Once you start using some audiophile earphones, it’s really not easy to go back to regular True Wireless earphones, and even though TWS earphones are also getting really good, they still can’t quite match the excellence you’ll get with high end IEMs.
iFi Audio’s Go Pod Air fixes this problem by just letting you use your wired IEMs like True Wireless Earphones, and it is a next level experience to listen to your earphones like this.
There have been products like this before, iFi’s way of doing is more refined, so let’s check it out.
UNBOXING
Inside its box, you’ll get the manuals and the iFi Sticker, and then there’s the zipper case which has the Go Pods inside, along with the extra MMCX adapter, and there’s a USB Type C cable.
DESIGN
The case of the GoPod Air is actually quite lightweight, and it almost looks like a regular hardcover case you’d get with earphones. Instead of a magnetic clasp, you zip and unzip to open it, and this is definitely larger than your typical TrueWireless earphone case, but it is almost the same size as the case you get with your wired earphones, and I don’t see how they could’ve made this smaller. It is quite light and easy to carry at just 106 grams with IEMs attached.
The pods themselves are also quite minimal, and a really great thing about the Go Pods Air is that they come with both 2 pin and MMCX adapters, so unlike other options that you have to buy separate versions of, you can attach all of your earphones, and you can even buy ear loops for pentacon and estron connectors, which I have not even seen yet.
CONTROLS
You can play, pause, change tracks, and control volume by touching the GoPods, and the pods are quite responsive to touch, so these functions work very well.
One small issue that you may run into is that when putting them on or off, it’s easy to have unintended touches, but they did keep this issue in mind, so with 4 taps on these pods, you can disable or enable the touch controls.
COMFORT
Wearing them is quite simple, and the earhooks work very well with IEMs. This is actually a really good way of wearing your wired earphones, it stays super secure on your ears so you can also use it while gymming, and this can be even more comfortable than regular TWS earphones as the weight is distributed on your ears.
The only problem is that if you wear glasses with thick frames, then it’s not going to be as comfortable as using it without glasses, but I was still able to use them with my glasses without issues.
They are also IPX5 rated, so using them at the gym or light showers of water shouldn’t damage them.
BATTERY
The Go Pod Air cost 250 US dollars, or around 21 Thousand Indian Ruppees, and that is on the expensive side for a true wireless solution. The small batteries in these products lose their health in a few years, so I asked iFi if the batteries were user replaceable, and they said that this is an IPX5 rated product, so the batteries aren’t user replaceable, but you can send this to an iFi service center, or to their distributors, and they will replace the battery for you.
iFi claims 7 hours battery life on the pods, and another 8 hours on the case, which means you can only charge these one time with the case, and that’s not very impressive. This is the most basic version of their Go Pod lineup, so you can check out the other options with 35 hours of total battery.
APP
They do have an app for these, and you can use this app to enable or disable codecs, upgrade the firmware, and you can even change the digital filters here. This may be a placebo, but I did feel that they sounded better with bit perfect mode enabled.
SOUND QUALITY
I have to say that listening to Hi-Fi audio on wireless earphones just feels so weird at first. Like you know how this will work, but having this kind of an audio quality without wires is truly an experience, and you just don’t expect the details and the soundstage without wires.
With support for codecs like LDAC, AptX HD, LDHC, you can get close to lossless quality, and there are new codecs like AptX Lossless now, but LDAC is also pretty good and it’s supported by almost every device.
I tried this with my Simgot EA1000s and Kiwi Ears Quintet, and you just get the quality that these earphones are known for without wires.
Once you hear the sound, this ear hook mechanism and this unusual way of using wired earphones just feels so worth it.
One thing that I noticed is that the sound of your earphones gets noticeably warmer, so they do feel bassier than they should sound. There could be many reasons why this is the case, I don’t know if it’s the balanced connection, the difference in codec, or just the tuning of these pods.
If you really want the most neutral sound signature, then you may have to use EQ, or you may actually find the bass boost to improve your listening experience.
Now I will not say that the quality on this is exactly the same as plugging this into a high end DAC Amp, and it is not easy to switch the connection quickly and check for sound quality differences, but I will say that the sound is quite close to how they will sound over a cable, and most people shouldn’t find any bothersome differences.
Another thing not strictly related to them is that you get really excellent noise isolation from your IEMs, and that’s just not possible with regular TWS earphones.
FEATURES
I don’t know how much the following features help with the sound, but they do seem to have some neat tricks that give you a higher quality than other similar options.
Every stage like Bluetooth, DAC, and Amp are separate and optimized individually, and they have a dedicated Qualcomm chip for Bluetooth reception.
The amp stage is actually balanced, which is very interesting, and the Go Pod Air have an automatic impedance feature, so they adjust to the impedance of your earphones with 3 different levels for optimal amplification with different models.
MIC TEST
COMPARISON
iFi now has 3 different models in their Go Pod lineup, the Go Pod Air is the entry level model, then there’s the regular Go Pod, and there’s also a new Go Pod Max with even more features.
You may not hear a sound quality difference between the Go Pod Air and the higher end Go Pod, because the only difference in their sound is that their amplification stage is more powerful with support for even 300 ohm earphones. The Go Pod Air easily drove all of my earphones, so unless you have something very exotic that demands that extra power, you should get the same sound quality with both models, and I think that really makes the Go Pod Air a great value in this lineup.
When you compare this with the Go Pod Max, the Max has support for AptX Lossless, and it has some extra stuff that can make high end IEMs sound better. Very few devices support AptX Lossless as of now, but there are some differences that can make it worth it for the top level IEMs.
The Go Pod and Go Pod Max models do have much better battery life in their case, with the compromise being a bigger and heavier package.
CONCLUSION
So the iFi Go Pod Air is definitely a very well thought out product, and it does deliver on all the promises it makes about making your audiophile earphones wireless.
There are some compromises that you will have to have with any product like this, but iFi has really tried to minimize them.
The only real shortcoming that I can think of is the extra battery life in its case, but 15 hours is still good enough to not run out on a single trip, so I don’t think it will be an issue for people who use this.