[jamato8]

I have been listening to the RE-600's for a few  days now. EXcellent sound. I am surprised by how good they tiny things sound and frankly, IMO, they could be the only in the ear monitor you would need. They sound very flat to me, transparent, dynamic and open and this amazes be because of the size and my past experience with universal small monitors. With the 901 in balanced you get even more of the great listening experience. An A+ iMO. 

 

[tigon_ridge]

Quote:

I have been listening to the RE-600's for a few  days now. EXcellent sound. I am surprised by how good they tiny things sound and frankly, IMO, they could be the only in the ear monitor you would need. They sound very flat to me, transparent, dynamic and open and this amazes be because of the size and my past experience with universal small monitors. With the 901 in balanced you get even more of the great listening experience. An A+ iMO. 

I don't know if you've owned any customs other than your JH13's but some comparisons to customs or those $1000+ universals would be nice.

 

[tigon_ridge]

Hifiman says their diaphragms are coated with titanium, but to my knowledge titanium is only about as strong as modern steel. I'm wondering if they were actually referring to titanium nitride coating, which is 4 times harder than steel. I've never heard of titanium alone being used as a coating material. In fact, from my research of bicycle frame material, titanium doesn't tend to bond very well to other metals.

 

[higbvuyb]

Quote:

Hifiman says their diaphragms are coated with titanium, but to my knowledge titanium is only about as strong as modern steel. I'm wondering if they were actually referring to titanium nitride coating, which is 4 times harder than steel. I've never heard of titanium alone being used as a coating material. In fact, from my research of bicycle frame material, titanium doesn't tend to bond very well to other metals.

Might be because it's the same strength for much less weight.

 

[tigon_ridge]

Quote:

Might be because it's the same strength for much less weight.

It's actually not that big of a difference, and if it's only a coating, then it would make even less of a difference. Besides, full titanium diaphragms have already been implemented before for years. What would be the point of going full titanium to just titanium coating? On top of that, getting titanium to coat on another material would be next to impossible; titanium pretty much only likes to bonds to itself. The more I think of it, the more I think titanium nitride would make a lot more sense. It would allow for a very strong but light diaphragm, capable of very high resolution. Come to think of it, I've been getting gobs of detail from my EQ'd RE-400 that I've only heard from the ER4S (minus all of the ER4S's downsides).

 

[Theta Alpha 1]

Quote:

Hifiman says their diaphragms are coated with titanium, but to my knowledge titanium is only about as strong as modern steel. I'm wondering if they were actually referring to titanium nitride coating, which is 4 times harder than steel. I've never heard of titanium alone being used as a coating material. In fact, from my research of bicycle frame material, titanium doesn't tend to bond very well to other metals.

 
You can find pictures of a Titanium coated Hifiman driver here http://alexmod.do.am/forum/10-164-1
 
I think, they first announced Titanium coating back with the RE-252.
 
 
Here's some more pictures of Titanium drivers in portable audio, from Sunrise Audio https://www.facebook.com/SunriseAudio
 
Koss http://cdn.head-fi.org/c/c1/c1ecb077_KossKSC75diaphragmsmall.jpeg, http://www.head-fi.org/t/571216/koss-pro-dj-100-the-budget-king/945#post_8697146
 
Fischer Audio http://www.head-fi.org/t/652243/fischer-audio-fa-003ti-official-announce
 
Your comments on the bonding and use of TiN are interesting.

 

[Theta Alpha 1]

Quote:

Come to think of it, I've been getting gobs of detail from my EQ'd RE-400 that I've only heard from the ER4S (minus all of the ER4S's downsides).

 
Then maybe you should EQ some LCP and CNT IEM's and see what you think.

 

[higbvuyb]

Quote:

It's actually not that big of a difference, and if it's only a coating, then it would make even less of a difference. Besides, full titanium diaphragms have already been implemented before for years. What would be the point of going full titanium to just titanium coating? On top of that, getting titanium to coat on another material would be next to impossible; titanium pretty much only likes to bonds to itself. The more I think of it, the more I think titanium nitride would make a lot more sense. It would allow for a very strong but light diaphragm, capable of very high resolution. Come to think of it, I've been getting gobs of detail from my EQ'd RE-400 that I've only heard from the ER4S (minus all of the ER4S's downsides).

Mylar diaphragms coated with titanium aren't particularly unique; I'm not sure why you're dismissing a concept that is actually used right now.
 
Your comment about TiN supposedly producing 'gobs of detail' is vague and I'm not sure why a brittle ceramic would be more suited to an application where it is expected to flex back and forth constantly.

 

[tigon_ridge]

Quote:

 
You can find pictures of a Titanium coated Hifiman driver here http://alexmod.do.am/forum/10-164-1
 
I think, they first announced Titanium coating back with the RE-252.
 
 
Here's some more pictures of Titanium drivers in portable audio, from Sunrise Audio https://www.facebook.com/SunriseAudio
 
Koss http://cdn.head-fi.org/c/c1/c1ecb077_KossKSC75diaphragmsmall.jpeg, http://www.head-fi.org/t/571216/koss-pro-dj-100-the-budget-king/945#post_8697146
 
Fischer Audio http://www.head-fi.org/t/652243/fischer-audio-fa-003ti-official-announce
 
Your comments on the bonding and use of TiN are interesting.

Thanks for the link! See the golden color of the diaphragm? That's exactly the color of TiN!!! Pure titanium looks more like dull silver.
Quote:

Mylar diaphragms coated with titanium aren't particularly unique; I'm not sure why you're dismissing a concept that is actually used right now.
 
Your comment about TiN supposedly producing 'gobs of detail' is vague and I'm not sure why a brittle ceramic would be more suited to an application where it is expected to flex back and forth constantly.

I'm not quite dismissing as I am doubting that it's actually pure titanium. Since my assertion was vague, I'll elaborate. TiN has extremely high hardness per weight ratio, which means less inertia for the diaphragm, and therefore better control. You're correct about TiN being too brittle to be used as a diaphragm coating into most cases, but with sufficient manufacturing technique, I believe it should be doable. It's just a theory, which the colors in those images uphold. You'll never see pure titanium with that color. Even in the hardware industry, even when TiN is used as coating material products are sometimes still marketed as "titanium coated" rather than "titanium nitride coated."

 

[higbvuyb]

Quote:

Thanks for the link! See the golden color of the diaphragm? That's exactly the color of TiN!!! Pure titanium looks more like dull silver.
I'm not quite dismissing as I am doubting that it's actually pure titanium. Since my assertion was vague, I'll elaborate. TiN has extremely high hardness per weight ratio, which means less inertia for the diaphragm, and therefore better control. You're correct about TiN being too brittle to be used as a diaphragm coating into most cases, but with sufficient manufacturing technique, I believe it should be doable. It's just a theory, which the colors in those images uphold. You'll never see pure titanium with that color. Even in the hardware industry, even when TiN is used as coating material products are sometimes still marketed as "titanium coated" rather than "titanium nitride coated."

Hardness is probably irrelevant to diaphragms. You can't have a hardness to weight ratio because hardness is a surface property, not a volume one. Perhaps you mean stiffness, e.g. elastic modulus. TiN has a higher elastic modulus but because it is brittle, this is fairly useless since you need the coating to cover the flexing parts in order to confer stiffness to the diaphragm. 
The yellow colour is probably because of the way the photo was taken. The other photo shows a silver colour. Polished titanium is as shiny as any other metal.

 

[tigon_ridge]

Quote:

Hardness is probably irrelevant to diaphragms. You can't have a hardness to weight ratio because hardness is a surface property, not a volume one. Perhaps you mean stiffness, e.g. elastic modulus. TiN has a higher elastic modulus but because it is brittle, this is fairly useless since you need the coating to cover the flexing parts in order to confer stiffness to the diaphragm. 
The yellow colour is probably because of the way the photo was taken. The other photo shows a silver colour. Polished titanium is as shiny as any other metal.

http://alexmod.do.am/forum/10-164-1
 
That's obviously a golden color, not some camera or lighting effect. Look at the golden outer and inner rings. The inner ring is one most relevant. It moves, but only in one direction, which means it's a perfect candidate for a super thin metal sheet coated with several layers of TiN. Hardness = tensile strength. When referring to surface tensile strength, it's known as "hardness." Otherwise, they're more or less synonymous, albeit using different units of measurement that can be directly converted from one to the other.

 

[higbvuyb]

Quote:

http://alexmod.do.am/forum/10-164-1
 
That's obviously a golden color, not some camera or lighting effect. Look at the golden outer and inner rings. The inner ring is one most relevant. It moves, but only in one direction, which means it's a perfect candidate for a super thin metal sheet coated with several layers of TiN. Hardness = tensile strength. When referring to surface tensile strength, it's known as "hardness." Otherwise, they're more or less synonymous, albeit using different units of measurement that can be directly converted from one to the other.

It's clearly silver with reflection coming from the outer gold-coloured ring.
 
Hardness is completely different to tensile strength. There is no such thing as surface tensile strength. The benefit of TiN over titanium would be increased flexural rigidity, not hardness.

 

[tigon_ridge]

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The benefit of TiN over titanium would be increased flexural rigidity, not hardness.

Yes, and also per weight. That is key.

 

[higbvuyb]

Quote:

Yes, and also per weight. That is key.

I've found some speakers that have diaphragms made of titanium coated with TiN on both sides, so I stand corrected on that point.

 

[maguire]

Is it worth getting both RE400 & RE600????????