Edifier avails the NeoBuds Pro, an extremely ambitious model for a contained price, which has not yet left its mark on the True Wireless headphone market.
And pre-orders are already open on Indiegogo.
An ambitious reduction? Or too optimistic?
The manufacturer is not a beginner in the audio industry, if only by owning the Stax brand (a legend of the very high-end electrostatic headphones). Still, Edifier has nothing of the scale of a brand like Sony, for example. However, the announced ambition of its NeoBuds Pro headphones has enough to arouse our curiosity.
The NeoBuds Pro are in-ear type, with a general design close to that of Huawei’s Freebuds Pro and a flat stem on which touch controls are grafted. They will be sold with a visibly very compact charging box, marked by an aluminium plate on its surface. The headphones are IP54 certified, which is in the average of the genre. Finally, it should be noted that seven sizes of silicone tips will be available, enough to make their use adaptable to as many people as possible.
The new Edifier headphones also incorporate an active noise reduction system, which according to the brand, would attenuate up to 42 dB. A figure looks almost fishy since the best True wireless ANC usually cap at 25 dB or even 30 dB, but no more. Even reputable headphones, like the Sony WH-1000Xm4, don’t go that far.
Advanced sound architecture
In parallel with this ambitious noise reduction, Edifier has built a rather exciting sound architecture, namely a two-way hybrid, close to that of the Bowers & Wilkins PI7 therefore. A classic dynamic transducer thus takes care of the bass and midrange, and a transducer with a balanced frame (of the brand Knowles) reproduces the treble. Each transducer has its dedicated amplifier.
On the slightly more marketing aspect, the NeoBuds Pro are Hi-Res certified since they integrate support for the very foggy LHDC codec (in addition to the classic SBC and AAC) and announce a bandwidth of 20 Hz – 40 kHz.
The hand-free part is equally ambitious since Edifier uses six microphones in this mode. What to isolate very effectively
the voice. Note that the Edifier NeoBuds Pro works in concert with a dedicated application, which integrates an equalizer.
The only slight disappointment of this data sheet was the headphones’ announced autonomy: 5 hours with ANC, 6 hours without ANC. A result in the low average.
The nerve of war, the price of Edifier NeoBuds is rather interesting: the headphones are advertised at about 75 euros for the first buyers, for a final price of around 110 euros (KSH 14,051).