Raising the Hifiman Arya from the dead

Here’s a photo of my dead HE-560 driver as of March 2020 and a new item reference photo for comparison.

I gave up on HiFiMan after this, as there were numerous visible cracks in both drivers. The driver that died had a massive divot where it shorted out (lower left), but smaller divots were also present in the functional driver. The second driver surely would have died before long.

Today I never recommend HFM and don’t talk about their products unless asked or required. Before mine died I thought their QC issues were a thing of the past, but not any more. I now think failure is a function of creating thin, diaphanous metal traces on a flexing mesh. I do not believe that HFM wiring can hold up to thousands of vibrations per second, as inherently required by audio drivers.

HFM can sound great, but I’d not own one out of warranty. Mine died after 13 months, and started to fail before that. It required more and more amp power to produce adequate volume, and developed a strange tonal hollowness. On the bright side, I sold the parts and cables for meaningful money (e.g., $150 for dead parts; I paid $250 new) on Ebay. One man’s trash is another man’s treasure.

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