness colored, soft, suede-similar protective pouch and a screw on six.35 mm adapter..

The cable is approximately 1.5 meters long and has a smoothen, rubberized PVC sheathing. The cable feels to be of good quality and seems very durable. It'south supple with no sign of kinks and sits quite nicely. At the top are two 2.5 mm 2-pole plugs that connect to the headphones. Down farther is a rubber Y-split with nice strain reliefs on at both ends. Finally the cable terminates in a straight three.5 mm gilt-plated metal plug with an AR logo on information technology. The plug and adapter feel very premium and bring together together seamlessly.

Build, condolement and isolation

As soon as you lift this headphone out of the box you can feel information technology'southward very well congenital. The AR-H1 boasts an all metal construction that feels well weighted (simply non heavy) and robust. The metal curvation connects to a metal clasp from which the cocky adjusting leather headband extends. The yoke is really solid and has absolutely no flex or bend to it and feels particularly strong. This is of course fastened to the rectangular earcup housing which is covered with a ventilated metal grill and contains the 86mm planar commuter with NdFeB magnet array.

The yoke swivels back and forth to help achieve a comfortable fit and the earcups as well hinge upward and downwards and adjust themselves to your particular caput shape. This means that you don't really need to fuss with anything, you tin simply put them on and they'll sit correctly autonomously.

Silky polish and soft pleather ear pads beautify the driver'southward front plate and experience very premium. They're filled with a soft memory foam and are attached via a clip-on machinery making them like shooting fish in a barrel to replace should you always need to.

Personally I find the AR-H1 very comfortable. The retentivity foam ear pads are squeamish and soft and big enough to fit fully around even my big ears and at the same time forming a good seal. The headband is nice and wide but at that place's a fairly stiff downward-strength and it's quite stiff so I would have liked to meet a lilliputian more padding on the underside. For the most part though I tin wear these for a long time with no problems.

Existence an open back style sound isolation is non very practiced as y'all probably can imagine and so like about open back headphones y'all'll need or at least desire a fairly quiet surround. Noise leakage is present merely nowhere nearly as much as I expected. It seems the AR-H1 let's in more than noise than it lets out which could be good or bad depending on the state of affairs.

Sound

Sources used for testing

• Flac/Foobar2000 > Arcam irDAC-2
• Flac/Foobar2000 > Topping DX7
• Acoustic Research AR-M20
• ATC HDA-DP20 > Phatlab Sassy II

The AR-H1 has a fairly linear sound signature that is slightly mid-frontwards with great separation and clarity throughout. While existence detailed and largely uncolored it'due south still very musical and entertaining. It'due south quite dependent on source equally I found the properties of different sources to play a large factor in the last sound (more info in the "pairing" department below).

Music has a very "make clean" presentation, over again with clarity being a discussion that keeps coming to my mind. However the AR-H1 is not what I would consider a detail monster. It's still pretty forgiving to poorly recorded music and doesn't reproduce the most subtle of micro-details but tends to smooth them over a bit. That means information technology's not the most resolving merely personally I detect it a strength equally it draws the line betwixt musical and analytical and allows the AR-H1 to remain on the side of the one-time.

Bass is close to neutral with well a well defined border to bass notes simply still has a natural decay. It can keep stride with busy/fast tracks just as well as it brings the "meat" in slower bass oriented hip-hop and electronic music. Sub-bass has a picayune less emphasis than the mid-bass and has good extension but is fairly easygoing. Listening to Westside Connectedness's "So Many Rappers in Dear" the deep sub-bass notes can be conspicuously heard but don't drown out everything else which tin sometimes happen with less technical headphones. Bassheads will likely feel shortchanged but lovers of neutrality should be pleased.

Mids are lavishly articulated with great tonality and instrument separation. Vocals evidence no signs of graininess and are reproduced with accuracy. The vocals in "Chop-chop" from John Legend's Evolver anthology are a joy to listen to with Brandy'due south silky smooth vocalization in particular coming to the forefront. There's smashing residual to be heard in "Vii ii Eight" by Triosense with the pianoforte just slightly taking the lead simply leaving plenty of infinite for everything else to come through.

