STAX SR-X1

Major-Hifi Gold Award.

."STAX production of electrostatic earspeakers has always been notably impressive and luxurious. The new release of their flagship SR-x9000 coming out soon has been supported by their excellent release of a budget friendly option. Audiophiles who haven’t experienced electrostatic headphones should strongly consider adding this to their collection. If you’re a fan of bright or ‘v-shaped leaning towards bright’ headphones and want a home listening headphone, I encourage you to get something like this. There are drawbacks, like the SR-X1’s lightweight construction that verges on flimsy. Nevertheless, there are some really high quality components in this combination, which led me to giving them the Major-Hifi Gold Award."

HomeTheatherHiFi.com

Though the compact system is brilliant, it still comes down to the sound, and STAX did not disappoint. These diminutive headphones have a place in the flagship, full-size line of STAX earspeakers. Though they lack the full-bodied presence of the other earspeakers on the SR-X line, they can hold their own against the Lambda line as an affordable option, and I found them much easier to listen to for long sessions at my desk. If you want a headphone with a lightning-fast, neutral, and highly resolving ability to show you the nuances of your music, the STAX SRS-X1000 system should be on your shortlist."

The soundstage the Stax can generate is extremely wide, lavishly spacious and absolutely controlled – even in a dense or busy mix, each element of a recording can easily be individualised. There’s elbow-room for everyone, but this is not at the expense of integration or unity. Each and every recording is presented as a singularity rather than as an assembly of discrete occurrences. - T3