Exceptional Design

Ratings

Pros

• Great design, very good construction, hardly any faults.
• The materials used are of high quality.
• Very good presentation.
• Two sets of foams: full and donut type.
• Explicit sound, suitable for some particular genres and songs.
• Good level of clarity, transparency, separation and detail.
• Detachable MMCX cable with microphone and textile covering.
• Good adjustment range of the headband and speakers.

Cons

• I don’t mind the upper headband, but the speakers do put too much pressure on my ears. In my case, the wearing time can’t be more than two hours.
• The cable is thin compared to some IEMS of the same brand and price range.
• Very limited sub-bass, with an unnatural, undulatory and coloured reproduction.
• Low physical load in bass and early mids, unbalanced and hollow with respect to high mids.
• Soft treble with low/medium extension.
• It’s not an all-rounder, but its range of use is conditioned by personal taste and the genres of music played, and can even be ambivalent to specific songs.

Purchase Link

https://rosetechnics.com/products/roseselsa-distance-montain-over-ear-hifi-wired-headphones-ootd-vintage-design-44mm-dd-driver-mmcx-3-5mm

Link to the WEB

https://rosetechnics.com/

Introduction

ROSESELSA, the brand formerly known simply as Rose or Rose Technics, was founded in 2015. Since then, it has been dedicated to the pursuit of unrivalled original sound reproduction through intelligent technology and meticulous manufacturing. In recent years, it has introduced a series of excellent audio products that are well known among music enthusiasts around the world. ‘Dare to make differences‘ has been Rose Technics’ statement and determination since its inception, and its original intention adheres to the concept of original design and simplicity, continually designing classic and elegant products in pursuit of immortality in an era of rapid obsolescence. In this way, they have undoubtedly designed a product such as the Distant Mountain, a supra-aural headset with a distinctly retro and vintage design. They are made with a headband of solid stainless steel and genuine lambskin, which provides a stable, smooth fit without irritating the skin, and does not cause fatigue during use (this is what the brand itself says). The body has been CNC coaxial machined and the design is clearly fashionable. The 40 mm diameter dynamic driver uses a topological composite diaphragm. The redesigned dome and corrugated ring provide clear, transparent treble and deep bass. Thanks to the neodymium super magnets and the special acoustic structure for small headphones, the Distant Mountains offer richer sound details and a more natural treble extension. The metal grille reduces the impact of sound output on sound quality, providing smoother, more stable highs and a more delicate, fuller tone. The pressure-relieving design of the grille on the side of the cavity increases air permeability. At the same time, the air intake is several times higher than that of conventional large headphones, which significantly improves treble extension. The sponge ear pads take into account both softness and breathability. The headband allows for precise length adjustment and has a clearly visible scale. A braided 5N monocrystalline copper EMI cable with detachable MMCX interface is supplied. The classic headphone architecture leaves more space for the ears, allowing for transparency and comfort at all times during use. When playback is stopped, you can communicate with the outside world normally without removing the headphones. So you can concentrate on ambient sounds to travel more safely.
Undoubtedly, the brand’s introduction is comprehensive, informative, accurate and coherent, and has a clear objective. Let’s see in the following review whether it achieves its objective.

Specifications

• Driver Type: 40mm dynamic driver with composite topological diaphragm.
• Frequency Response: 20Hz-20kHz.
• Sensitivity: 115±3dB.
• Impedance: 32Ω±15%.
• THD: ≤2% @1kHz.
• Jack Connector: SE 3.5mm gold-plated.
• Capsule Connection Type: MMCX.
• Cable with microphone.
• Cable length: 120cm.
• Starting price: $64.99 USD.

