Linsoul KZ ZS10 Pro, 4BA+1DD 5 Driver in Ear Monitor, HiFi Wired Earbuds, Gaming Earbuds, Hybrid IEM Earphones with Stainless Steel Faceplate, Detachable Cable for Musician(Without Mic, Dark Black)

I stumbled upon the KZ ZS10 Pro, as I saw a review of this brand on YouTube. In addition, I saw several different models, which various reviewers showed. I was surprised to hear about how great this brand was. Previously, I had never heard of KZ before. Not to mention, I was shocked by the price tag. I was also impressed by the presentation AND the specifications. I figured I would give these a try.DESIGN/FEATURES: The ZS10 Pro has 10mm double magnetic drivers, which is large for IEMs. The frequency response is 7-40,000hz, which is Hi-Res Audio. That is impressive, as most IEMs, earbuds, and some headphones are 20-20hz. Surprisingly, most headphones or sets do not have that kind of frequency response, such as 40,000hz. The sensitivity is 111 dB with an impedance of 30 ohms, which is high for such a small device. The ZS10 Pro comes with 10 (5x2) hybrid drivers, two 30095 BA (Balanced Armature) Drivers for high frequency. Then, two 50060 drivers for mid frequencies and a DD (Dual-Driver) for low frequency. The ZSX housing is made of zinc alloy. The ZS10 Pro housing has a shiny, mirror-like, 304 stainless steel faceplate. However, it is a fingerprint magnet. The body is made of a semi-transparent resin, which is clear enough for the driver and the “guts” to be seen. Included are four additional and interchangeable ear tips. The ear tips are made of silicone. There are medium ear tips on the IEMs by default. The ear tips fit snug inside my ears, along with the support of the OFC cable, covered by plastic, which can wrap around the ear. No worry about them slipping out.The bronze OFC cable is high-quality and detachable. There is a Y-splitter, which is made of rubber. Also, there are angled, gold-plated, 0.75mm IEM pin connections within a transparent resin. By default, the IEM connectors are not attached to the earpieces. Therefore, they will have to be installed. This can be tricky. I found out the hard way. I figured it out, however. First, look on the side of the transparent resin of IEM connectors for the L and R. However, the letters can be a bit hard to see because it is etched in a transparent material. Anyhow, make sure the L or R is facing outward. The R will be the cable with the mic. Then, connect the earpiece to the IEM connectors. The faceplate should also be facing outward. The ear tips should be at the bottom, facing the ear. Now, they will ready to listen to, properly.BASS/MID-BASS/SUB-BASS: Wow! I have never heard a more fun sound device. The bass of the ZS10 Pro is second-to-none. The bass is aggressive, clean, controlled, deep, fast, thunderous, tight, and very, VERY punchy. The punchiness of the bass is like hearing boxing gloves against a punching bag. Despite that, the bass remains clear, so it does not bleed into the mids. The bass is not muddy, either. Out of curiosity, I tested the performance of the ZS10 Pro while playing various shooters on PS4 Pro. The first test was done while playing Call Of Duty WWIII played. The most impressive thing was hearing how loud and clear the explosions were, nearby. Once, I used a Glide Bomb killstreak, which landed on top of an enemy close to my position. All I could hear was a loud and clean boom with a thunderous, sub-bass rumble. Hearing multiple explosions is heavenly to the ears. Once, a teammate used an Artillery Barrage killstreak. I was in awe of how the explosions of those artillery rounds landing on the ground, gave a surprisingly, clean, loud, and punchy, boom. The aftermath of the explosion made a nice, thunderous rumble. In other words, the sound is similar to the sound of a subwoofer.HIGHS/MIDS: The sound is bright and unbelievably superb. Sounds are crystal clear, clean and VERY balanced, overall. The treble highs are nice. No distortion. Very little sibilance on those high sounds. Playing Call Of Duty Black Ops 4 is a good test. Gunshots are loud but clear. Each time bullets hit, there a slapping sound, which follows with a loud, SQUISH, when a kill is achieved. I found having the volume high while hearing this sound can be harsh of the ears. Of course, not so much, with the volume