ER4 -What am I missing? - Page 4

 

Knowles makes a number of dampers, or filters, that adjust the sound of the upper-end of the drivers.  They don't increase anything, ever, they are filters and dampers.  However, the end result gives you a perceived increase in bass, although it's not an actual one.  It's similar to the way Phonak uses a mid-range filter to adjust their sound.  So what the filters do is adjust the treble.  Some filters will end up "adding" treble because they filter out less than the ones that come installed on the Etymotics.  Others will filter more to reduce the treble a bit more.  

 

These filters do work on all Etymotic models BTW, not just the ER4.  Etymotic sells green filters, I'm unsure if they are the same knowles filters, or developed in-house.  

Inks...I respect your knowledge but agree to disagree in a couple areas.  Can only go by what my ears (good or bad) tell me.

 

I do think the ER4P (at least unamped) struggles a bit with complex music.  I have played around with this quite a bit as it has been a hot button for me and I'm certain I'm not the only one that feels this way.  Contemp jazz. jazz fusion with lots of percussion as well as horns, keys and guitars....it starts meshing together as an all midrange type of sound.

As far as UM3X bass being muddy, let's not forget that with universals our ear anatomy and tip choice can cause quite a variation in sound.  With a comply tip I could almost agree but with the new Westone "Star" tips or my UM56, it's incredibly tight, punchy and fast.  UM3X is a very good IEM.  Among the best tonality and decay of any universal I have heard.

Edited by Spyro - 1/6/13 at 2:01pm

It seems the main issue here is rooted in the perception of bass in the ER4. People perceive bass differently which has been proved through experimentation. Some prefer about six more dB than others, but practice can change a person's perspective of what sounds accurate.

Earlier you said Etymotic would be better to raise bass levels to account for tactile feedback felt from the bass of live instruments. I assume you mean bass felt though areas of the body other than the ear. But the bass produced by an iem cannot physically produce tactile bass felt in the chest for example. An iem can only produce heard bass in the ear canal. Increasing the bass in the ear as a substitute for felt bass is a trick that doesn't work on everyone. Hence this disagreement.

One can learn to ditch the need for this illusion by focusing less on bass impact and more on bass detail and its volume relative to the mids and treble. For example the song Angel by Massive Attack has heavy bass emphasis, which imo is preserved by the ER4S very well. The bass is still emphasized in relation to the mids and treble. Other iems simply emphasize it even more.

I think it's similar to the illusion of the spinning ballerina. One sees her spinning in one direction but can choose to see her spinning from the opposite direction through focus alone. In a similar way, one can choose to focus on different aspects of bass presentation to overcome the perceived illusion of tactile bass in iems.


Edited by gnarlsagan - 1/6/13 at 5:08pm

Bass is affected by seal, regardless of the difference in our ear's shape. I wouldn't dare to put a non modded Comply tip on a already muddy IEM. Even with silicone wide bore tips the UM3X is simply muddy, unless those star tips are giving you a looser seal than I, but then you're sacrificing isolation. Heck even the W4 is a bit muddy, though not as bad. The problem with these Westones is that they're just simple boosted bass, all in the midbass regions, not unintrusive, bottomless bass like on the EX1000 or even FXD70. 

Edited by Inks - 1/6/13 at 6:01pm

If you listen only to one pair of IEMs and not much else, you can acclimate to some variance, in fact your brain is good at it if not too severe or an obvious spike. Problem is when you listen to a lot of different things, both in ear and out, that balance issues are harder to fathom. I'm of the bit extra is right for my ear but I'm clearly not a bass head. GR07 sounds like it has a bit too much midbass to me and I chose a jh13 over the 16.

 

Not even felt through the body.  I'm just talking about replicating a full sound.  Imagine sitting 2/3 of the way back in a 15ft square sound room.  You have a pair of 6" bookshelf speakers on the wall in front of you.  This would be representative of the Ety.  Or you have a pair of 10" 3-ways on the floor.  Assuming both speaker options are decent speakers, I would much prefer the 10" 3-ways.  It's that simple.

 

Adding bass then? Or just extending bass response? IIRC bookshelf speakers don't extend very well below 60Hz, but the ER4 extends linearly to ~30Hz, and falls 2-3dB at 20Hz. It depends on the FR of the 3-ways in this example for this comparison to be meaningful. What did you think about my other points concerning the missing 6dB effect?

 

Also I'm on the fence about how the single driver ER4S compares to a multi-driver like the W4 for complex music. 

 

Spyro you say the ER4 sounds a bit mashed together in comparison to multi-driver units. Have you ruled out FR as the cause of this effect? An iem with a 10k peak (or other peaks) will make details at those peaks more apparent. 

 

 

 

 

Are poor transients with complex music directly related to CSD? I thought CSD was a straight shot tone from 20Hz to 20kHz, and wouldn't performance under that condition be different from performance during many different frequency sounds playing simultaneously?

 

What Spyro is saying makes some sense in that multi-driver units should be able to produce more accurate detail in their respective frequency ranges, but it's how those drivers interact at overlap frequencies that has me concerned about performance. It may also be that a single driver is capable of covering enough audible frequencies for the (questionably) technical benefit of multi-drivers to not matter. It would be nice to compare an equalized W4 with the ER4S and find out. 

Edited by gnarlsagan - 1/8/13 at 6:11pm

 

Well, exactly and I can't really argue with any of that as our subjective tastes will always come into play.  Years back, when I owned SE530, TF10, and ER4P all at th same time....I put away the SE530 and TF10 and listened exclusively to ER4P for 2 weeks.  True, the perceived amount of bass changes when not exposed to bassier IEM's.  And true, I could not argue the ER4P is the most neutral of the three.  But when switching back to either of the other two, accurate and neutral or not, I get a far more immersive adrenaline and emotional effect from the music and I suppose that is the bottom line.

Yes, an IEM that is too slow shown in CSD is going to blend everything more. Yes, naturally higher frequencies are faster and lows are slower, but you can still see the parameters. "Detail" is frequency related, unless one is speaking of imaging which will make details more apparent. The XBA3 does do what Spyro claims, multidrivers do to the ER4 though. It has superior imaging, making details more apparent, layed out better and reaches depths of bass much lower, with a more natural decay. Not only that, but it actually extends higher in the treble to 20k, the ER4 tops at 17k. I will listen to the W4 with resistance to unleash it's potential though, but so far the ER4 is above it IMO. 

Edited by Inks - 1/9/13 at 8:30pm

 

I see what you mean. I experience a similar effect sometimes and want more bass depending on the track. Seems there are two ways to approach listening here, and both can be very satisfying. 

 

 

 

Makes sense. It seems bass decay is more important for perception than extension. Not a ton of music goes below 30Hz iirc, but the decay is what gives it that emphasis and rumble. 

 

What is it that contributes to imaging? Why would the XBA3 image better? Multiple drivers?

 

Also looking forward to your ER4/W4 comparison. 

Transient speed wil contribute to imaging. I think the width of the XBA3s soundstage also makes it easier to catch.