Link to my review and measurement index thread where one can also find a full review overview, more information about myself as well as my general-ish audio and review manifesto: https://www.head-fi.org/threads/956208/
I only give full stars. My ranking/scoring system does not necessarily follow the norm and is about as follows:
5 stars: The product is very good and received the "highly recommended" award from me.
4 stars: The product is very good and received the "recommended" award from me.
3 stars: The product is good/very good, but not outstanding/special enough to get any of my two awards. ["Thumbs Up"]
2 stars: The product is only about average or even somewhat below that and somewhat flawed/flawed in some areas. [neither "Thumbs Up" nor "Thumbs Down"]
1 star: The product is bad/severely flawed to outright bad. ["Thumbs Down"]
Ultimate Ears Reference Monitors
Source:
Personal unit.
Miscellaneous:
I opted for the standard design, long silver cable and large carrying case.
Fairly nice unboxing experience with a nice, high quality, large cardboard case.
The acrylic shells are 3D-printed, of high quality and feature nice coloured side indicators.
I really like that the three drivers, crossover, cables and sound tubes with dampers are visible.
I like the spacious, sturdy, black powder-coated carrying case that is nicely and softly padded on the inside. A cleaning tool with a dedicated cut-out in that carrying case is included, too.
The cable with four twisted conductors below the y-split is of high quality and nicely flexible and soft; it’s definitely one I really like aesthetically and in terms of how it feels.
2-pin connectors.
The fit, seal and comfort are excellent for me, nonetheless I personally rather prefer the handling of universal fit in-ears and would have bought my UERM as such if that option existed back then.
Three Balanced Armature drivers per side; three acoustic ways; dual-bore sound output.
Sound:
They are custom-moulded after my physical ear impressions taken by the official nearby Ultimate Ears distributor who 3D-scanned them and also shipped them to the UE headquarters as physical backup.
Tonality:
Neutral to bright-neutral.
I always perceived my UERM as the closest match to my personal perception of “flat neutral”, even though they subjectively didn’t fully achieve this (up until I finally discovered the Etymotic ER-4S (and then their successors, the ER4SR) which come extremely close to that and have suprassed my UERM for this purpose) when listening to music, sine sweeps or noise signals, even though they were definitely a step up in terms of flatness (and especially resolution) to my Shure SE425 which were the in-ears I probably used most until about late 2014.
That said, while the bass is very flat and extends flat down into the real sub-bass without any roll-off, it is a little lifted to my ears by about 3 dB, which adds just a tiny bit of body to the sound, and spills ever so slightly into the midrange but without necessarily colouring it – after all, these are ultimately still some of the flattest sounding in-ears that were made.
The midrange timbre is mostly spot-on to my ears, with the upper mids/presence range being just slightly more on the relaxed side, which gives the UERM a still very revealing and honest, but somewhat more relaxed (I’m not using the word “musical” as this isn’t really a colouration and the UERM are still more present here than many other in-ears), less brutally revealing than in-ears with a more diffuse-field oriented midrange tuning such as my ER-4S.
So ultimately what I hear is an accurate midrange reproduction that is just slightly closer to the “prosumer neutral” than the “studio neutral” side.
Above that, except for the ~5 kHz range that, just like on my ER-4S, is a bit more recessed than flat-neutral to my ears, the highs are neutral, accurate and flat to my ears until the super treble is reached: here, the UERM have a peak between 10 kHz and 13 kHz, and it is not exactly subtle – if an instrument or song hits exactly this range, which however happens rather rarely, the highs can appear sharp, even to the point of nearly unbearable, which is somewhat unfortunate as otherwise and most of the time, the treble response is very accurate, even and realistic.
Therefore the UERM represent, in a positive way, an “unspectacular” and mostly flat-neutral sound that clearly falls into the neutral category, although they are ultimately not as flat (/”sterile”) sounding to my ears compared to Etymotic’s ER-4S, ER4SR and ER2SE, and can become a bit strident sounding if there is plenty of information in the range between 10 kHz and 13 kHz, which is however thankfully rather rarely the case.