Treble is close to neutral and is fairly polite. It gives a adept sense of air and never becomes intrusive. Extends very well and the sheen of cymbals sounds very lifelike and natural. At that place does seem to be a slight peak in the lower treble that sometimes edges on sibilant and I would take liked to run into a hint more of a dip there to proceed that in check. Overall though there'south great texture and realism in the treble.

Soundstage: in Pink Floyd's "Money" sounds are clearly outside the headspace. At that place's a corking sense of open up space with the AR-H1 but the sounds don't get distant and the imaging remains strong with positional cues. In Solar Field'south "Random Fri" the swirling digital sounds near the beginning of the track can clearly be sensed as if moving 360 degrees around your head.

Amping/pairing

While rated at simply 33 ohms the AR-H1 does need some decent ability behind it to bring out the best performance.

ATC HDA-DP20: With the ATC HDA-DP20 which has a rated maxumum headphone output power of 255mW@32 ohm on quieter tracks I can plough up the volume to 100% and it sounds practiced only there's no leeway if you desire to get balls to the wall so to speak. And so ideally yous'd want a bit of extra amplification with this particular DAP. Adding the Phatlab Sassy Ii tube amplifier to the concatenation brings this combination to life in a big fashion.

Acoustic Research AR-M20: Using Audio-visual Research's own AR-M20 maxing out the volume makes things louder than I'm personally comfortable with. The sound is smoothen and full-bodied, which are inherent characteristics of the AR-M20. Perchance unsurprisingly the synergy betwixt these two components is really good.

Topping DX7: The DX7 is a very neutral DAC/AMP and probably non the all-time pick for powering the AR-H1. The sound is a petty sparse throughout although the bass has a prissy abrupt edge to information technology. This isn't a mistake of the DX7 at all, just that I think it'southward better suited to headphones with a slightly warm tilt.

Arcam irDAC-Ii: An underrated DAC (IMO of course) especially in regards to the headphone output stage which was carried over from their flagship A49 amplifier. The irDAC-Two is a great match for the AR-H1. Information technology's smooth all the same highly resolving sound is the perfect partner for the linear tonality of the AR-H1.

Comparisons

Oppo PM3 ($399 USD)
The PM3 is slightly thicker in the lower midrange with some added warmth to the mids in general and the bass is a bit more forwards in comparing to the AR-H1. It has a smoother presentation that nevertheless brings good detail with information technology. It'southward lighter in weight and both accept good build quality. Being a closed back headphone the PM3 doesn't have the same airiness and the soundstage is more narrow and intimate.

Ultrasone Performance 860 ($260 USD)
The 860 has more than sub and mid-bass presence. The AR-H1 has a bit more separation in the mids and mids are slightly more forward. Mids sound a bit more resolving on the AR-H1. Treble has more prominence on the AR-H1 and marginally better timbre. The open up backs of the AR-H1 give a sense of more width in the soundstage. Amazing built quality on both these headphones and condolement levels are roughly the same. Two bully headphones in this comparison with the main differentiates being the price and weight in the bass. 860 for those who want the bass and the AR-H1 who desire that extra resolution.

Conclusion

If this is a sign of things to come from Acoustic Inquiry I believe we can expect them to grab a decent chunk of the planar headphone market in the future. One of the things that stands out in my listen almost this production is the quality of materials and manufacturing attention to detail. The AR-H1 puts many well regarded veteran brands to shame in regard to build quality. Comfort is good and I'1000 able to wear these for long sessions without any issues whatsoever and I would merely wish for the headband to exist a bit softer or take a little more than padding on the underside.

The sound that these headphones produce is fantastic, specially because that this is the company's first attempt at a planar magnetic headphone. All this comes at what I would consider a reasonable price for what AR is providing with the AR-H1. And then with that said, if you're looking to purchase some headphones with an uncolored and linear simply still musical signature, definitely go your hands on one of these for an audience. These guys (Audio-visual Research) hateful concern and they're coming out of the gate potent.

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Source: https://www.head-fi.org/showcase/acoustic-research-ar-ha1-planar-headphone.22199/reviews

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