The disparity is comparatively refined—just like the distinction between a martini that’s stirred (holes in entrance) versus shaken (holes within the again)—nevertheless it’s undoubtedly audible. I are likely to choose headphones with an expansive soundstage and many element. Although with the SJY, I discover the marginally hotter and extra pure sound extra inviting for lengthy listening periods. And these are headphones that may reside comfortably in your head for lengthy stretches.
The impression of the straightforward swap of earpad orientation is made potential partly due to the design’s arch minimalism. The design was supposed to have as few items as potential and to carry them rigidly in place with the aim of attaining purity of sound. The aluminum chassis, diaphragm, and driver all measure low, single-digit millimeters. Your complete physique that clips onto the pads mixed is simply as thick as a typical month-to-month journal in 2026.
{Photograph}: Martin Cizmar
Due to that, these headphones really feel extra like a carbon metal pocketknife within the hand than a pair of ANC Bluetooth headphones. They’ve a powerful sturdiness and don’t really feel like one thing you’ll fear about breaking when you go to sleep with them on. They do weigh greater than a pound—at 570 grams with their cable, they’re virtually 40 p.c heavier than AirPods Max. They arrive with a padded case that has a beneficiant layer of froth for defense and a braided cable.
Regardless of their relative heft, I’ve had them perched on my head very persistently for the reason that testers arrived. That’s primarily as a result of detailed sound they render from the various gigs of too hardly ever used 24-bit Hello-Res FLACs on my desktop, as headphones like this will make outdated songs sound new once more. And if it begins to sound outdated once more? Simply flip these earpads to have the holes on the opposite aspect, and it’s an entire new ballgame.
Curve Killers
The flippable earpads are additionally made potential by the best way they’ve been tuned. Excessive-end wired headphones are having a little bit of a renaissance, rising slowly whereas the remainder of the audiophile market dies off round them. However they’re additionally getting extra homogenized. That’s as a result of the foremost makers are aiming to tune their merchandise alongside the Harman Curve, a tenet for the perfect earphone frequency response constructed from in depth scientific analysis, together with blind listening.
Whereas the Harman Curve is controversial amongst lovers on message boards, it’s been extensively adopted by headphone makers who attempt to get their inventory tuning on course. SJY doesn’t reject the Harman Curve however has tweaked the tuning away from it and, much more apparently, deliberately permits a listener to change up the signature relying on the orientation of the earpads. That’s what makes them so distinctive in a world saturated with headphone choices. In any case, SJY is in the beginning an fanatic model, owned and operated by Jeffrey Yin, who began the corporate in 2020 on the day after his 18th birthday. The SJY line has 4 fashions to this point, with a fifth on the best way, all made by Yin himself in Houston. You don’t purchase these to have simply one other pair of headphones. We hope that’s apparent sufficient.
However for me, it’s as near an ideal pair of headphones as I’ve ever owned.
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