Impedance: 42 Ω
Frequency Range: 5 Hz — 30 kHz
Sensitivity: 112 dB SPL/mW at 1 kH
Weight: 336 g (11.8 oz.)
Total Score
Introduction
Greetings to all Hifitopia readers on these hot June days. Today, we’ll be reviewing a product from a company you all know. Introducing Meze Audio’s entry-level model, the 105 Aer!
Let’s see how good the 105 Aer is, especially with its attractive price during the promotional period. Does its sound live up to its design?
The product I have here was provided by Meze Audio so I could publish an honest and independent review. Thanks to Meze for choosing to work with independent reviewers and for accepting our principles of honesty.
Before I started writing this review, I spent about 150 hours with the Meze 105 AER (excluding burn-in).
Click here to purchase the Meze 105 AER with a 25% discount.
Design & Build
105 AER’s Package
Just as you’d expect from a Meze Audio product, the incredible design and stunning visual experience begin the moment you open the box. Inside, you’ll find a sleek hard case featuring the brand’s logo, a cable and its carrying pouch, a 6.3mm adapter, a cable organizer, and documentation.
Meze 105 AER
The quality of the foam, the headband, and the build quality—all of these are examples of excellent engineering and design. It feels very sturdy, looks stylish, and is comfortable. It doesn’t tire you out during long listening sessions. The headband mechanism is very comfortable.
As required by the open-back design, a mesh grille is used on the back of the ear cups. The distance between the driver and your ear, along with the material in between, has been carefully selected. Quality is evident in every detail of the headphones. Meze Audio logos are positioned at the points where the headband meets the frame, giving it a premium look.
105 AER’S Case & Cable
The hard case is made of a woven, rigid textile and is lined on the inside. The zipper quality is top-notch and appears to be waterproof (the company makes no such claim; this is just an observation). Even the fabric cable sleeve is multi-layered, thick, and quite high-quality. The included cable is made of soft polymer material and a polymer fabric coating. I don’t know the cable’s internal construction, but it looks quite high-quality.
Synergy
Although it’s an over-ear headphone, the Meze Audio 105 AER is effortless to wear. While testing the 105 AER, the moments I enjoyed most were when I was lying down and listening with my DAPs. I’ll tell you about the synergy I experienced with them.
In terms of its tonal character, the 105 AER offers a balanced and neutral sound profile with some “musical touches” in the mid-high range. For this reason, I believe it pairs well with sources that fall within the neutral-to-warm spectrum.
Meze Audio 105 AER & iBasso DX260mk2
H gain – Class AB & H – 3.5mm – 42-44/100 volume
To be honest, I had some preconceptions about this pairing due to iBasso’s neutral-bright house sound. However, my listening sessions revealed the exact opposite—positive results. The Meze 105 Aer paired exceptionally well with the DX260mk’s tonal character. The result produced a balanced and instrumentally rich sound. Tonal-wise, this pair has a slightly mid-centric, warm tone. It excels with acoustic genres. I got a very satisfying result with Chris Isaak’s “Wicked Game”: The guitar and that soothing vocal are front and center, accompanied by crisp, distinct cymbals for a great acoustic performance.
When it comes to technical aspects, the 105 AER offers an excellent level of detail for its price range. The pairing with the iBasso DX260mk2 proved to be a solid choice in showcasing this. With the track “Eulogy” by Tool, I noticed something: Listening to the Meze 105 AER at extremely high volumes isn’t advisable with this pairing because the soundstage becomes shallow when I crank the volume too high. However, when I play it at a moderate volume, the sense of depth is much better. In this track, the sound contrast across the spectrum is beautifully balanced, which I really enjoyed. Overall, in tracks with a lot of instruments, the separation is above average—provided you don’t crank the volume too high. Looking at the overall evaluation, I give this pairing a score of 8.8/10.
Meze Audio 105 AER & Hiby RS8II
H Gain – Class A & AB – 3.5mm – 38-46/100 Volume
Listening to the Meze Audio 105 AER with the RS8II is a wonderful experience because I know this is the best sound you can get from the 105 AER. Of course, we’ve seen plenty of examples of the effects of pairing an entry-level headphone with a $4,000 DAP,but this was a good test to see the limits of the 105 AER.
The resulting resolution, detail, and overall separation are at a level you wouldn’t expect from a headphone in this price range. The RS8II brought out the full technical potential of the 105 AER. In terms of tonal balance, it’s similar to the previous pairing but yields a less mid-centric and more balanced sound profile. It’s both sufficiently crisp and highly musical. I thoroughly enjoyed listening to Avenged Sevenfold’s “Acid Rain” with this pair. Here’s the difference compared to the previous pairing: when listening at high volumes, I don’t experience any loss of spatial depth. In the Queensryche – Silent Lucidity track, while I found the overall presentation slightly too treble-focused, the texture quality of the guitar and male vocals was satisfying.
With Turbo mode on: The sound is fuller, crisper, a bit warmer, and more intimate, yet it feels better. It’s particularly enjoyable for pop-rock and general listening and is definitely more musical.
With Turbo mode off: A more laid-back presentation and a relatively more analytical character. I think the 105 AER handles complex tracks better here, but the presentation is much more sterile.
