Whizzer Kylin HE01 comes with a rather big matt black box. Even the writings on the box are black (with shiny fonts). When you open the inner magnetic box, HE01 salutes you like a piece of jewelry, like earrings rather than earphones. They are tiny comparing to many 1DD IEMs out there, made out of plastic and aluminium, definitely not cheap looking, the color scheme makes them stand out from the crowd, not much a manly look, but different.
The detachable 5N OFC cable, which shares the same rose gold color, looks very good too. It has 0.78 2 pin connector style. The right side has a little red dot on it, also the right IEM, so you won’t struggle to find the right side while connecting the cable. It’s a nice touch. The connectors are also see-through like the shells and have an angle, acting like ear hooks when connected, to sit firmly in your ears. Beeing small and light, the comfort level of Whizzer HE01 is very high. You can sleep on them without any problem.
You get a matt black aluminium carrying case in the box with “Kylin Acositic” writing on them. Did they mean acoustic? Feels very good in the hand, and sturdy.
6 pairs of silicone tips, 3 of them are “vocal“, 3 of them are for “reference” sound. They are on the softer side, none of them worked for me for a good fit, I used my trusted 3rd party ear-tips for testing.
Gears I used for testing
PC > Hiby R3 as DAC > Tidal
Smartphone > Hilidac Atom Pro Type-C DAC > UAAP
Sound
The sound signature of Whizzer HE01 is v-shaped. But very well shaped 🙂 I had to make that joke, sorry. With every IEM from China, I have this fear no matter what the frequency graph shows, how will electro guitar solo’s will sound, will there be sibilance or harshness? Will I be able to listen to Freddie Mercury? High octave notes, high octave vocals. Whizzer Kylin HE01 passes my test tracks successfully and gets my attention from the beginning.
Juno Reactor – Conquistador (Astrix Remix), one of my favorite test tracks. One track to test them all. Lows are very good, not bass head level (thankfully), maybe not the bass rumble you may desire, but definitely kicks good. Both sub-bass and mid-bass notes are very detailed. No takeovers there.
Zamzama – Avi Avital. Orient instruments, sound, meets western sound (piano). The layering of the instruments is on a high level. Some might say, that would be me, it’s on par with more expensive IEMs. The soundstage on the other hand, good, but not the best, for my ears at least. The quality of the notes, some might say timbre, for an 79$ IEM, again, very good, the technicalities of HE01 are very good.
Testing both male and female vocals on one track, Everything’s Alright – Jesus Christ Superstar, a musical from 1973. Both without any problems, male vocals are a bit recessed, not hitting your face, female vocals are more forward, both sounds realistic as they are in life.
Without any track from the group Tool, Inoculum this time, there is no proper testing of any IEM 🙂 Heavy tracks like this are not easy to handle for many earphones. Whizzer HE01 also struggles from fast drum + fast electro guitar notes, solos, can’t catch them all, but hey, we are dealing with a single dynamic driver 79$ IEM here, if it could handle them all, the price would jump a lot higher logically.
An other 10 minutes test track, this time from my favorite genre Blues, Walter Trout – Say Goodbye To The Blues. This one is for your ears to listen.
Whizzer Kylin HE01 is an all-rounder earphone, justifies what you pay for. You can drive them easily from any sound source. A balanced sounding IEM, maybe that’s why I like it that much, fits my taste good. Lacks a bit of clarity on some tracks, time to nitpicking. I would love a better cable, that doesn’t tangle after the y-split because it’s very thin and a wider choice of ear tips including foam tips.
I would like to thank Whizzer for providing me the review unit, it’s been a good and honest journey.
Specs
Driver: 4th gen BRIGHT series 10.2mm dynamic driver
Impedance: 18Ω
Sensitivity: 112dB/mW
Frequency range: 14-40000Hz
Cable: 5N OFC oxygen-free copper with 3.5mm plug, 0.78 2 pin connectors
Inside the box
Whizzer Kylin HE01 earphones
Detachable cable
Matt black aluminum carrying case
3 x pairs of vocal silicone ear tips, 3 x pairs of reference silicone ear tips, all-white color
Little cleaning brush