oBravo Cupid hybrid planar magnetic/dynamic earphone

David Teng is the founder of oBravo, a Taiwanese manufacturer specialising in high-end, high performance headphones and earphones. oBravo’s initial development efforts centred on full-size headphones, such as the HAMT-1 hybrid AMT/dynamic driver-equipped headphones reviewed by Hi-Fi+ Editor Alan Sircom in issues 120 and 121. Later, oBravo branched out to design ultra high performance hybrid earphones that sounded terrific, but also were typically quite expensive.

Most oBravo headphones and earphones use hybrid driver arrays, deftly combining dynamic mid-bass drivers with exotic planar magnetic, ribbon, or air motion transformer-type (AMT) tweeters. The three common threads we have observed in oBravo products to date have been an emphasis on refined and very revealing sound quality, expertly crafted hybrid driver arrays, and relatively high selling prices. However, at Munich High-End 2019 oBravo surprised us with a highly disruptive new product we never anticipated.

At Munich, David Teng greeted me and said, “I’ve got a new hybrid earphone I want you to hear.” The earphone was called the Cupid and it was beautifully made, surprisingly small, and sounded so good that I felt sure it would be expensive. But I was wrong about that.

When I asked the projected price of the Cupids, Teng replied with practiced nonchalance, “Oh, about £249.” Hunhh?!?I could scarcely believe my ears, partly because the Cupid sounded competitive with earphones carrying four-figure price tags, and partly because it was one of the least expensive oBravo earphones ever. 

The Cupids use compact lozenge-shaped earpieces made of mirror-polished brass treated to an electroplated ‘black gold’ finish. The driver complement consists of a 6mm dynamic mid-bass driver with neodymium motor magnets and a 8mm second-generation planar magnetic tweeter (patented). Signal connections are via enhanced oB-MMCX connectors. A 1.2m, balanced signal cable with silver-plated OCC conductors and a 2.5mm balanced plug comes standard, along with a 3.5mm adapter. Also included are three pairs of silicone and Comply™ Foam ear tips. a small two-chamber carry bag designed to keep the earpieces from chafing against one another, and an oBravo cable tie-down strip. This configuration, called the Cupid Prime, sells for £249 (or $269 US).

I tried the Cupids with an Astell&Kern SP1000M DAP loaded with CD-quality or better music files and with the Tidal app. I also ran the earphones with an iPad Air and a Samsung Galaxy Note 9 smartphone. I soon discovered the easy-to-drive Cupids performed surprisingly well with my tablet and smartphone, though they were sufficiently revealing to underscore the substantial qualitative differences between those devices versus the much higher performance Astell&Kern DAP. 

Next, I found the Cupids offered all the core elements of the oBravo ‘house sound’: namely, neutral and smooth top-to-bottom tonal balance, exquisite and seamless integration between their dynamic and planar magnetic drivers, expressive dynamics, and a very fine degree of resolution. If you were wondering if the Cupids are a ‘real’ oBravo, the emphatic answer is “Yes!”

Two tracks will help illustrate the qualities that make the Cupids so special. The first is ‘Charlie Foxtrot’ from The Souljazz Orchestra’s Chaos Theories [Strut Records, 16/44.1]. The song is chockfull of incisive, intensely syncopated piano, percussion, trumpet, and saxophone lines and the Cupids conveyed the instruments’ timbres and dynamics with terrific energy and clarity; each instrumental voice sounded pure and completely distinct from the others. The second is “My Friend the Forest” from Nils Frahm’s All Melody [Erased Tapes, 16/44.1], where the Cupid’s not only captured the sweet, pensive tonality of Frahm’s piano, but also brilliantly rendered all the small micro-details that conveyed the action of the piano and the reverberant characteristics of the recording space. Frankly, £249 earphones aren’t normally expected to do such things so well, but somehow the Cupids pulled it off.

If you want a substantial taste of what serious high-end earphones are all about, yet without putting your budget in distress, look no further than oBravo’s Cupids. At their asking price they are not just a bargain, but a musical gift.

TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS

Type: Hybrid planar magnetic/dynamic universal fit earphone

Driver complement: 6mm dynamic mid-bass driver, 8mm planar magnetic tweeter (patented)

Frequency response: 20Hz–40kHz

Impedance: 16 ohms

Sensitivity: 105dB

Weight: Not specified

Accessories: Three pairs of silicone ear tips, three pairs of Comply™ Foam ear tips, fabric protective pouch, a cable tie‑down strip, 1.2m balance signal cable with silver‑plated OCC conductors and a 2.5mm balanced plug, and a 3.5mm adapter

Price: £249 UK (or $249 US)

MANUFACTURER INFORMATION

oBravo Audio

URL: obravoaudio.com

UK/US Distributor

oBravo UK

URL: obravo.co.uk