I just turned my wired audio headphones into Bluetooth cans with this DAC — and the sound quality is shockingly good
As much as the best wireless headphones sound really good, they’re never able to stand up to the sonic might of a pair of excellent wired headphones. Be that to budget restrictions, space constraints — even when wired, Bluetooth headphones generally don’t sound as good as the best wired audiophile headphones.
So it’s long been a quest of mine to see if I can bring some wireless sophistication to my favorite wired headphones — and I might have just found the end of my journey.
What is it?
This is the Astell & Kern HB1. You might have heard of A&K before — a maker of extremely expensive audio hardware like digital audio players, desktop amplifiers, and other premium sound gear.
The HB1 is one of its most accessible products. Rather than the thousands you spend on one of A&K’s (excellent) touchscreen music players, the HB1 is a funky little dongle that’s only going to set you back $249.
It’s a little dongle DAC, like a more premium version of the iFi Go Link Max that I tested recently, although it’s got a secret: Inside its plastic shell, alongside the top-notch DAC, there’s a battery — and a Bluetooth antenna.
The idea is that you can either use it as a USB-C powered DAC, plugged into a phone so that you can get better hi-res playback for your wired headphones, or you can plug in some wired headphones and then use them wirelessly.
Does it work?
As a dongle DAC, the HB1 is excellent. It takes hi-res lossless streams from Qobuz, and decodes them with greater detail and panache than your phone ever could.
There’s slightly more space, more depth, and more detail to proceedings. The bass in drum bass is chunkier and vocals are more clear.
When you boot up the battery and get listening to your favorite wired headphones things get even more fun. Your phone or laptop can be in one place, letting you wander around the room with headphones that sound better than the Sony WH-1000XM5 could ever hope to.
You don’t need to worry about there being a headphone jack on your phone, and it frees up the USB-C port on your device in case you need to charge while listening to music.
Now, while the Bluetooth connection does lose some of the hi-res playback features that you get when fully wired, the excellent DAC and amp on board the HB1 make sure that you don’t mind too much in the long run.
I was at first not entirely convinced by all these ideas at first, however. After all, I still had to wire the headphones into the dongle in my pocket while using it — why should I not just connect the DAC to my phone and listen like that?
But there was one pair of headphones that completely changed my mind.
Audeze LCD-X and the HB1: A perfect pairing
One of my favorite pairs of headphones are the Audeze LCD-X. They’re a big, brutish pair of cans, open-backed so that everyone can hear my music and I, what they say.
As much as I like the best noise-canceling headphones for use on the bus, I’m not such a fan of using them at home when I need to hear the doorbell at a moment’s notice.
The open-backed nature of the LCD-X boasts not only a wider soundstage, but their nature also allows me to hear the doorbell far more easily than I otherwise might.
But, with their nature as wired headphones, using them around the house means two things in my pocket, or a wire draping across the floor.
The HB1 allowed me to hoover the house with the little dongle in my pocket, and my phone on the table. I could hear the doorbell thanks to my open-backed headphones, and my phone battery was saved thanks to the amplifier in the HB1.
I got it. My LCD-X didn’t become traditionally wireless — but they earned some of the format’s greatest benefits thanks to the HB1.
The drawbacks of the wireless life
Ok, so there are a couple of caveats to the HB1: The first is the cable mess — you still have to have the headphones connected somehow, of course.
Headphones like my LCD-X happen to have pretty awkward cables, and walking around with them (and sometimes extra adapters for socket compliance) becomes potentially annoying.
It also highlights that while there’s no wire connecting you to your phone, this isn’t a wireless solution to listen to your wired headphones on the bus. After all, the wire is still there.
The HB1 supports AptX HD, but even then, it’s not capable of the full range of quality that Qobuz plays.
Then there’s the loss of the true hi-res lossless playback. The HB1 supports AptX HD, but even then, it’s not capable of the full range of quality that Qobuz plays. This one didn’t annoy me as much as I thought it might, given the overall quality of the Bluetooth playback, but it was noticeable.
It’s also just another device to charge. The HB1 lasts around 12 hours when being used in Bluetooth mode, which isn’t as much as you’d expect from even the Bose QuietComfort Ultra headphones — whose 24-hour battery life is considered low for the format.
For me, around the house, the sound benefits of using my wired audiophile headphones over a pair of traditional wireless headphones make the HB1 well worth the $249 cost.
Even as a simple DAC the HB1 is a great buy, improving music playback from your phone, laptop or tablet while powering more impressive headphones.
The Bluetooth mode, while my focus here, is really more the icing on a very tasty cake — and one I can heartily recommend to anyone looking to improve the audio quality of their devices without breaking the bank.
If $249 is slightly to much for you, you should also think about the iFi Go Link Max. It costs under $100, and brings some of those audio gains to your devices; albeit restricted to a wire.
More from Tom’s Guide
Source link
