Dan Clark Audio AEON 2 - Open & Closed - Official Discussion

My understanding is the Aeon 2 C is significantly better than version 1. I own them and definitely enjoy them. There can be some unit to unit variation I have heard. You may want to reach out to @taronlissimore and @andrew the sponsor of this forum as they may have an open box Aeon 2C for a very good price.

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20 characters! :wink:

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Hi @taronlissimore
Any updates on when my Aeon 2 closed will ship?

Hey, @JoeyGun you may want to email Taron directly through the headphones dot com website or during normal business hours as he is usually available there and very active. @taronlissimore should get back to you!

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Cool cool, got his reply. One day left before I get my Aeon 2 closed!

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Price dropped for anyone interested! I eat shipping and fees!

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If anyone is interested I have listed my Aeon 2’s for sale.

Aquired a pair of Audeze LCD 2’s and much prefer the wider staging of an open back headphone.

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Your comparison is really interesting, especially the comparison with Elegia. I’m bumping back and forth from Elegia (now discounted to euro 500) and Aeon2C in my mind but can’t decide for one over the other. While the Elegia comes with a great price and a build quality that’s really great the sound of the Aeon2C especially with perforated pads seems to follow a little more my personal preferences. Actually not a big fan of dynamic drivers. The best thing would be try both but where I live I have no possibility at all to do that. Thank you so much for your notes and for sharing.

I have both.

To me, the Elegia is a big warm soft down pillow. The Aeon 2 Closed is a nice cool firm memory foam pillow.

Either is nice, depending on what you like. I’ve found after listening to the Aeon for a while the Elegia sounds just a bit too warm and boomy, but it definitely has its charms if you like that sort of thing :wink:

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Thank you so much for your hints. I’m more into planar sound than in dynamic driver and because of neck pain I prefer memory foam pillow too. Being on budget the soft pillow keeps on calling me even if I know I want the memory foam. Out of jokes one thing for sure is that both are well built and pleasing headphones.

Just received my Aeon 2c Noire. These things are gorgeous! Comfort is great. Besting my current favorites ibasso SR2 because of the ear cup shape. No sound impressions just yet as I want to burn them in per their manual/mfr comments. I don’t have a definitive position on that debate, but I figure let’s play on Dan’s turf and give it the benefit of the doubt.

Did I mention these are beautiful headphones?

@Lothar_Wolf I got 'em! I feel like they should just be framed…

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Post some pictures please! I’d like to see them

I just got some Aeon RT opens with the VIVO cable upgrade (included for same price as stock cable!). I’m enjoying them so far quite a bit. They would probably benefit from some burn in too. The Aeon 2 was just out of reach for me, as I used my most recent stimulus $ for these. I think they match well with my Schiit Lyr 3/Bifrost 2 combo.

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I’m very curious to hear your impressions! I’m considering a HP roster shakeup and the Noire are on my radar. Also seconding @robson’s request for pictures :smiley:

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Initial impressions on the Noire. Please note I’ve not used any of the felt inserts. I’ll tinker with those later once I’ve become accustomed to the stock signature. All listening done on BF2/Lyr 3 with stock tubes.

Build and comfort
Build is solid with no real standout qualities. I am concerned about the longevity of the ear up fold mechanism, but that’s pure speculation. The Aeon folding mechanism has been around for a while now, and my limited research hasn’t found rampant complaints about this failing.

The included 1/4” terminated cable leaves a bit to be desired. It’s not a bad cable like those included with Hifiman products, but it’s vacuum cleaner sheath isn’t appealing. It did remain kink free and was pliable, but felt cheap.

Comfort is really quite good. Clamp is a bit light, but survived my “will you fall off if I look down” test. The Noire actually bested my previous favorite headphone for comfort, the iBasso SR2. The feature that allows this is the elongated ear cup cavity. You know, they actually resemble a human ear, as opposed to the circular cavities of the SR2. This can however lead to hotspots as the bottom of the cup touches the jaw. It’s not as bad as the Hifiman Arya, but it is there. Personally though, it did not bother me. This is the first headphone to give me the ever elusive “forgot I’m wearing headphones” feeling.

As to be expected, the glossy finish does pickup fingerprints. Thank you DCA for including a cleaning cloth :slight_smile:.

Treble
Ouch. Starting here because this is the most stand-out part of the sound. It’s sharp. Like oh god someone save my poor ears sharp. After hearing this, I looked for measurements to confirm. Found an oratory measurement for Aeon 2 Closed with perforated pads. This should be identical as DCA confirmed the Noire is just an A2C with perforated pads and a black paint job. As we can see from the measurements, there is some spiciness occurring around 6k and Thai-levels of spiciness after 10k. This spike is really making it difficult to enjoy some songs. I imagine the inserts help alleviate this.

