If you’re like most of us and listen to streamed music through headphones, you know it pales in comparison to the warmth and realism of a decent analog hi-fi system. 

écoute headphones are engineered with a built-in vacuum tube and a signal path designed to compensate for the deficiencies of digital audio signals to bring back the missing warmth and realism to your listening experience.

A SIGNAL PATH DESIGNED TO:

• Fill out the sound and add warmth to digitally compressed music
• Add clarity to the midrange where our ears are most sensitive
• Reveal more detail in the instrumentation
• Make vocals sound more realistic

Your streamed and wireless listening experiences can now sound as good as they do on a home hi-fi system.

 

Because they are so expensive, vacuum tubes are typically only used in high-end analog hi-fi systems. This has led to the false belief that there isn’t any value in using vacuum tubes when the signal source is anything less than ideal, or worse, digitally compressed. 

We have found the opposite to be true—digital signals have MORE to gain from vacuum tube amplification in terms of sound quality simply because there is both, more room, and more need for improvement.

Streamed and wireless audio signals are compressed to reduce the file size leaving your music sounding comparatively lifeless and flat. The characteristic even-order harmonics of a vacuum tube create minute euphonic details that fill out the sound and add warmth to digitally-compressed music. This texture makes your music sound fuller and more realistic—less like it is being reproduced by a piece of audio equipment and more like it is being performed live in front of you.

 

Though sound quality is subjective, the prevailing belief among audiophiles and musicians is that vacuum tubes surpass transistors in both sound quality and realism because of a combination of factors: 

TONE AND TEXTURE:  Vacuum tubes introduce pleasing harmonic distortions primarily on the second notes replicating the warmth and richness of live music.

COMPLEX HARMONIC STRUCTURE: Vacuum tubes produce a rich and detailed soundstage, faithfully recreating the intricate timbre of instruments and vocals, revealing subtle nuances often lost in transistor-based systems. 

WIDER DYNAMIC RANGE: Captures the expressive nuances of music, comparable to the natural dynamics of live performances.

SOFT CLIPPING: Vacuum tubes exhibit smoother and more gradual clipping that resembles the natural compression and distortion in real-world sound sources, contributing to an authentic reproduction of music.

INCREASE GAIN: Adds clarity to the midrange where our ears are the most sensitive enhancing the tonal quality and organic timbre and delivering a more realistic representation of instruments and vocals—realism you only get from a vacuum tube.

 

Up until now, it hasn’t been practical to put a vacuum tube in a pair of headphones.

Conventional vacuum tubes are fragile, extremely sensitive to vibration, consume an enormous amount of energy, produce a tremendous amount of heat, and are entirely impractical for use in battery-powered applications. 

But we are not using a conventional vacuum tube—we are using a KORG Nutube P61, a next-generation dual-triode thermionic valve (vacuum tube) based on vacuum fluorescent display technology. 

Despite not looking like a traditional vacuum tube your grandfather would recognize, Nutube’s anode grid filament structure operates exactly the same as a conventional vacuum tube. The Nutube P61 has all the characteristics of the finest single-ended triodes used in high-end hi-fi systems and produces a luxurious and realistic listening experience. But unlike a conventional vacuum tube, Nutube:

• Runs cool 
• Consumes little power (Only 2% of a conventional tube)
• Shock resistant
• Durable and long-lasting (functional lifetime in excess of 30,000 hours) 

 

 

 

Other headphones use a single off-the-shelf chip to do most, if not all, of the signal processing on a single circuit. écoute headphones are designed differently with individual dedicated components at each step of the signal conversion—a solution normally reserved for high-end rack systems, but almost entirely unheard of in headphones.

This solution allows us to bring together the best component at each stage of the signal path to ensure a superior listening experience.

• Vacuum Tube Pre-Amplifier: Nutube 6P1 Dual-Triode Thermionic Valve 

The Nutube has phenomenal linearity with a focus on the second harmonic and a classic “tubey” sound delivering a listening experience with a life-like, full-bodied presence. 

• DAC: Realtek ALC4050 32-bit, 384kHz Digital-to-Analog Converter

Known for its spacious soundstage and for delivering realistic and musical tones across the board from a neat and airy treble, through detailed and textured mids, and into deep and lush bass and sub-bass frequencies.

DRIVERS: Custom 40mm Cellulose Fiber 

Designed to take advantage of our meticulous signal path with a  patented motor drive system that ensures an accurate and linear response to avoid thermal compression artifacts.

• IMPENDENCE: 10 Ohms
• DYNAMIC RANGE: 100db
• WIRELESS: Bluetooth 5.3 supporting apt-X Adaptive, apt-X LL, LDAC, and AAC. Range 10 meters / 33 feet
• ANALOG INPUT: 3.5mm
• HIGH-RESOLUTION DIGITAL AUDIO INPUT: USB-C 
• CHARGING: USB-C 
• BATTERY LIFE: Approximately 20 hours of listening
• PAIRING: Auto pairing memory of up to two devices.
• ACTIVE NOISE CANCELATION (ANC): Activated by firmware update Spring 2024
• TELEPHONICS: Answer phone calls when paired with your phone. Activated by firmware update Spring 2024
• PREMIUM MATERIAL: All-aluminum body and armature that is as durable as it is beautiful.
• COMFORTABLE REPLACABLE EAR PADS: Cool memory foam that wicks away heat and keeps your ears cool. The over-ear design is more comfortable than on-ear designs and has excellent passive noise cancellation.

 

 

No matter where you are or what your signal source is, you can always listen to authentic vacuum tube audio. Listen wirelessly via Bluetooth, wired via 3.5mm port for analog input, or USB-C for lossless digital.

 

 

 

 

 

écoute audio is a subsidiary of Morpho MFG. Manufacturing is what we do at Morpho MFG. Our business is making ideas into tangible products—it’s what we do. écoute is our first personal crowdfunded project, but we have been developing and manufacturing products for other companies Kickstarter and Indigogo projects for nearly a decade. Our manufacturing expertise has earned Morpho MFG official recommendations for contract manufacturing by both Kickstarter and Indiegogo.

The idea that became écoute was born out of our love of listening to music and dissatisfaction with the listening experience we were having on our headphones. A discussion started about how we could design a more realistic wireless listening experience that sounded like our tube-driven hi-fi systems. Not being the type to accept the belief that it was impossible to put vacuum tubes in headphones, we challenged the engineers in the group to figure it out—and they did!

With a proven concept and working prototypes, we are now ready to share our headphones with you. The purpose of this campaign is to raise the necessary funds to begin production.