Fiio FT1 Headphone Review

[Arashi_Tsunade]

As a happy owner of the AKG K371, I was infatuated with the "reviews" of these headphones when they first came out, so after a while I ordered them... Alas, it took me a moment to realize something was wrong; they sounded bright and wrong, I'd even say tiring to listen to.

 

[oscar_dziki]

What the hell is going on here @amirm? We have an $165 over the head headphone that equalize downwards from not bad distortion numbers in bass, and you do not recommend it? On what basis. Brother, please read your review once again, It makes no sense, Please retract it. This is nonsense, Based on your own numbers, these headphones are legit. Even without EQ. EQ is on their side. What the hell?

 

[FTB]

What the hell is going on here @amirm? We have an $165 over the head headphone that equalize downwards from not bad distortion numbers in bass, and you do not recommend it? On what basis. Brother, please read your review once again, It makes no sense, Please retract it. This is nonsense, Based on your own numbers, these headphones are legit. Even without EQ. EQ is on their side. What the hell?

Did you already try the K371 at the same price ?
One is good, not the other.

 

[solderdude]

What the hell is going on here @amirm? We have an $165 over the head headphone that equalize downwards from not bad distortion numbers in bass, and you do not recommend it? On what basis. Brother, please read your review once again, It makes no sense, Please retract it. This is nonsense, Based on your own numbers, these headphones are legit. Even without EQ. EQ is on their side. What the hell?

Does Amir have to retract.....

Sadly, I can't recommend the Fiio FT1 headphone as is.

With EQ, it becomes quite nice, with high level of comfort and looks.

I read that as being a quite nice and comfortable great looking headphone with EQ

It needs to have mid-bass lowered IMO and without EQ is a bit thick sounding.

As with every headphone there will be people loving it and people that hate it.

 

[amirm]

Thanks for the review! Do you measured GD?

I did but forgot to post it. Just added to the review which looks pretty much the same as what @solderdude post:

 

[amirm]

What the hell is going on here @amirm? We have an $165 over the head headphone that equalize downwards from not bad distortion numbers in bass, and you do not recommend it? On what basis.

Harman target for bass is already too much for a segment of the population. For me, it is just right. Push it higher, especially in upper bass/midrange and it becomes bothersome to me. It brings out bass that should not be there for example in my instrumental female tracks.

Remember, my recommendations are mine. You don't get to question it. You can vote for yours in the poll.

 

[Rincewind42]

Alas, it took me a moment to realize something was wrong; they sounded bright and wrong, I'd even say tiring to listen to.

Indeed, I was very disappointed too with the stock sound without EQ. Even on material that had little or subdued bass content under 100 Hz, the midrange and the treble was just a shouty, shrill mess to my ears. Fatigue kicked in for me after 20-30 mins on these for sure while I can listen to my stock HD6xx at loud volumes all day with no ill effects.

I'd suggest to try my slightly tweaked Oratory1990 preset from one of my previous posts, that made a big difference for me. The fatiguing aspect is gone for me with that EQ.

 

[zebra-f]

As an owner, I have to confirm that the cable is extremely microphonic.
Someone also mentioned that glasses can break the seal. I haven’t experienced that, even with fairly thick temples by “audiophile” standards.
But I’m not a big fan of the earcups, they’re not plush enough, a bit too rough, and they feel like they don’t seal well (though it’s just the sensation). I would rather have full leather.
The mid-bass issue is easy to fix, and I wouldn’t trade that sub-bass for anything else (and I’m not even a bass head). Nothing at the top end bothers me. Overall, I’m very happy with them. I'm torn between 'fine' and 'great'.

I also feel like they’re treated unfairly here compared to the K371, or maybe I’m missing something.
Why isn’t the mid-bass mentioned in the K371 review?
At 150 Hz, the target is somewhere around 94.2 dB.

• K371: 9.65 - 9.7 dB
• FT1: 9.75 - 9.85 dB, and yet only this one gets reduced by 3 dB (I know that there is a bigger bump at 130 Hz, but it look like it could be reduced by 1 or 2 dB there instead if K371 is left as is).

For the K371, there’s also no treatment for that bump around 90 Hz or whatever’s happening in the sub-bass. What gives?


Btw. they smell like a quality product

 

[Blimple]

Harman target for bass is already too much for a segment of the population. For me, it is just right. Push it higher, especially in upper bass/midrange and it becomes bothersome to me. It brings out bass that should not be there for example in my instrumental female tracks.

Remember, my recommendations are mine. You don't get to question it. You can vote for yours in the poll.

What other models in that segment manage to compete with FT1? you think? I can only assume sivga oriole, likely their best dynamic HP, but still need some eq tho

 

[solderdude]

As an owner, I have to confirm that the cable is extremely microphonic.
Someone also mentioned that glasses can break the seal. I haven’t experienced that, even with fairly thick temples by “audiophile” standards.

Seal breakage (glasses) actually helps a bit in lowering the bass.
Glasses should be between the red and lighter red response for most people.
A little bump in the 150Hz region is the 'punch' frequency band, too much of it and it becomes 'muddy' sound.

