Another help me pick some IEMs thread. Looking for warm/lush.

Just to warn you about the MC5s, you might want to try them out longer. I don't have them myself, but considering they are dynamic you may as well give them 100 hours for burn in to see if it helps a little.

Anyway, something that is warm and lush to my ears that I have heard around that price is the old Logitech Superfi 5's (or should I say the new UE 600's since they've recently been rebadged with more accessories). They probably aren't the best choice now though, although they are cheap.

If you want warm and lush thouugh, and dont mind stretching your budget just a little, consider the Radius DDMs. I don't know how much isolation you need, but if its just computer fans etc you might be able to get away with them> I think there are a few places you can pick them up within budget.

Klipsch Custom 3, IE7, DDM and HJE900..........

Quote:

Originally Posted by shaddix 

Thanks for the reply, I will leave the MC5s on pink noise over the weekend and see how I like them come Monday. Out of the box though I had to put some pretty heavy EQ on bass and treble in order to match the sound of my 595s.

 

I will look into the DDMs, thanks again! 

 

edit, Could you be more specific on the isolation of the DDMs? My computer isn't your typical computer, I have 9 fans total and 5 mechanical harddrives. 

Wow!! you must have some serious machine out there! 9 fans. How loud does it get, can you measure in decibels dB?

DDM will isolate better with the right tips and fit. I use comply foam when I am on the go in the train or plain. That works for me.

Haha.  Well it'll be warm but not lush.  It'll be likable regardless though.  The midbass hump can be annoying for some.  It's not exactly massive, but it's wide.  From pink noise testing and EQing when I owned a pair, the 0dB point is pretty much at 20Hz and 1kHz, and everything in between is bumped up with the center at 100Hz.  There is a bass knob that basically acts as a variable Q for the enclosure.  Unfortunately, it only affects everything below 100Hz, so it only fixes half of the issue.  If you want low end extension, you are forced to keep it set high or the bottom end becomes anemic.  The best route is to keep the knob set high and run a wide EQ cut at 100Hz to drop down the whole region 4dB-6dB.  Then the whole frequency response is pretty well balanced.  Now you will get used to the emphasis over time anyways.  The mind as a way of auto adjusting over time.

I like the Custom 3 too, very nice earphone, well balanced, excellent sound stage.

I'll suggest the Monster's Turbine Pro Gold as another option.  If you want smoother highs, it's a great option.  Again, it's a very well balanced earphone, notes are thick and well textured, and the treble is very smooth.

^^^ That chimes with my experience of the IE8. Well put. Mind you, I never did get used to the colouration, which I find completely unacceptable in an IEM at this level.

If you want something lush you could give the budget Xears TD100 a try. Sound signature wise they are quite similar to the IE8 and they are currently discounted to 15 euros (plus 8 for worldwide shipping). Check out Joker's review here (search for TD100).

Quote:

Originally Posted by krismusic 

^^^ That chimes with my experience of the IE8. Well put. Mind you, I never did get used to the colouration, which I find completely unacceptable in an IEM at this level.

There are very few earphones that don't have some form of coloration.  All the high end ones I've used needed EQing to flatten out the response, some more than others.  The IE8 isn't bad.  It's likable by some.  It's also pretty mild really other than the fact that the emphasis is wide.  There are only a few good earphones that you can used with no work and have a very well balanced presentation.  Now these shouldn't really be your only choices.  If you open up to the idea of EQing and invest in some method to provide robust power to EQ, then a whole heck of a lot of other great products can be improved and really shine.  There's only been one earphone that I've used that I couldn't EQ and make it better and that was the CK90Pro.  For my perception of response, it's flat from 30Hz to 15kHz and I can't add or remove 1dB anywhere and improve it.  Everything else I've used, even very "flat" ones need at least a couple dB here or there added or cut to offer the same linearity across the spectrum.  Many earphones I've used require more considerable changes, even really good earphones.  One of my favorites, the CK10 has a 9dB bump at 10kHz that makes the earphone hot and spitty.  Some things like this can be improved via an open cell foam tip to soak up some of the high end, but EQing gets it flat and good.  Earphones like the MTPG, RE252, Custom 3, and IE8 all are well balanced and relatively flat from a grand perspective but all need a couple dB here or there to truly flatten out and become what I could consider uncolored or unbiased.  I would never call an earphone unacceptable due to a gearing of the device.  Really the engineers developing these products have goals, specific intent, target markets they're trying to shoot for.  In most cases these goals require some level of coloration.  Unfortunately this does make product X suitable for one guy and product Y suitable for another guy.  EQing negates the natural gearing and can make a lot of products suitable for anybody.  There are still a lot of sound characteristics beyond just frequency response though, and everyone has preferences on these aspects as well.  EQing can't fix these, so in the end certain products will fit certain people still just because of how they present sound.  Even with the same frequency response all earphones sound quite different from each other.  Stepping back to the IE8, it is actually a relatively natural sounding earphone.  In terms of these other aspects (level of detail, dynamic range, texture/articulation, note thickness, etc.), the IE8 is placed in a pretty middle ground spot.