Every once in a while, a product comes through this office that prides itself on truly unique innovation. This was before my time, but I imagine it was a huge deal when the first IEM that had tuning switches came around. The idea of having multiple different sound signatures on 1 IEM with the simple flick of a switch I’m sure was crazy. More recently the Cayin RU9 came through and certainly turned some heads. The whole DAC dongle experience is a strange one, because stuffing everything in your pocket when you’re on the go can be a bit much. RU9 changed that with a tiny angled USB cable and MagSafe support, and it really felt like something completely new.
These innovative products are few and far between, but we recently had one touch down here at Bloom: Luxsin X8, the new DAC/Amp from Luxsin that has full AI assisted parametric EQ. In this article, I’m going to break down all things X8, and state my case for this truly being one of the more groundbreaking products we’ve seen in this hobby in some time.
Build and Sound
Luxsin X8 comes in at $699, and is housed in a fairly discrete matte black build. The layout is simple, a volume knob on the right. A 4’ LCD touchscreen display in the middle, with a 4 pin XLR, 4.4mm and 6.3mm jack to the left. The back of X8 includes balanced XLR and unbalanced RCA line outputs, a USB-B digital input, coaxial and optical digital I/O, an IEC power inlet, and grounding/trigger connections, all providing flexible analog and digital connectivity for multiple different kinds of external amplifiers and sources.
This would be a good time to quickly compare X8 to Luxsin's first release, X9, which we’ll have to do a couple of times in this article. The naming convention and price difference between these 2 units would suggest that X8 is the lesser of these 2 units, and I just don’t think that is the case here. These 2 co-exist quite nicely together, and I think they are really made for 2 different groups of people. X9 is more hardware focused, and has more options such as a subwoofer out, and has full pre-amp capabilities. X8 is much more feature focused, with deeper UI capabilities and more sound customization options than its predecessor.
X8 has an output power of 4.8 watts, which is going to be enough to drive just about every IEM, and most headphones as well. Even harder to drive IEMs perform well on X8, as it extracts every last ounce of detail and clarity. Headphones generally do well on X8, barring the crazy hard to drive planar magnetic driver headphones like Susvara OG or DCA E3. With headphones like these you run out of headroom pretty quick, and you certainly do not get the full experience. I did most of my listening on X8 with gear I’m familiar with, which all tend to be easier to drive.
This unit sports a very nice mixture between musicality and clarity. It definitely has a sound signature on the smoother side, with a big soundstage and really great spatial imaging. There is lots of detail emphasis in the upper midrange and treble regions, a good amount of extra extension and delicacy up there. Compared to X9, which I find to be much more natural and technical, X8 provides a much more casual listen that even leans on the warmer side at times. This supports my point in that really there is no clear winner here, with different internals, features, capabilities, and sound signatures, the choice between these 2 units is entirely up to the needs of the listener. These units really have 2 different use cases and exist really well alongside each other. Now with all that being said, let's get into the user experience on X8.
User Experience
Upon starting up this unit, you are greeted with a fun animation on the equalizer screen where it flows nicely from left to right. I believe it does this until you begin playback. There are multiple different “home” options, most of which we saw on X9. Lots of different styles, colors, and ways you can personalize the look of this unit when it is playing music. It also came with 2 new VU meters, one that shows the output in each channel side, and one that has the power and temperature specs of the unit. These 2 new options were added to X9 in a recent firmware update as well.
Swiping to the right reveals the settings part of the unit. From left to right is source in, output port, audio setting, wifi, general, and about. Source in and output port are self explanatory, this is where you configure what you are listening to, where it comes from and where you’re sending it. If you are just using this as a DAC/Amp, you can leave it on the Headset output all the time. I used X8 partly as just a DAC going into the Topping A900, so I was on the XLR option for that configuration. It is a little confusing at first that when you are not using the Amp, that the option isn't to set it to “DAC” or “DAC ONLY” or something along those lines, which is why I point that out here.
Audio Setting houses a lot of customization features that are worth noting, specifically the headphone gain, auto impedance detection, DAC filters, left right balance, and much more. There are also more nit-picky options like the volume step, boot volume, etc. In general you have more basic options, such as display activity / brightness, volume button functionality, and other minor accessibility options. One other important thing to know is that in “About” when you click “My Device”, you can find the IP address to put into your computer to bring up the web player. All settings on X8 are accessible via app and web player alongside the unit itself. This also applies to the EQ / sound settings, which we will get into next.
If you swipe all the way to the left, you have your sound customization options. For starters, on the left most side there is a quick bypass button to turn off and on your effects easily for easy comparisons. The next option over is “effect”. In this section, you have a slider for stereo width, preset EQ options for different genres / preferences, a 3 band EQ option, and loudness control. These options work well and are all pretty cool, besides the preset EQ options which are generally all really terrible. Not sure why sources have options like this, as they almost never really work or enhance the sound at all. There are also 3 different crossfeed options to choose from on the main screen as well.
The EQ settings, labeled as “HP-EQ”, go pretty deep, and are some of the most impressive software I have seen in this space. You can turn this off and on and select different saved EQs on the device itself, but to adjust the EQ and use the AI, you must use the app or web player. I recommend the web player for the smoothest, most seamless experience.
To start with EQ, you must add the headphone / IEM you are listening to. It has hundreds of units to pick from, but I imagine this database will only grow as time goes on. Once selected you are prompted to pick a target curve. Now this is probably my only gripe with this software. It is picky, but if you want a starting point, you have to select a target curve and then the easiest way to reset it is just to ask the AI to remove it. I wish you could just import the graph of the IEM you are listening to and have a fresh slate. It is strange to me that this is the only way, but I digress. This is a 10 band EQ system, so you can manually select the frequencies you want to adjust and how much you’d like to adjust them. The manual EQ settings are probably easiest used in “Batch Edit” where you can input all your EQ settings at once.
On the right side of the screen in a little circle you have access to the Ai EQ assistant, which can also be accessed at the top all the way to the right as well. This works just like any AI chatbot, you give it commands and it will instantly give you a full write up of what it's doing. What I especially enjoy about this is how detailed its responses are. If I say “more bass and vocal clarity”, it will give me the current state assessment of the tuning, tell me its target, its optimization strategy with goals and approach, the summary of what it changed along with the purpose of each individual change, and expected results.
Once you get all of that and click compare parameters, you get a graph comparing what the equalizer is currently doing and what it will do once changed. The last step is to click “Apply Recommended Parameters” and then you are good to go. The simplicity, convenience, and integration of this AI is incredible, and I think there is lots to learn about EQ from watching its process and reading the detailed reports of what it does.
Overall X8 is a competitively priced, great sounding DAC/Amp out of the box that offers tons of easy to use customization options, which really elevate this unit and make it hard to beat. I have loved spending time with X8 for the last few weeks, and have gotten lost in different PEQs in ways I haven't before, and I think that's really special. It gave me a totally different, futuristic feeling experience that made me want to get into the office and listen to music. It’s a unit that is actually fun and exciting to use, and I think its features will become a new benchmark in this hobby.
If you have any questions about X8, hop in a live chat or email us athello@bloomaudio.com, and check out our product page here.