Packaging

Unsurprisingly, the Distant Mountains come in a relatively large box wrapped in cellophane, which has a ring to be hung on a rod. The box is eminently white and has an actual photo of the product occupying much of the main face. At the top is the brand logo, below is text referring to the philosophy behind the creation of the model. On the back there is a brown bar at the top and then, on a white background, there is the whole description of the product in Chinese and English, the contents of the package and two real photos of the two models of the product, brown and black. My model is the black one. At the bottom, the compatibility of the product is indicated, next to it are the brand’s contact details and the icons of the certifications it complies with. The box opens like a book in two halves. The first thing you see is an onion paper cover with a picture of the product seen from the front and the name of the model on the mountains that connect the two transmitters. On the spine there is a small white box that holds another set of doughnut-shaped foams. After removing the paper, you can see the headphones sheathed in white cardboard in a simple, but very effective way. It has a strip of cardboard in the form of a handle that fits the base, while the speakers are embedded in custom-made holes. The gold parts are protected by blue non-adhesive cellophane. On the left half is an envelope-like box with more accessories. The complete contents are as follows:

• The ROSESELSA Distant Mountain headphones with full foams.
• One black textile-coated cable with two coiled strands, microphone and gold-plated 3.5mm SE plug.
• Two spare doughnut-shaped foams.
• One user manual.
• One figure of an anime girl on a transparent base plate with brand logo.

Both the presentation and the packaging combine elegant design with masterful simplicity to keep the product safe during a journey of several thousand kilometres. The refinement and great design of the product is apparent from the packaging itself. I’m missing a carrying bag and I’m missing the badge with the anime girl on it. On request, I would have liked a couple more spare foams, as they can always be hard to come by.

Construction and Design

The design has a clear retro and vintage character, but its style is remarkable and integrated into the present day. The materials used are of high quality, such as the headband, made of pure stainless steel, and its lambskin covering. It is a narrow rod with a gold-plated rectangle finish and the lettering indicating the channel inscribed on its outer side. On the inner side there are screws to secure the two rods together. A flat sheet of metal protrudes from the lower centre of the rectangle and has a gold-plated stop across the top of the rectangle. This sheet has slots and is the part through which the loudspeakers slide and fit into the corresponding slots. At the bottom there is another golden piece with a rectangular shape at its junction and a rounded finish at its free and opposite end. The piece that slides along the rod is a thick sheet metal with a groove and a cylinder attached which forms part of the same body. The outer face of the cylinder has a gold-plated circular piece with concentric grooves on the inside. On the bottom surface of the cylinder is the MMCX connection, each of which has a red plastic crown to indicate the right side and black for the left side. The inner face of the cylinder has a circular base with an upper diameter that enlarges conically to form the base that houses the loudspeakers. On the outer face of the base of the speakers there is a concentric groove and the model name inscribed along the round lines. The rim of the base of the container has multiple holes spread over its entire surface, all of which are protected by grooves. As it approaches the outside, the rim widens to form a flat face with a larger diameter. This face is thin and, on the other side, is completely protected by a thick, slightly domed mesh that protects the speaker. Finally, the foams fit over the thin, larger diameter side, wrapping all the way around the back to the holes in the rim. The doughnut-shaped foams allow a large part of the loudspeaker to be visible.
The cable consists of two coiled strands with a black textile sheath. The sleeve of the 3.5mm gold-plated plug is shaped like a smooth, metallic cylinder. The cable outlet is protected by a black double rubber sleeve. The splitter piece is a metal hexagon repeating the brand logo and bearing this inscription on the main face. The pin is a simple rubber ring perforated on the inside. The microphone is a cylinder with a black plastic button on one side and a hole on the other. The male MMCX connectors are gold-plated and both have a cylindrical black plastic sleeve that tapers at the cable exit. Each is inscribed with a small initial letter to identify the channel.
It is worth remembering that this product costs $65. The level of detail and refinement throughout the design is superior, simply elegant and beautiful. This is something that can be seen in all the product photos and is worth enlarging to see the precise and beautiful finishes. As the only flaw, the sliding system through the shaft is not too strong, although it is not completely smooth. I would have liked its movement to be a little more forceful. It is certainly a minimalist design that is a paradigm of elegance, simplicity and efficiency.
On the other hand, the weak link is the cable. I stress, as always, that I don’t like the MMCX connection interface, but I understand that it is very suitable for this model. Although it may seem that it will fail during daily use with a lot of unintentional cable tugging. The problem lies with another model from the same brand: the QuietSea’s cable is very similar, but thicker and can be chosen with a 4.4 mm balanced plug. No doubt, comparisons between the two cables are odious.

