Bulk Initial Impressions January 2021 Part 1

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Since I got so backed up in Q4 2020, I will be doing 2 bulk initial impression posts.

Any rankings are still in BETA form. Do not compare closed-back rankings with open back ones, please. Link to where I talk about my beta recommendations here.
 
As for r/Gaming_Headsets, these will not be individually posted there. But once I post part one and part 2 I will post both together over there, once I repost the main sticky to include links to the guide, along with a section for current mega threads and more.

----Audeze Penrose----

What everyone has been waiting for, my thoughts on the Penrose.
 
Build
Build quality is fine, it's not going to blow anyone away as it is all plastic but nothing feels extra cheap about it. The build is identical to the Mobius which I have had since near release and it is holding up very well.
 
Comfort
Comfort is mostly good but the clamp is fairly high. This will ultimately be the difference between it being comfortable or uncomfortable for most. For me, it took about a month or so for the Mobius to break in and after that, I had no comfort issues. The Penrose is breaking in about the same as the Mobius.
 
Sound
Sound Quality wise I haven't spent enough time with it to say exactly how it stacks up. But it's damn close to the Mobius, which I gave in my Beta Grades a B- for technical performance. The Penrose from my impressions so far is between a C+ and a B-. So it's still by a decent margin the best-sounding wireless headset on the market.
 
Worst Case: Mobius USB > Mobius LDAC BT > Mobius BT > Penrose RF > Penrose BT > Mobius 3.5mm > Penrose 3.5mm
 
Best Case: Mobius USB > Mobius 3.5mm > Penrose 3.5mm > Mobius LDAC BT > Penrose RF > Mobius BT > Penrose BT
 
Conclusion
So overall it is easily the best wireless gaming headset I have ever reviewed. But by how much, well I will talk about that in the full review.
 
Issues
Thankfully I haven't had to deal with many of the issues many users are reporting. Most of the issues are feature-based which I don’t test right away, so I figure some of the issues will pop up after further testing. Most of the feature updates should be fixable via firmware.
 
The thing that surprised me most about my time testing is how stable it has been connection wise.
I do get the issue where I need to unplug and replug the dongle on restart on PC.
 
My biggest issue with the Penrose
With the Penrose hitting the market at $100 less than the Mobius and the Orbit and Orbit S Going on sale fairly often, it's hard to justify the Mobius now. The Mobius needs a price drop or to go on sale a little more often now, $300-350 would be best. The Mobius is still the best sounding Bluetooth headphone so it still has that (spoiler for the next review).
  • Mobius $300
  • Penrose $300
  • Orbit S $250
  • Orbit $220
Full Review Coming Soon.
 
Penrose: TBD
Mobius: B/B-
Orbit: B/B-

----Drop + THX Panda----

I know a lot of people were hoping for info from me on this but it's to the point where I have spent too much time with it and can't really do initial impressions, but because of that it will be one of the next reviews I do. It will be out soon.
 
Full Review Coming Soon.

----Sennheiser PC38x----

The same issue as the Panda, I've spent too much time with it. This will be the next review to come out. With comparisons to other Sennheisers.
 
Full Review Coming Soon.

----Schiit Vali 2+----

The Vali 2 I was never all that fond of, but the Vali 2+ is very much a pure improvement in all ways. In general, I wouldn't recommend people buying the old Vali 2 as a first amp, but with the new one, I may be able to actually change that.
 
It now directly competes with my previous favorite sub $200 Hybrid Tube Amp the Massdrop x Alex Cavalli Tube Hybrid Amp (CTH). So I'm trying to get it back in to directly compare against.
 
Hopefully, a few new Schiit reviews will also be coming soon after this one.
 
Full Review Coming Soon.

----iFi Zen DAC and Zen CAN----

The review of these was supposed to be out by now but sadly like everything else they got delayed.
I'm very impressed with both of these and the Zen DAC is going to be highly recommended by me, but there are some choices that I'm not 100% sold on, which ill talk about in my full review.
 
Full Review Coming Soon.

----Apple Airpods Max Wireless----

I planned to do a full review of these when I assumed they would be good but overpriced. After getting them in there kinda just meh and overpriced. Here is the beta rankings and ill just say unless your a hardcore apple fan boi, don’t bother.
 
No full review planned.
 
Tonality: C+
Technicality: C-

----Cloud 2 Wireless----

This 100% uses the same driver(if not it's super similar) as the Cloud 2, but the housing differs.
 
The FR is remarkably close to the CLoud 2 with only a few slight improvements. Bass is still too elevated and the mid-bass still bleeds into the mids because of its elevation. Mid-range remains fairly flat until you get to the upper mid-range which has a slightly higher elevation. Treble still is bright but not as peaky, the 4k dip isn't as bad either.
 
