CES 2016

You probably haven’t heard of Maroo Audio. The company, after all, is just launching this year. But based on the sound quality of its initial products, you might want to hear more from Maroo Audio.

Maroo Audio is the audio division of Maroo, a global accessories brand with more than 50 retail partners in 30 countries. Specifically, Maroo Audio is comprised of a team from CyberAcoustics and most notably Maroo Audio has partnered with Advanced Communication Systems (ACS), a British company founded by musician Andy Shiach. ACS is in the business of building custom in-ear monitors for professional musicians and audiophiles and thus is also in the hearing preservation business. ACS gives Maroo instant credibility.

Maroo Audio showed a line of very elegant earbuds designed for women; the style is more jewelry-like than usual, and the tips are designed for a woman’s smaller ears. Very nice stuff, actually. But my ears were drawn to the Maroo Pro Audio line of in-ear monitors. These are built in conjunction with ACS and the name-dropping alone gets your attention: Black Sabbath, Pink Floyd, George Martin, David Guetta, Radiohead, Depeche Mode, etc. If musicians from these groups use ACS, then I am interested.

Three earphones are available, the Evoke MA-EP9001 (single driver) yielding 105.5dB at 0.1 volt (1 kHz); Evolve MA-EP9003 (three drivers) yielding 119.9 dB, and Encore MA-EP9005 (five drivers) yielding 120.5 dB. Each uses Knowles balanced armature drivers with other patent-pending technology. Three sizes of foam tips are provided, yielding noise isolation on the order of 26 dB. The enamel-coated Limun cable is made from six Litz wire conductors, containing seven individual silver plated copper strands. They are interwoven with Aramid fibers to provide high pull strength.

Although the show floor is the definition of a poor listening environment, I tackled the flagship Encore model for a quick listen. The attenuation actually made listening possible in the noisy environment, and in a word, the sound quality was stupendous. We are subjected to inferior sound quality every day and the sudden appearance of high sound quality is always a revelation. The Encore provided that kind of revelation. I can hardly wait to listen to these again in a properly quiet environment.

Be warned that high sound quality is not cheap. The MSRP here is about $1,000 which is a lot for earphones, but if your ears are up to the challenge, you might consider that money well spent. Look for availability in Q2. Maroo Audio, with ACS, is a new company that deserves a place at the audiophile table.