TONALITY: 8.8/10
TECHNICALITIES: 8.5/10
TIMBRE: 9/10
IMAGING: 7.5/10
SOUNDSTAGE: 8.5/10
MUSICALITY (subjective): 9.5/10
CONSTRUCTION: 9/10
ACCESSORIES: 9.5/10
SOUND VALUE: 8.5/10
INTRO
Soundrhyme is a chinese audio company from Xiamen, China, that begin working as OEM maker in 2017 then founded Soundrhyme official in 2019.
Like alot of other chinese company working as OEM in audio, they earn experience working for other and then go on their own with the experience they earn.
Unlike alot of chifi companies that get unnoticed, SR already has a solid fan base, thanks to their cost effect hybrid 1DD+4BA SR5, then apart their entry level SR1, it seem every of their release get positive reception.
In my case, it was the 1DD+6BA SR7 that trigger great interest in this company that don’t tune IEM with Harman target as reference, which is a blessing for me that prefer warm or sweet mids that don’t create shouty fatigue. The SR7 was a big love story and something still extremely competitive one year after it’s launch.
Them based on graph balance, I’ve selected the DTE500 to review because i’m a big fan of tribrid using sonion EST and well, the graph seem to promess lush bassy sweetness.
Priced 460$, the DTE500 is a 1DD+2BA (sonion for mids, knowles for highs)+2 sonion electrostat (EST), this price alone worth to trigger our attention since it’s among cheapest tribrid of this type.
Now let see in this review if it deliver a mix of musicality and technical performance that should make curious our wallet.
CONSTRUCTION&ACCESSORIES
The DTE500 are pure candies for they eyes, and every time i share pics of those i get wow effect comments. The housing is average to big size depending your ears size, it’s made of skin friendly medical grade resin plastic that is very smooth and their a glossy finish over eyes catching sparkly gold leaves. This is a IEM that feel like kilobucks in eyes and hands and the smooth CIEM organic shape permit a high level of isolation.
Why? Because it’s fully sealed. Which mean their no proper venting too for pressure release, this can cause rare instance of driver flex squeaky noise, but it doesn’t affect negatively the sound experience once it’s insert. Yet, it’s something to be noted for those sensitive about that.
The top has a 2pin connector that isn’t recessed, so be cautious to don’t bent the pin. I don’t struggle slipping them into female connector and insertion isn’t too loose nor too tight.
The nozzle is average long with an organic ear canal like shape, it’s large too and has 3 tubed holes, this mean you should be aware ti not block any with too small ear tips nozzle. It’s more thinked for shallow fit than very deep fit.
All in all, excellent construction and personally, the benefit oof high isolation surpass negativity of intermittent driver flex for me.
Now, when it come to the cable, we are well spoit with a 3in1 modular, It’s a single crystal copper plated thick silver cable, the material is full of 48 cores in each core. 6 strands 0.06X7 0.1X1 coaxial twisted Litz structure weave, the skin uses transparent and environmental protection TPU material, visible real material. The quality feel excellent and the signal transmission is clean and crisp, which benefit warm tonality of DTE500.
In term of packaging, we are spoil again with a very generous amount of goods. It come not with one but 2 high quality case. One in metal that feel invincible and will be perfect for survivalist wanting to stay audiophile in upcoming apocalypse, and a second one more elegant, made of leather and spacious enough.
Then we have 2 pairs of memory foams tips and 3 pairs of wide bore silicone eartips. Oddly enough, no short wide bore eartips, which is the one I find more appropriate for an IEM with big nozzle.
All in all, very positive construction and accessories impressions.
SOUND IMPRESSIONS
The DTE500 balance can be perceived as bassy mid centric to smooth neutral with sub bass boost, it has a colorful buttery character to it, free of harsh edge or texture abrasiveness.
The overall timbre is buttery, liquid and organic, very smooth and rarely if ever sharpened or boosted in noise info. We are into sonion balanced armature sweetness, well filter-damped and very sweet to their ears, not bity or sketchy.
The bass is warm, dense and mellow in impact yet meaty in potent weight. It has good rumble sustain that adds a sense of vibrancy to slam release as well as cello stroke, which can go grunty with softened distortion stridency.
It’s not what i would call a fast and thigh bass, and it shine more with slow music genre like soul, R&B, pop and rap than fast rock or jazz with complex rhythm section where kick drum need fast edge to it’s attack, which will be lacking with the DTE500 softed thumping and creamy bass line.
Yet, it doesn’t mean it blurs the mid range with its inherent warmth release, thanks to tribrid configuration, the mids are layered upon this wide chunky lush bass response.
Cello lover will be in for alot of joy, since the restitution is natural and magnify in lush density, you will never confound cello with violin with the DTE500.
