iBasso IT03 – A New Era – Highend Signature at a Killer Price
IBasso IT03 In Ear Earphone
$259
Pros
- Excellent closeup vocals,
- Deep textured bass
- Astounding price, Elegant design, Great fit,
Cons
- Need a decent source synergy
- Tip selection/fit is essential for getting strong soundstage and mids
Stock Cable:
The supplied cable is not off the shelf cable but a custom cable iBasso commissioned to be designed with high purity OFC.
It has a nice right angle jack and exhibits very low levels of microphonics. It has memory wire in the earguides and keeps the fit nice and secure.
Accessories:
You get a good amount of decent accessories for your money
For the price the case is extremely premium, made of good quality leather. I personally prefer hard cases but this one is very nice almost feels handmade/artisan.
The range of tips is well presented and quite extensive
After a lot of tip sampling – my preference in the end was – Spin Fits and Sony Hybrid tips.
These seems to have the best fit for me and provided the best balance of signature for my musical tastes.
Burn In Changes:
The burn duration recommendation is for 150 hours. I was sampling the signature at 30/50/100 and 150 hours. The core changes I experienced was the strong bass was reduced at the 50 hour mark and by the 150 mark the treble smoothed out nicely.
I understand that this is typical of Balance Armature type in ears. I don’t expect to hear any changes beyond this timeframe and feel the earphone is more coherent and better balanced now.
DAP Parings:
I used the Cowon Plenue S and the Lotto Paw Gold Titanium Edition
For me the Lotto Paw Gold has the best synergy with the IT03 and it really felt like they were tuned for each other. Tracks were energetic and full of emotion, the full range had good coherence with excellent detail.
With the Cowon Plenue S everything felt too weak and soul less, bass lost all its magic textures.
This goes to show the importance of source synergy as they could greatly vary.
After Market Cable Pairings:
I used ALO Litz cable and Custom Sony Kimber cable
Using the Kimber Kable felt like the earphone was struggling somewhat and sounded a bit congested.
The Litz cable pairing worked very well and softened the treble and resulted in a general smoother feel with less fatigue.
