Eastern producer Ultimate Audio began lifestyles within the Seventies creating turntable cartridges, amplifiers and different hi-fi elements. Rapid ahead to 2023, and the corporate has launched a circle of relatives of wi-fi earbuds, the flagship style being the brand new ZE8000s.
To be had in black or white finishes, they’ve a novel design that puts maximum in their electronics out of doors the real earpiece, giving them a lovely sci-fi glance. Inside of they use what Ultimate calls ‘8K sound’ which it claims to be the audio similar of high-resolution visuals. The query to be responded is: whilst audio is being compressed for wi-fi transmission, can that be true?
Feel and appear
The earphones are available in a quite huge however very light-weight battery case, the vast majority of its inside house used to accommodate the bigger-than-usual ‘telephones. It has a lid that slides upwards to open, which isn’t straight away evident – so watch out to not raise it vertically, which it received’t do. In comparison to many different comparably priced earbuds, the case doesn’t really feel love it ’s somewhat as robust as one would preferably like; it’s respectable, however there are more potent ones available in the market.
A USB-C cable is incorporated for charging and the case has a multi-LCD battery show indicator, which is a pleasing contact. The buds will fee to complete in one-and-a-half hours and the case in two hours, with a quoted 5 hours of playback from the buds, plus 15 with the case, suggesting 3 complete recharges are to be had. That’s now not stellar by way of fashionable requirements, with the similarly-priced Grasp & Dynamic MW08s providing as much as 12 hours within the buds and 30 within the case. Moreover, Ultimate doesn’t state how noise cancelling impacts the authentic battery lifestyles.
Up and working
Pairing is so simple as opening the case, which places the buds into pairing mode and so they seem in your units. Multipoint connection doesn’t seem to be to be had so it’s going to be a case of re-pairing between units – a minor inconvenience. Sign power was once very good alternatively, and not using a dropouts skilled even in busy commuter environments. The ZE8000s include 5 sizes of ear guidelines and, with the best ones decided on, have compatibility conveniently into the ears. They’re additionally IPX4 splash-proof.
There’s in fact a better half smartphone app and, on first use you could be triggered to put in any to be had firmware replace, which takes a couple of mins. You then’re in a position to make some tweaks to the sound, beginning with the listening modes. There’s lively noise cancelling, wind reduce mode, ambient listening mode (which blends exterior sounds in for more secure use in public), plus voice thru mode, which prioritises ambient sound so you’ll extra simply have a dialog with out casting off the buds (for instance, when wanting to talk to any individual on a educate or identical location).
Every bud comprises microphones on the best and backside in their stems, enabling them to make use of beamforming era to raised analyse each your voice when talking, and adapt noise cancelling to the exterior noise. Capacitive surfaces on each and every bud help you transfer modes by way of tapping, with voice comments to substantiate your variety. The quite a lot of modes all paintings rather well and the ANC is one of the best round, firmly keeping apart you from the out of doors international.
Tool extras
The following possibility within the app is a ‘quantity step optimizer’ which helps you to trade quantity in additional actual increments than your smartphone’s personal quantity buttons permit. It’ll be great for some other folks but it surely’s now not truly a headline characteristic, particularly if you happen to use the telephone’s tool slider fairly than the buttons. Extra attention-grabbing then is the in-app EQ, a four-band gadget that provides you with -/+3 dB spice up and reduce and handily, the way to save presets. The usage of the telephone’s complete top for the person interface allows you to make somewhat actual tweaks right here and it’s extra refined than maximum EQs of its kind, permitting superb tuning versus the fairly ham-fisted manner of a few different methods. It’s in reality helpful for reaching the type of sound you want.
Sound efficiency
The earbuds use particular 13mm-diaphragm drivers in a silicon encompass and with a floating mechanism for the voice coils, which Ultimate says assist to succeed in extraordinarily low general harmonic distortion. Additionally they use magnificence AB amplifiers, the place many others use magnificence D. Along with the usual SBC and AAC formats they improve the high quality Qualcomm aptX and aptX Adaptive formats for wi-fi transmission at as much as 24bit/96kHz.
Sonically the buds are truly very spectacular, providing very good separation and stereo efficiency. Low finish is complete however by no means overpowering, whilst mids are crisp and transparent, with the highest finish glowing and lively. They’re quite impartial in personality – which isn’t a grievance – however chances are you’ll need to make minor EQ tweaks within the app to fit your non-public personal tastes. As famous, the EQ this is in truth helpful, fairly than being a perfunctory addition.
Going to 8K
Within the app, you’ll turn on ‘8K’ mode, which sacrifices somewhat battery lifestyles so as to procedure sound at increased decision. Its precise quote is “as an alternative of focusing handiest on fine-tuning of explicit frequencies, the time component of each and every unmarried little bit of sound could also be in moderation calibrated with virtual sign processing”. That’s just a little nebulous as descriptions cross, however whilst you flip 8K on you do pay attention a slight sprucing of the sound. It’s moderately refined, however toggling it off and on, you’ll pay attention that the higher-quality mode is certainly a minimum of somewhat extra detailed.
The ZE8000s are aimed toward audiophiles greater than informal customers. Their characteristic set specializes in audio constancy fairly than anything, therefore you could have 8K mode blended with shorter battery lifestyles, an EQ that’s in reality helpful, however no multipoint connectivity, and so forth. The listening modes paintings rather well, which is a characteristic that’s nice for informal customers too. The declare of high-resolution audio is extra aspirational than factual; since they don’t improve lossless Bluetooth audio, they’re now not technically transmitting at tremendous top quality in the best way that 8K video transmits visuals. In spite of that, the aptX codec does its paintings admirably and audio high quality is greater than excellent sufficient for all however essentially the most diehard purists.
There’s robust pageant alternatively, particularly from the identically-priced NuraTrue Professionals, which do improve lossless audio in addition to a number of different hi-tech options. The ZE8000s are very superb earbuds for track listening, however Ultimate would possibly need to believe including a couple of extra tool options by the use of firmware updates to stay tempo with the contest.
Key options
- Worth: £299 / €329 / $349
- As much as 15 hours battery lifestyles
- Proprietary 8K sound possibility
- A couple of noise-cancelling modes
- USB-C charging case
- 5 units of ear guidelines
- 13mm drivers
- In-app EQ
- Capacitive contact surfaces
- IPX4 splash-proofing
- AptX Adaptive codec
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