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Review: SoundMagic ES18 Measured

post #1 of 8
2/29/12 at 7:45am
Thread Starter 

Well, I have no other experience with SoundMagic's IEMs.

This is my first one. It's the cheapest hi-fi IEM I've ever bought.

 

Yes, I mean it. It's high fidelity enough that I will not hesitate to call it HI-FI.

 

AND, it's cheap. It costs me $15 dollars here in Taiwan. 

 

How good it is?

I measured it with RME babyface & condenser microphone. I used a small tube and some clay to emulate ear tube.

Here's the result:

 

FR plot:

圖檔

 

It's FLAT! FLAT from 30Hz to 2kHz. It's great with-out question.

 

THD% across frequency:

圖檔

 

It's LOW distortion and CONSISTENT ratio across most of the frequency which is quite hard to find.

For example, the pricy Denon C710 which costs many times of the small bud, didn't performs so well:

THD% of Denon C710:

aJDA9.png (1024×701)

 

Back to ES18,

CSD plot:

圖檔

 

Please note that the floor is -60dB, the ringing around 6kHz maybe caused by resonance in the tube. But it's still quite low after 2ms (under -40dB.)

Most frequencies decreases in unity, although not very fast.

Here's the plot till 18ms:

圖檔

 

(It's background noise of the system after 10.83ms. )

 

 

It sounds great and also measured great.

 

For the price, I'd call it magic!

 

 

 

As for other aspect, the package is good, comes with carrying soft bag, three sets of tips. Good enough.

Though the seal & comfort is not best among the IEMs I've had. 

The comfort is average, seal would be great if you use Comply Foam T400 with it.

 

Well...... I'll recommend it to anyone without hesitation. Even if you've already had many IEMs.

 

 

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post #2 of 8
2/29/12 at 8:36am

Interesting results there, I've found the lower-end Soundmagics that I heard in the past (PL11, PL21) to be quite bass-heavy. I'll wait for these to become available in my country so I can try them out.

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post #3 of 8
3/18/12 at 10:21am
Have you measured any other IEMs?
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post #4 of 8
4/10/12 at 5:06am

hey guys if you are looking for a budget good sounding good bass earphone try the ep-600 from creative , its cheap , just $10 and i would like to add that , i like what es18 gives but if a new guy goes on and buys these he wont like it cuz , new who are in to music likes bass , thats what my friend did he said where bass and i said give that back my mistake , i like the es18 but when you stack it up against e30 , you will know why it is priced low , but how !!! have they used inferior e10 drivers ?? or damaged or refurbished ?? e30 priced $30 but es18 is just $8 !! i will rate

es10 as 20/10 cuz no earphone at this price come with a pouch , not even a ahc-260 or cx215 .

 

.IMG_20120410_173101.jpg

 

i will do a review soon with ep-600 soon . its nice to see 10 mm drivers in low end earphones . cheers folks .

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post #5 of 8
4/10/12 at 5:08am

theres a philips she-7000 coming .

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post #6 of 8
4/10/12 at 6:00am

Looking at that frequency graph, despite how flat it looks, to me it appears to be dark (i.e. recessed treble).

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post #7 of 8
4/10/12 at 6:12am

mine e10 is already in customs, so i will 100% if they sound the same.

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post #8 of 8
5/8/12 at 12:38pm

Just replying to 2nd the great reviews on the ES18s. My impressions are in this thread: [ http://www.head-fi.org/t/596638/soundmagic-es18/30#post_8368931 ]

 

I'll be trying out the ES10s soon as well (which seem to have the same driver as the ES18s and are $2 less).

 

The Auvio hybrid tips are a really good match for the ES18s, BTW.

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