FR wise the only thing worse is that 3k raise. Aside from that, the treble is a bit smoother but still bright and bass extension is better.
 
Sound quality overall is still very similar to the cloud 2 over its included dongle. So a cloud 2 with no dongle on a good source will sound better but these are not half bad.
 
This may be my new favorite sub $200 wireless gaming headset. It isn't perfect and still doesn't hit my average of C for sound quality but I have had no issues using it, it's comfortable, and the builds good and compared to the rest of the market this does stand out. Price like all Wireless gaming headsets is a bit too high and I would take this over going wired but for people looking for wireless id for a sure start here.
 
Full review planned.
 
Cloud 2 Wireless
Tonality: C+
Technicality: D+
Cloud 2
Tonality: C+
Technicality: C-
Cloud Alpha
Tonality: B-
Technicality: C

----Sennheiser HD560s----

Sadly, I still don't have a unit of my own in, thankfully I was able to borrow a unit for a couple of days. But not long enough to fully review it just to get some initial sound impressions.
 
The simplest way to put this is it is the new mid-tier Neutral bright king. It's not actually overall that bright just a touch and is very balanced overall. This does however replace the DT880 (non 600ohm) in almost all cases. The only thing I initially found was weaker on it was imaging. This is why I don't see it being amazing in FPS titles.
 
Build and comfort are identical pretty much to the rest of the HD500 series. Sound quality and presentation lean closer to the 500 series. It's pretty much the peak HD500 series headphone.
 
HD560s
Tonality: A+
Technicality: B- (Maybe C+)
HD6xx
Tonality: A
Technicality: B
HD599
Tonality: B
Technicality: C
 
Full Review Planned.

----Beyerdynamic Tygr 300r----

Sadly I won't be doing a full review as I didn't have it in long enough, and won't be able to get it in any time soon. But I was able to rank it.
 
Simply put it's a better DT990. The Dt990 is very popular but IMO not very good. The Tygr 300r offers a DT990 like sound signature but better and with better imaging. Honestly, the way the DT990 gets falsely described is actually how the TYGR sounds.
 
I still think the DT880 is just plain better. If you want the wider staging and bigger bass the TYGR 300r is solid.
 
No full review planned.
 
TYGR 300r
Tonality: B
Technicality: B-
DT880 (non 600ohm)
Tonality: B+
Technicality: B-
DT990
Tonality: C+
Technicality: C+

----Corsair Line----

I was going to do initial impressions of the HD75x and HS70 BT but decided to just sum up why they all suck instead. I hate this.
 
I'm glad I didn't post my 2018 year-end Awards because in it I said Corsair was one to watch in terms of audio after the base HS line launched. Little did I know the decent tuning they stumbled upon was an accident (or they just made the choice to tune everything worse) and they would spend the next 2 years making sure everything they released was tuned like junk to match the poor performance. What a Huge disappointment. Come on corsair I know you can do better.
 
The HS35 and HS45 are shocking bad but at least there ultra-budget headsets I don't know what excuse they have for the Virtuosos tuning. At its price, it is unacceptable for a product to sound as bad as this. All the other products I talk about sounding poor at this price like the A40/50, Arctis Pro line, G pro-line, Blackshark v2 line, and more, all sound amazing compared to this, and they're not good for the price. ITs seriously unacceptable, that mixed with the HI-Res certification BS, and this product treats the consumer like there dumb. It's a BS marketing badge they paid for to sell a POS. If the product is ok to better, I tend to not really care about the Hi-Res BS, but in this case, it's a borderline scam.
 
Honestly, I hate to say it but Corsair has reached the point where it's safe to say avoid all Corsair headsets currently available and doesn't trust any future releases until they prove they can make something that is even ok. Corsair first did it with their mice(they do have a couple of ok mice), then their keyboards, and now their headsets. They have replaced Razer in the category of “Just avoid. 
 
Razer is now a safer bet than Corsair, 2020 really was a weird year.
 
Corsair I 100% know you can do better, scrap the Void line and Virtuoso and start from scratch and make something decent, then change back the HS line and fix all the QC issues. (also remove the fake grills)
 
No full review planned.

Tonality Beta Grade
Technical Beta Grade
HS50/60/70 Non-Pro:
C+
D-
HS35:
E
E+
HS45:
E
E+
HS50 Pro:
D
D-
HS60 Pro:
D
D-
HS60 Haptic:
D-
E+
HS70 Pro:
D
D-
HS70 BT:
D-
D-
HS75 XB:
D+
D-
Void Elite Line:
D+
D-
Virtuoso:
D-
D