In this Friday review we check out the $599USD OSLO cable by Dita Audio. It is an oil soaked copper cable with changeable termination. Let’s see how it performs.
Disclaimer: Dita Audio provided the OSLO free of charge for this review. Headfonia is not affiliated with Dita and they are not a site advertiser. Many thanks for the opportunity and generosity.
About Dita Audio:
Dita Audio is a Singapore based manufacturer of In Ear Monitors and cables. They specialize in making single dynamic driver earphones and have partnered with a very reputable company from the HiFi scene for some of their previous cables. Dita Audio has been around for six years already, their former flagship – the Dream, has been available for a strictly limited run and is discontinued already. The newest additions to their lineup can be seen as the spiritual successors of the Dream.
Previously we looked at their other offerings, the Answer, the Truth and their Twins.
Dita Audio’s philosophy is simple. They strive for perfection, without using any sound-compromising materials while aiming for beauty in their designs.
Today we’re reviewing the OSLO cable for you. It’s the first cable they sell under their own brand.
About OSLO:
OSLO stands for Oil Soaked Long-crystal Oxygen-free cable. It was apparently developed over the span of two years. As the description of the cable already spills, it’s oil soaked. This means all their copper wires have been bathed in nano-particle-infused oil. These nano-particles are gold and silver dust flakes and are supposed to fill the little gaps of the copper’s surface. This should then result in greater conductivity.
Dita opted for 30 AWG sized wires, which is considerably smaller than what seems the norm. Unlike their competition, with very few exceptions, they deliver the Oslo cable with interchangeable plugs. They call them Awesome Plugs. The deal is, you can simply unscrew the connected plug and change it for one of the supplied ones. This makes any source mismatch irrelevant, as you can easily use 3.5 mm, 2.5 mm or 4.4 mm.
You can get the Oslo with either 2-pin, MMCX, Dita Twins, Dita Dream or FitEar connectors. Dita sells their Oslo cable for 599$ and it can be bought through one of their retailers.
Dita Audio Oslo
Build Quality:
The Oslo organizes its four wires in a twisted, round form, unlike most manufacturers who go for a regular braid. Dita’s cable has decent build quality in my opinion. Oslo is nicely flexible, although their competition does have softer and more flexible solutions. I also noticed, that Oslo is a bit prone to friction noise and transfers those to your IEMs and into your ears. Which can be a bit annoying.
On the lower end of the cable you have your Awesome Plugs. There’s a silver aluminium ring that can be screwed off. Once you’ve done that, you can detach the current plug and hook up another one that fits your source. This is really cool and comes in super handy in many situations.
Dita uses a big aluminium circle as a Y-Split. You might see, that they have their brand name and the Oslo Logo cut into it. After that you get a plastic chin slider that does exactly what it’s supposed to do. My sample came with a 2-pin termination that should fit 0.78 mm sockets. However, these 2-pin connectors are fairly large and don’t fit just any IEM. I for example could not fit the Oslo in any of my Empire Ears, AAW or Audeze monitors. IEMs that worked fine came from 64 Audio, Noble Audio and others.
I get that there are manufacturing tolerances and no absolute engineering standard for 2-pin, but other cable makers use 2-pins that fit all my IEMs. It’s a shame the Oslo doesn’t.
Dita Audio Oslo
Package:
Paying customers will get a small, yet elegant black box with tiny gold and silver dots on it. In the box you’ll find the cable, a soft blue pouch, the additional Awesome Plugs and a minuscule bottle of Contact Enhancer. This Contact Enhancer uses the same nano-particle infused oil and should go on all connectors and plugs to offer a better point of contact. It can also be used with any monitor and on any connector/plug to which you wish to apply it.
All in all the package is quite nice. I especially liked the Awesome Plugs. For once I don’t have to worry about which termination I should get.
The review continues on page two.