I find this bass to pair very well with soul, r&B and pop due to big rumbly slam with pleasant colorful timbre.
Overall bass can be summarized as dark in definition, tactile in density, right in tone but creamed in texture details, it favor bass line before kick presence, which isn’t very clean nor easily readable.
The mids are the best part of the show for me, instruments and vocals are sweet like honey without being too sticky. The layering is open yet embraces you intimately, making the DTE500 mid centric and focused on acoustic instruments like piano, saxo, cello and violin but without the upper mids bite and abrasiveness.
But let’s begin with female vocals, those are magnificently smooth, lush and natural with a wide and full presence free of any sibilance, harshness or shoutyness, these aren’t plain loud and screamy yet forward due to wide and well layered delivery.
Breathy vocals will never lack air, while soprano will never pierce your ear drum, it’s pure delicacy that captivate and immerse for long listening pleasure free of fatigue or tone over brightening that can affect cohesion of an enveloping liquid musicality.
Piano lover will be in heaven with the DTE500 since the tone is full and rendering don’t have sudden high pitch note loudness that will unsettled the listener, it’s fast and laid back playin that favor color naturalness without adding much edge or texture info to note, each stroke release wide note with a lush sustain to it that blossom in air and keep it’s layering. In jazz trio, pianist will be focus but not in a monitoring way, more like if you were sit back of piano and get spoil with fullness of instrument resonance, united way so you don’t pick up too much finger or string noise nor the infamous Glenn Gould weirdo singing.
These are very sweet mids for sure, with a wide presence that is sirupy not papery or plasticy at all, BA timbre hater will be very happy: the sonion BA is sugared.
Then the note weight is heavy but don’t have edgy tapping to it, it’s no analytical mid range here, it’s intimate and immersive, as well I would not suggest those to Harman target lover cause pina gain and upper mids boost will feel to low and I guess they will be deaf feeling.
And now the smooth near dark treble which is sparkly and brilliant too, and organically balanced, is something unique in my audio journey which means it’s hard to describe too. It’s like trying to explain the form delimitation of an impressionistic painting. It’s there, it’s rich and far from dull, the extension passes the 10khz bar and even has air but it’s not a bright and crunchy treble, it doesn't boost texture grain nor micro details, even bad recording will be forgiven with the DTE500 gentle highs.
It means it’s colored too, and thickens with extra lower harmonics.
The violin flow without abrasive bite in attack lead, it’s liquid and dense, smooth in presence loudness but wide and holographic, it never feel recessed or off tone but super fast playin of Hilary Hann will be harder to read since each note will not have proper clean silence between them, it’s glued with euphonic warmth.
The 2 EST seem to focus on percussion rendering and this adds an extra dimension to the sound, it’s crisp and speedy this time yet doesn't feel detached due to intimate presentation as a whole and not too loud ultra highs. This adds a sense of well needed immediacy to jazz, pop and R&B by sharpening the presence of a percussions line which is easy to track. Those have this appealing natural brilliance and metallic snap too, which only EST or very good DD can offer.
This mean the acoustic guitar too sound fabulous, and that when you go bass less music like with folk singer songwriter, the result will be mesmerizing, the vocalist will have focused presence with wide lush natural timbre and it’s guitar playing will be clean, airy and sparkly, not lacking in fundamental note nor in inherent crispness of it’s string pulling and release.
To my ears, this is a very refined treble, a bit like adding EST to Final E5000 IEM, it’s non fatiguing yet captivating, and the fact it’s not analytical keep a part of mystery to your music that you want to get lost in, as well, EST deliver delicate vividity, not a trebly in your face snapping and sparkling, it’s anti splashing in fact and ultimately very sane for your hearing health.
With the right eartips, soundstage can go quite wide and tall, but never really deep, it’s like an intimate cocoon you wanna hide in, the center stage isn’t recessed and you’r in the middle of it which explain it’s not far away and hall like sounding. It’s a stereo tapestry that is well stretched and doesn't scoop frontal projections which embrace you.
Then, if we are in warm territory, it means it’s no monitor IEM accuracy but all this driver's permit an impressively open and holographic macro dynamic with good layering that avoids muddyness. If I can be esoteric, I'll say the soul (tone) of instruments are better layered than their edgy presence, but ultimately, it’s quite hard to properly position instruments since you melt into them.
Side notes:
At 17ohm of impedance and 112db of sensitivity, DTE500 are easy to drive but a bit source picky, they will not like alot of impedance gain yet need good power to wake up EST drivers too. This happen with all tribrid with EST i own (7), they shine with humble Xduoo X20 which has lower than 1ohm of impedance and no bass boost, with Penon Tail or Xduoo XD05plus it can go too warm and bassy for ex.
Then the ear tips are very important, since the nozzle is thick and have 3 hole you need a proper wide bore to open up soundstage otherwise their will be interference between soundwave which compress and mess up imaging and spatiality.
