Fiio FT1 Headphone Review

[solderdude]

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.

Nope. EQ between 100Hz and a few kHz is correct.
It is also the reason why Amir does not EQ according to the measurements but eyeballs the measurements and then makes an EQ based on what he hears and sees as problem areas on the plots.

Of course there are plenty of folks who like to EQ exactly according to a measurement and when you would apply that EQ to that particular copy on that particular fixture in that particular fitting/position you can get a nice line that follows the chosen target exactly.

In most cases that will give an improvement for sure.
But get this... when one EQ's several headphones this way they sound similar but not the same. That is because:
Headphone copies differ.
Positions on the fixtures differ (or are averaged).
Pad conditions may differ (temperature, wear).
Different fixtures might be used.
Different targets may be used.
Different EQ settings (the implementation of it)
Different seal may occur both on the fixture and on the head.
Actual heads do not conform to standards.

You see .... that is the science behind headphone measurements.

That does not make headphone measurements on a fixture pointless. On the contrary.
When one used one fixture the science tells us the results will be comparable to those of others using the same fixture and same copy provided they fit a same headphone in the same conditions and will only have to allow tolerances to be the difference between the measurements (regardless what the cause is for the tolerances).

That is the science part.

Any generated EQ will most likely be an improvement simply because headphones are far from perfect and never will conform to any target on every fixture but you can get them to 'follow' a certain target on a certain fixture ... that is the science part.

Knowing head/perception/circumstances like listening SPL, fit, seal etc will differ on any head is something that must be taken as a given.
That too is very well described by science. Many articles have been written about this.

That is the science part and is what fits with ASR. Especially the knowledge that a fixture conforms to a standard and your ears might well differ (and actually do).
That does not make any EQ pointless or even not preferred.

 

[Arashi_Tsunade]

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.

I had the same feeling as you, what I was hearing was a bright sound with overpowering bass and slightly excessive highs. Let's call it a "V" sound. I requested a return on Amazon the same day.

For gaming I use Sony pulse 3D and they are much more linear than the Fiio.

 

[ziggurcat]

@Rincewind42 I came across another EQ profile for the FT1s last night looking through the eqMac Pro app I have on my computer (it was in the list of headphone presets available in the app) -- it's labeled as "Measurement: oratory1990", but is quite different from the one you have cited. I copied all of the info into Topping Tune, and exported as a .txt file that I can share here if there's nothing unethical about that. Yesterday, I listened to Amir's, the tweaked oratory1990 you mentioned, and this one, and I had a very difficult time hearing the difference (at least not with the content I was testing).

 

[Rincewind42]

I copied all of the info into Topping Tune, and exported as a .txt file that I can share here if there's nothing unethical about that.

Sure, why not, I'll give it a go. I think it's just common courtesy to mention the author of the preset, but at the end of the day, they're just EQ settings so they can be shared freely.

Speaking of evaluating different EQ presets, I find dense metal music to be very good for evaluating EQ (and headphones in general) as they highlight every peak and valley in the frequency response quite well (and sometimes painfully, lol). Probably because heavily distorted guitars are more or less shaped white noise, and the cymbals bring out sibilance issues very quickly. In my experience, you can get away with quite wild FRs and heavy-handed EQing on more sparse acoustic materials, but wall-of-sound type metal with lots of layering is the ultimate stress test. Then on electronic music there's usually no point of reference (esp. if there are no vocals), so pretty much anything goes that sounds vaguely pleasant EQ-wise.

(Related, listening to heavily distorted guitars on nearfield monitors also very obviously highlight the combs filtering effects of the desk reflections as you keep moving your head. That can be very hard or near impossible to hear on material that has less densely packed spectral balance.)

Classical symphonic music is another good test, especially if it features large choirs, but I find it harder to spot peaks and valleys in relatively sparse symphonic arrangements. It's probably the best test for "natural timbre", though.

E.g., electronic music sounds "fine" on my cheapish bookshelf speakers, but if I put on some large-scale orchestral music, they start sounding plasticky and a bit fake. Whereas on my Neumann monitors orchestral music is spot-on, zero flaws and 100% natural sounding. Same goes for headphones I think.

 

[ziggurcat]

Sure, why not, I'll give it a go. I think it's just common courtesy to mention the author of the preset, but at the end of the day, they're just EQ settings so they can be shared freely.