Mids
Mids, especially vocals, were a bit difficult for me to judge. Especially when A/B-ing with the 6XX. At first, I believed the cans to be mid-deficient. However, after an extensive listen (several hours), I was never dissatisfied or distracted by the vocals. Upon reflection and some time listening “critically” and more A/B with the 6XX, I believe the confusion came from differences in how tracks were recorded. If a vocal sounded distant, it was because it was recorded that way. While the 6XX presents all mids as “in your head”, the Noire does not. I’ll further elaborate on this in the soundstage section.

As for timbre, I found it to be fantastic. 'nough said.

Lows
If the treble was an ouchie, this section is a yummy :smiley:. I’m picky when it comes to bass. I’m not a bass-head, but I like my headphones “fun” and for me, that means accurate and plentiful bass. I want to hear the bass and feel it. The Noire delivers. Some may wish to give it a couple db more in the 70-105 region, but personally I found this too much. Plus, any time I can get away with not eq’ing a can, I’ll go for it.

Detail, Soundstage, and Imaging
Perhaps due to the elevated treble, but these cans sound more detailed to me than any other headphone I’ve tried with the exception of the Arya and HD800s.

Most reviews will say something like "soundstage is good for a closed-back headphone. Well, soundstage is excellent compared to other open or closed-back. If the 6XX is on stage, the LCD-GX is 1st row, the Noire is 3rd. What’s important to note, is that while sounds is pushed back, it’s not reduced in texture, detail, or audibility. Overall, this is another excellent quality for the Noire.

Imaging I’ll admit is a bit difficult for me to judge when listening to music. I can tell you where I hear the music from, but I don’t know if that’s accurate. To overcome this, I listened to a few orchestra videos on Youtube. When Solos were played, it was quite easy to identify sound sources.

Movies and games
After a gaming/movie binge that lasted much longer than I’d care to admit, the Aeon Noire have put a smile on my face. Bass is satisfying, detail and imaging are really pronounced and dynamic range is balanced perfectly to my taste. Watching the documentary “Spitfire” on Netflix, the dogfights were a blast and the “thump, thump, thump” of the gunfire were deep, controlled and satisfyingly punchy.

Playing Elite Dangerous, the exliration of fly-by during combat, the various weapons fire, and the -usually less-noticeable- system sounds were all a pleasure to listen too. It’s best summed up in the tired cliche, I’m hearing things I’ve not heard before, or were too mundane to draw attention previously. Psychosomatic? Maybe, but I Love it.

Conclusion
DCA has released a great looking, and sounding headphone. It’s portability, aesthetics, and overall great sound signature make this a worthy headphone to have in anyone’s stable. The only detractors, are the piercing highs, and the absurdly long and “cheap” feeling cable. Both of these short-comings can be fixed, and personally, I’d rather have a long cable than a shorter one. But then again, I’m not taking these headphones far from a desk.

I hope someone finds this useful and please feel free to ask any questions. As always, I do not claim to be an expert or even an audiophile, but sometimes a layman’s perspective ain’t so bad :wink:

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Excellent reading and impressions.
I’ve received my Noire today.
I’m trying them with my “evaluation tracks” and impressions are good and in line with my expectations.
Fit for me is perfect. They are incredibly light and comfortable on my head, no problems with the clamp force which is perfect for me.
First impressions on sound are good, given that the music I listen to hasn’t by itself piercing picks on highs.
Fun kind of listen with good bass emphasis and appreciable soundstage for a closed back headphone.
The cable is really disappointing, it’s the only negative note. It does it job and doesn’t tangle but looks really cheap, something in the style of the cable that come with my Sundara and that I’ve replaced as soon as I had the chance. The same will happen with this one but given the overall care that the headphones shows I’d expected a cable with a little more quality.

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Really glad you included some impressions for Gaming/Videos, as that’s my main interest in getting a pair of these to compliment my open-back headphones. Looking forward to the continuation of your review!

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Well fellas, I think I’ve said all there is to be said for now. Please let me know if you have any feedback, questions, or comments. Also, apologies for lack of photos, but these cans demand proper photographic respect and I just haven’t found the time. Hopefully this weekend!

