Introduction

Drop has been going heavy with mechanical keyboards and headphones ever since the rebranding from Massdrop, and we have a new slew of Drop-sold products being reviewed on TechPowerUp. These include the officially licensed Drop + LOTR keyboards as well as relevant keycap sets in collaboration with brands including Marvel and Noctua. On the audio side, the company's biggest hit has to be the excellent HD 6XX open-back, over-ear set of headphones made in partnership with German powerhouse Sennheiser. While Drop has raised the price of the HD 6XX since the time of that review, it showed the power of vendor-specific headphone collabs that we've since been seeing in the IEM space lately. Drop took this success to heart and has since worked with a few other audio brands, Dan Clark Audio being one such partner.


Known as MrSpeakers until 2019, Dan Clark founded the eponymous Dan Clark Audio (DCA) audio brand in 2012. Dan has been in the audio business for a few decades now and his claim to fame has been with closed-back headphones. In particular, and in his own words, "how to make closed headphones sound more open while delivering the isolation many headphone users required." Dan Clark Audio has been responsible for some of the more innovative engineering in the headphones space of late, including the use of novel metamaterials in his flagship Stealth and Expanse headphones, but there have been some root technologies developed over the years that have gone into his ÆON—henceforth referred to as Aeon for easier typing—series of headphones. In particular, I'd draw your attention to the DCA Aeon RT that the first-party model the Drop + DCA Aeon Open/Closed X sets are analogous to, in the same manner the Sennheiser HD 650 was for the Drop x Sennheiser HD 6XX. Today we examine the Aeon Closed X planar magnetic headphones that aim to offer a wide soundstage coupled with a warm audio signature and a highly comfortable fit, without breaking the bank. Thanks to Drop for providing a review sample to TechPowerUp and we begin this review with a look at the product specifications in the table below.

Specifications

Packaging and Accessories

This is my first Dan Clark Audio product review and it does happen to be a Drop collaboration at that. As such, I wasn't sure what to expect going in but a relatively small box was not high on my guessing list! The box is aesthetically clean, with a black base that has the Aeon writing in a shiny silver print in addition to a simple headphones logo and the DCA company logo itself. On the back is confirmation about the US-based design and manufacturing of these headphones, and you can add customer support to that too, given Dan Clark Audio is based out of California. The Drop partnership finally makes a showing here courtesy a sticker that also confirms the model inside as well as the hand-written serial number of the unit, for records. A single seal on the side keeps the contents in place during transit.


Opening the box reveals a carry case right away, with other accessories placed underneath. This includes a laminated quick start guide going over upkeep and use of the headphones, as well as a unique set of tuning materials and an associated guide. The Aeon Closed X at launch seemingly only came with one set of pre-installed tuning materials (1-notch white felt) which continues to be the case. However, the Aeon RT allowed for a total of four sets of materials that effectively dampened the higher frequencies to varying extents and now the Aeon Closed X follows suit with black foam, black felt, and a 2-notch white felt set seen above. I understand this is a minor update that has come forth at least six months ago based on talking to other customers of these headphones.


The carry case provided sells for $30 separately and is fittingly titled the Aeon case. This is a molded hard storage/carry case made of EVA (ethylene-vinyl acetate) that has the DCA logo on the front and a textured finish applied to the plastic all around, to add grip in the absence of a carry tag. More branding is seen on the zipper pulls, with the self-sealing zipper also helping add some dust and spill resistance. It's not the smallest of cases but still makes for a fairly portable solution inside a backpack or carry-on luggage.


The headphones come neatly placed inside the case with a separate compartment in the lining that currently hosts the cable inside a plastic pouch. There is enough room here to also accommodate a portable DAC/amp or even a reasonably-sized DAP to complete your portable audio listening chain. The headphones come with the pads almost touching each other, except for a small foam piece keeping them from experiencing any unwelcome wear. This is especially handy given previous batches of the DCA Aeon headphones had some pads with uneven foam filling that has since been resolved, yet would have been worse for wear out the box without the foam separator.