Dan Clark Audio Stealth Review

DCA Stealth

Sound quality and tonal characteristics

 

If you’ve heard the Stealth’s little brother, the Aeon 2/Noire, then the Stealth’s sonic presentation will be extremely familiar. The Stealth sounds eerily like the Noire, but simply turns things up to ’11’ in terms of technicalities and performance.

Right away, the Stealth impresses with an extremely pleasing tuning that’s astonishingly close to the Harman target curve, which is an industry benchmark for tuning preference. Balance and clarity are the two most immediately characteristics that the Stealth reveals, along with a complete lack of any discernable distortion. It’s such a well-behaved tuning, that out of the box, the Stealth feels at first a little…unremarkable – especially if you’re used to the dynamic punch and drama of a more in-your-face dynamic-driver headphone, such as those in Focal or Grado’s lineup.

The Stealth is an absolute masterclass in terms of displaying planar magnetic speed and agility, at times approaching electrostatic alacrity and deftness. What’s remarkable about the Stealth is how DCA has managed to combine this tuning and planar tactility, yet make it feel entirely natural at the same time – there’s no brittleness nor plastic-sounding timbre that can befall some planar magnetic headphones. The Stealth does genuinely feel like it’s performing magic at times, being able to at once deliver a textured and intimate vocal performance from Anderson. Paak in ‘Heart Don’t Stand a Chance‘, while at the same time playing wonderfully resonant reverb from the backing vocals which sound like they’re coming from stage left/right at the same time, with absolutely perfect decay.

Bass feels more sub-bass focused, being well extended and super nimble and never yielding any sense of flab nor distortion whatsoever. Aphex Twin has never sounded tighter nor well defined than it did on the Stealth. Like other DCA headphones, it must be noted that the Stealth’s dynamic character is rather neutral – there’s no getting around the fact that it’s a lean-sounding headphone, and doesn’t give you any real sense of visceral shove nor slam. This is without a doubt the single biggest factor that will turn people away from the Stealth when played back-to-back against other closed-back headphones, but the interesting thing about the Stealth is that your yearning for ‘more’ out of them in the slam department gets lesser the more you listen to them.

At first, I did honestly find the Stealth a little unexciting – I didn’t feel the urge to reach for them for some ‘fun’ time listening. However, given time, you become accustomed to their astonishing level of clarity and textbook tuning that really does become your new ‘benchmark’ in terms of tonal performance, which then makes everything else seem a little flawed. Instead of looking for the dopamine-inducing dose of mid-bass ‘shove’, you begin to become a junkie for the remarkable little world of pinpoint imaging and brilliantly separated sounds that envelop your head – all in a perfectly comfortable and outside-world-blocking cocoon.

DCA Stealth

The Stealth’s midrange is perhaps where the most interesting and enjoyable stuff happens. While it doesn’t have a hugely organic-sounding mid-range in the way that a staple like the Sennheiser HD600/650 does, the Stealth instead makes up for it with sheer accuracy and engagement, leaving nothing on the table playing Phoebe Bridger’s excellent cover of Metallica’s ‘Nothing Else Matters‘. The Stealth’s mid-range feels somewhat forward, placing you right in the front row when it comes to listening to vocal and instrumental parts, giving the Stealth a somewhat intimate presentation. And yet in the same track, it will also reveal itself to have a rather vast-sounding sense of soundstage. The multi-tracked guitars in ‘Hummer‘ from The Smashing Pumpkin’s ‘Siamese Dream’ have plenty of crunch and sizzle, telling me that the Stealth will happily ‘rock out’ when called for.

My favourite tuning filter with the Aeon 2 Noire is actually ‘no filter’, as I found that the 3 provided foam/felt options made it feel a little too cosy and tempered the highs somewhat. And yet, with the filters completely removed on the Noire I did feel like it was a little too spicey up top at times. Whatever DCA has done with this ‘Acoustic Metamaterial’ sure is working, because the Stealth has an absolute ‘Goldilocks’ approach to treble that ups the ante in terms of refinement compared to its less expensive sibling. The Stealth has detail for days, and yet it’s smooth in a way that doesn’t feel like it’s casting a veil over the upper octave at all.

