The Elysian Diva is the brand's $1599 mid-level IEM product that is priced just above the Gaea and half the price of their flagship Annihilator. This specific Diva that I'll be looking at there is the updated 2023 model, which was provided on loan as part of the Watercoolers Head-Fi tour.
The Diva tour unit did not come with packaging, and only really came with an Effect Audio carrying case and the Effect Audio 4-wire Ares S cable which comes standard with the product. The cable itself is the same as the cable you can buy separately, but comes with the more unique Pentaconn Ear connector that is standard on all of Elysian's products. This specific connector is a ConX connector on the Ares S cable and can be swapped out for other connector types like 2-pin and mmcx.
The Diva has a medium-sized shell, but is fairly deep. Despite that, it is very, very comfortable in my ears. The front shell features a glittery pattern over a black shell. Elysian also released the Diva in blue and red shell options as well.
One of the unique features of this product is the ability to toggle between three bass modes. The default setting has a slightly above neutral bass response that focuses heavily on sub-bass, while there's a lower bass mode that is more along the line of what I consider neutral, and a more fun and playful higher bass mode. These come in Red (low), Black (mid), and Blue (high) bass color indicators.
Tweaking between the three isn't how other IEMs who have tuning switches do it though. Instead of physical dip switches or replaceable nozzles, the Diva requires the use a very small flat-head screwdriver to turn the settings from left to right. This does cause some issues, as you can leave it in-between settings and totally lose bass altogether. I am also a little wary of how durable the material you are torquing on is. One of the sides of the loaner tour unit already seems to have some wearing issues.
Sound Impressions
The Elysian Diva can switch between three tuning settings. All three are different takes on a neutral mid-range and treble with varying levels of bass. With the lowest bass, setting, I found the tuning to be closest to what I consider neutral and lines up as close to the Antdroid targets as it can. The standard (mid) tuning dips the mid-bass a bit, and looks more closer to something like the Symphonium Helios or Thieaudio Monarch tuning. The highest bass level switch adds a lot more subbass shelf to the overall sound, and is the most fun and punchy of the settings.
In general speak - I preferred the big bass boost setting the most of the three. It came out as the most unique and flavorful of the options, and also sounded the most real to life. I didn't really like the standard mid-tuning because I felt it lacked mid-bass thickness, and the low-bass tuning lacked a little bit of bass punch and kick, although, it had the most coherent and smooth overall sound, and was still a step up on my Hidition Viento CIEM in terms of technical performance in the areas of detail resolution and open spaciousness of its soundstage.
So, for the remainder of the review, I will focus on the bass switch on the blue setting: the big bass mode. Just keep in mind that the general technical performance remained the same between all three options.
Bass levels are really nice on the blue switch. It has deep subbass, and levels that are very high, but also lacks any midbass bloat, since its heavily focused on below 100Hz. On tracks that demand it, it's very punchy and has a good tactile feel to it. The extra bass also gives more meat to the mid-bass region, despite not heavily focused there, as compared to the other two options. If I was to knock anything here, it would be that this extra bass boost does come at the expense, and very slightly so, the resolving edges. It's a just ever so slightly more rounded.
The mid-range and treble are just nicely tuned throughout and very even and coherent. There's no sharp treble issues, no worries of sibilance, and everything just sounds exactly like it should. The upper treble is also filled in and has good extension.
This is important, as I do find the overall technical performance of the Diva to be very, very good. It's not only resolving, but also bigger in soundstage size than other similarly tuned IEMs. It's stage sounds bigger than the similarly tuned Hidition Viento, and also larger than the Subtonic Storm.
It doesn't have nearly the resolution and bass texturing that the Storm does, but the Diva is quite proficient and its something I'd consider getting if I did not already have many similarly tuned IEMs.
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