Adjustment and Ergonomics

With such a simple design, the comfort of the set can be questionable. The keys are the circularity of the upper pole, its dimensions, the angle of the pole through which the speakers slide and the thickness of the foams. I think the rod has sufficient adjustment travel for most. I can’t boast of having a small head, but in my case, the rod travel is more than sufficient. My suffering is centred on the width and the pressure that the speakers exert on my ears. This pressure affects the temples of the glasses (at my age I need glasses to see up close). But it also affects me when I’ve been wearing them for more than an hour, and my limit is two hours at a time. On the other hand, the top temple hardly comes into contact with my head. I still have quite a lot of hair on the top of my head, which cushions and minimises contact. All in all, the fit is quite good, easy, quick and precise. The problem is the speakers, which press very hard against my ears and are very unbearable after two hours of use.

Sound

Profile

The Distant Mountains have a slight V-profile with an emphasis on the upper mids, a smooth low end, a fairly light sub-bass and treble with a falling extension. They feature two types of foam: full and donut. Donut foams lighten the low end and detract a little from the body of the sound, but improve the technical aspects by allowing a cleaner, crisper sound. I prefer the use of full foams, as the sound is lean in itself, and the following review will be based on this choice.
I must introduce that there are albums that the Distant Mountain have reproduced very well and that I have enjoyed very much. But many others do not sound the way I have them in my head. Can my unit be different from others?

Bass

It is clear that the Distant Mountains are not designed to handle heavy bass loads. With a 40 mm driver, they should be able to handle more power and deliver more realistic and natural bass. However, this is not the case. As soon as electronic music with its heavy bass drums, continuous bass lines and fast changes are played, you can see that the bass performance is not very appropriate. In the first instance, the bass drums feel coloured, with an audible vibrating behaviour that overlaps with the sound that should be emitted naturally. Admittedly, this behaviour is not the same for the entire bass range, but only for the sub-bass tones and the transition to the mid-bass. This can be observed in my classic very low frequency pure tone test. The tones between 20 and 30 Hz have a very low physical capacity, but are overly audible, which gives a coloured bass sound. They offer a perceptible and audible, but bearable, vibratory aspect. However, this less natural wave and pulsating character is enhanced between 40 and 100 Hz, until it drops below 200 Hz. This clearly translates into real music: the Distant Mountains do not support an excessive bass load or overly concentrated bass drums in a narrow low-frequency range. Under these conditions, the sound is neither too natural nor too realistic, the frequencies are coloured and a wave and vibration character takes over the sonority. It is clear that there is a critical bass range between 40 and 100 Hz. The evidence of complex, dirty and difficult-to-execute bass only highlights these problems. The bass lines moving through this frequency range highlight the limitations of this model in reproducing heavy bass. It is clear that these are not headphones for electronic music. However, there are some low frequencies or bass lines that do not affect the Distant Mountains as much and the sound becomes rather more acceptable. It is therefore not possible to generalise and claim that this behaviour is completely uniform for all music with prominent bass. In any case, this aspect makes them less versatile.