Overall, the Stealth does trade excitement and visceral drama at a macro level for finesse and accuracy, but longer-term listening does reveal that the Stealth does have drama – but the drama happens to live within the details.

Powering and source paring

While it does have a relatively ‘portable’ profile, the Stealth very much requires a dedicated source to achieve proper performance, being only 86dB in terms of sensitivity. The Stealth does sound a little flat and slightly unremarkable when pushing a smartphone or laptop to its limits, but stepping up to a DAP with some curry under the hood does do wonders in terms of improvement. The excellent Astell&Kern SE200, with 4Vrms on tap from its dual 2.5mm outputs proved to be a terrific pairing with the Stealth. Using a modded aftermarket cable, the SE200 needed only 80 from a total 140 volume increments to extract a silky and snappy performance from the excellently recorded ‘Brite Nightgown’ from Donald Fagen’s solo album ‘Morph the Cat’. This track (and the rest of the album, for that matter) features some of the best reference displays of bass guitar and drums when it comes to testing headphones, and I couldn’t fault the playback experience when pairing the Stealth on this portable rig.

DCA Stealth

I spent some time playing the Stealth on two different Class-A solid-state desktop amplifiers, the Questyle CMA600i and the extremely high-end Fidelice Precision DAC and headphone amplifier from Rupert Neve Designs. Stepping up to a discrete desktop amp paid dividends in terms of dynamics and punch, making the SE200 feel somewhat soft and laid-back by comparison. Feeding the Stealth with some additional wattage and headroom not only improves dynamics, but also creates a far more sorted sense of separation, with improved front-back depth. I found that the Stealth felt best when fed in high gain on the extremely powerful and capable Jotunheim 2 from Schiit Audio, which has a whopping seven and a half watts on tap at 16 ohms. The Jotunheim helped give the Stealth a tad more tonal mass and richness, making for a more exciting and engaging presentation that made me stick with the Jotunheim 2 for the most part when it came to listening to the Stealth.

DCA Stealth

Comparisons

Stealth vs Aeon 2 Noire

Like I mentioned before, these two headphones from DCA share not only the same basic shape, but also go about making sound in a very similar kind of way. A quick swap between the two reveals a very similar tuning, with a little more upper treble forwardness standing out in the Noire that makes it sound ever so slightly ‘honky’ by comparison. Tuning aside, while the Noire is a bloody technically proficient headphone, the Stealth steps things up even more. There’s more blackness between notes. There’s more definition within the micro detail of notes. There more cleanliness in the bass. There’s just more of just about everything.

The Noire does have a slightly more rich and ‘fun’ overall sound compared to the more clinically-minded Stealth, but it does hang in there pretty well in terms of delivering an impressive performance. Sure, the Stealth does pip it in just about every category (barring comfort), but is it four times better than the Noire as the price might suggest? Not in a million years. Either the Stealth makes the Aeon 2 Noire feel like a stone-cold bargain, or the Aeon 2 Noire makes the Stealth feel like an expensive special performance edition of an already superb sports car that has some fancy badging and paint on the outside. I’m not quite sure which way I’m leaning, but I think it’s the former.

DCA Stealth

Stealth vs Focal Stellia

Focal’s closed-back flagship is the spiritual nemesis of the Stealth in just about every way possible: it’s ostentatious, dramatic, and in-your-face. I also happen to think it’s brilliant at what it does: making music come alive in an impactful and stylish way. Listening to the Stealth after the Stellia makes you feel like you’re listening to a live concert over a telephone rather than being there in front of a wall of guitar amplifiers, it simply doesn’t have the same dynamic characteristics which genuinely do feel speaker-like on the Stellia at times.

