Introduction
If you have been in the Chi-Fi circle for a while, you must have noticed the name “Hisenior” from time to time. For the record, Hisenior Audio usually make custom IEM for professional such as musicians and engineers, but they are also aiming for the audiophile market. Recently, they have released two universal IEMs namely the T2 Classic and Fe3 Universal (Fe3U) made specifically for drummer, bassist, guitarist, keys, and vocalist. Now, how the two monitors coming from this esoteric company will perform? It is an interesting question that shall be answered as a non-musician but a fellow audiophile.
Packaging & Accessories
First, I presumed that the T2 Classic that I received from Hisenior is not the retail unit with the full packaging since it only came with a pelican case. Inside, we have the IEM itself, a black colored 3.5mm cable, and some stock eartips with different sizes. However, the Fe3U do came with a medium sized black box. Within that box, alongside the IEM we received a cleaning cloth and tool, a white colored 3.5mm cable, and a round protective case containing some stock eartips including foam eartips. Another thing that caught my eyes is the name “febos” written on the packaging box and the protective case. I don’t have a definitive answer to what it means, but I believe Febos is probably a sub-brand of Hisenior Audio that is responsible for the existence of the Fe3U. Overall, the packaging and accessories here are just average for the price.
Design & Build Quality
T2 Classic and Fe3U have more or less the same shell size and shape mold. They are made from allergic free resin mold and have that almost custom shape to them. In terms of appearance, T2 Classic has all black color resin while Fe3U has purple with some blinky decorations on the face plate. Both have the “febos” writing on their faceplate. As a company who mainly make custom shell designs for studio uses, both IEMs have an incredible isolation level for that passive noise cancellation. Based on the specification of both IEMs, the T2 Classic and Fe3U have -20dB and -26dB of isolation, respectively and they truly block all outside noises. However, the caveat is there will be some pressure build up or that vacuum suction effect feeling in my ears along with their slightly big size shell which will eventually make my ears feel uncomfortable and in pain after a while. Of course, YMMV. Other aspects such as cables and eartips are just fine and should be sufficient and good enough for what it is.
Functions & Specifications
Hisenior T2 Classic
- Shell/Material: Allergy Free Resin MMCX connector
- Driver: 2 Knowles Balanced Armatures (CI + ED)
- Impedance: 18Ω @ 1kHz
- Sensitivity: 105dB SPL/mW
- Frequency Range: 20Hz-20kHz
- Isolation: -20dB
- Cable: 8 core OCC cable with 3.5mm termination
Hisenior Febos Fe3U
- Shell/Material: Allergy Free Resin 2pin connector
- Driver: 3 Sonion Balanced Armatures
- Impedance: 40Ω
- Sensitivity: 113dB/mW
- Frequency Range: 15Hz-22kHz
- Isolation: -26dB
- Cable: 8 core SPC OCC cable with 3.5mm termination
Retail Price & Where to Get
This unit is a review unit tour provided by Hisenior. Big thanks to Hisenior and Bryan Liew for including me in this tour. The Hisenior T2 Classic and Fe3U can be purchased for $119 and $249, respectively from their official website here:
Fe3 Universal In Ear Monitor Handcraft 3BAs (hisenior-iem.com)
T2 Classic Universal In-ear Monitor Black Knowles 2BAs (hisenior-iem.com)
Source Pairing
- Windows 10 Laptop > Realtek HD Audio 3.5mm output > T2 Classic/ Fe3U
- Sony NW-ZX300 (Walkman One Neutral) > Fiio AM3D > T2 Classic/ Fe3U
Test Tracks
Tonality
T2 Classic
Warm V-shaped is the sound signature of the T2 Classic, which I can understand the tuning decision here since Hisenior is targeting it for drummer, bassist, guitarist, and vocalist. In pure audiophile perspective, we will discuss it further in the next section.
Fe3U
The Fe3U on the other hand is going for that flat neutral sound signature. Looking at the official frequency response by Hisenior, it has exactly the same graph as the classic Shure SE535 and even the same number of driver configuration. I’m not sure if Hisenior is trying to recreate the SE535 at cheaper cost or if it is just an inspiration. Unfortunately, I don’t have the SE535 to make a comparison.
Bass
T2 Classic
Bass is the highlight of this IEM. Period. Sub bass is deep, reaching the 20Hz territory and mid-bass is boosted to give the warmth and thick bass impact with a slight mid-bass bleed. Since it is coming from a Balanced Armature, the bass is tight and pretty well defined although with a caveat of artificial timbre. This impression is coming from a song called Fly By II, a 90s R&B classic. I guess for the price, the bass performance of the T2 Classic is above average.
Fe3U
Although the overall tuning is neutral, bass is actually having a little bit of bump especially the mid-bass. Sub bass extends quite deep like in the T2 Classic although not as loud. Bass performance such as timbre and impact are great and solid for a BA driven IEM. Coming from the T2 Classic, Fe3U feels more neutral or “flatter” but still maintaining the detail and transient. Yeah, unfortunately not really an improvement from the former.
Midrange
T2 Classic
Lower midrange is slightly boosted giving male vocal a little bit of energy. Now, the upper-mids are quite uneven at least to my ears. There are not much pinnae gain here, it’s a slow gradual towards the presence region (lower treble). Starting from the presence region till the mid-treble, there are some forwardness there. The result of this is high pitch vocal and some midrange instruments may sound recessed and “nasal” at the same time although not every
time. Fortunately, the vocal resolution and clarity is very good. In Ku Akui, Hafiz powerful vocal sounds clean and clear with good timbre to it.
