Event Coverage

Klipsch's New Lean and Fit Earphones

By Hurrairah bin Sohail - 10 Dec 2012

The New Klipsch A5i

Lean with Great Fit

Any headphones brand worth its salt nowadays has realized the importance of the sporty, fitness enthusiast customer. Musical accompaniment for your exercise routine has become a popular way to drown out ambient noise outside and to treat your ears to more familiar tunes, as opposed to the playlist blaring through in your gym's sound system.

We have seen the trend of acoustic manufacturers targeting this particular niche throughout the past year. Sony released the XBA-S65 for fitness buffs when they brought their range of balanced armature earphones to Singapore. Similarly while Denon’s new launch of products was primarily targeted at audiophiles, they remembered to have something for the “exercise freaks” in the form of the AH-W150.

Klipsch launches the the A5i earphones for sport enthusiasts.

Klipsch has become an extremely popular earphone brand in Singapore on the back of the success of the S4 in-ears. Recently, at an event held at the Ion Sky in Singapore, they announced the global launch of a new addition to their product lineup in the form of the A5i, which is made for use when engaged in physical activity. 

The A5i from Klipsch sports an electric green do and looks extremely trendy.

Design

Sports earphones first and foremost, taking into account the usage they will suffer, have to be hardy and waterproof. Klipsch seemed to have taken all these aspects into consideration. The A5i cabling is constructed with Kevlar thrown into the mix so as to ensure that the wires do not tangle or get damaged when snagged. The earphones are also waterproof, allowing users to wash the sweat off them after they are done using them.

Kevalr is used in the construction of the cables to give the wires sturdiness, while the earphones feature the standard around the ear wearing style.

Klipsch has fitted the A5i with 6.5mm drivers, which is quite a way smaller than standard 8mm to 12mm sized regular earphones come equipped with. While this definitely helps make the A5i light with its total of weight of just 19g, we will have to see how it impacts performance.

An in-line three-button control pod eliminates the need to change tracks from your music player. The clip attachment also provides extra anchoring for the A5i.

As is standard with sports earphones, the Klipsch A5i offers an around-the-ear wearing style intended to ensure the earphones remain in place while you work out. To provide additional anchoring, the in-line control pod comes with a clip attachment. This means you can pin the cabling in place, stopping it from swinging around to a large degree when out running or jogging. But the most interesting feature of the A5i headphones is the movable and bendable arm for the ear-buds themselves. This allows for adjustment of how deep the ear-buds can be placed in the ear canal.

In this shot you can the the bendable arm for the ear-bud of the A5i which can be used to adjust fit.

Performance

The separate arm mechanism of the Klipsch A5i is a good feature to be included for sports earphones. We were able to get great noise isolation by pushing the buds in, which seems perfect for indoor environments. A loose fit which allows for a moderate level of ambient noise to seep through, which would be extremely helpful if you are running or cycling outdoors. Allied with the light weight of the headphones and the around the ear wearing style, we have no problems with how the new earphones sit.

There were models on hand to showcase how well the Klipsch A5i functions when put to the test.

As mentioned earlier, the light weight is achieved partially due to the 6.5mm drivers used. While small in stature, we were surprised with the bass delivered by the Klipsch A5i. Deep and defined to a good degree, the low notes had good impact. The beat or groove, which represents the tempo, is perhaps the most important aspect of the music when exercising. The A5i is particularly suited in helping this party of composition shine through.

Available in markets now, the Klipsch A5i has a price-tag of S$229.

On the percussion heavy Tessellate by Alt-J, the new Klipsch product also displayed a decent transient response, showcasing the variety of sounds with a good level of detail. However, when compared with the Klipsch S4i II (which we luckily had on hand), the A5i seems to lack the warmth of tone which makes the former, regular variety earphones so formidable when handling pop tunes.

Pricing and Availability

The Klipsch A5i is out on the markets now and is priced at S$229.

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