Hifiman Edition XS Initial Impressions

Coming from K712, HD600, HD380, and SRH1540. Other mentions Fidelio X2, Soundmagic HP150.

Been looking forward to trying my first planars, spent a lot of time searching and although I think I will end up having Audezes some day I got the Edition XS, since I already spent a lot of Black Friday money on audio plugins.

So they arrived today and I put them on. Behringer UMC1820 > Behringer Xenyx 802.

They are super comfortable. Granted I have a big head.
The build quality feels really nice, I’ve never had something so robust in my hands. (first planars)
Turned them on.
First notice: soundstage - big, the separation is so-so, the imaging is average. It sounds in between fluid and accurate.
Second notice: these were really hard to drive? I had to turn the volume knob to 65% for full volume. With the HD600 I can go 40%-50% max. And that made no sense given their impedance.
Second notice: dayum that treble
Had to turn it down on my mixing board. Like 50% down
Long term listening: dayum that treble. Kept turning it to 30% and then back to 50%.
Now I’m used to it. Treble is fine at 70% of its volume. Probably losing some hearing. But now that I got used to it…
Conjure One (chillout electronic, pop): AMAZING vocals, amazing polite sound, great soundstage, great balanced sound (with treble reduced by 40-50%)
The detail level are amazing. I’m hearing individual reverb settings on multiple instruments separated. I never knew that was possible.
Symphonic and progressive metal are great and expansive.
Pop: Great. Some sibilance.
Overall bass: not as controlled as I expected. It’s very strong and I had to turn it down a tiny bit.
The mids are kind of recessed. I upped them a tiny bit.
I don’t care if you don’t like EQ.
Prodigy - Spitfire - a track I listen to measure how the headphone deals with high distortion in high volumes. It was almost up there in the clarity section, as if I’ve “almost reached my goal” in overall clarity. A BIT of distortion, but far better than what I get with HD600 or K712.
After an hour of listening I thought to myself: These kinda sound boring… Sure detail and all but they aren’t as pleasurable as my HD595 or HD600.
Some time later on, I heard how they sound with hardcore EDM / DnB.
Dayum they slam. So they have my place in the rig until I get the Audeze LCD-Xs some day.
Robert Miles - Children. Amazing sounding. Deep, detailed, powerful. Got to love em, although they can sound a LITTLE thin and sibilant, I’ve grown to like em more.

I hope the burnout is real and they get better, but overall I’m happy with my purchase.

*very very rarely the right driver rattles but I’ve heard a lot of quality issues after like multiple returns with XS so I’m fine with these, wouldn’t want to get a worse pair. I only consider these an entry pair until I get the Audezes. Then I’ll give em to some young guitar kid or something.

I won’t be returning unless I face some serious quality issues within return period.