Mids

The midfield should be more noticeable. And indeed it is, but the problem is the imbalance between the first half of the mids and the upper mids due to an obvious and over-emphasised gain of bell. The second half is overemphasised and affects both the male voices and the base of many instruments. With a full-bodied, dense and almost hollow bass, the warmth and physical expression of the first part of the mids is non-existent. Thus, with such a low level of physicality, the male voices and instruments in this area sound too hollow, devoid of soul, base and strength. On the other hand, the emphasis is clearly on the upper mid-range and all the details, whispers, breaths and whistles are much more dominant than the essence of the voices. In this sense, many female voices are heavily favoured, while the male voices lack strength. It is no longer a question of a distant or close positioning of the voices, in which the male voices are placed at a middle distance, while the female voices take centre stage, but of a physical component that is absent and too thin. Thus, the tendency of the sound is to emphasise the part of the brightness, the details and even the sibilances. There are styles that are clearly favoured, while others are more off-putting because of this emphasis on the upper mids. The high excitation of the upper mids and the distance between the initial part of the midrange are enhanced by the low ability to reproduce the bass fully. Thus, the sound is unbalanced, too thin, hollow and distant at its base. Darker music can be a blessing, but more vivid rock or pop can be piercing. In this way, the mids as a whole moves away from a musical naturalness and towards a more marked and polarised extreme, focused on certain genres and even specific tastes.
It is true that the sound is clearer, brighter and more transparent, focused on details, even at macro level. But it lacks the foundation to be, once again, an all-rounder.

Treble

The treble has an appropriate initial sparkle that coincides with the transition between the upper mids and the first treble. Thereafter, they descend noticeably. The result is an initial sparkle that does not convey much excitement, lift or penetration, but rather shortness and limitation, both in power and brightness and in extension. The treble feels somewhat limited in its projection towards brightness and clipped in extension. The timbre is not the most adequate, but it is not so negative either. It doesn’t manage to reach a complete realism and it is placed in that zone of soft treble of accompaniment of the rest of the bands, without being able to stand out by itself.

Soundstage, Separation

The scene appears moderately wide and loud, but shallow in depth. When bass is well reproduced, depth and physicality are gained. Still, the generation of layers is not very adequate. Most of the elements are in three planes, with the macro detail being more present and closer. This is the busiest plane, where things happen (for better and for worse). The bass, when executed correctly, can travel between the three planes. Male vocals and a lot of instrumentation stay in that low-key, physically charged second plane. The tendency is to push the music towards the main plane, which generates that hollowness and low physical load, as well as losing naturalness, homogeneity and realism.
The overall timbre is also not the most natural and tends towards brightness, so it can become somewhat metallic, less pleasant and penetrating.
Distant Mountains are prone to sibilance, although more so in the lower part, not in the brighter part.
There is a good distance between the elements horizontally, but not on the longitudinal axis. A three-dimensional image is not generated, but more flat.
At the detail level, some micro-detail is visible, but only if it is in a favourable frequency range and in the right plane. Some details are obvious and others are hidden. In this sense, it is not very coherent. Neither is the scene, which moves in these planes and creates a larger or smaller footprint depending on the plane and frequency range.
The image and its position are also affected by these characteristics and are more realistic on the horizontal axis, supported by an acceptable distance and separation.

Conclusion

The ROSESELSA Distant Mountain are headphones that are better as a whole than the sum of their parts. With a spectacular design, excellent construction, high quality finishes and two extremely attractive colours, ROSESELSA has created a very elegant and attractive product. I must admit that holding the Distant Mountain in my hands does not disappoint at all and only raises the expectations created by the pictures on the website or by any user who has them. Even the packaging is up to par and all for a relatively low price: $65. You don’t expect such a build quality in a product of this format. Compared to many IEMS, the Distant Mountains are inexpensive, with exceptional build quality and design. However, the sound is less than perfect, for my personal and musical tastes. The Distant Mountains have a brilliant V-shape, with limited sub-bass, a fairly neutral mid-bass, a first half of light mids, a very prominent upper midrange and a soft, not too extended treble. You might think of the Distant Mountains as a good fashion item, a museum headphone, a great addition, but they wouldn’t be my first choice for playing the music I like. And I’ve tried my best. They are the classic product that you want to like, but they fall short of being complete. They’re like that album by your favourite band that you never really liked. However, headphones do have one thing going for them: equalisation. And the Distant Mountains allow it to enhance their performance and awaken their potential.

Sources Used During the Analysis

• iFi GO bar Kensei.
• EPZ TP50.
• Burson Audio Playmate 2.
• Aune X8 XVIII Magic DAC + OpAmp Sparkos Labs SS3602 + ifi ZEN CAN 1.
• Tempotec MARCH V.