Speaking of evaluating different EQ presets, I find dense metal music to be very good for evaluating EQ (and headphones in general) as they highlight every peak and valley in the frequency response quite well (and sometimes painfully, lol). Probably because heavily distorted guitars are more or less shaped white noise, and the cymbals bring out sibilance issues very quickly. In my experience, you can get away with quite wild FRs and heavy-handed EQing on more sparse acoustic materials, but wall-of-sound type metal with lots of layering is the ultimate stress test. Then on electronic music there's usually no point of reference (esp. if there are no vocals), so pretty much anything goes that sounds vaguely pleasant EQ-wise.

(Related, listening to heavily distorted guitars on nearfield monitors also very obviously highlight the combs filtering effects of the desk reflections as you keep moving your head. That can be very hard or near impossible to hear on material that has less densely packed spectral balance.)

Classical symphonic music is another good test, especially if it features large choirs, but I find it harder to spot peaks and valleys in relatively sparse symphonic arrangements. It's probably the best test for "natural timbre", though.

E.g., electronic music sounds "fine" on my cheapish bookshelf speakers, but if I put on some large-scale orchestral music, they start sounding plasticky and a bit fake. Whereas on my Neumann monitors orchestral music is spot-on, zero flaws and 100% natural sounding. Same goes for headphones I think.

Attached is the .txt file for the Oratory1990 FT1 headphone preset that was available in the eqMac Pro app.

I can hear some differences, but they are pretty subtle to me depending on the content. The one "metal" track I usually test with is Melvins & Lustmord's The Bloated Pope, and I think that is probably the track where I hear the most differences in those three profiles.

 

[_Piotr]

Nope. EQ between 100Hz and a few kHz is correct.
It is also the reason why Amir does not EQ according to the measurements but eyeballs the measurements and then makes an EQ based on what he hears and sees as problem areas on the plots.

Of course there are plenty of folks who like to EQ exactly according to a measurement and when you would apply that EQ to that particular copy on that particular fixture in that particular fitting/position you can get a nice line that follows the chosen target exactly.

In most cases that will give an improvement for sure.
But get this... when one EQ's several headphones this way they sound similar but not the same. That is because:
Headphone copies differ.
Positions on the fixtures differ (or are averaged).
Pad conditions may differ (temperature, wear).
Different fixtures might be used.
Different targets may be used.
Different EQ settings (the implementation of it)
Different seal may occur both on the fixture and on the head.
Actual heads do not conform to standards.

You see .... that is the science behind headphone measurements.

That does not make headphone measurements on a fixture pointless. On the contrary.
When one used one fixture the science tells us the results will be comparable to those of others using the same fixture and same copy provided they fit a same headphone in the same conditions and will only have to allow tolerances to be the difference between the measurements (regardless what the cause is for the tolerances).

That is the science part.

Any generated EQ will most likely be an improvement simply because headphones are far from perfect and never will conform to any target on every fixture but you can get them to 'follow' a certain target on a certain fixture ... that is the science part.

Knowing head/perception/circumstances like listening SPL, fit, seal etc will differ on any head is something that must be taken as a given.
That too is very well described by science. Many articles have been written about this.

That is the science part and is what fits with ASR. Especially the knowledge that a fixture conforms to a standard and your ears might well differ (and actually do).
That does not make any EQ pointless or even not preferred.

Resolve and listener had a great chat about this while discussing Sean's and Dan's new paper findings. Its why they do measurements differently because our heads are different, our ears are different and e.g. some of us have glasses.

 

[Montrealer]

FT1 is for sure the epitome of fine. It is good to very good after EQ though. It definitely isn't the disruptor that was hyped. The zero 2 and he400se are by far the best deals in personal audio. I think with those 2 you're set, unless you really want to go down the rabbit hole.

Betting on these and losing, you're only out $150. That rabbit hole is pretty shallow, don't you think?

 

[Reticuli]

The poor channel matching would drive me nuts.

 

[Montrealer]

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.

I am 62 years young and have been collecting headphones since 1976. I turned 13 that year and immediately got hooked on the HD414 I received on my birthday. A large batch of sets later, ranging in price from $2 to $8,000, this woody is one of the worst-sounding pieces of sh... I have ever experienced out of the box. Almost as bad as the infamous (to me) Focal Elear before some serious EQ and pad+cable overhaul. The FT1 sounded so bad that I gave up on EQing it—too much work.

I landed here thanks to a link from a member of my usual hangout. Curves from Amir and Oratory90 improved things, but those sounded too muffled to my aging eardrums. However, yours not only improved things but also made the headphones sound linear, with accurate tonal rendering and a slight lift exactly where it belongs. Congratulations on a job well done, zebra-f. These phones won't ever be a go-to for me, but thanks to you, they won't be relegated to my "untouchables" sub-section either. Again, bravo.

