HiFiMAN Arya measurements and impressions

Discussion in 'Headphone Measurements' started by Vtory, Feb 20, 2019.

  1. Vtory

    Vtory Audiophile™

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    I’ve played with my friend’s Arya for nearly half a week. Will return them this Friday.

    My overall impression is very positive so far. Honestly amazed. HFM successfully souped good parts of previous generations of HEK and HEX maybe even adding some lessons learned during Susvara developments.

    Some highlights of subjective impressions
    • Arya tonality reminded me of hex v1 (no ab, just from my memory). Very pleasing and well-balanced. A little bright (indeed a tad brighter than hex 1 if I recall correctly) but still within what I consider neutral (maybe “least upper-bound” of my neutrality zone). Easily love tastefully tuned mild W-tonality -- nevertheless to my ears sound quite coherent and continuous from bottom to top.
    • I have a certain set of criteria regarding showstoppers -- boring bass, muddy or honky midrange, and piercing or sibilant high treble -- but arya failed in none of these.
    • Vocals occasionally sound harsh or too edged but not as problematic as stock hd800 or focals.
    • Slightly plastic-ish, hollow, and/or artificial timbre -- a lot better than hex v1/2 but still worse than susvara-- might bother some. For this reason, arya might work better with something complementary (meatier and fuller sounding headphones).
    • Ignoring minor improvements (mostly regarding presentation), driver-related technicalities (plankton, micro- and macro- details/dynamics, transience) are nearly at the same ballpark of HEK v2. If you’re familiar with focal open trio, imagine a distance bw clear and elex. But to much less extent for arya-hek2.
    • Articulate is the best word to describe arya. Both HEK 1 and 2 did surprisingly well in this regard, but arya is a bit more improved on top of them. Making me revisit the favorite tracks to find something hidden (at least less evident before).
    • Bass is equivalently satisfying compared to my current go-to ether 2. Main difference is that Arya is more articulate and E2 is tighter and punchier. Both well match to the detail level of bass reproduced by convert-2 -- only bested by susvara. DTPed 800 is also great but too dry by comparison.
    • Ether 2 has fuller, better, and more resolving midrange but arya’s mid and high mid have better sense of reverberation. Very engaging and life-like.
    • Transience and delineation are all very good with Arya. It still is on the “softer” (or “gradual” at least) side but less so than heks. Sounds faster than any other HFMs I experienced except classic line and susvara.
    • Treble sounds artificial but enjoyably controlled. Reminded me of some colored compression drivers (couldn’t exactly remember which though).
    • I need to emphasize this. Like other hek variants, arya scales very, very much -- potentially bad if good signal is not fed. Tested with various configurations: mbp (as dac amp), topping d10+fiio q1, even d10+ec bw (god please forgive my curiosity).. It didn’t take long to understand why the owner was meh about arya -- he uses topping dac worshiped somewhere else. No wonder. In addition, arya taught me that convert-2 still had potential to pull out. Good thing in my book.
    • Headband is largely identical with hex -- it can swivel. Comfort guaranteed, but build quality isn’t as good as hek v2 or susvara (haven’t seen hek se yet). For 1.6k product, I wanted to see better bq.
    • Cable is not as weirdly-looking as hex or hek but inflexible (like elex cable) and cheap-ish.
     
    Last edited: Feb 21, 2019
  2. Vtory

    Vtory Audiophile™

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    Here are MiniDSP EARS measurements. See more in this and related threads: https://www.superbestaudiofriends.o...g-sbaf-compensations-from-minidsp-files.7067/

    Measurements are done with 95db SPL@300hz unless specified.

    upload_2019-2-20_19-53-28.png

    FR are interesting in three aspects:
    1. I thought I hated 2k dips (on sbaf-compensated plots). But I begin to think 2k dip is actually favorable if (1) not excessive and (2) very gradual bw (lower Q).
    2. Repeating small dips in mids might be the result of internal reflections and relevant cancellations. Graph-wise they look ugly and rough, but I am suspecting they’re associated with some of positive impressions.
    3. 10k is noticeably peaked (possibly causing brightness) but sibilance range (6-8k) is fairly well-controlled. This likely explains why I thought arya had the best treble tonality among hek variants.
    It’s worth reporting that while LR channels seem perfectly matched, with each set of measurements, I observed small amount of imbalances (see the below). Averaging five different positions mysteriously offset error.