The Stellia is most definitely a coloured-sounding headphone, and is nowhere near as balanced as the Stealth’s voicing which manages the transitions between lows/mids/highs with more finesse and truthfulness. When you settle down and get accustomed to the more restrained and nuanced take on things from the Stealth, it’s a clearly more technical and balanced performance, with more space between notes, a more expansive soundstage, and a slight edge in terms of detail and speed. They’re two very different takes on a closed-back headphone design, made for two very different sonic preferences. Can I have both? Sadly I can’t, but if I did, I think I’d lean towards the Stealth…but then again, I already have an Aeon 2 Noire on my desk…

Stealth vs Sennheiser HD800s

Yes, I know the HD800s is an open-backed headphone, but given the Stealth has been pitched as a closed-back-with-none-of-the-shortcomings, it’s worthwhile seeing how it performs against the Maestro of soundstage. The short version is that the Stealth very much sounds like closed-back headphone compared to the expansive character of the HD800s – there’s simply no getting around physics. The Sennheiser is an industry legend for good reason, and does provide a remarkably different experience to the newcomer from Dan Clark Audio. The HD800s sound more ‘correct’ tonally, for lack of a better word. Sure, there’s substantial bass roll-off and a marked peak around 6kHz that the Stealth will stomp all over in terms of measurements and low-end reach, but the HD800s has a more believable organic tone that makes the Stealth sound somewhat clipped with its faster, more technical attack and decay.

DCA Stealth

Stealth vs Ether 2

Again, we’re comparing the Stealth to another open-back pair of cans here, but being until now the flagship planar in the DCA line-up it’s worth seeing how they stack up against one another. The Ether 2 is a very honeyed-sounding, warm headphone with an extremely pleasant and euphonic tuning. It sounds markedly warmer than the Stealth, and has a degree more bass impact – this is interesting as I also find the open back Aeons to have more bass impact than their close-backed cousins. The Ether 2, despite being an open-air design is actually more intimate-sounding than the Stealth, which does a better job of pulling apart individual tracks both forward/backward as well as front/back. The Ether 2 tends to smooooth things together with a lovely velvet presentation, but this makes it feel like a bit of a slouch in the technical department compared to the more clinical approach that the Stealth takes.

DCA Stealth

Final thoughts

The Dan Clark Stealth is without question a tour de force in terms of headphone design and an a terrific example of what can transpire when a company pushes technology to the limits to create an uncompromising closed-back flagship headphone. Dan Clark Audio has done everything that you’d expect from a $4K flagship headphone – they’ve given it a suitably ‘wow’ look and build, they’ve packed it with new drivers and AMTS technology, and have also voiced it to be as ‘perfectly’ tuned as you could expect when you put it on a measuring rig.

While it makes a compelling case for itself on paper, the Stealth doesn’t quite have the same level of emotional appeal – it’s a cold-looking, cold-sounding clinical headphone that evokes all the passion of a laser-guided bomb strike over Baghdad. That’s being mighty critical, but music is an emotional past-time at the end of the day.

The hardest case to make for the Stealth, however, is in terms of value.

Dan Clark Audio has certainly poured a ton of R&D into the Stealth and the evidence is certainly evident in the fantastic build quality and technical performance, but it just makes me realise how good the $899 USD Aeon 2 Noire is by comparison. I feel like the Stealth is like one of those futuristic concept cars that a manufacturer like BMW will wheel out at motor shows from time to time – sure, they’re cool and all, but why not go and get an M3 instead? They’re actually attainable, and you can drive one today. But, if you’re looking to extract that last percent or two of detail and performance and enjoy a finessed, balanced sound then you can rest assured that the Stealth will leave absolutely nothing on the table.

 

4.4/5 - (126 votes)
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Hailing from Sydney's eastern beaches, Matty runs his own beer business, 'Bowlo Draught', as well as working in creative advertising. When he's not enjoying his hifi and vinyl collection at home, he can probably be found rolling-up on the green at his beloved Bondi Bowling Club.

2 Comments

  • Reply May 11, 2022

    Marco

    Mate, I really need to know where you found that headphone stand! It’s absolutely dope!

  • Reply May 19, 2022

    Bearcat M. Sandor

    Hey Marco. It looks like common plumbing supplies. I bet if you took that pic to a plumbing supply shop (even Ace hardware, Home Depot, Lowes, in the USA) they could hook you up for less than $20. Put the pieces together, wrap some climbing rope on it for color and you’re done.

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