Final ZE8000 Noise-Cancelling True Wireless Earphones

Flagship Truely Wireless In-Ear Earphones

The new Final ZE8000 is a flagship true wireless earphone based on Final’s extensive research and development across acoustic, psychoacoustic and material engineering fields. The ZE8000 delivers what Final terms “8K SOUND” – a new level of hardware / software innovation that delivers transparent sound and fantastic comfort even for very long listening sessions.

 

8K SOUND

Many wireless earphones employ several methods of tuning, including acoustic design and DPS (Digital Signal Processing) to deliver a pleasing sound, with particular attention to frequency response tuning to present a higher sense of perceptual ‘clarity’. With the ZE8000, Final offers an innovative breakthrough: instead of trying to just fine tune particular frequencies, Final is using advanced DSP to calibrate all parts of the audio signal in the time domain as well.

Taking advantage of the computing power of ZE8000’s microprocessor, a series of algorithms using FIR (Finite Impulse Response) filters were designed and applied to rectify both the frequency and time response. This special attention to time domain performance ensures that a natural and transparent musical image is presented to the listener, without introducing listener fatigue with frequency peaks. The result is a sound that is both smooth and detailed, well suited for long listening sesions.

 

Design Innovation for Enhanced Comfort

Many of the true wireless earphones on the market today are designed to place all components into the concha area of the ear, which may result in a size that does not fit people with small ears. For ZE8000, Final took the novel approach of dividing the design into multiple parts, so that the ear-fitting part is small enough to fit all ear conchas, while other electronics reside in the vertical section outside of the ear canal.

Complemented by newly designed dual-layered TYPE Q ear tips, the ZE8000 stays fit into the concha by locking into the ear with its small round shape. Compared to most true wireless earphones, where the hard surface of the housing is directly in contact with the ears, the dual-layered TYPE Q ear tips offer a soft silicone contact surface for supreme comfort.

 

ANC Optimised for Sound Quality

Turning on Active Noise Canceling (ANC) in many headphones and earphones degrades sound quality and can cause discomfort or nausea in users, particularly when no music is playing. To solve this problem, FInal engineers conducted numerous experiments with customized equipment and feedback from user evaluations. As a result, Final has succeeded in designing a noise-canceling algorithm that effectively creates a quiet, stress-free environment ideal for listening to music, while remaining faithful to the original sound. To enhance the accuracy and performance of the ANC algorithm, high-quality Knowles MEMS (Micro Electromechanical Systems) microphones are used.

 

Volume Step Optimiser

Volume is one of the most important factors affecting people’s musical experience. When volume is too low, the sound is unsatisfying, and when volume is too high the sound becomes fatiguing. When used with true wireless earphones, many mobile phones do not allow for fine tuning of volume steps, making it difficult for a user to arrive at exactly the right listening volume. In a truly innovative use of software, Final has implemented a Volume Step Optimiser which resolves this problem.

Starting from a listening volume level set by the user (reference volume) in the Final app, Volume Step Optimizer re-maps the volume steps from the smartphone to allow for finer volume adjustments around the reference volume. This allows users to easily pinpoint volume level with the volume control on their smartphone.

 

Noise Suppressing System with AB Class Amplifier & PML CAP

ZE8000’s audio system uses a Class-AB amplifier, a type of amplifier known for its excellent balance between sound quality and power efficiency. This is in comparison to the Class-D amplifier used by many TWS systems that are only optimised for power efficiency. Class-AB amplifiers contribute to more faithful music reproduction because of their lower distortion. The decoupling capacitors of the ZE8000’s digital signal processor are high-performance, low-distortion PML CAPs (Polymer Multilayer Capacitors) designed by the renowned Japanese manufacturer Rubycon. By using the latest manufacturing technology, PML CAPs achieve significantly lower distortion than typical MLCCs (Multilayer Ceramic Capacitor). This makes the output of digital signal processing, which is essential for 8K SOUND, cleaner and more accurate.

 

Ultra-Low Distortion Driver, f-CORE for 8K SOUND

8K SOUND can only be realized when hardware and software are designed in parallel and the two complement each other. In order to realize the full potential of digital signal processing technology, the driver unit must be highly accurate and have extremely low distortion.

ZE8000 features the newly developed “f-CORE for 8K SOUND” ultra-low distortion driver with a large 13mm equivalent diaphragm, unprecedented for TWS earbuds. A lightweight aluminum-magnesium dome in the center is injection molded onto a highly flexible special silicone surround, and a floating mechanism is used for the CCAW voice coil leads. This design has resulted in a significantly lighter diaphragm and, because no common adhesive is used, stable piston motion during vibration is achieved. Final claims that the “f-CORE for 8K SOUND” has the lowest THD+N (Total Harmonic Distortion Plus Noise) of any dynamic driver design in wireless earphones and IEMs.

This superior physical characteristics of the “f-CORE for 8K SOUND” driver not only provides the highest precision for digital signal processing, but also allows for the fullest possible portrayal of sound texture and detail.