Received my pair this weekend, have burned in for about 14 hours so far - already enjoying them quite a bit. No obvious / glaring faults for a $50 pair of earphones, and the seal and comfort level are better (for my ears) than my previous pair of ER-4S's. Definitely a great choice for budget...

Desmand, if "is like hell" is your way of asking if they sound bad without an amp, no. I'm new here and just picked up a pair of 595's (coming off of 497's originally, then ety er-4p's) and they sound pretty darn decent straight off my iMac's headphone jack. Of course, I'd imagine that an amp...