Frequency Response:
Etymotic ER-4S-Compensation
As I cannot get my UERM inserted deep enough into the coupler to its reference plane-ish position since I have got large ear canals, the upper treble/super treble peak shown on both compensation graphs is obviously exaggerated by at least 15 to 20 dB. As for the furthest peak to the right, I agree with it and would even say that it is more pronounced in my ears when performing sine sweeps than on the graph.
Other than that, this (ER-4S-Compensation) is pretty much exactly how I perceive my UERM.
InEar ProPhile 8-Compensation
Resolution:
Very high and definitely flagship territory.
It is very rare that the UERM are brought to their limits, and even then, if the recording is very dense, fast, complex and demanding, thy aren’t actually stressed or pushed to their actual limits, but rather pushed somewhat out of their comfort zone.
The bass is very clean, tight and fast, and doesn’t lack any resolution.
Micro details in the midrange are also resolved very well, with fine vocal details being uncovered easily.
Treble resolution is on a very high technical level as well, which is also why they peak above 10 kHz is (most of the time) not perceived as too annoying or unpleasant; high note separation is clean.
Fast and complex music material is not problematic with the UERM which represent it effortlessly.
While there are areas where my Campfire Audio Andromeda may have an edge over my UERM and while I would place my InEar ProPhile 8 (just a little) higher than my UERM in terms of micro details, they are nevertheless excellent, flagship-territory in-ears whose resolution and speed I would definitely put above that of my Etymotic ER-4S, Fischer Amps FA-3E, or the Noble Audio SAVANNA when it comes to other in-ears that fall into the category of a neutral tuning.
Soundstage:
Quite large and holographic, although not as large and spectacular to my ears than that of the UE18 Pro or my Andromeda.
While the UERMs’ stage is not the “best”, biggest or most precise I have heard from in-ears, it is nonetheless very good, with very clean instrument placement and the ability to cleanly reproduce “empty” space between and around instruments/tonal elements, without any bleed or fog.
- - - - - - - - - - - -
Comparisons:
Noble Audio SAVANNA:
The SAVANNA are slightly bassier and warmer in comparison, but roll off somewhat towards the sub-bass.
Midrange timbre is comparable while the Noble in-ears are tuned even more relaxed in the presence range.
The same goes for the middle treble and treble in general where the SAVANNA present a more relaxed tuning as well; in terms of super treble transition/the 10 kHz to 13 kHz area, I hear the SAVANNA as being superior (more realistic timbre).
When it comes to technical performance, the UERM have the somewhat faster, tighter and at the same time somewhat better controlled lows.
The difference is lesser in the midrange and treble, although the UERM also come out as more detailed here.
Soundstage and imaging precision is where the UERM also outperform the SAVANNA.
Ultimate Ears Reference Remastered to-go:
Bass quantity is pretty much similar while subjectively, the UERR appear slightly warmer, fuller in comparison, which is most likely due to the lack of the super treble peak that the UERM have whereas their successors do not. As a result, they definitely sound less analytical.
When it comes to the midrange, the UERRs’ appears closer, more intimate in the mix, with just a touch more perceived lower midrange body while still maintaining a mostly correct, neutral timbre.
In terms of the rest of the treble, both are pretty much similar to my ears, however the UERR do not have the UERMs’ 10 kHz to 13 kHz peak, wherefore they sound smoother, more realistic (“correct”) and more linear in the highs to me, which is a definite plus and, in my opinion, also a rather substantial improvement, however due to that, they are also perceived as “warmer” in comparison and lack that “UERM magic”.
While both in-ear models are on a very high technical level, the UERM appear a bit faster and tighter in the bass compared to the UERR whose lower notes seem to linger just a bit more, which is why they ultimately come across as somewhat tighter, faster and better controlled sounding than their successors that seem to have somewhat more body and decay despite not having any more bass quantity.
Directly compared, the UERMs’ soundstage appears to be somewhat more spatial and wider to my ears, with the UERR presenting the imaginary stage closer to the listener, which makes them appear more intimate.
Layering, precision and separation are pretty much equally good but as the UERRs’ bass appears a little “slower” in comparison, they come across as slightly blurrier/less precise on fast and dense tracks.
Etymotic ER-4S:
In terms of flatness and accuracy, I hear my ER-4S as superior to my UERM that have about 3 dB stronger bass quantity, are more relaxed in the presence range in comparison, and brighter past 10 kHz due to the peak that they have there, and which also makes their treble response come across as ultimately less even and realistic compared to the Etymotic (and UERR to-go), although that’s criticism on a rather high level.
