BudgetEarphonesEssay

Nevergiveup In The Belief And Oppoty To LetMusicBurn – The Evolution Of BLON BL-05s

[Estimated reading time: Approximately 2 minutes] 

The story behind BLON BL-05s is quite an interesting one but earphone development is an extremely boring subject thus I don’t want to bore you with too much detail. Let’s keep it short and sweet. All-in-all, its development stretched a total period of about 10 months.

Life of the BLON BL-05s did not begin after BL-05, rather it started after BLON BL-03. The idea was conceived when BLON wanted Jurgen’s and mine input on how to improve the BL-03. Both Crinacle and Hawaii Bad Boy contributed their valuable opinions as well. The intention of this tuning was meant to be an upgrade from BLON BL-03.

Blon BL-05
Blon BL-05

So how did the original BLON BL-05 come into the picture? During the fourth quarter of 2019, BLON was experimenting with the idea of piezoelectric drivers and they included it into their BL-05 earliest prototype… Which we know turned out to be a total flop thanks to a well-known friend’s over-enthusiastic YouTube review. The idea of a piezoelectric-equipped BLON BL-05 thus disappeared into thin air.

To cash-in on a higher-priced earphone, BLON banked on the success of BLON BL-03, dropped the piezoelectric driver and sold BLON BL-05 for almost 2x the price. Yes, the BLON BL-05 had cleaner bass and midbass compared to BLON BL-03 but was cursed by the “see-saw effect”. That is whenever bass is lowered, treble MUST be reduced if not the tuning will sound bright and harsh – similar to levelling a balancing scale beam. Eventually, the BL-05 was mercilessly bashed by both Crinacle and HBB… Of course BLON wasn’t pleased at all.

Aggrieved by the outcome, BLON decided to engage help from a close friend. This close friend contacted both Jurgen and myself (also our close friend) to re-tune the BL-05. After experimenting with their 3rd generation CNT driver (which has a thicker CCAW voice coil compared to 2nd generation), BLON sent us the “BL-05 MK2”, which sounded quite good… Almost Hana-like… Both Jürgen and I liked it… BUT… A slip of my tongue triggered BLON to scrap the tuning, and that is “Hana-like”. As we know Tanchjim is a business client of BLON’s, so it is definitely a no-go.

Blon BL-05

After a few WeChat correspondence with our common friend, BLON finally decided to base the final tuning of the BL-05s on my BL-03 improvement proposal “blueprint”. Hence, BLON BL-05s can be considered a BLON BL-03 “Mark 2”. 

If you wonder what the future of BLON BL-03 lies… Will there be a “real” BL-03 Mark 2 or BL-03s (whichever name it shall be called)… Well, I can’t foresee the future but there is a plan for a BL-03 successor. Meanwhile, enjoy your BLONBL-05s… It is worth waiting 10 months!

Contact us!

audioreviews.org

You find an INDEX of our most relevant technical articles HERE.

www.audioreviews.org
paypal
Why support us?
FB Group
Click To Join Our FB Group!
instagram
twitter
youtube


RELATED…

Author

  • KopiOkaya (Singapore)

    Head-Fier since 2018. “Who is KopiOkaya?” that is the first question many audiophiles and earphone enthusiasts ask when stumbled upon his coffee cup avatar… “I am just a nobody…” – that is his usual answer. This “nobody” has his audio roots stretch until the mid-1970s when his father hauled back a set of Sansui-Luxman-Coral combo from “a friend’s place” (so that mom believed it was a given set). He fell in love with the sound instantly, and the rest is history. Previously taught in a public school, now a full-time tutor and an “ad-hoc” multimedia producer, Kopi wants to divert his attention from his teaching job and focus on something he truly loves – hifi audio. Throughout the years, Kopi owned many “nice” equipment and accessories… until the year 2009 when he discovered Chi-Fi or Chinese Hifi. An euraka moment, it was the sound he had been looking for all these years despite spending thousands and thousands of dollars on branded, highly-reviewed equipment. He sold everything (except a few good cables) and downgraded to pretty much bare minimal.Back to the very first question… What is “KopiOkaya” then… In Singapore, where Kopi is based in, kopi O simply refers to thick black coffee and kaya is a type of toast spread made of brown sugar, coconut milk, eggs and pandan leaves, commonly served as breakfast in Southeast Asia regions.

    View all posts

KopiOkaya (Singapore)

Head-Fier since 2018. “Who is KopiOkaya?” that is the first question many audiophiles and earphone enthusiasts ask when stumbled upon his coffee cup avatar… “I am just a nobody…” – that is his usual answer. This “nobody” has his audio roots stretch until the mid-1970s when his father hauled back a set of Sansui-Luxman-Coral combo from “a friend’s place” (so that mom believed it was a given set). He fell in love with the sound instantly, and the rest is history. Previously taught in a public school, now a full-time tutor and an “ad-hoc” multimedia producer, Kopi wants to divert his attention from his teaching job and focus on something he truly loves – hifi audio. Throughout the years, Kopi owned many “nice” equipment and accessories… until the year 2009 when he discovered Chi-Fi or Chinese Hifi. An euraka moment, it was the sound he had been looking for all these years despite spending thousands and thousands of dollars on branded, highly-reviewed equipment. He sold everything (except a few good cables) and downgraded to pretty much bare minimal.Back to the very first question… What is “KopiOkaya” then… In Singapore, where Kopi is based in, kopi O simply refers to thick black coffee and kaya is a type of toast spread made of brown sugar, coconut milk, eggs and pandan leaves, commonly served as breakfast in Southeast Asia regions.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *