Audio Performance After Burn-in

Now, after calibrating the sound card and accounting for the base floor noise levels, I am a touch more confident about the SPL label, but there is likely still a significant offset across the board owing to the overall resistance and impedance in the system in addition to the operating volume/gain. The curves should also ideally be normalized to a set frequency, but the IEC711 is such that you can't really compare these results with most other test setups anyway, just within our own library of measurements. What is useful information is how the left and right channels work across the rated frequency response in the FiiO FH5s earphones, or at least the useful part of it. The left earbud was separately tested from the right one, and colored differently for contrast. I did my best to ensure an identical fit for both inside the IEC711 orifice, so note how the right channel is ever so slightly behind in the lows and mids, but then has a relatively higher difference in the highs with a further reduction in the overall response here. It does seem like the Knowles BA and its tuning is where you not only see the burn-in effect, but also sample to sample variation even within the same set.


There is a reason why I split the testing section across two pages, and the additional graph talking about burn-in was only part of it. Remember those sound-tuning switches on the side of the ear buds? I wanted to test them as well, since it is a form of hardware equalization for further sound customization. Note that I did not use the other provided ear tips. While we do get bass ear tips and vocal ear tips, no treble-optimized ear tips are included, so I stuck to using the same balanced set as before and simply used the tuning switches in order. To better compare the effect of the switches, the frequency response curves were normalized at 1 kHz. Everything worked as expected; however, keep in mind that the normalizing has somewhat hidden the boost in the mids that the M switch (M for mids) helps with. We still clearly see the bass boost with the B switch, the mids/upper mids boost with the M switch, and the treble boost with the T switch, where everything else generally remains the same in practice. A non-normalized graph would show that last bit better, but make it far worse in other areas to where this is the best compromise in my books.

In a way, the hardware-tuning switches make it extremely hard to talk about the listening experience with the FiiO FH5s since you can always use a software EQ to get a similar effect, but to a less-efficient degree. Balanced mode is clearly where FiiO spent most of the time since any of the boosted modes also lose detail elsewhere. This is most obvious with the Bass switch, as the highs take a pounding. So keep this in mind and play around with the different tips as well.

I mentioned this before, but the strong points of the FiiO FH5s are the mid-bass and mids proper. Sub-bass is fine, but the semi-open design with relatively less isolation means you are not going to experience any booming thumps. I personally prefer this as I would much rather have detail retained. This is where the dual dynamic drivers come in, first with the larger one enabling a warm and energetic mid-bass that works nicely for EDM music. The soundstage in particular is very nice, allowing for clear distinction in width, depth, and height. This is exactly why FiiO went with a second dynamic driver to cater to the mids instead of a balanced armature driver, which is tricky to get right but worked out. Vocals are really good, and the extended soundstage continues to make an impression with hip hop, country music, and blues being favored more over classical and jazz. Post burn-in, things look much better for the highs too, with a smooth transient response that I spoke about in more detail on the previous page. I still found myself wanting more here, though, and on occasion felt things were worse than just a few minutes ago. I can't tell if it is a hardware or tuning issue, but turning on the T switch does help at those times.


Before moving on, let's do the customary TPU test of comparing how the FiiO FH5s fares inside a physical ear mold as opposed to the more ideal scenario involving the artificial head. This is no ThieAudio Monarch and ends up faring more like the norm, where things are quite close in the lows and mids but get progressively worse in the highs. That 8 kHz peak in particular is what I was talking about earlier, with a larger rise from the background to cause some discomfort to the perceptive ears.

As for comparisons to others, well, by the time I finished this review, I went through the Campfire Audio twins, TinHiFi T5, and ThieAudio Monarch. The latter made this seem cheap in more ways than one, which didn't help since I was still figuring out the burn-in situation at the time. But in hindsight, there are more than a few favorable things to say. The Campfigure Audio Satsuma comes in much lower for sure and actually has better tuning and clarity in the highs, but loses out elsewhere and has nowhere near the soundstage or range of the Fiio FH5s. The TinHiFi T5 is bested comprehensively, so much so that I would not get it over the FH5s even at nearly half the price. The Campfire Audio Honeydew costs slightly less and is a closer competitor owing to a bass-heavy response with a weaker mids and treble response. It is almost like the FH5s with the B switch turned on. The extent of customization is where the FiiO pulls ahead in my books, and it looks and feels better to me even before we get to the accessories where the FiiO is unbeaten. The only other set of IEMs tested thus far in this price range is the ThieAudio Legacy 5, which I believe is a much better balanced set. If you are not looking for customization options or don't care about accessories or brand names, the L5 is the better bet more often than not.

That having been said, there is nothing else in this price range here that comes with balanced cable options out of the box, which automatically gives a point to Fiio. This also means talking about it much is futile, and all I can say is that it works, but not to where you gain much. Tuning is already a weird bag of good to alright, so stereo playback is not going to be a bottleneck by any means.