@parmiep @monochromios @robson

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Dan Clark Audio Aeon 2 Closed have been on my radar for a long time.
I love planar headphones and I appreciate them much more than I do with dynamic driver ones and I was looking for a closed back set for a number of reasons.
This brings me to a general consideration.
Aside from measurements and technical performances when adding a piece of equipment to our collection I’m firmly convinced that we have to know specifically and clearly what are we using them for.
It may sound obvious but sadly it isn’t.
We all look at that sweet unicorn called “Universal headphone”, that headphone that will work fine in every situation, with all music genres, with all DACs and head amps we have.
Sadly, as all unicorns, that headphone doesn’t exist.
This brings me back to why when I saw the Aeon Noire at headphones dot com I decided to buy them.
As many of you probably already know I live between France and Italy, moving very often and continuously because of my job.
I’ve studies aesthetics and psychoacoustics and I’m currently studying Alvin Lucier’s music and translating to italian his book “Reflections”.
I’m often in public libraries (fortunately Universities are open for study purposes) for long period of time, consulting documents and writing but I have also to compare texts, scores and various executions of Lucier’s works.
It is clear that I have to listen to music in ambients that can’t be defined ideal.
This explains why closed backs were needed.
But explains also why planar headphones.
Lucier’s music consists of a series of acoustic phenomena produced by the interaction of sounds and the ambient where they happen. In order to understand and fully appreciate these phenomena a planar headphone comes to help a lot more than a dynamic driver since produces less internal acoustic phenomena than a dynamic driver headphone does.
Aeon 2 Noire come in a nice all black suite and I really love the look.
The compact carrying case and the folding mechanism is a plus for my needs and are very valuable to me.
The headphones are the most comfortable experience I ever had and I can wear them for my standard 8 hours of job without problems.
Importantly the perforated pads on the Noire while isolate from the outside well reduce the stress on ears due to sound pressure and allow me to avoid problems in my study/work sessions.
The overall sound from the Noire is good, more balanced than with the standard Aeon 2 Closed or at least so they sound to my ears.
Surely the Noire don’t fall in the neutral headphones category.
They have a sound colouration that privileges basses and highs.
Anyway the mids aren’t unbalanced or unpleasant and for the music I listen to with the highs aren’t ear piercing.
The sound stage is very good laterally, while the front stage is quite near to the listener.
Anyway for a closed back headphone they sound very “open”, airy, thanks to an upper mids rendering that fools our brain a little with the frequencies and that make us perceive the headphones more open than they are.
Details are very good and clearly perceptible.
Instrument separation is very good and it is important for my use in order to distinguish original sounds and their alteration due to the place where they are produced.
The cable is the only negative note for me.
It isn’t as good as I’ve expected for a set of headphones so well made and curated for the rest.
This brings me to conclusions.
I’m really enjoying the Noire.
For sure if I want to listen to Bach or John Adams I would use another kind of headphones.
For my psychoacoustic studies and for music like the one of Alvin Lucier and similarly developed like the one by Mika Vainio, Ryoji Ikeda, Alva Noto, Autechre, Loren Ambarchi, Jim O’Rourke and Kassel Jaeger (François J. Bonnet from INA GRM Paris who’s helping me a lot in my studies) these headphones suite my needs perfectly.
Unicorns don’t exist nor exists a perfect headphone.
We have to learn what we want from an headphone and patiently build a collection that fits our different needs.
While an all rounder headphone will make us happy many times but always in seek for a new and more universal headphone than the one we have, a specific headphone will make us happy, period.
And will make us grow in self consciousness and appreciation of what we choose and have in the present time.
I’m sorry for my long writing but putting down my first impressions about the Noire I wanted to make clear how I believe an headphone purchase has to be made: no one can tell you what kind of sounds you like and no one can tell you what kind of headphone you need to appreciate them.
As for many things in our life what you want, what you need and what you like are questions that only one person can answer and it is you.
You have to discover, experiment, fail and grow up as a listener.
Developing a consciousness of our needs and tests are to me more important than seeking unicorns.
A big thank you to April, @andrew and @taronlissimore at headphones dot com that had the patience to assist me and reply to all my questions for my first transoceanic purchase and to all the community for the hints and suggestions that brought me to this moment of happiness and satisfaction.
A special thank you to my friend @MRHifiReviews.
Your long comparison between Focal Elegia and Aeon 2 closed helped me a lot deciding for the Noire. I was all in with a Focal closed back but when I saw the Noire specs I immediately knew they where the right headphones for my need. Thank you bro.
Stay safe and enjoy.

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Awesome brother! You have to let me know what you think of them Stefano paired with different amps and dacs!! I eventually want to review a pair myself!! Glad @taronlissimore and team took great care of you. @monochromios

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I’ll do for sure brother. @taronlissimore and his staff are wonderful persons and it’s a pleasure to buy from them. Stay safe and enjoy

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