    upload_2019-2-20_19-54-6.png

    Bass response is very solid (= of little variance), no matter how arya is positioned or even with imperfect seals. Possibly due to combinations of low-mass and non-stiff membrane, extremely open structure, and other factors, resulting in low acoustic impedance. Positioning affected higher frequencies rather than bass responses.
     
    Last edited: Feb 21, 2019
  3. Vtory

    Vtory Audiophile™

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    upload_2019-2-20_19-55-12.png

    Arya sound pretty close to auteur (with auteur pads) in tonality. Arya is more edged while auteur is a little zingier. Slight peak around 1k of auteur bother more to my liking than 2k dip of arya.


    upload_2019-2-20_19-55-33.png

    (Both measurably and perceptually) Arya take the opposite approach compared with ether 2, staring from 1k hz. I like both, and indeed they define my “comfort” zone with brighter and darker limits.

    I am also attaching comparison plots with senn hd600 (new pads), hd800 (stock), and elex.

    upload_2019-2-20_19-55-57.png
    upload_2019-2-20_19-55-50.png
    upload_2019-2-20_19-56-12.png
     
  4. Vtory

    Vtory Audiophile™

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    upload_2019-2-20_19-56-37.png

    Note that harmonic levels measured by minidsp ears tend to be higher than other measurement rigs (much higher than most flat couplers, and also remarkably higher than commercial hats). That said, arya distortion results are surprisingly low for my rig and environment, except noticeable peak at 4.7k. Although 4.7k peaks are commonly shown in my other EARS measurements (probably related with EARS resonance character), but they’re more evident this time around (other results typically <0.5%). No idea why. Scratching my head.


    upload_2019-2-20_19-57-16.png

    Step response shows both good sub-bass response and seemingly problematic? lasting ringing. Calculating from consecutive two peaks of ringing, it’s around 4.6 khz. That’s exactly shown in the 1/12 wavelet spectrogram, too.

    upload_2019-2-20_19-58-1.png

    Minidsp tends to report more energy aroung 4-5khz (see hd800 result attached below). The difference is that arya has longer-lasting “green” area (-16 to -22db to peak) -- typically called as “ortho-wall”. I believe this phenomenon is associated with some of positive perceptions like room-feeling reverb (so, I don’t think this necessarily bad), but need to collect more thoughts.

    upload_2019-2-20_19-58-9.png
     
    Last edited: Feb 21, 2019
  5. Vtory

    Vtory Audiophile™

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    Closing thoughts, I am seriously considering to get a pair of arya for myself. Maybe should talk to the owner to make a good deal.

    PS. Black is always right.

    [​IMG]
     
  6. Vtory

    Vtory Audiophile™

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    Re-posting these for better (personal) consistency

    My measurements from now on will adhere to the following protocol:
    1. Left and right channel frequency response, sbaf-compensated, 1/24 octave smoothing, averaged at 5 different positions (old-IF-ish approach)
    2. 2nd to 5th harmonic distortions including noise floor
    3. Step responses with overshoot [1] and settling time [2]
    4. 1/12 octave wavelet spectrogram (both normalized to peak and non-normalized)
    All measured with 95db SPL at 300hz signal

    [1] Overshoot is calculated as the percentage of the 1st peak minus the 1st dip -- mainly for operational convenience
    [2] Settling is calculated as the time required for the response curve to reach and stay within ±5%FS

    -------

    upload_2019-2-23_13-44-43.png

    upload_2019-2-23_13-46-58.png

    upload_2019-2-23_13-47-7.png

    upload_2019-2-23_13-47-17.png

    upload_2019-2-23_13-47-25.png
     
  7. dubharmonic

    dubharmonic Friend

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    Did you try them at all with tubes? I was expecting it to be a terrible match, but the HEKV2 paired with a Valhalla 2 took me by surprise. The treble lost most of the metallic sheen.
     
