Beautifully airy and articulate. Air is abundant in the A5000. The A5000 renders crashes and cymbals with a good bite but never rough. If I want to summarize A4000’s performance in a single statement, I would say that it has the sound signature of A8000; going a step further, I could say that A4000 achieves about 80% of what A8000 can do, which is really not a small feat. I know that it is hard to believe what I am saying, but this is what I feel; actually, at times, I thought that 80% might even be a bit conservative! Switching to Turbine Gold, I think it sounded closer to A4000 than IE80 and FX750. The Turbine Gold also has a similar soundstage and clarity as the A4000. The Turbine Gold has metal shells so they are heavier and not as comfortable as A4000.

final A5000 Single High Precision Dynamic Driver IEM

Final Audio is usually given their fair due of credit with both their A and E series in-ear releases for providing exceptional stages and images at affordable prices. Unsurprisingly, the width and depth I got out of both the A5000 and the E5000 alike was very impressive. Both units have spatial capabilities that easily set them apart from other in-ear units in their price range. With the E5000, I heard a bit more width; the A5000 still provided more-than-adequate width, and competes with the E5000 by providing a moderate amount of height in its image. All the above made clear that Beryllium was not an option for the driver of A4000 and A3000. So, what was the solution? Final engineers had the idea to start from a humble and underestimated material, such as PET (Polyethylene terephthalate), which many manufacturers use, but in this case Final engineers tried to get the most out of it! How do you do that? By making changes to the voice coil, magnet and housing. The idea behind it is that if we want a driver to have a performance as close to perfect as possible, then all its parts must work as a single unit; if one (or more) of the driver parts has a flaw, then the driver ecosystem as a whole suffers.The A5000 and E5000 have fundamentally different fits and physical designs. Rather than attempting the impossible and (in this case) entirely subjective task of deciding which provides “better” comfort, I'll instead just use this section to highlight their differences. PC + CX31993 or Avani dongle dac, PC + topping E30 & L30, Sony ZX707 DAP, Xperia 10 IV phone – A5000 needs same power as A4000 (less than A3000), just the cheap dongle is fine to be honest. The eartips provided enjoy so much popularity, I need not to expand on them. Great material, does not make your ear sweat exceedingly like an S&S will, no pressure buildup in the ear canal (compared to foams, or again the S&S for that matter), tonality wise it of course matches perfectly with the A4000. I don't like them so much on other IEMs, but that's outside the topic of this review. However, there’s a distinct difference in their textures that goes beyond balance. The A5000 is firm and fast in its lows, and showcases a high level of detail in its subs and mid bass – it’s simply more analytical. While the Blessing 3 doesn’t suffer from slow or floaty bass, and in fact even delivers some respectable slam, it’s a little more resonant in its delivery. It leaves time for some warm and tasteful blending, whereas the A5000 commands its low end like a tyrant. Mids

A5000 | final A5000 | final

The A5000 and Blessing 3 both perform impressively in their treble, and I don’t have much to criticize here for either. However, once again, we hear two different approaches. The Blessing 3 finds just the slightest amount of extra brightness compared to the Blessing 2, but nonetheless, has a much more Harman like character than what’s heard in the A5000. It mostly serves to to preserve realistic high frequency detail, with just little colored brightness in its mid-treble that pulls some higher harmonics out of electric guitars or strings. To test classical mids, I’m using The Piano Guys' “Code Name Vivaldi.” Dang, once again the A5000 manages to punch far above its weight here. The strings sound phenomenal – are we sure this isn’t secretly a hybrid? The bass can overwhelm the mids a tad once more, but the overall quality is so much better than the A5000’s price indicates. I really can recommend these to almost anyone looking for an IEM in this price range – as long as you don’t want it to look fancy or colorful and you don’t hate bass. Also, the cable is more basic than basic and indeed, changing it as soon as possible is advisable….if you manage to connect another one without going crazy!! The cable was quite hard to fit properly when connecting the 2-pin to the shell, and took some effort. More than I would have liked, and I was very careful to fit the two together. Even with that, it took more effort than it should. I worry about taking the cable on/off repeatedly such as switching cables as a result. The insert is in fact recessed, so not all aftermarket cables will work. Not to worry as the included 3.5se OFC is quite decent. With IEMs, I always do the usual burn-in of about 50 hours; it’s not that without this the IEMs do not sound right, but rather that the burn-in helps them to reach their full potential. Now, much more important than the technical burn-in, I consider the so-called phycological burn-in, which helps the listener to get acquainted with the IEM; in that sense, the phycological burn-in does not actually have a limit, and the more you listen the better you get to know the IEM.Detail retrieval was impressive at first with the A4k, and it sure is very capable in this domain, just not to the very-top level anymore. Things like the S12, the Heyday and many others have joined the fray and are giving the A4k a tough battle to fight. In my opinion the A4000 still manages to win out the others because it has many pros and almost no cons where the chinese planars always represent some compromise in their replay, be it closed stage like the Tangzu or the off timbre on the S12. silicon type eartips (SS,S,M,L,LL), each having a soft part for a comfortable fit in the user’s ear drum and a more rigid and groovy part for the sound conduit. This combination ensures a high level of sound insulation.

Final Audio A5000 - Reviews | Headphone Reviews and

The standard against which everything should be measured. I think it deserves that strong of a statement, because realistically it's what I always end up doing. "Is it as comfortable as my A4000 ?" If not, then I'm not going to grab that next IEM as much as the A4k I already have. "Is it as light as my A4000 ?" If not, I'm not going to wear it for long, and end up not touching that next thing because of that. "Does it sound as good as my A4000 ?" If yes, then that IEM is certainly special and deserves a review. While far from cheap the A4000 sits at a reachable price point for many and challenges products twice as expensive in many ways (weight, practicality, ease of use) or even any IEM on the market in others (soundstage, imaging, comfort) Imaging and Separation: I would call this IEM average in both without much to say. It exists and can do both while not really excelling at either. 5/10

Sound Impressions

I commend Final Audio on their dual-density silicone eartip mounting system, with the inner silicone ring being a firmer type of material than the outer part, it makes it quite easy to mount them on the spouts coming out of the IEMs. Color-coding the right vs left and in alternating dark vs light shades is also very nice so that you can make sure you're getting two of the same size when you install them. The tips are quite comfortable. Their musicality remains quite serious and mature, but never boring: they are iem's that wake up with their alert rendering, always focus. It's nonetheless the best experience you can currently get, maybe at the exception of the A5000 (that I have yet to try) Furthermore, Final eartips are very nicely designed, providing a high level of sound isolation, so ambient noise with A4000 or A3000 was never a problem. Slightly lowered the bass, as I found subbass could get overwhelming pretty fast on genres that didn't benefit from the push in that region.