Products of the Year

Headphone Product of the Year

Pass Labs HPA-1 headphone amplifier ($3500; reviewed by John Atkinson & Herb Reichert, July & December 2016, Vol.39 Nos. 7 & 12 review)

In an era when planar-magnetic headphones are increasingly common, it's fitting that our first Headphone Product of the Year is an amplifier unfazed by difficult loads. Indeed, the Pass Labs HPA-1, which also functions as a two-input, line-level analog preamplifier, is comfortable with loads ranging from 15 to 600 ohms—and, as John Atkinson discovered, this MOSFET-based design plays with authority.

Notes on the Vote: Not content with a single win, Mytek HiFi's Brooklyn D/A headphone amplifier—our Joint Digital Product of the Year—took second place for its talents as a headphone amplifier, winning almost as many first-place votes as the Pass Labs amp. Earning just as many first-place votes as the Mytek but fewer second-place votes were the Abyss 1226 Phi headphones, which so impressed Herb Reichert. Thus were we spared the chagrin of having no headphones place in our very first headphone competition.

Finalists (in alphabetical order)

Abyss 1226 Phi headphones ($4495; reviewed by Herb Reichert, August 2017, Vol.40 No.8 review)
AudioQuest NightOwl Carbon headphones ($699.99; reviewed by Herb Reichert, June 2017, Vol.40 No.6 review)
Focal Elear headphones ($999; reviewed by Herb Reichert, December 2016, Vol.39 No.12 review)
HiFiMan HE1000 V2 headphones ($2999; reviewed by Herb Reichert, April 2017, Vol.40 No.4 review)
Mytek HiFi Brooklyn D/A headphone amplifier ($1995; reviewed by Jim Austin, Kalman Rubinson, Herb Reichert, November 2016 & May 2017, Vol.39 No.11 & Vol.40 No.5 review)
Shure KSE1500 electrostatic headphones ($2999; reviewed by John Atkinson, November 2017, Vol.39 No.11 review)
Sony Signature Series MDR-Z1R headphones ($2299.99; reviewed by Herb Reichert, June 2017, Vol.40 No.6 review)