Headfonia editor Lieven Vranken would like to know: "Does the new AudioQuest DragonFly Copper still have a place in our fast-evolving personal audio landscape?"
Few audio reviewers are as intimately familiar with the DragonFly franchise as Lieven. He favorably reviewed DragonFly v1.2 in March 2016, later evaluated DragonFlys Black and Red in July of that same year, and finally put DragonFly Cobalt through its paces in October 2019.
Of course, as Lieven is firmly rooted in the worlds of head-fi and portable audio, he holds exceptional knowledge and first-hand experience of a wide range of USB DACs, headphone amplifiers, and other headphone accessories, making him uniquely qualified to assess the performance and value of the latest edition to the DragonFly family.
In his assessment, Lieven pairs Copper with a wide range of headphones — from the UM Multiverse Mentor IEM to the Beyerdynamic DT770 closed-back studio monitors to the planar-magnetic Audeze LCD-2 Classics — and, while some marriages proved happier than others, Copper's character shone through.
Compared to previous models, Copper does a better job of creating air and space, offers improved top-to-bottom frequency extension, and delivers a more immersive listening experience overall. Lieven summarizes: "The Copper version sounds weightier than the Cobalt version, with improved mid-timbre and layering. Both DragonFly units are musical and engaging but the performance of the newest one is at a higher level. For me personally the choice to upgrade is easy."
So, does the latest DragonFly still have a place in the personal-audio marketplace?
"The answer to that," decides Lieven, is an easy one: 'Yes, definitely.'"
