Those who complain in regards to the sound high quality of wi-fi earbuds are lacking the purpose. There are clearly higher sounding headphone choices on the market, nevertheless it’s the comfort of wire-free tiny earbuds that buyers have embraced. Beyerdynamic’s second era Xelento Wireless thinks it may well ship each: wi-fi comfort with audiophile high quality sound, however we’ve some issues.

The most evident subject with the $1,200 Xelento Wireless earbuds is that you just’re paying $1,200 for wi-fi earbuds that technically aren’t utterly wi-fi. Like a few of the earliest ‘wireless’ choices to hit the market (earlier than the debut of actually cable-free choices from Earin, Bragi, and finally Apple), the Xelento Wireless buds—the elements that really sit in your ears—are tethered by two brief wires to a neckstrap that holds the batteries and Bluetooth {hardware}.

So whereas they don’t have to be bodily linked to a smartphone or different audio supply (which continues to be an possibility if you happen to go for the $1,000 Xelento Remote instead, or purchase a separate 5 pole Pentaconn cable to attach the buds to a hifi system) it doesn’t really feel proper to discuss with them as actually wi-fi. The one benefit to this strategy is that it means the buds themselves can as an alternative prioritize measurement, consolation, and audio {hardware}, as an alternative of getting to cram all their performance into such a small house. The neckband additionally guarantees a stable 14 hours of playback on a single cost, though if you happen to’re away from an influence supply for some time, you gained’t have a charging case buried in a pocket to shortly high them again up.

Our different concern is that, regardless of the usage of the corporate’s miniaturized Telsa audio know-how with 11-millimeter drivers in every bud plus gold-plated plugs, silver-plated cables, and a complete of 10 pairs of interchangeable eartips, the Xelento Wireless are nonetheless depending on Bluetooth: a wi-fi know-how that has been kind of shoehorned into offering over-the-air audio supply. The neckband contains a built-in digital-to-analog converter with an amplifier from AKM and help for codecs like LHDC, Qualcomm aptXTM HD, and aptXTM, however these are all nonetheless compressed codecs, and anybody prepared to drop $1,200 on earbuds will probably be making an attempt to keep away from audio compression in any respect prices.

Although we haven’t examined them in particular person, there’s little doubt that Beyerdynamic has created a finely tuned and superbly crafted pair of wi-fi earbuds right here. But the Xelento Wireless are going to be a tough promote, even to these joyful to splurge on their audio gear. The tethered Xelento Remote model would possibly truly be the higher possibility right here, as they are available at $300 cheaper than Sennheiser’s IE 900 earbuds, which ship a set of premium and wonderful sounding buds in supplies like milled aluminum as an alternative of the 24-carat gold that Beyerdynamic has put into its newest and best.