^THIS^

I've heard the same. I'm waiting for the USB-C adapter so I can start using DAC mode on my Bathys (I have a 14 pro max, so it's still lightning - USB C). Really exciting considering the fact that I'm ALREADY incredibly happy with them via wireless use.

Thanks for your insight on this!

That's what Focal does to you 🎉

Could not agree more ... Low quality review IMO .

Fr he brushed through the review you can tell he didn't like them but it's crazy how he'll call the hifiman ananda bt the best bt headphone. I don't understand why he didn't compare it to that as well

But if it’s wired, then there’s no point to buy this bt headphones, no? I can just grab my Focal Clear or Celestee if it’s wired

@@OneDicz i dont think so. Using the Celeste you need a Dac/amp also, that makes not so portable setup. Bathys let you use one basic usbc to usbc cable to connect to your phone or pc/mac with 24bit/192kHz audio, also with microphone capabilities, something that other headphones dont have that. All other headphones let to use microphone only with bluetooth connection. Here with the bathys you can use microphone with bluetooth and DAC mode :D

@@OneDicz I understand, that's true. But I don't have a Clear or a Celestee, so with the Bathys, I will get decent wireless quality, and performance on par with one of analog wired models, with the added benefit of amp/dac/anc while charging at the same time (I think - will have to check that one out still...). So basically, I'm getting one headphone to replace my Sony XM4 and Audioquest NightOwl...

@@OneDicz But it can do both and that's the point. If you want to go wired, it sounds incredible with its built in DAC. But if you want to go wireless, you still can. If you only have the Celestee then you now have to own 2 pairs of headphones if you want BT functionality.

Do you need Tidal to experience loseless or will Spotify work with the DAC?

I bought both 1 day apart and returned the PX8. The PX8 sounds a bit muddy compared to the Bathys.

See the review on Darko's channel

USB mode is my primary use case and how I think headphones like this perform best. You get ANC and top notch sound with wireless being an option. Yet it seems to be overlooked by most reviewers as a primary feature. I'd be interested in seeing more comparisons done with usb mode too.

I believe when Josh stated he had this issue with the whine sound and Bluetooth delay. But I have not heard any other reviewer mention these issues

From someone who says the max sounded good? Ok good try there. While I do not straight up call the max a piece of trash. But for it’s asking price? It is no where near the price performance ratio. Whatever “features” the max has are also quite irrelevant to majority of the people considering they are mutually exclusive to Apple eco system which is one of the worst thing ever. I did a short preview on the bathys and initial impression was already good from the audio stand point. I will get my hands on them in a couple of days to be able to spend more time with it. But as of current I am pretty sure this review is way off even for just having a short moment with the product.

If you can find a store near you with these and others, i would recommend heading there and taking a listen

He didn't go over the performance of the dac mode on this headphone which actually puts it in line of $800 wired headphones such as the celestee!

Does microphone work in DAC mode for conference calls? I'm looking for headphones which are for multiple purposes: music, calls, even calls while playing video games maybe. My current ones are not good at it, they switch into headset mode and they sound awful, they completely cut off all frequencies outside voice range and suppress all noises that are not a speech. I would expect them to turn into soundcard when connected via USB, but that's not the case. I'm not interested so much in BT as in ANC for office and I have my current headphones wired via USB 99% of the time.

@@pavelperina7629 I checked today and you can talk. I connected the headphones with a USB cable to the Samsung A52S 5G smartphone. The quality wasn't great, but the interlocutor understood everything.

Hey Mario I just got the 5909 last week and you're right they do sound fantastic, probably the clearest sounding BT headphones I've tried but I've noticed a couple of things that I'm not sure are going on with my pair or if it's just how they are. One thing is when I'm on a call after about 10 minutes the headset sometimes drops the connection or turns itself off, also my voice while on a call always sounds muffled like I'm on ANC. It also sometimes drops the connection when listening to music for a while and on-head detection is very spotty. When it's working flawless it's beautiful but when it's not it's a little annoying. Just curious if you happened to notice any of these things too

The DT1990 pros are fine if you never want to own another headphone. I sold mine because they were so bright they made all my other gear sound muddy and muffled and listening for more than 40 min is painful as they cause fatigue. But if you have hearing damage or in your 70s they might be good.