 

[FTB]

As an owner, I have to confirm that the cable is extremely microphonic.
Someone also mentioned that glasses can break the seal. I haven’t experienced that, even with fairly thick temples by “audiophile” standards.
But I’m not a big fan of the earcups, they’re not plush enough, a bit too rough, and they feel like they don’t seal well (though it’s just the sensation). I would rather have full leather.
The mid-bass issue is easy to fix, and I wouldn’t trade that sub-bass for anything else (and I’m not even a bass head). Nothing at the top end bothers me. Overall, I’m very happy with them. I'm torn between 'fine' and 'great'.

I also feel like they’re treated unfairly here compared to the K371, or maybe I’m missing something.
Why isn’t the mid-bass mentioned in the K371 review?
At 150 Hz, the target is somewhere around 94.2 dB.

• K371: 9.65 - 9.7 dB
• FT1: 9.75 - 9.85 dB, and yet only this one gets reduced by 3 dB (I know that there is a bigger bump at 130 Hz, but it look like it could be reduced by 1 or 2 dB there instead if K371 is left as is).

For the K371, there’s also no treatment for that bump around 90 Hz or whatever’s happening in the sub-bass. What gives?


Btw. they smell like a quality product

For having compared them directly, the Fiio is much more bassy, too muddy.
The AKG have clean deep bass.

They are both the same price, the Fiio is a hype...

 

[zebra-f]

But I’m not a big fan of the earcups, they’re not plush enough, a bit too rough, and they feel like they don’t seal well (though it’s just the sensation). I would rather have full leather.

I forgot that this sensation comes from pretty low clamp force, I tried to bend them pretty hard, but it doesn't help much.

I also feel like they’re treated unfairly here compared to the K371, or maybe I’m missing something.
Why isn’t the mid-bass mentioned in the K371 review?
At 150 Hz, the target is somewhere around 94.2 dB.

• K371: 9.65 - 9.7 dB
• FT1: 9.75 - 9.85 dB, and yet only this one gets reduced by 3 dB (I know that there is a bigger bump at 130 Hz, but it look like it could be reduced by 1 or 2 dB there instead if K371 is left as is).

For the K371, there’s also no treatment for that bump around 90 Hz or whatever’s happening in the sub-bass. What gives?

Continuing why are RTINGS' measurements slightly different?

• RTINGS 5.8k peak
• Amir 4.6k peak

They gave almost identical rating when it comes to measurements and by looking at the graphs, the FiiO (green) seems easier to fix. In other aspects, the K371 isn’t even close to the FT1 yet from this thread (I'm looking at you @FTB ), someone could easily conclude that the FT1 is trash compared to the K371. So which one is it?

 

[FTB]

I personally don't believe the measurements of RTings nor their rating system. What curve(s) do they use ? It is not clear and this isn't the Harman target.

I think the best measurements are from Amir and Oratory as they are concordant.

One is more tortuous than the other.

 

[zebra-f]

I personally don't believe the measurements of RTings nor their rating system. What curve(s) do they use ? It is not clear and this isn't the Harman target.

I think the best measurements are from Amir and Oratory as they are concordant.

One is more tortuous than the other.

This one shows peak in the middle of RTINGS/Amir at 5.2k Hz.

 

[solderdude]

Different fixtures so different results.

 

[zebra-f]

I had to check it by ear using this tool.
There are definitely no peaks at 5.8 kHz or 5.2 kHz. It starts falling off before that, so Amir’s measurements might be the closest to what I’m actually hearing
However, that peak at 4.6 kHz isn’t as noticeable as it might seem from the graph. My unit seems to have two peaks: one at 4.1 kHz and another at 4.6 kHz.
I’ve included my finished EQ profile if anyone wants to try it. I started with a sine wave test and then tuned everything down to reasonable levels while listening to music.
I'd like to play around with the Q values if anyone knows a good online visualizer or graphing tool for that, drop a link.

 

[solderdude]

It's not your copy but your ears.
This is why, yet again, it is different on different fixtures as they all have a different pinna and earcanal.
Nothing to worry about your brain knows about these dips/peaks in your hearing.

 

[zebra-f]

It's not your copy but your ears.
This is why, yet again, it is different on different fixtures as they all have a different pinna and earcanal.
Nothing to worry about your brain knows about these dips/peaks in your hearing.

In this case, any mention of an EQ profile (like in Amir’s review) should automatically be shunned on this website, yet I haven’t seen that happen.

 

[Crosstalk]

I think it's a common subjective nonsense that some headphones are made for a type of music or another.

Yes, however there are lot of folks who ask - I listen to jazz, what’s the best headphone for me?

 

[MayaTlab]

In this case, any mention of an EQ profile (like in Amir’s review) should automatically be shunned on this website, yet I haven’t seen that happen.

It's a per-headphones issue for the most part, and some headphones have enough fixture to fixture or head to head consistency in some parts of the spectrum that what you'll experience on your own head will be a closer match. It's just that on ASR there's very little talk about how headphones can differ significantly in regards to minimising undesirable inter-individual variations and very little testing is done to determine which headphones perform more or less well and in which part of the spectrum, to assess how confident you can be in applying EQ profiles to your own use case.

In regards to the frequencies of interest, past 4-5kHz you can expect a lot of inter-individual variation that's not desirable with most headphones.

This is a pretty good segment to illustrate the issue (note that the HD800 is a very good performer in that regard below 4kHz or so, most passive closed backs would be a lot worse) :