New Open Back for $700: Cleer NX Next

Beryllium on the Utopia, Alu/Mag on the Elear.

 

Has anyone heard anything about these?? They were supposed to be released in spring. It's summer.

 

They were still refining the tuning when I heard them in April at Canjam LA. The tonality was OK: pretty tight, well extended bass, Good sounding slightly lush mids, and a slightly peaky metallic tinged treble. They were taking feedback, so that's what I told them. It reminded me of a slightly more metallic sounding Elear. The build quality was on point, though: pretty amazing. If they can get the sound signature right, it could really be a great value

 

There is a technical contribution as well. They are using an ironless driver, essentialy magnets in lieu of iron pole pieces. This reduces back EMF (eddy currents) and makes for a faster driver. Here is a paper by the inventor: https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-00437000/document. George Cardas did a similar thing for IEMs with the driver in the A8 IEM.

 

Necro-Thread-Bump. Did anyone ever get a chance to hear these things? It's impressive when a start-up creates their own driver that doesn't look like every TPE driver ever.

 

I got one while ago. It's a good headphone but has two treble peaks that can be a deal breaker for many. For me the treble is not as bad as all the beyerdynamics I've had and I have pretty much adapted to it. What bothers me more is the occasional echoes in the midrange. I tried measuring them but there was nothing on csd or spectogram that would explain what I hear.

There are some quite simple mods I'm yet to try. Those mods are supposed to decrease bass distortion (which for me hasn't been a problem) but might help with the echo issue too.

I have been looking for a bigger soundstage alternative for Focal Clear and these are pretty close from what I recall. It's been a while since I had the Focals but I'm not missing much with these except for punchier bass on Focal. I compared Next side by side with dt1990 (with dekonin elite velours) and to my ears it's no contest. Dt1990 just sounds hazy in comparison. No sibilance, atleast not as much on dt1990. What is noteworthy is the way how Cleer makes things sound big. I don't mean big soundstage but the presentation in which sound sources are not small and distinct but bigger and occupying larger areas in the soundstage. HD800 does this and also Verum One. In cleer it is not as obvious as with the senn and verum but it's definately there and personally I like it. Just sounds more realistic and lifelike to me.

Because of the treble and echo issues I would be disappointed if I had bought these new and paid $799. For used $350 mint condition I'm glad I gave these a change and if any of the mods work out these will be a keeper for me. Andromedas will continue to get most of my head/ear time but it's nice to have these around when my earcanals need some rest and I feel like listening to a fullsize that does not sound veiled after the andros.

My mini dsp ears fr measurement. HD6XX included as reference.


Some internal pictures for folks who are into this kind of things.