[tomscy2000]

Thanks for relaying that information, Brooko.
 
It looks like HSA is associated (under the same financial umbrella) with one or both of the companies that I mentioned. That's great that they're paying attention to QC.
 
One thing to add: Molex does produce its own drivers as well, most notably for Final Audio, though I've heard that they're closely associated with Sony. I still don't know the relationship between the two. Star-Micronic used to produce for Etymotic (for the ER6/6i) but seems to have gotten out of the game. There are also a couple other companies, though I don't know if they make BAs oriented toward audio or not --- perhaps they just produce for hearing aids and other microelectronics. I did not know about Cresyn.
 
I can't tell what they're using to measure that graph, but hopefully it's not via an IEC60318-4 coupler, or else it'd have severe high frequency roll-off. It it's 2cc or some other straight-tube coupler, then it'd be less of an issue, though there'll still be quite a bit of roll-off.

 

[Brooko]

It'll be interesting to see the reviews once they start coming in.  Mine is about 3/4 done.  I'm really enjoying these so far - so they've had a lot of 'ear-time' in the last week.
 
I'm not noticing a huge HF roll-off.  Mind you with my 'older' ears, that may not mean a lot 

 

[Zelda]

  OK - Jack is watching this thread, and emailed me last night and through the morning regarding questions about the BA100 drivers.  If I make mistakes here - then the fault is mine not Jack's.  I'm taking 3 emails and paraphrasing the contents into one post.
 

• He confirms that HSA actually does the design - but they are manufactured by another company - but to HSA's specification.
• There are only 5 companies which currently brand their marks on the actual drivers.  Sonion from Denmark, Knowles from USA, Sony from Japan and Cresyn from Korea.  The 5th company is HSA.  The reason they can do this is because of the proprietary tech inside the drivers.  Otherwise everyone would be doing it (the ones using the generic drivers).
• Because of the proprietary (and different) nature of the drivers - I'm guessing they're covered by patent/NDA here - generic manufacturers can't use the same driver.  The modified one belongs to HSA only.
• Here's a direct quote (for Tom) regarding BA's - "The situation of the BA drivers and BA earphones will keeping the same in long time in the future. For the BA drivers has no progress in this industry,Just as the guy pointed out, the BA drivers are too difficult to control the quality, there are 2/3 are faulted. and normally the L/R difference are 6 DBs. He tell the truth of the industry, but not for our BA drivers and our earphones."  
• Their current production has an average difference per driver of 0.2 db in their production testing (yep - matched THAT closely).  Direct quote again "BA 100 is with only 0.2 db different with most of our testing,but we publicize the L/R difference as 1 DB, You can test it by yourself, most of them are keeping at 0.2 db difference, it is the highest standard at the industry. Who can do it in this field? This is only ask the assembling factory can reach this aim? No, none other brand has this serious standard until today."  
• Here is the graph he showed - sorry - this is what I was given - but it conveys the message:

 
Hopefully this answers a few questions.  I know I'm loving the BA100s so far.

thanks for the info! 
and that graph is  waaay too flat 

 

[goodvibes]

I'm surprised that BA QC issues are that prevalent. Perhaps these are rejected before leaving a factory. Could explain their normally high cost and why Hisound can sell this inexpensively with what appears to be a proper BA transducer.

 

[tomscy2000]

  I'm surprised that BA QC issues are that prevalent. Perhaps these are rejected before leaving a factory. Could explain their normally high cost and why Hisound can sell this inexpensively with what appears to be a proper BA transducer.

 
They are, that's why I was concerned with QC, especially with this thing being a low-cost item. I heard the Astrotec AM70 and it had some channel imbalance issues. Not overly severe, but bad enough for me to detect them. Platters are QC'ed at the factory, but for production reasons, they have a relatively loose range of performance. Look at any BA stat sheet, even from Knowles, and you'll see a pretty wide range of tolerance values for performance. TBH, I'm a little skeptical of 0.2 dB tolerance, but until an actual series of samples is measured, we'll have to take their word for it.

 

[goodvibes]

I stand corrected.
 
.2 seems low to me as well. Perhaps that the average deviation or what they've seen so far. Batching may help as well. Would still be great. 

 

[DigitalFreak]

I have a review sample on the way. Still waiting on it though and for whatever reason I'm getting no tracking info. I'm hoping the package didn't get lost in the mail.

 

[H20Fidelity]

Still waiting here. Same story as above.

 

[DigitalFreak]

Still waiting here. Same story as above.

According to my tracking my package left Hong Kong on the 28th and it goes dead from there. Before yesterday I was getting nothing so I'm guessing it took awhile for our packages to enter the Hong Kong postal service. I'm also guessing we'll have to be patient until it hits the shores of our countries and finally appears in the local postal tracking system.

 

[H20Fidelity]

According to my tracking my package left Hong Kong on the 28th and it goes dead from there. Before yesterday I was getting nothing so I'm guessing it took awhile for our packages to enter the Hong Kong postal service. I'm also guessing we'll have to be patient until it hits the shores of our countries and finally appears in the local postal tracking system.

No tracking here, nuffin.
Flying on a wing and a prayer.
I have faith though.

 

[n0str3ss]

I want to see how this bad boy is gonna do in the upcoming reviews.

 

[goodvibes]

No tracking here, nuffin.
Flying on a wing and a prayer.
I have faith though.

 
Same.

 

[n0str3ss]

Any idea how ba100 compares to options with roughly the same price like vsd1, and s1?

 

[mark2410]

just having a listen to the set that came today.  first thoughts are its alright, then i have a little google and such and see the price.  my god, just how cheap is it!  from the spiel on the box i was thinking it was supposed to be something higher up the food chain.  oh and its a nice box, lovely case too. 
 
im thinking these just ended sales of the VC02.

 

[n0str3ss]

  just having a listen to the set that came today.  first thoughts are its alright, then i have a little google and such and see the price.  my god, just how cheap is it!  from the spiel on the box i was thinking it was supposed to be something higher up the food chain.  oh and its a nice box, lovely case too. 
 
im thinking these just ended sales of the VC02.

 
Until now how do feel these compare to vsd1?