@@chungang7037 I received them a few days back and burned them in , they sound incredible , love the highs it’s Cristal clear and I have no problems with fatigue.. I’m 23 .. everything sounds so nice pushed to the sides and sepersted

It all depends on what you want. Streaming music straight from the phone sounds excellent when listening to ultra luxury BT headphones like the Bathys or ML 5909 and they do outperform mid-rangers like the Airpods Max or Sony XM5 (post eq), albeit not by much. When you start comparing $600+ BT headphones to one's in the $400-500 range you're really just gonna find a 10-15% difference in improvement. It doesn't sound like much at all but for audiophiles that little bit of extra quality is worth spending a few hundred bucks more. The only downside to the luxury headphones is that call quality typically isn't quite as good. There's only so many components that can fit in a set of headphones so most companies looking to make the best sounding set have to make a compromise elsewhere, usually in the phonecall department. Now in good conditions there isn't a very big difference in call quality between something like the Bathys vs XM5 and if you're indoors on Zoom or in a car both you and the other caller will have no problem at all and the calls are very clear. On the other hand if you're walking around on a busy street or in a semi-loud area the Bathys struggles quite a bit and the XM5 blows it out of the water. Sorry for the long winded response but I hope it helps. I will say that for me the best balance between excellent sound quality and clear calls was found with the ML 5909 and B&O H95. Excellent sounding with the 5909 being just a little more clear in the vocals and the H95 having a little more bass. The Bathys' sound was like a happy medium between the two while having a slightly wider soundstage. I will say though if you don't care about that extra 10-15% difference and would rather save some money I would recommend the XM5. Those are my daily drivers and after alot of comparing to other headsets once they're eq'd the sound is really really good, calls are excellent and they're very reliable, especially if you're an Android user. If you use an Iphone they're still excellent but the Airpod Max may be a slightly better match.

I tried the Bathys, Celestee, and Clear MG in an audio store and I really didn’t like the Celestee. Felt confined and boring. The Bathys sounded more engaging and was wireless and $200 cheaper which is a clear win. Clear MG had great treble and clarity-didn’t get any of that in the Celestee.

I like bass, which one from focal is the best?

Stellea are absolutely amazing mate. They are so good in fact that I now want a utopia

@@attomicrooster7823 Just ordered mine and I hope I have the same experience as you and many others that are speechless tying to explain these.

adiohead

I have both, and on sound quality Bathys is hands down better. Even with personalized EQ on Drop Panda with SoundID app, Bathys was better. One area that Drop Panda gets ahead is when 3.5 mm jack is used with proper DAC. I tested both with FiiO M17, and Drop Panda has more consistent experience between wireless and wired.

@@mertcubukcu much appreciated!

@Mert you mave have just removed $800 from my account

How much worst is the ANC though?

@@paullacan It works well enough for me. However if you are constantly on a plane go for the airpods max as it is slightly better. For office and around town the Bathys is more than acceptable.

This! ⏫

SBC is a non go in windows for high end wireless headphones .... I use a dedicated bluetooth adapter on my PC to be able to use aptx HD .

@@fernandom5070 i prefer ldac but i guess aptx hd is also fine for most streaming usecases. I don't know how tidal compresses audio on a macbook so i can't comment on josh's review process unless he explains it. Other famed reviewers gave it thumbs up on bluetooth audio, dac mode and noise cancelling so i might wait until next year to get these. The only people i know who use airpod max have never spent even 50 dollars on decent IEM's before so i reckon focal's audience is not exactly those people anyways although they are looking at the NC market in general.

@@teachonlywhatiseasy Hi , I have not had the opportunity to test ldac as is a Sony proprietary codec ( Bathys do not support it unfortunately ) . All I can say is that I can appreciate a big different using SBC or plain Aptx to using Aptx HD . In any case , the real breakthrough for wireless headphones will be to be able to use Aptx lossless . I can not wait for the new codec to be implemented . Thx for your reply by the way .

@@fernandom5070 omitting ldac is alright as people keep complaining it renegotiates to a lower bitrate when you move around which isn't great for bluetooth but almost all my devices from fioo and hiby do ldac 96khz 24 bit. aptx HD is backwards compatible with aptx lossless so i guess the dac + implementation makes all the difference in my experience. even compressing down to AAC is justifiable. no wonder apple never bothered paying for ldac.

Its also significantly better in bluetooth mode also.

Wired performance is important .... Why ? Because it replace you DAC + Amplifier . So yeah , not testing DAC mode Vs wireless is a big fault from this review