  8. Vtory

    Vtory Audiophile™

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    For Arya, haven't yet. But it's not difficult to imagine how treble can be tamed a bit with tubes. Indeed one of the setups I heard hek2 was with allnic totl otl tube. Not bad by any means. From my experience with lyr 3, can expect good synergy bw arya and lyr 3, too. Btw, to me arya is less problematic in treble tonality. Less splashing and less sparkling. It's somewhere between heks and susvara.

    I am also excited to hear a pairing bw arya and 3f (expecting to receive 3f by march), because I speculate better current driving ability would benefit current-hungry planars.
     
  9. Rustin Cohle

    Rustin Cohle FKA jazztherapist

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    @Vtory By chance have you heard the Ananda and have a sense of how it stacks up to the Arya? Noticing the prices on the Ananda are coming down a bit to almost half Arya MSRP.
     
  10. Vtory

    Vtory Audiophile™

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    No I haven't. My bet is that ananda is renamed hex and arya is renamed (and cost-reduced) hek with some changes each. HEX-HEK difference varies depending on how to value imo.

    Btw headband structure of sundara was a huge off for me. Ananda seems to share the same frame. By comparison, arya is more in line with hek and previous hex's.

    If I want a budget-friendly hfm planar, I'd go for massdrop hexx instead of ananda. Just speculation.
     
  11. purr1n

    purr1n Desire for betterer is endless.

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    3k, 5k bumps and and 10kHz spike.. 5kHz distortion spike. Hmmm. 98% chance this drives @Hands crazy.
     
  12. Hands

    Hands Overzealous Auto Flusher - Measurbator

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    I mean, if it's a renamed HE-1000, yeah, I won't like it.
     
  13. AstralStorm

    AstralStorm Friend

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    So this is the new HE-500 tonality for quadruple the money on HEK frame and driver, but much more articulate and clean in bass?

    (Yes I'm facetious, but it seems to share the signature based on the measurements. It is likely almost the same design as HEK but tighter membrane.)

    This means no win vs HE6SE modded. Pity.
     
  14. Vtory

    Vtory Audiophile™

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    Two things.

    1. HEK vs HE6 is really a matter of preference. Either these may be preferred. Or neither. Without modding I can live with the former, but never with the latter. ymmv.

    2. And I honestly think it very inappropriate to involve modding into "generalized" vs discussions. Except universally-approved ones -- including detailed recipes, pre-post measurements confirmed by many, and proven effects. So in my book, hd650 kiss mods or something like hd800 sdr may suffice. But I don't think he6 mods have that level of reliability.
     
  15. AstralStorm

    AstralStorm Friend

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    I find HE6 mods very reliably resulting in a good headphone. I think MrSpeakers also does, given he made Code-X on that base. That said, HE6 are extremely demanding on the amplifier and expose issues in them such as current clipping.

    The question is not of sufficiency but comparable quality. HEK tonality can be preferable but from what I read this does not have that tonality being much brighter and having those "fun" CSD peaks. It might have the quality and clarity though. Could use a listen to be sure.
     
  16. Vtory

    Vtory Audiophile™

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    Of course some mods can make a good result. I don't disagree.

    What I am saying is that 'modding' per se is VERY broad (and loosely-defined) concept.

    Speaking of reliability, I would like to require overall consistency. A mod can be said to have a high reliability if it produces similar results under consistent conditions. Remember how KISS mod was documented and how many times it was repeated by a number of people resulting in consistent experience. However, without knowing "details" of a specific mod, and without knowing how thoroughly that mod was validated (e.g., measurements from compatible rigs, comparative subjective evaluations from many),I still remain doubtful.

    Products from skillful modders like LFF (or Eshaaf in the foreseeable future?) may have some benefits in this regard. But introduce other issues. For example, total costs. HE6SE has nearly the same price tag as Arya (let alone he6se has fucked headband structure/frame..). Modding via known experts adds additional cost which I guess isn't cheap -- likely 500-1000 usd. Now overall cost is placed in totally different price category.