Let’s also take a look at this with a third-party 4.4mm cable:
Meze 105 Aer With 4.4mm Aftermarket Cable & Hiby RS8II
H Gain – Class A & AB – 4.4mm – 30-35/100 Volume
The cable I’m using is a simple, no-name cable made of SPC material that costs about $50. I specifically chose this cable because I wanted something similar to the stock cable. That way, I can observe the effects of the increased power and control provided by the 4.4mm connector more clearly, rather than being influenced by the cable itself.
The first thing I noticed was that enabling turbo mode made a bigger difference with the 4.4mm model. I now get a distinctly warm tone with turbo mode and a neutral tone without it. I’m pointing this out specifically because this effect isn’t the same with every headphone; I’ve listened extensively to both configurations, and my personal preference is to use turbo mode.
Based on the same songs, the 4.4mm added a bit more harmonic separation and dynamism to the sound. It’s good in terms of soundstage, but other than that, there isn’t much else to note. Aside from all that, I could say it felt more familiar in terms of timbre, though that might just be a perception. Frankly, I found the difference to be minor, and I think it makes sense for Meze to offer a 3.5mm cable. Of course, this also relates to the 105’s driving requirements: with over-ear headphones that are harder to drive, using the 4.4mm output is absolutely essential for DAP listening.
Meze 105 AER & FiiO BTR7
H Gain – 4.4mm/3.5mm – 40-50/100 Volume
Compared to the RS8II pairing, I found this duo—which is more likely to be paired side-by-side—to offer reasonable value for the price. First of all, the BTR7 powers the 105 AER quite effortlessly. The resulting sound proves what I said in the “Synergy” section. The BTR7 has a warmer sound than the previous two pairings; even though it’s a much more affordable device, the warmth it adds to the sound makes for a more enjoyable listening experience. The low frequencies sound much sweeter and fuller. Every time I listen to the same tracks, I find a more complete sound and a better listening experience. Moreover, we’re still at a very high technical level. The efficiency in this pairing is very high. My overall score for this pairing is 9.6/10. I’d like to emphasize that this pairing is my top recommendation for a warm source device for the Meze 105 AER.
Sound
The Meze Audio 105 AER features a slightly warm, open sound signature. The overall sound profile is comfortable and versatile. It becomes slightly more pronounced in the upper-midrange and exhibits a subtle brightness in the pinna region alongside its warmth. This fine-tuning makes it both musical and enjoyable while also ensuring it remains technically solid. The sound exhibits a mid-centric character at certain points, bringing vocals slightly to the forefront. Overall, the 105 AER displays a rich, distinctive tonal coloring across the entire frequency spectrum.
Bass
There’s a deep, distant, and sufficiently full-bodied but light bass that doesn’t dominate the soundscape. It’s slightly sub-heavy. Although it’s a dynamic driver, and while we might describe the overall tone as slightly warm, the bass isn’t part of that. There’s a solid instrumental foundation here. It makes a wonderful contribution to the rest of the sound because there’s plenty of headroom in the midrange. Whether the bass weight is sufficient here depends entirely on your expectations. I liked the weight of the bass notes and the fun factor in pop and R&B tracks. Overall, this is an open-back headphone. I found the drum levels to be average, while the bass guitar and double bass were above average.
Mid
The midrange may be where the Meze 105 AER shines the most. Here, there’s a slight warmth in the lower mids, followed by a tiny dip in the midrange, and then a gain right in the vocal region and beyond. Thanks to this structure, there’s plenty of headroom for instruments here, and the sense of layering is excellent. Moreover, the instrument timbres are consistent, and the level of accuracy is very high. In Paul Anka’s “You Are My Destiny,” the violin that appears on the side of the stage sounds both realistic and full-bodied—and I really loved that. When I played “In Gloom” by Lake Of Tears, it was a true musical feast: rock melodies with a polyphonic, country-infused vibe blend with metal. The male vocal presence is magnificent, and the transparent balance in this area is commendable.
Treble
At this point, the choice regarding the 105 Aer becomes a very personal one. The trebles are designed to stand out at certain points, carrying the analytical aspect of the sound and delivering that airy effect. The lower trebles are a bit too central and intimate in terms of staging, while the upper trebles, despite having good extension, sound more distant. Actually, this setting is a very reasonable choice in terms of proximity to the natural range. Still, the 105 AER’s trebles can sometimes prevent you from cranking up the volume on certain hard-hitting metal tracks. I think this is a side effect of the market’s shift toward planar headphones. Still, the trebles remain consistent and enjoyable: when I play “Static Electricity” by King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard, I find the placement of the cymbals impressive and enjoy the overall treble presentation. However, as I mentioned, I recommend adjusting your expectations regarding warmth in this frequency range.
Technique
From a technical standpoint, I don’t think there’s much to criticize about the 105 Aer. It offers a level of resolution and detail that can rival the “planar driver craze.” In addition, it produces a consistent sound, and its technical performance is exceptionally well-balanced for an open-back dynamic driver headphone in this price range. I think that’s important. In terms of soundstaging, it’s slightly above average: positioning and separation are good, but depth is average. I found the width to be sufficient. Its imaging capability is adequate but not spectacular. However, the 105 AER is impressive in how it blends tonal accuracy with fine detail.
Last Words
The Meze Audio 105 AER is a great entry-level open-back headphone thanks to its exquisite design, versatile sound, and comfort. Especially considering it’s currently on sale for $300 as part of the current promotion, I believe this is a great deal. The performance you get for the price is remarkable.
Click here to purchase the Meze 105 AER with a 25% discount.
