Great big sound from slightly big earbuds

If you’re expecting sonic fireworks at a great expense, you may be disappointed. However, if you want the most accurate, insightful, and realistic version, Audeze Euclid is a thrill.

prologue

Since 2008, California’s Audeze has been making some of the best pound-for-pound headphones you can buy, even if they typically come with a hefty asking price.

The company is particularly keen on planar magnetic technology, which helps explain both the asking price and the size of the headphones themselves.

Audeze also tries not to let the need to keep in-ear monitors small enough for their purposes get in the way of that line of thinking. So the Euclid are a pair of in-ear buds that have both planar magnetic technology and the hefty price tag that the company exists for.

But even considering the Euclid’s wired or wireless flexibility, this is a very high price for an in-ear monitor. Is it probably worth it?

Audeze Euclid in-earbuds are available for £1,099 per pair. This equates to $1,299 in the US, but about AU$1,999 in Australia.

You don’t have to tell me this is a lot of money for a pair of in-ear monitors, even though that pair has complicated internals and both wired and wireless connectivity options. Some of our favorite wireless in-ear headphones cost about a third of this price. So Audeze might as well offer something special in Euclid…

design

• 3.5mm, 4.4mm, and Bluetooth receiver cables
• MMCX connection
• Includes Audeze, Comply and SpinFit eartips

When dealing with small objects that cost a lot of money, manufacturers can get into a bit of a tight spot when it comes to design. No sane person wants an over-engineered pair of earbuds, right? So while the sound quality might be all worth the asking price, it reveals the premium nature of the product to the casual observer. What should I do to

Audeze did a good job designing Euclid. Of course, that’s not the same as saying that these earbuds look like they’re worth the money. The polished aluminum housing looks and feels great, and the glossy company logo on the slice of carbon fiber that wraps each earbud provides just the right amount of shine.

Each earbud attaches to the included braided cable using a click-on/click-off MMCX connector. Euclid comes with a length of cable terminated with a 3.5mm single-ended plug and a 4.4mm balanced plug on one end and a flexible ear hook on the other. ear. Also bundled is a Bluetooth receiver integrated into the cable that connects the two earbuds. It has 8 hours of battery life on a single charge and can handle codecs up to aptX HD.

As far as eartips go, Audeze is in town. The Euclid package contains 3 pairs each (S/M/L) of Audeze silicone tips, Comply foam tips and SpinFit silicone ear tips. Therefore, it is easy to get a comfortable fit without aggravating the skin condition.

Features

• 18mm ultra-thin planar magnetic transducer
• phaser waveguide
• fluxer magnet

Despite being light and beautifully crafted, the Euclid eartips are a lot thicker than you’re probably used to. That’s because Audeze mounts his 18mm planar magnetic transducers on each one, and along with the accompanying technology, they need a little more space.

An ultra-thin Uniforce transducer contains a voice coil that does the audio business, and is supported by Audeze’s patented Fazor waveguide to counteract the fading and distortion you’d expect from a closed-back in-ear design increase. Fluxor magnets further reduce distortion, improve sensitivity and keep the frequency response as uniform as possible. This is the usual Audeze methodology, on a much smaller scale.

Basically, that’s it as far as features go. Your money buys you two lengths of cable, a whole stack of ear tip options, and some very complicated small-scale engineering.

sound quality

• Spacious scale and dynamism
• very detailed and well organized
• Low frequency realism may not be for all listeners

First off, don’t think Euclid makes a silk purse out of your laptop’s audio performance pig’s ear. Earbuds like this only make the source player’s shortcomings more apparent, so be prepared to do the right thing. And being right also means a decent DAC and decent quality digital audio files. Of course, if you’re using a Bluetooth receiver cable, DACs with 24-bit resolution are already available.

Connected to a MacBook Pro via an iFi Go Bar USB DAC and playing a bunch of high-res files from Crush by Floating Points, the Euclid sounds a bit muted at first. However, it is safe to say that this is a false alarm. In fact, Euclid is completely naturalistic and precise.

Admittedly, these earbuds don’t play favorites regarding frequency ranges. The idea that they extend down to 10Hz is fantastic, but the low frequencies they produce are deep, rapid, and forcefully controlled, Very detailed. Some listeners may want a little more fuller punch, but few seem to find the momentum and variation in Euclid’s bass reproduction somehow lacking.

As far as tonality is concerned, the top of the frequency range is equally well controlled, quick and well judged. The treble sound is crisp, pleasant rather than hard, and crunchy enough to let the top end shine. The level of detail remains dizzyingly high, and there are always plenty of unruly attacks.

However, it’s in between that this set ceases to be just a very good pair of earbuds and takes flight. , robust enough to give substance to voices and instruments, and neutral enough where tonality is concerned so that all elements sound incredible.

The entire frequency range is nicely put together, with no over- or under-estimation. There’s plenty of dynamic headroom available to take full advantage of crescendos and other big changes in attack, and there’s hawkish attention to subtle overtone discrepancies in solo instrument recordings.

And it all takes place in a large, well-defined and stunningly three-dimensional soundstage. So whether the recording in question is complex, dense, or both, each element of it has enough breathing space to be described as stretchy. The control and speed of the lowest frequencies also allows Euclid to explain convincing rhythms.

In short, there’s very little to drill a hole in here. Yes, you can’t get punchier, more muscle-bound earphones for that much money.

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