Sound Quality
Everything about the Advar is high quality until this point, and now let’s dive into its sound capabilities. The Meze Audio Advar is a spacious and roomy sounding IEM with good dynamics, coherency, and resolution. The new Meze sounds very well balanced, definitive but smooth and easy-going.
When companies create a well-tuned single dynamic design, it’s always a very pleasing experience. There are no complex crossovers or additional electronics of any kind, just a beautiful sound from a single driver unit that is highly coherent and musical. From that standpoint, Advar creates a high level of musical experience with a stereo system type of delivery and performance.
Bass
Advar delivers a very natural and breathy bass, and the dynamic driver is nicely balanced in terms of definition and control. The Advar gives you the bass whenever you need it but always keeps it under control. I can easily say for a dynamic driver, this is as good as it gets from a sub-1000$ IEM. You have sufficient rumble, good texture and a well-delivered definition. Despite being a single dynamic setup, the Advar doesn’t spill its bass to the mid-range in any way whatsoever, which is quite impressive.
I honestly haven’t seen this kind of bass quality and well-controlled delivery from a dynamic driver for a considerable amount of time. Meze hit the sweet spot with the bass in the Advar, and additionally, the lower frequencies have excellent resolution, detail and texture. The mid-bass and sub-bass balance are excellent, and the transition from mid-bass to the mid-range is well organized and smooth. Overall, I couldn’t find any weakness in the bass performance of the Advar, especially at this price level.
Mids
The mid-range feels slightly diffused, but only very slightly. Apart from that, the mid-range is silky smooth with fantastic timbre quality for the price. Some might prefer more ”in your face” mid-range delivery, but if you’re not obsessed with that, you’ll find nothing wrong here. The Advar sounds definitive, transparent and very detailed in the mid-range, giving you a very musical experience but with excellent resolution and micro details.
The tonality aspect of the Advar is its most impressive part, but its dynamism and quickness are nothing less than spectacular for a $700 IEM. You have very good PRaT and dynamism together with great detail retrieval and transparency.
Again, you might prefer a closer mid-range with more attack and aggressiveness, for the sake of overall energy and emotion. But Advar delivers the mid-range so effortlessly and spacious, it creates a very natural atmosphere just like what you usually get when you set up a home audio system. That’s the thing I liked the most about it.
Treble
High frequencies are well extended with great detail ability and most importantly, with great articulation. It personally got me by surprise, as I didn’t expect it to deliver this level of separation and articulation. But the treble has great energy but also great balance and smoothness.
Also, the timbre here is very well done just like the mid-range, with good enough thickness in the cymbals but they’re not too thick, it’s just the right balance with a life-like feel. The treble is well defined and open with a spacious approach, but never aggressive. Highs are very transparent and resolving, and they have great stage positioning, separated from mids very well. Overall it’s a very realistic and well defined treble performance which is impressive.
Page 1: Information, Packaging, Design, Build, Fit
Page 3: Technical Performance, Comparisons, Conclusion
Scott Leslie
Can you compare the Advar to the Sennheiser IE600?
Lieven
The units are on different continents, sorry
Darren Barwick
Advar are my first IEMs, first headphones actually. Have always listened to home systems. Recent life change doesn’t allow me to listen to the home system like I used to. After lots of research and reviews I chose the Advar. Your review was the one I kept coming back to. The comparison to what just happened to be all my finalist was what sold me on them. I couldn’t be happier. Paired with an iFi Gryphon I am now able to listen to my music whenever I like. Honestly surprise at how much I enjoy them. Did not think it would compare to the feel of my my mid range audiophile home setup, but it does, even exceeds it in some ways. So thank you and all the other writers here at Headfonia for helping me along in my new audio quest.
Lieven
Thank you, Darren. Enjoy the Advar!
Andrea
Bought one yesterday on the spot at Canjam London. Had no intention to buy another IEM since I acquired recently an IE600 and listed the Advar by fluke, just killing time in line to listen the Lyric. Well, God bless CANJAM, I have never heard such good mids even in a headphone… And the bass is just perfect, never boomy but solid and enveloping. After listening to these the Lyric failed to impress, great comfort but too much bass for the acoustic music I listen. These compare well to the Elite. The IE600 are being packed and returned to Sennheiser: if you like the sub_bassy Monarch 2 you will like them probably just as much, but they do not have the warmth of the Advar.