The Dark Saber is Moondrop's latest top tier IEM coming at $799 and featuring a whopping 10-driver configuration (2 dynamic drivers and 8 balanced armatures). The Dark Saber naming totally reminds me of Star Wars, and its legendary darksaber wielded by the leader of the Mandalorian, but in this case, it is referenced as a dark sword held by one of their anime mascots, and displayed on the box cover.
The Moondrop Dark Saber is a review unit loaner provided to me by APOS Audio. You can grab this unit at their online storefront at: https://apos.audio/products/moondrop-dark-saber-iem
The Dark Saber is a on the larger side of IEMs. It has a long body that is reminiscent of some of the other Moondrop IEMs like the Blessing 2 series. While they do look a little bit intimidating, they do fit my ears fairly well. I definitely felt them in my ears, but they did not cause any pain or discomfort.
The faceplate looks like it is wood, but it is actually carbon fiber. While they advertise it as "hundreds of layers of carbon fiber", I would argue that, while technically, it probably is hundreds of TOWS of carbon fiber, a layer of carbon fiber in the materials world, would be very heavy and very thick. Okay -- off my materials science soap box...
The cable included terminates in 2-pins and a modular jack that lets you fit on 3.5mm stereo or 4.4mm balanced jacks to your cable. This is the same cable that is on other Moondrop products such as the Aria 2.
The included zipper case is also one in the same as well.
Sound Impressions
The Moondrop Dark Saber has a balanced and slightly lean tonality as it matches the Harman Target curve fairly closely except with an additional emphasis in the 1-2KHz range that does make it sound more forward at times. I generally consider this tuning fine for most genres and adaptable.
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This comes down to some personal preferences too. Tuning is a large part of my favorability index, and I find some of their other products more aligned with my preference in the critical upper mid-range than what I get from Dark Saber. It has all the ingredients to be a great IEM for my personal tastes - with a nicely balanced bass range, treble air, but the I would have liked a more toned-down mid-range.
I get it though, the Dark Saber puts a lot of focus to female vocals. In those songs, like Hannah Svensson's Crossroad, her voice stands proud and center compared to some other IEMs I like. You can hear her cracks and breaths just a little more easily, but is that what I want to focus on?
Generally speaking, though, the Dark Saber is a very smooth sounding IEM that has great transition from the bass to lower-midrange that is both coherent and filling. It could possible use a little more mid-bass to balance to upper-mids, but I am perfectly fine with this generally neutral tuning.
In The Smile's "The Opposite", the intro drums and bass guitar riff are snappy and quick, and don't have any bleed. What I find missing is a natural decay. It's a quick transient attack, but missing a little bit of layering as the song progresses into more complex parts with Thom York's vocals and Jonny Greenwood's guitars entering the track. While it sounds particular fine, I expect a little more substance and nuance in a pricier product.
Final Thoughts
As you probably can tell from the above -- I'm not a big fan of Dark Saber at its asking price. It seems a little high for a very generic tuning (these days) without any bells and whistles. The tuning does not fully align with what I prefer, but it's still very, very adaptable. I just find that you can potentially get a much better value in their lower priced lineup and one that suits my personal preferences more.
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Thank you so much.
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