at a normal level. Hearing the high end of female voices sound great. Hearing the female voices from characters in WWII was one thing. Hearing them on Call Of Duty Black Ops 4 is another. Hearing my character, Battery’s voice lines sound great. “Cluster grenade, enjoy!” “Splash!” “Dropped!” “All right, boom time.” “All talk!” “Doggone!” Those are some of my favorites voice lines. Once, Battery ran inside of an open-ended bay of the Summit map. Battery said a voice line, while outside of the bay. Then, her voice became magnified, as she entered the bay. Plus, there was an echo of Battery's voice. The authenticity of the echo was unbelievable and nearly, scary. This was a good example of a transition between mid to high sounds.IMAGING/SOUNDSTAGE: The ZS10 Pro has good imaging and soundstage. These handle directional sounds, exceptionally well. During matches, I could still, hear the dialogue of nearby teammates shouting out the location of enemies, and other random sounds, throughout the map to the left and right of me with precision and clarity. I knew what was going on around me and where the action was taking place on the map. It seems the sound magnifies when sounds are going on in a different direction. For example, each time my character looks in one direction, the sound increasingly amplifies in the direction, where things are going on, such as gunfire and explosions. Of course, I would hear less, where fewer actions were taking place. If my character, looks straight ahead, all sounds can be heard, equally.LOWS: The lows are great, as they pick up subtle sounds with no effort. I am hearing sounds, which I could barely hear with other headphones, such as the breaking of glass from afar, breakage of pottery, or bullet casings hitting the floor. Then, there are detailed sounds, such as the unbelievable sound of crunching, as my character was trampling through the deep snow, cracking of the ice or sounds of moving water, while swimming on the Icebreaker map. Of course, I am sure, some are wondering about footsteps. Well, the ZSX, picks up footsteps on Call Of Duty, quite nicely. There have been times, where I was able to hear footsteps of enemies coming after me. Then, as they got close, I was able to get in a good position to get the drop on them.MIC: The speaker for the mic is underneath a plastic, one-button remote. On PSN, I did a test for the adjust mic settings. I could hear my voice, crystal clear. During gameplay, my voice could be heard clearly.VERDICT: I am in awe of how great these sound. Considering these are Hi-Res, the price is not too bad. Not to mention, they can perform with some top headphones out there. Great for music and surprisingly, good for gaming.

Short version – the KZ ZS10 Pros provide great listening with rich bass, embracing vocals and notable highs. Using the iFi Audio Hip-Dac and Apple Music I choose these over my Shure SE-535s, the HD660S and Sundara, KZ-AS12 and Sony MDR-1AM2. Most of the time. The provided cable is a bit short and tends to tangle. I’ll replace it when it becomes more important than just listening.Not an audiophile, or any kind of expert or specialist when it comes to headphones or to music. I like particular music genres more than others and am really not a heavy listener. When lossless came out on Apple Music it was the metrics of what was being offered that drew my attention. What possible difference could Hi-Resolution Lossless using 24 bit at 192 kHz make? Why would I even care?I mainly listen while biking, running, flying or exercising and am more concerned with not shorting out my earbuds with sweat or dropping them onto the street when the wind really blasts. If you’re on the move the value of lossless will be apparent, but it’s not that critical to extract everything you can from the lossless encoding and the headphone specs.The jump from the CD-ripped music at 320kbps and iTunes 256kbps songs that make up my library to Apple Music and lossless has been dramatic. (My entire stored library is now archived to a backup drive and everything in all my playlists comes from Apple Music’s lossless cloud of songs). Even without what I can now hear with lossless, the massive music library provided by Apple Music is worth the subscription. With lossless, the music is transformed.These relatively