OneOdio Monitor 60

According to their own information, OneOdio has been developing equipment for audio production for 15 years. The manufacturer’s range includes True Wireless in-ears and wireless headphones with and without active noise cancellation, as well as wired versions in various designs.

With the Monitor 60, the Chinese manufacturer has expanded its headphone portfolio with a wired headphone that is intended to be used in studio environments as a low-cost monitoring tool. Will these closed headphones live up to this claim of professional quality?

Package

When it arrived, the OneOdio Monitor 60 were in a small but neatly presented cardboard box. A matt black base and shiny silver trim provide a first impression of quality. The headphones also come with three cables. These include a spiral cable with a 3.5 mm jack plug, 150 cm long when pulled taught. For studio work or use in hi-fi environments, these headphones are well equipped with a 300 cm cable and 6.35 mm jack plug. Another straight cable is 120 cm long and intended for use with smartphones, tablets etc. Its length is optimal for being laid under clothing for listening on the go and has an inline microphone with a call acceptance button integrated into the cable. To keep all the supplied parts together and protected from dust during transport and storage, a transport pouch with a drawstring is included. The package is rounded off with an instruction manual.

Handling

Despite their massive appearance, the Monitor 60 are surprisingly light at only 316 grams. One thing that was immediately noticeable when holding them in your hand was that the arms of the ear cups can be tilted inwards. In addition, the ear cups can be tilted 180 degrees so that they face outwards. As if that were not enough, they can also be rotated 90 degrees forwards and 90 degrees backwards. This gives them an extremely large range of movement, and the headphones can be folded up to save space. However, because the various movements are extremely smooth, handling the headphones when putting them on is not always easy. This would be better solved with a ratchet size adjustment. However, the headphones are not suitable for really small heads. Even at the smallest setting, the headband is too wide. The padding of the headband is comfortable, and memory foam inside the ear pads ensures a snug fit. However, the pads cause the ears to sweat slightly. The headphones’ contact pressure is delightfully low so that they can be worn effortlessly for long periods. Nevertheless, the fit is sufficiently secure to cope with head movements.

Construction, material and technology

Although the mesh look of its plastic ear cups might suggest otherwise at first glance, the OneOdio Monitor 60 is a closed model. Its ear-enclosing shells are surrounded by 30 mm thick ear pads made of protein leather which make them look massive. The audio cable is plugged in on the right side. A large jack socket on the left ear cup is used to conduct the audio signal, for example, to supply another pair of headphones with the sound.

In the OneOdio Monitor 60, two drivers, each with a diameter of 50 mm, do their job. They are driven by powerful neodymium magnets and thus theoretically achieve a sound pressure level of 110 dB/SPL. In addition, these headphones are well positioned with an audio frequency range from 20Hz to 40kHz. Even if that doesn’t promise too many reserves in the bass, it reaches far beyond the typical spectrum of human hearing in the treble. OneOdio also claim Hi-Res audio playback and certification for the Monitor 60.

A look at the specs shows that the impedance of these headphones is only 38 ohms. This means that here we have a contemporary piece of audio hardware that is also suitable for preamps with rather low-voltage outputs. However, a particularly detailed sound is usually attributed to headphones with higher impedances that are used with headphone amplifiers with a high output voltage. Therefore, checking the sound will be exciting…

OneOdio Monitor 60 Sound

What reads well on paper does not necessarily lead to jumping for joy in practice. And so it goes with the OneOdio Monitor 60, which elicited a quizzical look from our tester right from the first notes. The reason was that the stereo image of the unit we tested was slightly shifted to the right. It was, therefore, difficult to judge the stereo impression. We also noticed that the midrange reproduction was strongly overrepresented by these headphones. The frequency ranges at 7 kHz and around 10 kHz, which are critical for the presence and assertiveness of vocals and speaking voices, were very much in the foreground. The only way to stop the headphones from “sawing” was to turn up the volume. As soon as basses and especially low basses started, they made sure that the lower mids in particular were reproduced in a distinctly compressed way. The treble reproduction of the Monitor 60 seems brilliant at first listen. But it doesn’t take sharp ears to quickly realise that these headphones deliver significant high-frequency noise components.

Due to the unbalanced frequency response, the Monitor 60’s subjective signal resolution failed to convince me. Too many details were masked by the distinct frequency peaks. The sound dynamics of this closed model were characterised by a compressed sound behaviour, which was mainly determined by the bass components in the audio signal. The OneOdio can indeed deliver on its promise of distortion-free reproduction up into high volume ranges. However, its sound profile was so sharp that not many users will be able to take advantage of these volume reserves without a ringing in their ears. On the other hand, these closed-back headphones’ attenuation of external noise was just as good as their acoustic isolation from the outside world.