Then, cables will inflict too but the stock one is good enough, you can still scale up with something like Simgot LC7 (dont pass 100$ bar for cable upgrade since it's conter intuitive).
COMPARISONS
VS KINERA URD (2DD+1BA+2EST-650$)
The Urd is more U shaped and less mids centric and punchy.
The bass has less slam and chunk to it, it’s thinner and more resonant, less warm and thick in rumble.
The mids are again thinner, a notch bright and their more upper mids push, the definition is more edgy and sense of transparency and openness is higher. It seems more recessed too, more compressed in presence of instrument, less lush and natural in timbre, less vocal centric and lighter in note weight of piano too.
The treble is cleaner, thinner and dryer with the Urd, it’s less energetically snappy, more tamed in dynamic, less full in rendering. Brilliance and sparkle are more lively with the DTE500.
The soundstage is wider with DTE500, but not as tall and deep as the airier Urd.
Imaging isn’t masterful with both of these, even if more transparent in layering, Urd feel like a flat sheet with extra bass boost and upper mids push, it isn't as tactile and well articulate in sound layer wich feel on same level, percussions are easier to pinpoint with the DTE500 and mids and bass is fuller and more realistically articulate than the Urd.
All in all, unless bass warmth traumatize you, the DTE500 is superior both tonally and technically, the odd choice of using only one BA for mids and low-mid treble show the limitation of macro dynamic rendering which ultimately play big part of musical experience, this make me say: DTE500 is perfect upgrade from priciest Urd if you want as smooth overall balance with lusher mids, more natural and impactful bass and snappier treble.
VS LETSHUOER EJ07M (1DD+2BA+4EST-660$)
The OJ07M is more neutral, transparently bright and crisper and more airy sparkly.
Everything sounds cleaner as well as thinner with EJ07M, and clarity is notably higher.
The bass is less chunky and has thinner mid bass to lower mids transition, it’s more mature but can deliver a good amount of rumble when asked for which is less opaque and lush than DTE500 slower, warmer and darker bass.
Mids are crisper and more open, it’s monitor level in terms of edgy clarity, upper mids are brighter and timbre for vocals isn’t as sweet and natural, male vocals are notably thinner and overall mids seem a bit more recessed and compressed in the middle of stage.
Treble is notably more vivid and sparkly, it’s snappier and extracts a greater amount of sound info, it has more air and whole percussion range is well resolved while DTE500 will add warmth to it which makes highs a bit thicker and less sharp in definition.
Soundstage is notably wider with the DTE500, while notably deeper and cleaner-airier with EJ07M.
Imaging is a league ahead with the EJ07M, no competition here.
All in all, these 2 should marry together since they complement each other so well, i can see myself living with only these 2 IEMs ... .if i was forced to. Simply put, EJ07M is the technical beast while DTE500 the musical beauty.
CONCLUSION
While no end game in term of technicalities, it might be for some in term of musicality since the DTE500 excell to deliver a rich immersive and fun musical experience with natural timbre, inviting male and female vocal, smooth fatigue free overal balance and even crispness on top.
Yet, we are spoil with tonal goodness with the DTE500, but you need to lover lower mids and overall warm tonality, when I say no end game in performance, I mean it's not a technical sounding tribrid but it certainly not underwhelming in this department too! The holographic effortless layering that surround listener will sure impress, and the EST treble while not boosted to please treble heads and pierce the one of other, is something highly fascinating that add this technical superiority, mixed with an overal relaxed and warm tonality from dynamic and balanced armature drivers.
As an audiophile with more than 10 years of critical listening experience, I learn that lot of IEM are tuned like monitor and don't magnify musical experience for the soul but the brain, this ultimately push me further from music and being able to reconnect with my very wide variety of music with the DTE500 is a true blessing.
If you are an harman tuning lover, stay away of those, but for anybody else that seek ultimate musical experience in sub-500$ price range, this is a good bet because it's the cheapest tribrid with EST and one of the best too in term of lush natural balance.
Very Highly recommended (unless you want clean analytical sound and consider warmth as mud)
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PS: I want to thanks Penon for sending me this review sample after i manifest my interest to test them. Unlike many SEO obsess audio store that use affiliated program to redeem their reviewers, Penon don't do this and this is why I collab with them: i refuse all affiliated programs and despise them.
You can order the Soundrhyme DTE500 for 459$ here: https://penonaudio.com/sound-rhyme-dte500.html
It’s the immersion tuning. I’m proud of myself to not jumping to conclusions too quick, as most of commercial reviewers do, they have too many IEMs to review and give a very quick 5 sec listening on judging IEMs, which I feel that’s just a thin slice of the experience you’d get from actual users standpoint who paid the real money to the IEM]
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