As a result, the ER-4S are even more critical to the recording and even less forgiving, and more sterile sounding (which is something that I consider a very positive aspect while others may not).
While I prefer my ER-4S’ even flatter, less forgiving, more sterile tuning, when it comes to bass speed, control, micro details and note separation, I definitely perceive the UERM as audibly superior, as they have more detail headroom for the recording to pushing them to their limits.
The same as for the resolution can be said about the soundstage that appears to be a good bit larger than the ER-4S’ and “gives in” less early in comparison when very dense and fast arrangements are played back.
InEar ProPhile 8:
In contrast to the Etymotic in-ears, both represent more of a “natural neutral” kind of tuning, and the ProPhile 8 are actually pretty closely tuned to the UERM, but even more so to the UERR to-go (they sound almost similar to the UERMs’ successors).
To my ears, the ProPhile 8 have got pretty much exactly 0.5 dB less bass than the UERM, are slightly less “warm” in the fundamental range/lower midrange, sound a tad darker in the presence range at 2 kHz (but similar at 3 kHz), and are pretty similar in the rest of the treble except for the UERMs’ super treble peak.
Resolution-wise, I would place the ProPhile 8 even a little above the UERM (not that it really mattered the vast majority of the time, but in the rare cases when the UERM start to show traces of “caving in”/becoming ever so slightly “uncomfortable” with the recording, the ProPhine 8 don’t yet), with the tighter, faster and better controlled lows in direct comparison, and generally somewhat higher resolution and note separation, wherefore they deliver just that bit of extra resolution I rarely demanded from my UERM with very dense, fast and complex tracks.
To my ears, the UERMs’ soundstage is audibly larger in comparison to that of the InEar. Nonetheless, just as with the resolution, the ProPhile 8s’ soundstage remains rock-solid during fast, complex and dense recordings without starting to appear foggy.
Conclusion:
Recommended.
Neutral sound signature with high technical performance and authentic, precise soundstage. Only very shy of being “highly recommended” because of the upper treble/super treble peak.
Photos:
I only give full stars. My ranking/scoring system does not necessarily follow the norm and is about as follows:
5 stars: The product is very good and received the "highly recommended" award from me.
4 stars: The product is very good and received the "recommended" award from me.
3 stars: The product is good/very good, but not outstanding/special enough to get any of my two awards. ["Thumbs Up"]
2 stars: The product is only about average or even somewhat below that and somewhat flawed/flawed in some areas. [neither "Thumbs Up" nor "Thumbs Down"]
1 star: The product is bad/severely flawed to outright bad. ["Thumbs Down"]
Ultimate Ears Reference Monitors
Source:
Personal unit.
Miscellaneous:
I opted for the standard design, long silver cable and large carrying case.
Fairly nice unboxing experience with a nice, high quality, large cardboard case.
The acrylic shells are 3D-printed, of high quality and feature nice coloured side indicators.
I really like that the three drivers, crossover, cables and sound tubes with dampers are visible.
I like the spacious, sturdy, black powder-coated carrying case that is nicely and softly padded on the inside. A cleaning tool with a dedicated cut-out in that carrying case is included, too.
The cable with four twisted conductors below the y-split is of high quality and nicely flexible and soft; it’s definitely one I really like aesthetically and in terms of how it feels.
2-pin connectors.
The fit, seal and comfort are excellent for me, nonetheless I personally rather prefer the handling of universal fit in-ears and would have bought my UERM as such if that option existed back then.
Three Balanced Armature drivers per side; three acoustic ways; dual-bore sound output.
Sound:
They are custom-moulded after my physical ear impressions taken by the official nearby Ultimate Ears distributor who 3D-scanned them and also shipped them to the UE headquarters as physical backup.
Tonality:
Neutral to bright-neutral.
I always perceived my UERM as the closest match to my personal perception of “flat neutral”, even though they subjectively didn’t fully achieve this (up until I finally discovered the Etymotic ER-4S (and then their successors, the ER4SR) which come extremely close to that and have suprassed my UERM for this purpose) when listening to music, sine sweeps or noise signals, even though they were definitely a step up in terms of flatness (and especially resolution) to my Shure SE425 which were the in-ears I probably used most until about late 2014.
