[Rockwell75]

Maybe it can be agreed that it's a little of both while being entirely neither-- the it's its own thing.

 

[WhatToChoose]

An IEM should be able to isolate decently. I don't wanna be stuck with an LCD i4 on a 12 hour long flight with a crying baby on board. LCD i4 is not an IEM. You are the first person I've met that's claiming them to be. Most people refer them to be on ears which is exactly what they are. They don't isolate for sht.

Also, read my username, you literally quoted my post before that post.

The poor isolation was one of my hesitations with this IEM as a potential future purchase. External noises are quite distracting when listening to music, and since from where I live it would render these essentially unusable.

Also, @Mrcojocaru , the reason I did not reply is because your response was not worth replying to. I posted an irrefutable fact, and you got triggered. There is nothing more to say. If you want numbers as an example: a 100 dB sinusoidal tone will drown out a 90 dB sinusoidal tone of the same frequency (inteference due to phase of the signals may apply as well, but we can average out constructive and destructive interference to assume no effect in general). Apply this basic concept to random noise, and you got the "drowning out" part that IEMs do. Good day

 

[seamon]

Maybe it can be agreed that it's a little of both while being entirely neither-- the it's its own thing.

I think my point is being misunderstood here. LCD i4 is def unlike any traditional IEM we have ever seen before. That said, it can be reluctantly called an In Ear Monitor since it uses tips which goes in one's ears. If by that definition you can want to call it in an in ear then sure, by all means.

That said, my point is - it's not a very useful device and it's not a very useful in ear monitor because it provides 0 isolation. Custom In Ear Monitors were designed to protect a musician's hearing on stage. Is a LCD-i4 useful in this scenario? No.

Many people use IEMs outside while travelling etc where there's considerable noise. Is a LCD-i4 useful in this scenario? No.

What about sound leakage while with others? LCD i4 is prolly useless here too.

The only use case I can see of the LCD i4 is maybe walking alone and at home.

This is why LCD-i4 is not an upgrade to a traditional IEM like Solaris. It's like saying LCD 4 is an upgrade to the Solaris. While true, a full sized headphone will not provide you the versatility of an IEM like Solaris. LCD-i4 is def more versatile than a full sized headphones but it's no where near the versatility of a true IEM. You don't go about recommending a helicopter when someone asks for an upgrade to a car.

This is where my earlier reluctance to classify it as an in ear comes in. It's just a different category of product compared to a traditional IEM. It's in-between IEMs and headphones.

 

[seamon]

The poor isolation was one of my hesitations with this IEM as a potential future purchase. External noises are quite distracting when listening to music, and since from where I live it would render these essentially unusable.

Pretty much. I never even auditioned it as I don't see a use case where this 'IEM' will be useful to me.

 

[Rockwell75]

I think my point is being misunderstood here. LCD i4 is def unlike any traditional IEM we have ever seen before. That said, it can be reluctantly called an In Ear Monitor since it uses tips which goes in one's ears. If by that definition you can want to call it in an in ear then sure, by all means.

That said, my point is - it's not a very useful device and it's not a very useful in ear monitor because it provides 0 isolation. Custom In Ear Monitors were designed to protect a musician's hearing on stage. Is a LCD-i4 useful in this scenario? No.

Many people use IEMs outside while travelling etc where there's considerable noise. Is a LCD-i4 useful in this scenario? No.

What about sound leakage while with others? LCD i4 is prolly useless here too.

The only use case I can see of the LCD i4 is maybe walking alone and at home.

This is why LCD-i4 is not an upgrade to a traditional IEM like Solaris. It's like saying LCD 4 is an upgrade to the Solaris. While true, a full sized headphone will not provide you the versatility of an IEM like Solaris.

LCD-i4 is def more versatile than a full sized headphones but it's no where near the versatility of a true IEM.