 

[PierreRtings]

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.

Hi FTB, we measure on a B&K 5128. There is no Harman Target for it unfortunately. We offer the choice of Both Soundchecks targets, which have been externally validated An other Target that resulted from a large scale study By Senselab a research firm and a Japanese university, Rtings house target is an approximation of the Harman Over ear target on the 5128. Not a perfect translation, which is impossible. It was also validated by listening tests, and reported as a valid target on some seminars by Sean Olive. We also hope that one day some standardization comities would adopt something that can be considered a standard but there isn't. There isn't on the GRAS 45c neither for that matter but yes Harman's target has the widest acceptance. In the meantime we offer the option to see the frequency response compensated or raw along all valid B&K 5128, which give a good range of valid frequency responses. It appear to be the consensus, and is backed by some research that a certain range of responses are statistically equivalent in term of preferences. We documented some of that in a couple articles, feel free to google them it wouldn't be appropriate (for me) to link to our website here.

 

[FTB]

Hi FTB, we measure on a B&K 5128. There is no Harman Target for it unfortunately. We offer the choice of Both Soundchecks targets, which have been externally validated An other Target that resulted from a large scale study By Senselab a research firm and a Japanese university, Rtings house target is an approximation of the Harman Over ear target on the 5128. Not a perfect translation, which is impossible. It was also validated by listening tests, and reported as a valid target on some seminars by Sean Olive. We also hope that one day some standardization comities would adopt something that can be considered a standard but there isn't. There isn't on the GRAS 45c neither for that matter but yes Harman's target has the widest acceptance. In the meantime we offer the option to see the frequency response compensated or raw along all valid B&K 5128, which give a good range of valid frequency responses. It appear to be the consensus, and is backed by some research that a certain range of responses are statistically equivalent in term of preferences. We documented some of that in a couple articles, feel free to google them it wouldn't be appropriate (for me) to link to our website here.

Hello,

Thanks for the input, it's interesting.
There is something I still don't get : why your measurements of the AKG K371 show as much bass as the Fiio FT1 when with a direct comparison of the two, the Fiio is obviously bassier (and too much) than the akg ?

 

[MayaTlab]

Hello,

Thanks for the input, it's interesting.
There is something I still don't get : why your measurements of the AKG K371 show as much bass as the Fiio FT1 when with a direct comparison of the two, the Fiio is obviously bassier (and too much) than the akg ?

When you say "a direct comparison", do you mean your own personal experience listening to them ? If so as we've discussed a bit before in this thread, know that for some headphones, and these two are such headphones, bass response can vary rather dramatically between listeners, in situ, on your own head, depending on your anatomy / hairstyle / glasses, etc. It could simply be that the FT1 seals better on your own head than the K371 for example, and as a result produces more bass (and it could be the opposite for someone else among other possibilities ).

It could also be that the treble response is quite different between them, in situ, on your own head, vs your anatomically-derived individual "target", and as a result makes you perceive the rest of the spectrum differently.

Same will apply when measuring on different test fixtures with varying geometry / pinna / etc.

Rtings is one of the very few publication measuring bass output on a cohort of real humans to assess consistency, it's one of the things I appreciate the most about their tests and a great service to the community : https://www.rtings.com/headphones/graph/30572/consistency-l/fiio-ft1-vs-akg-k371/71934/1671

 

[PierreRtings]

Those tiny graphs they post are useless in this regard. Click to enlarge them and you see differentials. They don't allow linking so here is a snippet of it:
View attachment 483627

Clearly differences in bass and then in treble.

Of course we allow linking

 

[FTB]

When you say "a direct comparison", do you mean your own personal experience listening to them ? If so as we've discussed a bit before in this thread, know that for some headphones, and these two are such headphones, bass response can vary rather dramatically between listeners, in situ, on your own head, depending on your anatomy / hairstyle / glasses, etc. It could simply be that the FT1 seals better on your own head than the K371 for example, and as a result produces more bass (and it could be the opposite for someone else among other possibilities ).

It could also be that the treble response is quite different between them, in situ, on your own head, vs your anatomically-derived individual "target", and as a result makes you perceive the rest of the spectrum differently.

Same will apply when measuring on different test fixtures with varying geometry / pinna / etc.

Rtings is one of the very few publication measuring bass output on a cohort of real humans to assess consistency, it's one of the things I appreciate the most about their tests and a great service to the community : https://www.rtings.com/headphones/graph/30572/consistency-l/fiio-ft1-vs-akg-k371/71934/1671
View attachment 490462

Thanks for your answer.

Yes by direct comparison I mean my own personal experience.
I know this is not scientific but it seems I am not the only one feeling this bass difference between these two headphones. As far as I remember Solderdude on his blog felt the same and the difference is visible in Oratory measurements).

One thing I like in Rtings measurements is in fact the FR consistency graph but here again the K371 performs better according to them.

Trying to find why this diff. Yes the K371 have more treble peaking in their test, maybe this!

 

[Spiral_Architect]

Picked up a pair recently. I like them, but for all-around listening they really need EQ to tame the bass. I use slightly modified Oraroey1990 profile with topping DX5ii. On a small percentage of my catalogue they can be engaging as-is and don't sound bad at all even without EQ. But on most material the bass is definitely too much. Horribly microphonic cable, comfortable fit, good isolation without too much clamping. With EQ I subjectively enjoy them as much as anything else and at least in terms of frequency response the measurements shown here don't look as bad if you like Harman response a bit of EQ and you are there.
They may not be perfect but we are lucky that nowadays at about 150$ you can have many good sounding, reasonably competent headphones that with a bit of EQ just work well enough to enjoy the music and that's it.

 

[Shrek6]

The driver mismatch suggests there would also be similar variance between headphones, which might partly explain the large differences in opinions for these.

But what genre of music one listens to has to be a big factor. For electronic genres / hip-hop, I like mine. The extra bass is not a negative. And the channel imbalance doesn't matter as much. Maybe this makes audio fidelity in general kind of moot.. but quite often the main issue with headphones and speakers for these genres is lack of bass.
The included case is super nice. That should be standard with more expensive headphones especially if the cups don't swivel flat - I snapped the headband on my hd600 during a move. I wonder how many k371's could have been saved from this if they included a similar case instead of a useless carrying pouch

 

[XaviMartinez55]

I just sold mine after 3 weeks. Beautiful looking, awesome accessory pack......hated the sound. Cold, sterile, unexciting, "un-eq-able" for me. Didn't like the bass, didn't like th emids, and I found everything above 1 kHz to be a mess.

Looking for closed backs for travel purposes, not too large in size.

Sold them and same day went to a big dealer here in my city where they have like 40 different headphones to test on the fly, which I did.

The ones I liked the most....Shure SRH-840a, really good sounding with some shouty high mids. Rode NTH100, surprisingly good and coherent, just too much of a treble rolloff. LOVED the HD600 but I doubt the person sitting next to me inside the plane will really enjoy it....

K371 and K361 left me completely cold (and those were the first ones I went for), same for the Audio Technica M50-M50-M60.

I ended up with the Senns HD25......very competent and "analog" exciting sound. Had to push down the 125 Hz slider by a lot and push up the 34 Hz to compensate, but they respond very well to eq, and contrary to what I read, I didn't find the clamping force to be anything to talk about.....They are not perfect but after the initial eq adjustment, they are great !

 

[Tito]

Well, .. honeymoon is over i guess , and that youtube over the top unified shill action that made us think this is actually the best thing since the slice bread was kinda ridiculous.

and now.. when they youtubers review other closed back under 250euro .. the mental gymnastics trying to forget they have shilled ft1 to oblivion..


all of a sudden it is

" well, it is all goood, k371 is good , adam h200 is fine, 700 pro x is well . they could be very good if they were, which there is a possibility they are if they are if it is so... , . .... and

m50x, let's be honest her they are not very good but they really are! . just pick onee i guess."

somehow, as if everyone forgot that you wrote a gospel over ft1 being the secomd coming of jesus of audiophilia.

 

[FTB]

Well, .. honeymoon is over i guess , and that youtube over the top unified shill action that made us think this is actually the best thing since the slice bread was kinda ridiculous.

and now.. when they youtubers review other closed back under 250euro .. the mental gymnastics trying to forget they have shilled ft1 to oblivion..


all of a sudden it is

" well, it is all goood, k371 is good , adam h200 is fine, 700 pro x is well . they could be very good if they were, which there is a possibility they are if they are if it is so... , . .... and

m50x, let's be honest her they are not very good but they really are! . just pick onee i guess."

somehow, as if everyone forgot that you wrote a gospel over ft1 being the secomd coming of jesus of audiophilia.

Futile hype of reviewers based on nothing but only subjective impressions.
Of course the FT1 was good to them, but if impressions are not confirmed by measurements to stay neutral, there is nothing.

 

[ziggurcat]

Futile hype of reviewers based on nothing but only subjective impressions.
Of course the FT1 was good to them, but if impressions are not confirmed by measurements to stay neutral, there is nothing.

There were measurements in some of those reviews.