LinsoulKiwi Ears Quartet 2DD+2BA Hybrid In-Ear Monitor, HiFi Earphones with Hand-crafted Resin Shell, Detachable OFC Silver-plated IEM Cable for Audiophile Musician DJ Studio Gaming (Purple, Quartet)

For some reason three very different products are filed under the same listing on Amazon at the time I write this, so to clarify, this is a review for the Kiwi Ears Quintet and does not apply to the Quartet nor the Melody. I picked these up on a whim while waiting for another product to ship expecting them to be a curiosity that I'd quickly get bored of or would be disappointed by, and ended up being so impressed with them that I ended up keeping both products (at great expense to myself!)The Kiwi Ears Quintet were unique until the recent release of SIMGOT's SuperMix 4, suggesting that the success of the Quintet has inspired other companies to give this setup a shot. While the SM4 is cheaper and uses a very similar driver setup, it is a different beast targeting a slightly different audience that is particularly gaming focused. The Quintet is positioned as an all-in-one, do-everything workhorse IEM. The Quintet is a "quadbrid" IEM; that is, it uses four distinct driver types (1 dynamic , 2 balanced armature, 1 planar and 1 piezoelectric driver per channel). It's still unusual to find a quadbrid not costing in the ballpark of £1000+ so I was intrigued by the opportunity to sample this exotic configuration.Unlike most audio gear I've tried, the Quintet has an out-of-the-box tuning that particularly agrees with my ears. The tuning work on the Quintet is so impressive I now use these as my tuning reference when comparing IEMs. Further refinement is possible with EQ but I consider these one of the few audio products I can tolerate using without EQ.The interesting part of the driver mix for me is the Piezoelectric driver. This is a dedicated high-frequency driver using bone conduction - that is, the sound is transmitted through the walls of the ear canal, rather than the air volume in the centre. I was especially interested to read about this when you typically associate bone conduction with bass drivers. Piezos have a reputation for an artifical sound because of the unique way they transmit sound to your eardrum so I was prepared for that in my assessment of the Quintet.The metallic, artifical sound did not materialise. What I did notice instead was that the high frequencies travelling through the canal walls had the effect of widening the perceived "room" everything in the mix was placed in, and this seems to make it a lot easier to localise where a sound is coming from even with the extreme space limitations of an IEM. While I would not describe the headstage of the Quintet as wide nor out-of-head, it certainly is wider and taller than is typical for an IEM which affords it some significant advantages for gaming in particular. You will rarely be in doubt where something is and how close it is to you on the Quintet.Otherwise, the part of the tuning that strikes you the most about the Quintet is how unremarkable and smooth it is, the only slightly spicy spot being the midbass elevation but even this is fairly typical for IEM and headphone tuning. Considering that this IEM should by rights be a horrific clash of wildly different driver technologies clashing with each other, the end result feels effortlessly neutral to the point of being a bit boring, even! None of the common weaknesses of these driver types are apparent in the Quintet, and they are kept to their strongest aspects instead.This almost aggressively neutralising approach even extends to how the Quintet is affected by the quality of the source it's attached to, which is to say it's barely affected by source quality at all, unless you go out of your way to attach it to a high impedance source. The Quintet has an impedance of 32 ohms, which would be on the low side for a over-ear headphone but is very high for an IEM, and this seems to have been a decision caused by the desire to make the Quintet sound consistent no matter what you plugged it into. Helping this is the fact that the Quintet is extremely sensitive despite its impedance, not needing much current nor voltage at all to run properly. This is particularly impressive considering a usually current-hungry planar driver is part of the driver mix here. This consistency has been achieved with great success, and has even managed to make my frankly terrible, distortion-prone phone DAC sound very decent indeed! If I need good quality sound from my phone in particular, these are now my go-tos.The stock cable and tips the Quintet is supplied with are impressive, although I would have preferred a modular cable - but in testing the Quintet also doesn't really benefit from being connected to a balanced source anyway! I ended up using the Tripowin Noire with it and this has worked perfectly fine, but is definitely not required for this product. The cable provided with the Quintet is excellent quality, stylish and there was no change in performance switching from it to the Noire. While I ended up using third-party tips with the Quintet that improved performance, if I was stuck with the supplied tips I would have been quite satisfied. The Quintet takes the unusual step of supplying wider, shallow insertion tips as well as the more typical tip shape. This is presumably to make certain that you have an optimal seal on the Quintet as unlike with most IEMs both bass and treble are dependent on a good seal due to the piezo driver reinforcing the treble response. The storage case for the IEM is unremarkable and just does the job, with just about enough space for everything you need to store. You might benefit from the case Kiwi Ears sell separately if the slightly tight fit of the IEM in the case bothers you, but I'm satisfied with it.Don't misunderstand, then, this is a very competently tuned product that plays to the strengths of the various drivers it uses to produce a very cohesive experience that is well above average across the board, and is a very safe recommendation for someone who wants a quality product that will Just Work without needing support from a quality DAC/Amp or other extras, which is very hard to find in the IEM world. If you can afford to purchase the Quintet, this is a very safe bet indeed that you won't regret. I even tested them with wireless Bluetooth adapters and they handled that very well too despite the complex driver configuration, so you can also consider them for a higher-end custom TWS setup!

These are great! The sound quality, detail and balance across the range is really good for the price. They are less opinionated than other IEMs, so if you like a little more punch without EQing the s12 are more likely a better choice. You can achieve the same by boosting the mids a little. One other thing, the fit makes a big difference to the sound, probably because of the driver configuration.

The IEMs aren’t terrible, but they didn’t meet my expectations. To be fair, my opinion is shaped by the specific genres I listen to and my personal sound preferences. That said, I found these IEMs to be quite overrated, which ultimately led me to return them.The sound came across as tinny to my ears, and the tuning switches didn’t make a noticeable difference. I even tried tweaking using EQ, but the improvements didn’t warrant me spending the money. Despite the overwhelmingly positive reviews, I personally struggled to enjoy the sound profile and feel that giving them 3 stars is generous. That said, audio is highly subjective, and I can understand why others might love them and rate them higher and so I still recommend giving them a try as they might suit your ears better than mine.On the positive side, the packaging follows the usual clean and minimalist style typical of Kiwi Ears, which I have no complaints about. The travel case, however, is a bit tight, it tends to compress the IEMs slightly. Build quality is solid overall, with nothing major to fault and the comfort is very good as they aren’t too large and fit very well within my ears.

The Quintets sound superb, especially when paired with a DAC. I was afraid they might sound tinny having come across some mixed reviews, but unlike some of the cheaper "Hi-fi" IEMs I have tried in the past that sounded as sterile as hand sanitizer, these have a really well balanced sound. The sound isolation is good but the sound and comfort depend on the buds you choose. The cable may divide opinions, but I love the aesthetic and being a bit shorter means that it doesn't get caught on everything as you walk by. The packaging and look of the earphones are quite minimalist, and I have seen a few complaints about that but I think it's funny because it's surely better knowing that your money was spent on sound quality rather than fancy wrapping paper, right?Overall a deceptively good pair of earphones well worth the price, but really need a decent DAC to let them shine!

Quintet's are a great set of in ears and the sound quality is outstanding I've paired them with JVC spiral dots. The IEM's come with a basic set of tips, small carry case and a reasonable quality 3.5 mm cable all in all nothing to write home about but that just me nitpicking. I know 200 quid is a lot of money but I still feel this a great value IEM.

A wide sound stage, plus 5 drivers each tuned to make the most of their individual characteristics. These are my new go-to IEMs. Superb sound, and a quality feel.

The pair that I received must have been defective because these IEMs were totally unlistenable.