Hoomia H8 Hybrid Drivers In-Ear Stereo Earphone with Micro Phone Brown

I first became aware of the Hoomia H8 earphones from browsing the Head-Fi site, and there didn't seem to be a great deal of other information about them available – other than the review on Head-Fi, which certainly piqued my interest. I already have some of the Xiaomi Hybrid earphones, which I enjoy greatly, and I felt the Hoomias would be an interesting and enjoyable comparison. I received the review pair direct from Hoomia in exchange for writing an open and honest review.My headphone listening varies: at home I have a couple of full-size rigs – Arcam and Cambridge Audio CD players driving a Schiit Magni, a Pro-ject Headbox S, a Mr Nixie Russian valve (tube) hybrid amp, and a Project Starlight valve hybrid amp. My full-size headphones are Sennheiser HD598 and Audio Technica ATH-M50x. However, I'll also listen to a Sony MZ-RH1 Hi-MD recorder and an xDuoo X3 DAP at home and at work using a range of IEMs including Musical Fidelity EB33, Sennheiser CX880, Xiaomi Hybrid, and Xiaomi Piston 3. Most of my IEM listening is either at work (office) or late at night when the house is quiet.First ImpressionsThe Hoomia H8 earphones come in a substantial wooden box with a cut foam insert and a dense rubber winder/storage bobbin. It's certainly quite up-scale packaging and you get the impression that Hoomia are pitching the H8s at a more high-end market than a lot of their other earphone production. The build of the phones also speaks of solidity and quality with the 3.5mm plug and the Y-splitter covered in a rich, brown-anodidized sleeving, which tones very nicely with the dark brown, flat and sturdy cable (which is also very tangle-resistant). The earphones themselves are in either bare (or clear anodized – can't tell which) aluminium and are very ncely finished with a clean, engineered, "turned" appearance with laser-etched writing. The only slight let-down is the microphone assembly, which is made of black plastic; it works perfectly, but it looks a little "ordinary" compared with the rest of the product which is rather more "premium" as a whole. They come with medium silicone rubber eartips fitted and with small and large spare eartips in the box, and a pair of foam eartips. I did all my listening with the medium silicone tips – they were comfortable and provided good sealing and isolation.The cables emerge straight out of the aluminium sphere of each earpiece without any strain relief, and whilst this feels pretty solid, I do wonder a little as to whether it might slightly shorten the life-expectancy of the cables at this point – especially as you have to use the cable a little as a "lever" to help with inserting and removing each earpiece from your earlobe. I'd feel a little happier if there were some kind of moulded strain relief around the cables at this point. Time will tell.ListeningI generally give earphones about 48 hours or so burn-in. I'm not 100% convinced of the value of burning-in headphones – I think I've noticed some change/improvement in some cases, but I wouldn't bet my house on it. That said, I wouldn't call myself a sceptic either...In this case, however, I plugged the H8s straight into my Windows Phone Nokia Lumia 1020 – because I wanted to test the function of the MusIC button (Windows Phone tends to be the poor relation when it comes to these things, which seem to be mainly designed primarily around Android functionality, and maybe Apple iOS). As it turns out, it works fine on my Lumia 1020; a single press pauses or re-starts the playback, a quick double-press skips one track forward, and a quick triple-press skips back to the start of the track (and a double-triple-press skips you back to the previous track). I hadn't intended to listen for long from my phone, but I found myself really caught up in the music – I was listening to the album Sen by Sevara Nazarkhan as a variable bit-rate WMA file and I was impressed by the clarity and spaciousness of the music, and the firm, almost tactile quality of the bass. I ended up listening for about an hour without intending to. A good start – coming from my phone and a fairly compressed file at that. I then plugged the phones into a portable CD played and gave them 48 hours of relatively loud music with a good spread of dynamic and frequency range (Midival Punditz – as it turned out; the CD was handy). I always feel a bit impatient when I'm burning-in 'phones – I want to have a bit of a listen, but by inner purist urges restraint until a couple of days have passed.I have since spent about a week and a half listening to these phones with a wide range of music and I'm really starting to get a feel for them now. My main listening source has been my xDuoo X3 DAP, which continues to impress with it's musicality and openness. It always seems a bit artificial to break the sound down into bass-mid-treble, because that's not how I hear (or listen), but for the sake of making some sense of my impressions, I'll do so anyway...Bass – The first thing which struck me with the H8s was their bass presence, and extended listening has borne this out. The bass is plentiful, but very well controlled and articulate. There is clear definition in the bass and it reaches down very low. My standout track for bass extension is Glistening Fields from Iarla O'Lionaird's Foxlight album – the bass goes so low it becomes a tangible presence if you're listening on speakers with a quality, hi-fi sub-woofer. The H8s reproduce that effect remarkably well – given that they can only work on the ears and not on the chest cavity as well! It's also fair to say that the bass doesn't dominate or obscure the rest of the music – in dense orchestral passages it's still possible to hear into the heart of things and hear what's going on. I think that this is partly due to the quality of the mid-range...Mids – Just out of curiosity, I like to listen to a 20Hz – 20kHz sweep through new headphones, just to see how they respond. Nope, it's NOT scientific, but in the past it has picked out some notable resonances in some phones which ought to know better... With the Hoomias I thought I picked up a slight emphasis in the mid-range – nothing major – just a mild hump in the response. Whatever, listening to real music did reveal a corresponding clarity of detail and focus, particularly with vocals and some orchestral music. It's easy to hear through the complex textures of some of Wagner's or Sibelius's orchestral writing – and very rewarding it was. Likewise with Monteverdi's Vespers (Andrew Parrott's 1984 EMI recording) – the vocal lines are consistently clear, detailed and well-separated, with the other instruments existing in the same acoustic. The H8s appear to have been designed to get the best out of this kind of music. Where I felt they did slightly less well, was with some electronic-based music (Daft-Punk, for example), where the super-defined mid-range could feel a little fatiguing after a while, and I found myself turning the volume down, because it all felt a little "too loud". The Xiaomi Hybrids, with their slightly softened mid-range response, are a little more relaxing for listening to that kind of music for any length of time. Neither is right or wrong – it's about taste, and having choices.Treble – One of the things I'm finding with hybrid-driver designs like the Hoomia H8s and the Xiaomi Hybrids is the sweetness and clarity of the treble response delivered by the balanced-armature unit housed in each earphone. Granted, I'm a 50+ year-old guy and my hearing isn't going to be going all the way out to 20kHz anymore, but my hearing is still pretty good and relatively un-abused – I religiously wear high-attenuation earplugs when I'm out on my motorcycle. The treble from the H8s really is a delight – clean, sweet, open, and with no undue emphasis or stridency. In some ways I find it hard to describe the "treble" on its own, simply because it seems so well integrated with the rest of the music. There's not a hint of that exaggerated "hi-fi-ness" that you can get (and which I try to scrupulously avoid, because I find it so irritating). Vocals feel very natural with no undue sibilance, and cymbals are very clean with no excessive splash.Overall sound – Putting all this together, the H8s give a very detailed, seamless presentation. Very musical and open with no real vices or coloration to speak of. The sound-stage they present is open and spacious and very detailed, though interestingly, a little less widely spread than my Audio-Technica ATH-M50x – a little more intimate and "in the head". The sound-stage is very believable, with a real sense of placing with a genuine acoustic around performers.They are very detailed. However, with some kinds of music, they can feel a little "unforgiving", perhaps just a little "too much", but I'm being really picky in pointing this out – it's the kind of thing that I might notice one day, and not on the next, even listening to the same piece of music. It's the "flip-side" of being so clear and detailed all across the audio spectrum; just sometimes one wants to take a seat a little further back in the auditorium. These earphones will not disappoint if you're after hearing all the information – they really are lovely and a delight in that regard. I'll be listening to a familiar piece of music and a smile will come to my face as I hear some new detail, or a familiar intricacy presented with a new clarity.Value – Given that I received these earphones effectively "for free" (except that I've actually spent quite a few hours taking photos and writing this review), I do have to ask myself whether I think they are worth the asking price. On Amazon.com at the moment, they're available for $96 (or about £67.50) – which is a fair bit of money. On reflection, I do feel that at that price they do represent good value. If I'd bought them for that price with my own cash I'd feel pretty happy, and I'd be looking forward to listening to my music through them for a long wile to come.