Fe3U
Midrange is totally neutral, be it the lower-mids or upper-mids especially for instruments. In terms of vocal, the clarity is still as good as the T2 Classic. For the price, I think the mids here should have better performance such as resolution and timbre. To say that this is an analytical type of IEM is also not that suitable since the technicalities here are just similar as the T2 Classic.
Treble
T2 Classic
Treble here is neutral. Woodwinds, strings, and percussion instruments sound alright with good details. Upper treble or air is severely lacking on the other hand, although cymbals and hi-hats texture can still sound good enough. With that lack of air, soundstage feels are also affected.
Fe3U
Treble though is an improvement over the T2 Classic. It has more presence and better extended air. One thing though, there are tiny bit of peak at around the mid-treble region which can be obvious at higher volume. Timbre wise, decay such as in cymbals still have the BA characteristic but not as bad and without being sibilant.
Soundstage & Imaging
T2 Classic
Soundstage of this IEM is pretty much narrow and claustrophobic due to also added strong isolation and noise cancellation. However, as a professional monitoring tool, imaging accuracy is vital and hence, extra “natural” attributes such as soundstage and air are not needed otherwise it beats the purpose of this IEM. Imaging though is very much accurate within its soundstage I would say. One example is in Moanin’, where the trumpet placement is very close to my ears as if the player was playing right beside me.
Fe3U
Soundstage is much wider compared to T2 Classic thanks to the one extra BA and also the more extended upper-treble. I was listening to Hope (Title Theme) which is a classical-orchestral soundtrack of a video game, and it was actually sounded big and majestic. The soundstage is mainly about the horizontal rather than depth and height. Imaging has a little bit of improvement particularly the stereo imaging from the T2 Classic. However, it’s not really a huge jump in performance compared to the T2 Classic though.
Separation & Timbre
T2 Classic
The instrument layering coming from the Knowles BAs are great and already exceeding above its price tag in my point of view. The T2 Classic has also great macro details but fall short on micro details probably due to their limited tuning in certain frequencies. The weakest part in this section will be the timbre in which the decay of both BAs in this IEM cannot decay naturally like a dynamic driver.
Fe3U
Instrument layering is decent. Since, the depth of the soundstage is not that deep, there are not much space where every instrument can be revealed. Other technicalities are also decent. To be direct, the technicalities of the Fe3U are just tiny bit better or more or less the same compared to the cheaper and the one less BA driver of the T2 Classic.
Drivability & Synergy
Whatever the specs said on these two IEMs, both are extremely easy to be driven with something like smartphone. With different sources and amping, both IEMs did not show any sign of significant improvements in sound quality except tone (e.g., warmer, brighter).
Comparison
T2 Classic VS AudioSense DT200:
Audiosense DT200 is another recently released Chi-Fi 2 BAs IEM. DT200 is a neutral sounding IEM with more “complete” or balanced sound than the T2. Sub-bass goes deep until 20Hz same as the T2, while mid-bass and lower-mids are marginally lesser in quantity which resulted in less warm and more neutral sound to the DT200. Pinnae gain is tuned naturally higher, so vocal sound much more natural or “correct” to my ears compared to the more recessed and slower increased pinnae gain of the T2. This effect can be noticed in Stratego, in which DT200 midrange sound more “correct” meanwhile T2 Classic sounds weirdly “nasal”. Treble tuning is similar but upper treble is much more extended on the DT200. Technicality wise, T2 Classic has similar detail retrieval but is lightly ahead in terms of instrument layering, imaging, transient speed, and black background than the DT200. However, DT200 has slightly bigger soundstage on all the three axes and also has much more natural timbre, the bass has a wonderful almost DD-liked feels to it. In addition to that, although the DT200 is a neutral IEM but the dynamics are still great, just to make you not feel boring when listening to it. In this comparison, Audiosense DT200 is a win for me.
Fe3U VS Shozy Neo CP:
Shozy Neo CP is an old IEM but also has 3 BA drivers in it. In this part I don’t have to explain to much here because the Shozy is just better in terms of tonality and technicalities for much lesser price (at least to my ears). The Shozy has slightly more sub bass and mid-bass quantity but with more details, transient attack, and depth. The mids and treble are also more pleasing and more organic sounding with slightly better air extension. Furthermore, the Shozy has better imaging, layering, and clarity in which the differences here were obvious in Taiko Song, an amazing complex piece of record. The only downside of the Shozy is the artificial bass timbre, I found that the decay is too quick as well as a somewhat dull bass texture. All in all, the Shozy Neo CP has a warm-neutral sound signature with better technicalities in comparison to the flatter and neutral Fe3U. I’ll take the Shozy Neo CP for sure.
For Who?
Both IEMs are marketed as a monitor for musicians. As a fellow audiophile, these IEMs are recommended for someone who loves strong isolation and has that “studio monitoring” feel in an IEM.
Conclusion
In an audiophile standpoint of view, I feel like Hisenior T2 Classic is much more valuable than the higher priced Fe3U. Although the T2 Classic has a slight tonal balanced issue (to me), the technicalities it offers is quite good. The Fe3U on the other hand is not bad by any means, it’s just that for over $200, there are cheaper IEMs out there with better technicalities and in fact, the T2 Classic is pretty much Fe3U with just different in tuning. Putting all that a side, both have an outstanding noise isolation for an IEM, perfect for sound monitoring and music making I believed.
T2 Classic – 
(3.5 / 5)
Fe3U – 
(3 / 5)