I've never thought of LCDi4 as an upgrade to Solaris-- or any other TOTL IEM beyond the fact that, under conditions that suit it, it is said to sound better than any of them. As you say its lack of isolation very much limits its practicality and for many people times when it would be useful, ie., at home, would be better spent with proper open back headphones. However as someone who doesn't really like wearing full size cans, who doesn't have the inclination to invest in desktop gear and who listens to a lot of music at home, the LCDi4 has definitely piqued my interest as a decent compromise to get the experience of proper headphones-- they're definitely something I'm going to keep on my shortlist as a potential complement to the Solaris. I'm actually curious to try them when I'm cycling, where it's not necessarily a good thing to have all the sounds of the outside world blocked out.

 

[seamon]

I've never thought of LCDi4 as an upgrade to Solaris-- or any other TOTL IEM beyond the fact that, under conditions that suit it, it is said to sound better than any of them. As you say its lack of isolation very much limits its practicality and for many people times when it would be useful, ie., at home, would be better spent with proper open back headphones. However as someone who doesn't really like wearing full size cans, who doesn't have the inclination to invest in desktop gear and who listens to a lot of music at home, the LCDi4 has definitely piqued my interest as a decent compromise to get the experience of proper headphones-- they're definitely something I'm going to keep on my shortlist as a potential complement to the Solaris. I'm actually curious to try them when I'm cycling, where it's not necessarily a good thing to have all the sounds of the outside world blocked out.

Yea I prefer not to listen to in ears at home because I kinda don't like having something stuck in my ear. I much prefer speakers at home.

 

[Malevolint]

I'm not arguing about versatility or isolation.. literally just that it goes into your damn ear lol. If isolation is needed to qualify as in ear, then what would you call the Unique Melody Mirage or Maven? One has an open and the other a semi-open driver.

Also, useless? Come on. Iems are good, but they are not as good as headphones in the same price range for the most part. The i4 is better than any IEM I've owned in terms of sound quality and up there with my Eikon, probably even surpassing it. They're also more comfortable than all of my IEMs and headphones as well, so there's that.

 

[Deezel177]

I'm not arguing about versatility or isolation.. literally just that it goes into your damn ear lol. If isolation is needed to qualify as in ear, then what would you call the Unique Melody Mirage or Maven? One has an open and the other a semi-open driver.

Also, useless? Come on. Iems are good, but they are not as good as headphones in the same price range for the most part. The i4 is better than any IEM I've owned in terms of sound quality and up there with my Eikon, probably even surpassing it. They're also more comfortable than all of my IEMs and headphones as well, so there's that.

I'm reluctant to respond to this ongoing debate, because it's the epitome of off-topic. But, since it has something to do with the Solaris in at least a tangential way (i.e. TAEC technology), I must mention that there's a difference between (semi-)open drivers and (semi-)open head/earphones. For convenience's sake, I'll just say open to represent all degrees of openness; from semi- to fully-open. In the same way, I'll say headphones to represent both earphones and headphones for this comparison alone. The open in open headphones refers to the enclosure or chassis. The open chassis exposes the driver (and therefore, the ear) to the surroundings, which results in several sonic qualities, but also results in the loss of isolation.

This is not the same as an open driver. An open driver refers to a balanced armature driver that's had its lid removed, such that it radiates freely instead of through a spout or a sound tube. Or, this is at least how 64 Audio's popular tia technology works. I can't guarantee that it's 100% the same concept in other iterations. The difference between open drivers and open headphones, is that open drivers can exist in a sealed enclosure. Again, the tia driver is an open driver, but it's installed in a 64 Audio IEM that can provide between -15 or -20dB of isolation (depending on the apex module). If you use the solid module from their earplug line, you'll get -26dB of isolation. Similarly, the Maven and Mirage use open drivers, but they're inside a sealed enclosure, so they do provide isolation. In addition, the Maven's open-driver isn't technically a sound-producing device. It acts more as a noise-cancelling apparatus that @project86 gets into more in his review here: https://www.head-fi.org/threads/review-unique-melody-maven-and-mason-v3-iems.905639/

 

[crinacle]

I'm reluctant to respond to this ongoing debate, because it's the epitome of off-topic. But, since it has something to do with the Solaris in at least a tangential way (i.e. TAEC technology), I must mention that there's a difference between (semi-)open drivers and (semi-)open head/earphones. For convenience's sake, I'll just say open to represent all degrees of openness; from semi- to fully-open. In the same way, I'll say headphones to represent both earphones and headphones for this comparison alone. The open in open headphones refers to the enclosure or chassis. The open chassis exposes the driver (and therefore, the ear) to the surroundings, which results in several sonic qualities, but also results in the loss of isolation.

This is not the same as an open driver. An open driver refers to a balanced armature driver that's had its lid removed, such that it radiates freely instead of through a spout or a sound tube. Or, this is at least how 64 Audio's popular tia technology works. I can't guarantee that it's 100% the same concept in other iterations. The difference between open drivers and open headphones, is that open drivers can exist in a sealed enclosure. Again, the tia driver is an open driver, but it's installed in a 64 Audio IEM that can provide between -15 or -20dB of isolation (depending on the apex module). If you use the solid module from their earplug line, you'll get -26dB of isolation. Similarly, the Maven and Mirage use open drivers, but they're inside a sealed enclosure, so they do provide isolation. In addition, the Maven's open-driver isn't technically a sound-producing device. It acts more as a noise-cancelling apparatus that @project86 gets into more in his review here: https://www.head-fi.org/threads/review-unique-melody-maven-and-mason-v3-iems.905639/

I'll drop a bit of pedantry but it's good educational material for the interested anyways.

Technically the tia driver is referred to as a "direct-radiating driver" (you can read more about it here but it's fairly down the article), though on marketing it's referred to as an open driver for simplicity's sake (read: marketing is hardly ever right). When the term "open" or "closed" is used it's usually in reference to the system, though it's not uncommon for people to refer to open systems as open drivers as there's technically no such thing as a "closed driver".

So... I can see why direct-radiating/top-port balanced armatures can be referred as "open drivers" but doing so also creates more misunderstanding since the opposite "closed driver" implies that its output resonates within itself and does not escape the confines of its enclosure, and so you don't hear anything at all. My point being, all drivers are already assumed to be "open" and so when someone refers to an "open driver" it's just a different way of talking about an open system (vice versa for a "closed driver").

 

[Malevolint]

I'm reluctant to respond to this ongoing debate, because it's the epitome of off-topic. But, since it has something to do with the Solaris in at least a tangential way (i.e. TAEC technology), I must mention that there's a difference between (semi-)open drivers and (semi-)open head/earphones. For convenience's sake, I'll just say open to represent all degrees of openness; from semi- to fully-open. In the same way, I'll say headphones to represent both earphones and headphones for this comparison alone. The open in open headphones refers to the enclosure or chassis. The open chassis exposes the driver (and therefore, the ear) to the surroundings, which results in several sonic qualities, but also results in the loss of isolation.

This is not the same as an open driver. An open driver refers to a balanced armature driver that's had its lid removed, such that it radiates freely instead of through a spout or a sound tube. Or, this is at least how 64 Audio's popular tia technology works. I can't guarantee that it's 100% the same concept in other iterations. The difference between open drivers and open headphones, is that open drivers can exist in a sealed enclosure. Again, the tia driver is an open driver, but it's installed in a 64 Audio IEM that can provide between -15 or -20dB of isolation (depending on the apex module). If you use the solid module from their earplug line, you'll get -26dB of isolation. Similarly, the Maven and Mirage use open drivers, but they're inside a sealed enclosure, so they do provide isolation. In addition, the Maven's open-driver isn't technically a sound-producing device. It acts more as a noise-cancelling apparatus that @project86 gets into more in his review here: https://www.head-fi.org/threads/review-unique-melody-maven-and-mason-v3-iems.905639/

I'll drop a bit of pedantry but it's good educational material for the interested anyways.

Technically the tia driver is referred to as a "direct-radiating driver" (you can read more about it here but it's fairly down the article), though on marketing it's referred to as an open driver for simplicity's sake (read: marketing is hardly ever right). When the term "open" or "closed" is used it's usually in reference to the system, though it's not uncommon for people to refer to open systems as open drivers as there's technically no such thing as a "closed driver".

So... I can see why direct-radiating/top-port balanced armatures can be referred as "open drivers" but doing so also creates more misunderstanding since the opposite "closed driver" implies that its output resonates within itself and does not escape the confines of its enclosure, and so you don't hear anything at all. My point being, all drivers are already assumed to be "open" and so when someone refers to an "open driver" it's just a different way of talking about an open system (vice versa for a "closed driver").

Thanks for dropping some real info in response to our quibbling. I did actually learn something! So the Maven and Mirage are not open/semi-open systems? They look like it with their seemingly porous outter shell material. That probably results in terrible isolation. I could find any real info though.. not from a quick search at least.

 

[Deezel177]

Thanks for dropping some real info in response to our quibbling. I did actually learn something! So the Maven and Mirage are not open/semi-open systems? They look like it with their seemingly porous outter shell material. That probably results in terrible isolation. I could find any real info though.. not from a quick search at least.

Nah, those intricate structures are purely cosmetic as far as I know. It's still a sealed in-ear behind all that.

 

[ThePeave]

On the topic of the Solaris, I was having some minor comfort issues that I found a fix for and wanted to post in case anyone else was having similar issues.

I was able to get the best fit and seal with Spiral Dots, which usually work the best for me, but was getting some discomfort in the ear from the sharp edge around the lip where the steel nozzle meets the body (red arrow). It wasn't bad and wasn't immediately bothersome but I would start to notice it after about 30-60 minutes or so.



I took a smaller silicone tip and cut out the nozzle portion to make a dome shaped sleeve.



I put the sleeve over the steel nozzle so that it covered the sharp lip and then put the Spiral Dots on as usual and found this completely fixed the problem while still maintaining a great fit.



Not sure if anyone else has been having a similar issue, but if so hope this solution helps.

 

[Arghavan]

On the topic of the Solaris, I was having some minor comfort issues that I found a fix for and wanted to post in case anyone else was having similar issues.

I was able to get the best fit and seal with Spiral Dots, which usually work the best for me, but was getting some discomfort in the ear from the sharp edge around the lip where the steel nozzle meets the body (red arrow). It wasn't bad and wasn't immediately bothersome but I would start to notice it after about 30-60 minutes or so.



I took a smaller silicone tip and cut out the nozzle portion to make a dome shaped sleeve.



I put the sleeve over the steel nozzle so that it covered the sharp lip and then put the Spiral Dots on as usual and found this completely fixed the problem while still maintaining a great fit.



Not sure if anyone else has been having a similar issue, but if so hope this solution helps.

That's a clever solution. thanks for sharing.

 

[KB]

Just got back from the Fujia-avic spring headphone festival show. See some pics at the end of my post. Great show!

https://www.fujiya-avic.jp/user_data/headphone_fes.php#

I just want to make people aware of how a custom slip over can change the over all sound of your IEM. A custom slip over for your universal IEM is a great idea, for comfort and better isolation. However I would like to caution everyone who has these that if they are not optimized for the shortest bore possible it will adversely affect the sound of your universal. I have been working on this here in the Campfire Lab and found that its a can be a nasty outcome. I addition I have seen some Solaris custom slip overs that I feel could have been made better - shorter sound bore-. The universal IEM slip over part needs to be modeled such that the IEM is positioned as far into the custom slip over as physically possible. If the universal IEM is pulled back the sound bore of the custom slip over will add length to the sound bore and your whole freq will be rolled off. See demonstration doc on a typical BA and the affect of a longer bore.



Disregard the black (no tube)
focus on the peaks at 5000 - 7000
the longer the tube = more roll off / pushed back

Ideally the slip over would not add any length to the sound bore into your ear or be minimal.

These are some I saw at the show last week and appeared to be a good build. I am not sure who all is making custom slip overs but just wanted to caution on this. Fit is so critical with the Solaris, I have seen people report definitive renderings that I think are not representational of the IEM due to inadequate tip fitting. If the sound bore is too long or your foam tip or silicone tip is not fitting well its not the Solaris's fault. I have never encountered a IEM where the fit has such a critical impact on the overall sound. Generally a deeper insertion on the Solaris is going to yield the best sound. I hope this helps.



Show pics.




Thank you,

KB

 

[Malevolint]

Nah, those intricate structures are purely cosmetic as far as I know. It's still a sealed in-ear behind all that.

Thanks for clearing that up. If it's just cosmetic, then I like it. They have a very sci-fi feel to them.