Hybrids run in two camps exceedingly average or magical. Something like the Kz Zst is just average, nice but nothing special. Then there are hybrids like these Hoomia's that push a dual hybrid into magical. Why? Well they are articulate, you hear everything top to bottom, strong tight bass that doesn't bleed into the mids. Mids that are precise and highs that sparkle. A large sound stage with a nice 3d feel. But there is still that something else that is hard for me to define that musical quality that I find magical. I have several good hybrids including a few triples (2 ba+1 dynamic) most recognizable the Astrotec Ax60's which are very good, neutral borderline analytical. But just miss that extra bit these have. These are a small round sound chamber with a short tip which does make it hard to find the right tip for a good seal ( I'm using Havi B3p1 tips) the shell shape and size complicates insertion amd removal. That said these aren't difficult to drive, they work well with my Fiio X3 but found that my Asus tablet needed a headphone amp (Fiio A3) for the same sound experiance.Update, first suffered from a serious right to left imbalance on day two, loved the sound so chose to order a replacement. The replacement came. That it came opened and jsed isn't the issue but it didn't have just an imbalance but the left side didn't function. So as wonderful as these sound I am hesitant to recommend based on quality and durability. unfortunately based on other reviews it's a fairly consistent issue.

Soundwise, the Hoomia H8 earphones earn the 5 stars I gave them. There is a significant caveat, however: the metal of the earbuds resonate too easily. In normal use this mainly is an issue when the cord rubs against something, causing a vibration you hear (or sense a better word for it?). And should you knock something against one of the earbuds while it's planted in your ear--especially if its solid--you'll definitely hear that; if that something is metallic, it may actually hurt from the sound. So you do need to keep that in mind. Oddly, I also own Hoomia's D8, and those are also metallic, but not nearly as sensitive to vibration (though a metallic knock to those will also ring your ears--just the cord won't bother you the same).The sound is a well engineered balance between a dynamic driver and a balanced armature, with the former serving up good bass and mid-range, and the latter, crisp highs that deliver well-defined separation of channels.One final note, and this is true of any earphones I've thus tried, the fit of the inserts is everything. If you buy these and don't get the dramatic bass you were expecting, make sure you have ear inserts with a proper seal. I had to experiment with various ones--from other earphones in fact--before I got the right fit, and thus the best sound.[Update]One word of caution, make sure you use the earbuds themselves for putting in/pulling out of your ears. If you use the cord, it may cause the connection inside to come loose. So for long term use, a bit of TLC is required in this regard.