Donner Dobuds One Review – First Attempts
Pros — Good build quality
– Good battery life
– ANC works well to cancel out low frequency, granular controls
– Comfortable
– Good imaging and staging
– Bass boosted signature may cater well to bassheads
Cons — Eartip rolling might be needed for the Donner Dobuds One to fit well
– ANC doesn’t work for high frequencies
– Lower-mids sound drowned out
– Bass can distort at high volumes
– Splashy, peaky treble that causes fatigue
In this Article
INTRODUCTION
Donner is a brand I was not aware of beforehand. When they reached out to us to try the Dobuds One, I had a look at their website, and they seemed to be mostly catering to the pro market.
The Donner Dobuds One are the first ever TWS IEMs under the brand, so it’s interesting to see how a new player in the market handles the competition. Let’s see if the Dobuds One can stand out enough in terms of features, and of course – sound.
Note: the ratings given will be subjective to the price tier. Donner sent the Dobuds One for evaluaion.
Sources used: Pixel 4XL, Macbook Pro
Price, while reviewed: $50. Can be bought from Amazon.
PHYSICAL THINGS AND USABILITY
PACKAGING AND ACCESSORIES
The Dobuds One come in a compact packaging that houses the earbuds within a carrying case, extra 3 pairs of eartips, and a charging cable. Nothing too fancy, but the basics are well covered here.
BUILD QUALITY
The Dobuds One are built well. As per for TWS IEMs, the shell is plastic to allow RF transparency. The entire earbud has a matte finish, except for the touch sensitive area which is glossy.
Donner adopted a half in-ear design, where most of the earbud sits outside the ear. This allows more room for batteries and also aids in staging.
The nozzle is fairly long and has a gold metal mesh on top. One strange thing is the oval shape of the nozzle and tips. The charging pins and the microphones for voice pickup and ANC are on the stem.
COMFORT, ISOLATION, AND FIT
The earbuds are comfortable and offer good isolation with ANC turned on (though without ANC they are below-average due to the design).
One polarizing aspect might be the oval nozzle shape that can cause fit issues for certain individuals. Tip rolling might be required in that case.
BATTERY LIFE
Donner advertises 8 hours of battery life on the earbuds themselves without ANC, and 6.5 hours with ANC turned on. The charging case also allows for addditional 24 hours of battery life (without ANC). During my usage, I had to charge once a week and it was good to go.
Recharge times are reasonably fast too, with 1.5 hour of charge getting the battery full. Standby battery drain is minimal too, with the carrying case holding charge despite not using for days.
SOURCE AND EARTIPS
I used Google Pixel 4XL and Macbook Pro 16 as sources for this review. Stock eartips were used. Donner Dobuds One connected via AAC and BT5.2 in all cases.
DONNER APP AND ADDITIONAL FEATURES
The Donner Control app (available on Apple App Store and Google Play Store) allows you granular control over all of the features, esp. Active Noise Cancellation (ANC) and gesture controls.
There are three different ANC modes by default: Commute, Indoor, Outdoors, with Commute offering the strongest ANC performance. The manual mode offers 10 different levels of ANC. Such minute control is rarely seen at this price level, so kudos to Donner for that. However, the ANC only applies to low and mid frequencies (between 80Hz – 2000Hz) so high frequencies come through unattenuated.
Then there are the EQ profiles. One strange thing is that the custom EQ profiles sounds very honky and bassy by default, which means the presets have heavy EQ and DSP applied by default. Nonetheless, it’s good that you can at least create something of your own, even though without DSP the custom profiles lack clarity.
Gestures are another aspect where the Dobuds One shine. Usually I am not a fan of touch controls on TWS IEMs and earbuds, but the Dobuds One have one of the better implementations here, alongside the venerable Sony WF-1000XM4 (which cost significantly more). The gestures are very easy to configure and you get used to them quickly.
There are additional modes like Game Mode that reduces latency, and you can create an account which allows you to save and load profiles. Connectivity in general was rock solid. All very neat.
For a first product, Donner has absolutely nailed the app experience here. A job well done.
DRIVER SETUP
Donner use a 12mm LCP driver for the lows and mids, and an unspecified BA driver for the highs. The BA driver fits into the nozzle and sounds undamped, so I guess Donner did not use a damper in front of the BA nozzle.
TONALITY AND TECHNICALITIES
In the default “Donner Signature” EQ preset mode, the Dobuds One have an aggressive sub-bass boost that’s counter-balanced by a similarly aggressive mid-treble boost. They do not sound like a typical V-shaped pair of IEMs though, as the bass boost is mostly under 200Hz.
The sub-bass has strong rumble and impact, but can break apart if the volume is pushed too high. In moderate to slightly high listening levels (80-84dB) the bass sounds good. Any highter than that and you are getting into distortion territory.
The mids sound clean and somewhat upper-mid focused. Male vocals lack some body and can get drowned out in bassy tracks. However, male vocals remain intelligible for the most part.
Female vocals fare better, but can show instances of sibilance due to the uncontrolled peak around 8kHz. Pushing the earbuds deep into the ears can somehow reduce the treble peak, but it never goes away and can cause fatigue over time. Treble is the weakest part of the Dobuds One, and that becomes apparent as you notice the splashiness in cymal hits and hi-hats.
Staging is fairly wide, with decent depth. Imaging is also above-average for the price tag, though nothing to write home about. Macrodynamic punch lack their dramatic impact due to the bluetooth compression. Lack of mid-bass further compounds this, and the abrupt treble peak also makes crescendos sound oddly sharp and thin.
Overall, the sound quality is a mixed bag due to the spiky treble. If that peak can be mitigated, the Dobuds One sound fairly inoffensive. It’s possible to do so with custom EQ, though that reduces the sense of clarity noticeably.
SELECT COMPARISONS
Compared to the Apple Airpods 2, the Donner Dobuds One have a more aggressive sub-bass boost and sharper treble. The Airpods 2 have a more balanced, warmer tone, with a wider sense of stage.
In terms of features, the Dobuds One have ANC which the Airpods 2 lack. Gesture controls are also more exhaustive on the Dobuds One. Microphone performance is slightly better on the Airpods 2, as the voice comes out less processed. Build quality is also better on the Airpods 2, whereas the Dobuds One have better battery life.
In the end, you are paying a lot extra for the Airpods 2 due to the brand name and the “ecosystem” integration. The Dobuds One can be a valid alternative if you like the Airpods 2-esque form factor, while on a tighter budget, and need ANC.
CONCLUDING REMARKS
For a first product, Donner did a great job with their TWS app. I liked the overall presentation and design of the IEMs, and also the well laid-out gesture controls.
Unfortunately, it’s the sound where we encounter some hiccups. While the mids sound clean and have good clarity, the treble spike can become problematic. Add to that the distorted bass at high listening volumes, and Donner suddenly has some work in their hands.
The Dobuds One are competitively priced, offer a lot of features, and sport a great companion app. The tuning needs some work though, especially the treble which can be easily fixed by placing a damper in front of the BA driver.
Hopefully, Donner does that and more in their next release, since the core product is already well executed.
DISCLAIMER
Get it from Amazon
Our generic standard disclaimer.