    Even if we can ignore such issues, like you said, he6 and hek (hek v1, hek v2, arya all sounded a bit different but they're "hek-sounding" as a group) need very different amplification -- also with different level of safety caution. I don't see any value in comparing two things that differ this drastically.

    PS. That said, I always welcome a kind loan of code-x/6/.. or other verified modded he6(se) from friends or semi-friends, for measurement and evaluation purposes ;).
     
    Last edited: May 8, 2019
  17. Vtory

    Vtory Audiophile™

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    Attaching waterfall plot.

    I thought this super-open design would fast dissipate internal energy to outside -- this doesn't seem to the case. Even more complicated than similar open planars like ether 2 or lcd3f. Maybe need to collect my thoughts more about how to interpret this.

    upload_2019-5-16_22-10-48.png
     
    Last edited: May 16, 2019
  18. dan3952

    dan3952 New

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    I just got Arya's last week. You are the only person out of any of the reviews I've seen, who had brought up the slightly plastic sounding timbre.. well done!

    I feel that the soundstage, imaging, and detail are all good with this headphone, but I feel that the upper midrange timbre is slightly "off": my current frame of reference being my Martin Logan 60XT speakers. I like to listen to pianos and single violins to do critical listening, and avoid dense mixes. Knowing HiFiMan, and their opportunistic pricing and marketing, you probably have to buy an HE1000SE or a Susvara to get better timbre.

    I have had Focal Clears before, and feel that they offer a lot of detail, but they also had a cold, and metallic sheen to the upper midrange and treble, that made me turn them down with loud, brassy tracks, in particular. Might be a good match with a tube amp; to help soften things a bit. Bass and soundstage I felt were average.

    I've just heard planar bass for the first time, and I am amazed! I wish my speakers could sound like that. I feel that can hear the low distortion, fast response, and zero phase shift that a planar driver can offer. My speakers have a far from flat frequency response below 150 Hz, and lots of phase shift, when using a sub or not.

    I will probably be buying either HE-6SE or LCD-X this week, and will end up keeping the 6SE or the Arya, using the LCD-X for my more dynamic music. If an Ether 2 comes up at a reasonable price, I will look at that as well.

     
  19. purr1n

    purr1n Desire for betterer is endless.

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    Not really. If you are a timbre guy, neither the HE1000SE or Susvara get that totally right. The Susvara is acceptable. The HE1000SE is quite a bit off with a steely timbre in the highs and a slightly bit of plasticky in the lows. It depends, there are some variation back in the day. I have not been able to reassess their products with the most current processes.

    Tube amp can only go so far. It's the metal drivers in the lower lines. Utopia is better, but even then some have noted a "Be" coloration.

    If you are a timbre guy, seriously consider the Verum. The HE-6 stock is pretty etchy in stock form could be an assault on your ears if you are coming from LCD-X. I am not sure about the latest SE version. The power demands to get it to liven up are ridiculous. Verum is not the best in technicalities such as lowest distortion or most resolving, but it seems the most right and enjoyable.
     
  20. Clemmaster

    Clemmaster Friend

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    I got an open box on Monday.

    They are pretty terrible, right out the box.

    It kills me to say that, as I loved the HEX v1 and v2 and the way people described it sounded very interesting: full, slightly warm, expansive and very detailed - everything I fancy.

    The pair I have sounds thin in the mids (hollow), with "acidic" treble. Really not that enjoyable... Detail is there in spades and the stage is good, but the timbre is way off.

    I moved to dynamic headphones after I sold my HEX, currently using the Focal Stellia and HD 660 S, so it could be I'm not used to the planar sound anymore? I do, however, own the LCD-i4 (which are fantastic) which I use quite frequently and don't have any problem with them :confused:

    I suspect I got a lemon and contacted their customer support for a swap (I want to give this one a chance, for old times sake!), which they agreed to, but asked me to try burning it in for 100 hours, first.
    While I don't believe this will fix what I'm hearing, I've read several times that - contrary to many headphones - burn-in was a thing with these, so I'll oblige...
     

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