That said, while the bass is very flat and extends flat down into the real sub-bass without any roll-off, it is a little lifted to my ears by about 3 dB, which adds just a tiny bit of body to the sound, and spills ever so slightly into the midrange but without necessarily colouring it – after all, these are ultimately still some of the flattest sounding in-ears that were made.
The midrange timbre is mostly spot-on to my ears, with the upper mids/presence range being just slightly more on the relaxed side, which gives the UERM a still very revealing and honest, but somewhat more relaxed (I’m not using the word “musical” as this isn’t really a colouration and the UERM are still more present here than many other in-ears), less brutally revealing than in-ears with a more diffuse-field oriented midrange tuning such as my ER-4S.
So ultimately what I hear is an accurate midrange reproduction that is just slightly closer to the “prosumer neutral” than the “studio neutral” side.
Above that, except for the ~5 kHz range that, just like on my ER-4S, is a bit more recessed than flat-neutral to my ears, the highs are neutral, accurate and flat to my ears until the super treble is reached: here, the UERM have a peak between 10 kHz and 13 kHz, and it is not exactly subtle – if an instrument or song hits exactly this range, which however happens rather rarely, the highs can appear sharp, even to the point of nearly unbearable, which is somewhat unfortunate as otherwise and most of the time, the treble response is very accurate, even and realistic.
Therefore the UERM represent, in a positive way, an “unspectacular” and mostly flat-neutral sound that clearly falls into the neutral category, although they are ultimately not as flat (/”sterile”) sounding to my ears compared to Etymotic’s ER-4S, ER4SR and ER2SE, and can become a bit strident sounding if there is plenty of information in the range between 10 kHz and 13 kHz, which is however thankfully rather rarely the case.
Frequency Response:
Etymotic ER-4S-Compensation
As I cannot get my UERM inserted deep enough into the coupler to its reference plane-ish position since I have got large ear canals, the upper treble/super treble peak shown on both compensation graphs is obviously exaggerated by at least 15 to 20 dB. As for the furthest peak to the right, I agree with it and would even say that it is more pronounced in my ears when performing sine sweeps than on the graph.
Other than that, this (ER-4S-Compensation) is pretty much exactly how I perceive my UERM.
InEar ProPhile 8-Compensation
Resolution:
Very high and definitely flagship territory.
It is very rare that the UERM are brought to their limits, and even then, if the recording is very dense, fast, complex and demanding, thy aren’t actually stressed or pushed to their actual limits, but rather pushed somewhat out of their comfort zone.
The bass is very clean, tight and fast, and doesn’t lack any resolution.
Micro details in the midrange are also resolved very well, with fine vocal details being uncovered easily.
Treble resolution is on a very high technical level as well, which is also why they peak above 10 kHz is (most of the time) not perceived as too annoying or unpleasant; high note separation is clean.
Fast and complex music material is not problematic with the UERM which represent it effortlessly.
While there are areas where my Campfire Audio Andromeda may have an edge over my UERM and while I would place my InEar ProPhile 8 (just a little) higher than my UERM in terms of micro details, they are nevertheless excellent, flagship-territory in-ears whose resolution and speed I would definitely put above that of my Etymotic ER-4S, Fischer Amps FA-3E, or the Noble Audio SAVANNA when it comes to other in-ears that fall into the category of a neutral tuning.
Soundstage:
Quite large and holographic, although not as large and spectacular to my ears than that of the UE18 Pro or my Andromeda.
While the UERMs’ stage is not the “best”, biggest or most precise I have heard from in-ears, it is nonetheless very good, with very clean instrument placement and the ability to cleanly reproduce “empty” space between and around instruments/tonal elements, without any bleed or fog.
- - - - - - - - - - - -
Comparisons:
Noble Audio SAVANNA:
The SAVANNA are slightly bassier and warmer in comparison, but roll off somewhat towards the sub-bass.
Midrange timbre is comparable while the Noble in-ears are tuned even more relaxed in the presence range.
The same goes for the middle treble and treble in general where the SAVANNA present a more relaxed tuning as well; in terms of super treble transition/the 10 kHz to 13 kHz area, I hear the SAVANNA as being superior (more realistic timbre).