inexpensive KX ZS10 Pros are outstanding for me. I only bought them at under $50 to try out because of their great Frequency Response spec and the solid Amazon reviews. They have become my go-to headphones, and the baseline I use to compare with anything else.The frequency response from the specs is stated as 7Hz-40kHz. Regardless of any analysis about human ears being stuck in the range of 20Hz to 20kHz I enjoy the sound of those with wider range, and by a lot. I find that the bass seems more deep and rich, the highs more detailed and realistic. So, the range on these is excellent.Others in my listening adventures include the KZ-AS12, Sennheiser HD660S, HiFiMan Sundara, Shure SE-535, and Sony MDR-1AM2. Also a bunch of other much less expensive earbuds and headphones, but comparison isn’t really useful with this collection. I’ll also watch Joshua Valour, ABYSS Headphones, DMS and Darko Audio on YouTube and check out the breadth of opinions about headphones on Reddit. Mainly to learn more and to figure out what I may be missing. And continue the quest for a next level listening experience. (Have not approached an Abyss Diana or one of the Audeze LCDs. …yet).I personally find that IEMs, earbuds, are my favorite way to listen to music. So far none of the over-ear headphones has dissuaded me of this view. These KX ZS10 Pros have a really nice fit for me. Using memory foam earbud tips these seat and seal nicely and I’m barely aware that I’m wearing them. And I can easily wear them for hours. All of the over-ear headphones mentioned are comfortable, but they all do tend to become less comfortable over time, mainly due to heat.To net out my experience, these KZ ZS10 Pros blow away the Shure SE-535 (my up to now favorites, and my long-time traveling companions) and the KZ-AS12s. Better and richer bass, more lively engagement with the music. The HD660S and Sundara are both excellent, but I did not find them enough different from the KZ ZS10 Pros to warrant spending so much more or dealing with my own comfort preference for IEMs. The Sony MDR-1AM2 has a frequency response of 3HZ to 100,000kHz, which I do notice. They do not have quite the same overall quality of sound as I found with the HD660S and the Sundara, but the Sony’s are clean and consistent. Most of my listening uses Apple Music on my iMac and I use the Acoustic preset in the Equalizer to deepen the bass and accentuate the vocals. The MDR-1AM2 with the balanced cable also offers me a great listening experience, just a bit less in comfort than the in-ear KZ ZS10 Pro.Exploiting lossless tracks requires more than the built-in DAC on my iPhone or iMac. My choice was the iFi Audio Hip-Dac Portable USB DAC and Headphone Amplifier. It has the power to drive all of the headphones and IEMs I’ve tried, has a “bass boost”, excellent volume control, and includes a balanced 4.4mm headphone jack (which is great for the MDR-1AM2s). Also, battery powered for mobile use although it pretty much spends its whole life connected to the iMac. For me, so far, this little DAC/AMP is outstanding. (Although I keep looking at adding more options and more power … but I keep reminding myself that I really don’t listen all that much).As I said, my listening is somewhat limited. The songs that have really accentuated what lossless can provide and how these KZ ZS10 Pros perform include Eyes of the World and Bleed to Love Her by Fleetwood Mac (two of their songs I had never listened to until engaging with lossless on Apple Music and exploring these headphones), Enough of the Night by Jackson Browne, Knee Deep by Zac Brown Band with Jimmy Buffett, Keith Don’t Go by Nils Lofgren (who I don’t really listen to, but the acoustic opening for this song puts the guitar inside my head), and 4ware by deadmau5 (added to my list because of a lossless headphone review site that tests using it …). Elvis With The Royal Philharmonic Orchestra offers an entirely different level of appreciation for Elvis with this remix album, in lossless. Lossless Lionel Richie (Sail On, Ballerina Girl, Stuck on You …) offer both delicate guitar and rich vocals. The Killers, The Weeknd, Uncle Kracker and sometimes Mat Kearney become over saturated using the Equalizer settings, but lossless versus 256kbps offers a significant difference in listening experience.