Panther Audio Silver Dragon King Review: The Maverick
Hong Kong is one of the largest meccas in portable audio with small and big brands serving the local market for many years. Perhaps you may have heard of them before, yet I suppose not for the most about the brand I’d like to talk about today – called Panther Audio. Reserving additional introduction of Panther Audio to our next paragraph, Panther Audio has recently stirred up the scene in high-end IEM competition in the Hong Kong market as well as now attempting to expand its brand presence overseas based on its two new flagship products, called the “Golden Dragon King” (GDK) and the “Silver Dragon King” (SDK).
These two co-flagship IEMs have been gaining my attention ever since I discovered the news from Panther Audio on social media as well as hearing positive feedback from those who have demoed them on recent shows. Hence today, I’m glad to present you the review of Silver Dragon King – the “younger brother” of GDK. The SDK is priced at 13800HKD or about $1799, and while the GDK has been locally released in Hong Kong (priced at 23800 HKD or about $3049), Panther stated that they’re just yet reserving the global release for making some modifications in sound tuning to better accommodate the global users’ tastes and preferences. Without further due, let’s discover more about Panther Audio itself, as well as jumping into the main discussion – on how the SDK sounds and performs.
About Panther Audio
Based in Hong Kong, Panther Audio was founded in 2018 and they’ve been actively involved in the creation of UIEMs and CIEMs that range from budget to flagship models. It’s already been some years since the brand launched, yet they aren’t hasting in expanding the market reach but instead making a steadier approach in entering new markets, as said by Panther Audio themselves. Other than Hong Kong, Panther currently has an overseas distributor in Japan (E-Earphone) and multiple dealers in Taiwan and is gradually planning to expand to further markets, as said.
I had the chance to encounter their products in person during last year’s HKAV show and had the pleasure of experiencing the majority of their IEM line-ups, which left me with a good memory of them (although back then it was yet for the Dragon Series to be revealed).
Panther Family Line-up
While some brands (especially Chi-Fi) set a shorter life-cycle for their products and let the past models quickly discontinued or abandoned in attention, Panther seems to be taking a more respectful and conventional way of treating their brand and their products.
As mentioned earlier, while the two new co-flagships are currently getting the most attention in the meantime, the previous models are still going strong with some of them still considered as the hit-makers. All models have the option to be crafted as CIEMs (except the recent Dragon series) and the pricing of their product line-up varies from the $200 range to the $2800.
Alright, I don’t want the introduction to Panther products to get you bored reading the review, so I’ll reserve further explanation by directing you to the Panther Audio website in case you’d like to learn more about each of their products. Let’s now start talking about our main topic, the Silver Dragon King!
Unboxing the Package – What’s inside?
The Silver Dragon King comes in a compact yet beautifully designed box. Removing the outer sleeve drawn with the Silver Dragon art reveals another artfully designed box (reminds me of Black Panther and Wakanda design?!), followed up by a welcoming page before finally allowing us to look at the including. Other than the earpieces, Silver Dragon King comes with:
- Leather carrying case
- Stock cable
- 3 pairs of Simbio silicone tips
- 3 pairs of foam tips
- A silvery metal warranty card,
- Earpiece mesh bag
- Leather cable tie
- Cleaning cloth
- 3.5 to 6.3 AV adapter
- Cleaning tool
Next Page: Earpiece Features / Sound Impressions