When it comes to technical performance, the UERM have the somewhat faster, tighter and at the same time somewhat better controlled lows.
The difference is lesser in the midrange and treble, although the UERM also come out as more detailed here.
Soundstage and imaging precision is where the UERM also outperform the SAVANNA.
Ultimate Ears Reference Remastered to-go:
Bass quantity is pretty much similar while subjectively, the UERR appear slightly warmer, fuller in comparison, which is most likely due to the lack of the super treble peak that the UERM have whereas their successors do not. As a result, they definitely sound less analytical.
When it comes to the midrange, the UERRs’ appears closer, more intimate in the mix, with just a touch more perceived lower midrange body while still maintaining a mostly correct, neutral timbre.
In terms of the rest of the treble, both are pretty much similar to my ears, however the UERR do not have the UERMs’ 10 kHz to 13 kHz peak, wherefore they sound smoother, more realistic (“correct”) and more linear in the highs to me, which is a definite plus and, in my opinion, also a rather substantial improvement, however due to that, they are also perceived as “warmer” in comparison and lack that “UERM magic”.
While both in-ear models are on a very high technical level, the UERM appear a bit faster and tighter in the bass compared to the UERR whose lower notes seem to linger just a bit more, which is why they ultimately come across as somewhat tighter, faster and better controlled sounding than their successors that seem to have somewhat more body and decay despite not having any more bass quantity.
Directly compared, the UERMs’ soundstage appears to be somewhat more spatial and wider to my ears, with the UERR presenting the imaginary stage closer to the listener, which makes them appear more intimate.
Layering, precision and separation are pretty much equally good but as the UERRs’ bass appears a little “slower” in comparison, they come across as slightly blurrier/less precise on fast and dense tracks.
Etymotic ER-4S:
In terms of flatness and accuracy, I hear my ER-4S as superior to my UERM that have about 3 dB stronger bass quantity, are more relaxed in the presence range in comparison, and brighter past 10 kHz due to the peak that they have there, and which also makes their treble response come across as ultimately less even and realistic compared to the Etymotic (and UERR to-go), although that’s criticism on a rather high level.
As a result, the ER-4S are even more critical to the recording and even less forgiving, and more sterile sounding (which is something that I consider a very positive aspect while others may not).
While I prefer my ER-4S’ even flatter, less forgiving, more sterile tuning, when it comes to bass speed, control, micro details and note separation, I definitely perceive the UERM as audibly superior, as they have more detail headroom for the recording to pushing them to their limits.
The same as for the resolution can be said about the soundstage that appears to be a good bit larger than the ER-4S’ and “gives in” less early in comparison when very dense and fast arrangements are played back.
InEar ProPhile 8:
In contrast to the Etymotic in-ears, both represent more of a “natural neutral” kind of tuning, and the ProPhile 8 are actually pretty closely tuned to the UERM, but even more so to the UERR to-go (they sound almost similar to the UERMs’ successors).
To my ears, the ProPhile 8 have got pretty much exactly 0.5 dB less bass than the UERM, are slightly less “warm” in the fundamental range/lower midrange, sound a tad darker in the presence range at 2 kHz (but similar at 3 kHz), and are pretty similar in the rest of the treble except for the UERMs’ super treble peak.
Resolution-wise, I would place the ProPhile 8 even a little above the UERM (not that it really mattered the vast majority of the time, but in the rare cases when the UERM start to show traces of “caving in”/becoming ever so slightly “uncomfortable” with the recording, the ProPhine 8 don’t yet), with the tighter, faster and better controlled lows in direct comparison, and generally somewhat higher resolution and note separation, wherefore they deliver just that bit of extra resolution I rarely demanded from my UERM with very dense, fast and complex tracks.
To my ears, the UERMs’ soundstage is audibly larger in comparison to that of the InEar. Nonetheless, just as with the resolution, the ProPhile 8s’ soundstage remains rock-solid during fast, complex and dense recordings without starting to appear foggy.
Conclusion:
Recommended.
Neutral sound signature with high technical performance and authentic, precise soundstage. Only very shy of being “highly recommended” because of the upper treble/super treble peak.
Photos: