[ehjie]

I use the 240 and 140 on my OG and I love them

Agree...

 

[BowWazoo]

Today's main fight

 

[ehjie]

My Ten bucks...

 

[BowWazoo]

K.O. in the first round.
Blessing had no chance. In my opinion, the Solaris is in a different league.
Much more precision in the entire spectrum. More control in the lows.
Much more resolution in the highs.

Ridiculous that Crinacle has both rated A at technical grade.

 

[ehjie]

K.O. in the first round.
Blessing had no chance. In my opinion, the Solaris is in a different league.
Much more precision in the entire spectrum. More control in the lows.
Much more resolution in the highs.

Ridiculous that Crinacle has both rated A at technical grade.

He is a friend, friends differ in opinion, sometimes strongly.
My 1670 had a very bad rep. - piercing trebles - TRUE - but on bad recordings.
Graphs don't show the scale and quality of 3d holo. imaging, the quality of timbre and tuning on decent recordings, even on whatever shape they are v, w, etc.
They don't show the ENTIRE picture of a set.
I'm not a treblehead but i do appreciate those treble resolution and the degree of realism.
Same w/ the Solaris, a bad rep. too.

Apples and oranges...

Personally for me, In a different league. B2 still in the mid-range level
i.e. small scale of imaging and staging dimensions, compared to the Solaris gold, which simply can be ranked among full size hp
Then there's the detail retrieval, sub bass, mids. The B2 treble very hot to my taste...

 

[martas38]

K.O. in the first round.
Blessing had no chance. In my opinion, the Solaris is in a different league.
Much more precision in the entire spectrum. More control in the lows.
Much more resolution in the highs.

Ridiculous that Crinacle has both rated A at technical grade.

Crinacle rankings are crazy and unrealistic.

 

[crinacle]

Yeah crinacle sucks, how dare he have a different opinion

 

[Zaek]

I am relativ new here but i have the Solaris 2020 and the Sp1000. I had the opportunity to compare them with the IBasso Dx220, Dx300 and the Sennheiser ie 900. I hear my Solaris with the Ibasso's and i can definetly say the AK is in every Disciplin a bit better. In my Opinion the weak Spots of the SP1000 is the Wifi and the Speed of the Ui, but the Sound ist incredible.

Do give Cayin N6ii R01 a try. Very good synergy with Solaris.

 

[BowWazoo]

CP-145 sucks.
Original tips rocks.

 

[ehjie]

Yeah crinacle sucks, how dare he have a different opinion

LOL...

 

[Layman1]

K.O. in the first round.
Blessing had no chance. In my opinion, the Solaris is in a different league.
Much more precision in the entire spectrum. More control in the lows.
Much more resolution in the highs.

Ridiculous that Crinacle has both rated A at technical grade.

This is not a criticism of your comments, which I enjoyed (I own and love the Solaris 2020!), just a more general opinion on Crinacle and some of the strong opinions he seems to engender.

Personally, I'm not hugely familiar with the minutiae of @crinacle and his website, but he's one of the reviewers out there that I respect a lot and whenever I've used his site, I've found it to be a very helpful resource and I greatly appreciate his approach.

He may not always give the ratings I would give (better or worse) to certain IEMs, but that's totally to be expected, and I find his graphs invaluable - as a tool to be used alongside impressions, reviews, tech specs and my own demo'ing where possible.

What you also have there is a metric tonne of reviews with a consistent thread of likes/dislikes and preferences.
As long as a reviewer's preferences and biases are known - to some extent or other, we all have them - then we can glean valuable insights from a person's reviewing.
As an analogy, I like milk-based coffees with sugar, but I've trained as a barista and am still able to identify different beans/processing methods/origins etc even with sugar and milk in the coffee; it's as if my mind can just mentally 'filter out' the added qualities and find the essential character underneath.

So if I read a review from someone who I know hates forward upper mids ('M'...entioning no names, hehe) and they give a pretty objective but overall negative review to an IEM, I can still filter through that known preference and get a pretty good idea about whether I might love the IEM or not, and importantly, without getting unnecessarily hung up on whether that person ultimately gave that IEM as glowing a review as another IEM (or what grade I personally would give to the IEM).

Regarding the 'A' rating of Blessing 2 and Solaris in the technical department, I am not familiar with the Blessing 2, but a quick search seems to suggest it's around a $1000 cheaper than the Solaris; in this case, would it not be safe to assume Crinacle was talking about relative value here?

Personally, I'd give the EE Odin, the UM MEST and the iBasso IT03 all top marks for technical performance, but that score in each case would be taking into account the price of the IEM. This categorically does not mean that the IT03 performs as well as the Odin, as I hope will be obvious
And of course I will usually make it clear in the review that I'm referring to the quality relative to the price etc.

Anyway, just some thoughts. I've been listening to the Solaris 2020 with a Nayparm hardware-modded Sony ZX300 this morning and it's been a stunningly musical and engaging session (mostly rock, pop, hip-hop and acoustic in this one).
I'm continually surprised and delighted by the unique sound signature of the Solaris 2020

 

[BowWazoo]

I run my Solaris 2020 on the Q5 with AM3D module.

 

[Rockwell75]

K.O. in the first round.
Blessing had no chance. In my opinion, the Solaris is in a different league.
Much more precision in the entire spectrum. More control in the lows.
Much more resolution in the highs.

Solaris is indeed an outstanding IEM from a technical standpoint-- imho it easily holds its own with the likes of heavyweights like the Andromeda, u12t and IER Z1R. It is all around one of the truly great IEMs of the last 5 years...happy to see it's still getting lots of love. I'm actually tempted to pick up a used OG Solaris some day just to hear how it sounds to me after everything I've heard since.

This hobby is largely subjective-- there is no single IEM that will be the end-all be all for everyone, and no single perspective or approach that everyone will relate to. People will always have different opinions on stuff and every one of us has the capacity (hopefully, lol) to seek out those whose thoughts and impressions speak to them and discard those that don't. There's more than enough good info and resources out there for all of us to find the audio bliss we're seeking.

 

[BowWazoo]

How does the Solaris compare to the larger Empire Ears in-ears?

 

[Rockwell75]

How does the Solaris compare to the larger Empire Ears in-ears?

EE's lineup is a lot like CFA's in that they go for wildly different tuning profiles. I've only heard the Legend X and Bravado MKii which are nothing like the Solaris at all. The Odin would probably be the closest thing in their current lineup, except it has an upper mid-range that is the exact opposite of Solaris'-- I haven't heard it though. The truth is the Solaris is near the top of its game for what it does-- there are many IEMs that excel it in certain specific ways but I'm not aware of any that constitute a comprehensive upgrade to Solaris at everything it does best.