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CanJam New York 2025 Impressions Thread (February 22-23, 2025)
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UnderTheHill
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I am so beyond excited for this year, guys. I can't wait. I had to sit today out because of work but tonight at around 12am I'll be heading to the bus station to make the 4 hour drive from Boston to NYC for my 3rd CanJam.
What an awesome event. It genuinely has become one of the highlights of my year!
What an awesome event. It genuinely has become one of the highlights of my year!
Hi everyone,
If you’re at CanJam, come at 6:00pm to the 16th Fl for the Watercooler 2024 product of the year Awards - @Rockwell75 @HiFiHawaii808 and I will be presenting the awards to best products voted (headphones, amps, IEMs, etc) - voted by you, the community!
Bloom Audio giveaway winner will be announced at the end of the short ceremony (hurry up to Bloom’s room to sign before 6pm if you still haven’t).
Finally, Watercooler group photo will follow..
See you soon!!
If you’re at CanJam, come at 6:00pm to the 16th Fl for the Watercooler 2024 product of the year Awards - @Rockwell75 @HiFiHawaii808 and I will be presenting the awards to best products voted (headphones, amps, IEMs, etc) - voted by you, the community!
Bloom Audio giveaway winner will be announced at the end of the short ceremony (hurry up to Bloom’s room to sign before 6pm if you still haven’t).
Finally, Watercooler group photo will follow..
See you soon!!

HappyMachine
Previously known as eternairest
Did anyone see QDC at the show today? Not sure if I missed them. And is there a place to get impressions for CIEMs?
Back in Brooklyn from CJ, was impressed with Flipears Legion and prototype Letshouer (was told it could be the 16 when released), both bass cannons.
Having some Baby Luc's (but do love Modern as partner grew up in New Haven).
So glad more people are checking the Legion. FlipEars hit a home run with it.
MusicTeck has QDC IEMs. They are at the back of the show floor.Did anyone see QDC at the show today? Not sure if I missed them. And is there a place to get impressions for CIEMs?
I see this and I start to get anxious with so much going on, and this from someone who's a comic book publisher and vet of busy comic convention floors LOL
This looks intimidating!
Maybe I just didn't walk the isles when busiest but I had an easier time walking them when I did than in the past.
HappyMachine
Previously known as eternairest
Do you happen to know if they offer CIEMs fittings? Was eyeing a custom pair of the VXs but don't want to go through the hassle of sending the molds aroundMusicTeck has QDC IEMs. They are at the back of the show floor.
HEDDphones TWO and TWO GT on demo at the headphones/com booth - see you around. Epic day 1! 

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You sleep late for a year or 15 and hardly anyone's there that you remember. Only met 5 people I knew from back in the day (I was at the first 5 canjams from 2006-2010, but have been hibernating on and off since), though there were a few others that seemed familiar. Those who know me (all 8 of you) know I've always said I hate headphones. Which is to say I'd much rather listen to speakers. Blasphemy around here, I know. But I'm fortunate that I rarely need to use cans except on the go, which means IEMS, which brings me to the first thing I liked.
Sedna Earfit MAX Standard earbud tips. I always liked the sound of the clear tips, but they're the worst in terms of letting in noise. These solve that problem with an inner layer of some chemically goop. As soon as I put them on, that noisy hotel atrium went quiet. And they sound good, too. They sell these on amazon, and I already ordered two sets (total 4 pairs). I tested these to fit my Etymotics, but they have different sets to fit different IEMs, so be careful if you buy on impulse--reach out to them first.
For years, I've been considering getting a set of Audio Technica cans as a second or third set. Listening to three of the models today was disappointing. They still have that same forward sound, but the bass is humpty dumpty compared to the old days. Pass.
HiFiMan Susvara. They're very nicely detailed with a nice frequency response, but the ones everyone likes have seat belts, which is fine if you only listen to music recorded in rooms with 5 layers of blankets and sound deadening material. I also tried the unveiled ones (should there be a drum roll for the unveiling?) which removes the seat belts, but at a cost. Nice listening experience, and I'd try them again if they were in my price range, which they're not. At least new.
Grado Signature S950 was slightly warm but energetic. I really like them. The surprise was the HP100SE which I found more balanced and especially nice for classical music. On the down side, they're also a bit harsh and a bit heavy which, perhaps oddly, affected how they fit more than how heavy they felt.
The other thing I wanted to find was a replacement cable set less than a mile long and somewhat under 7 lbs 4 oz for my Sennheiser HD800S. Effect Audio can make them as a custom job. Looking through my notes and cards again, I see Dekoni Audio also has a balanced XLR cable of 1.2 meters length for the HS800S. And Element Technology (EleTech) might also make them custom. Everyone else seems to be working on it for the future.
Saving the best for last, there was the Austrian Audio Composer, which was a bit of a surprise--something unique in my experience. I'm a details freak that cringes when people call something musical. But the Austrian Audio Composer was lovely at low to medium volume levels. Surprisingly, it's superb at lower volumes, though I can imagine lots of competition if driven at higher volume levels. But at lower volume levels, they were delicately musical while still being detailed enough for this hardcore accuracy freak. It did very well on my basic listening test. In the discussion that followed my session, I was told they're often compared to electrostatics, which is another type of speaker that doesn't work as well at higher volume levels. I won't speculate as to why that is, but I will note that my home speakers are hybrid electrostatics, the Martin Logan ElectroMotion ESL.
For the record, my simplest listening test includes (1) Yours Is No Disgrace by Yes for that delicate bass work and the abrupt stop early on that kills every cheap piece of gear, (2) Southbound by the Alman Brothers (and the middle of Jessica for that rhythmic counterpunctual bliss) or Led Zeppelin for the live acoustic recordings of drumsets with their complicated cacophany of cymbalic overtones bouncing around the room, (3) a string quartet (usually Schubert's Late String Quartets by the Emerson String Quartet on Deutsche Grammophone), (4) a large classical piece (often Scheherazade or Copland), and (5) a small jazz band. Naturally, other pieces get added if time permits and I still care.
That was some meet. Not as noisy as a few I've attended. I thought I was able to listen well enough in the large room to get a general feel for the equipment, but not quiet enough to use for deciding a large purchase decision. The hotel was a little offputting. Is there a more inhospitable hotel lobby? Navigating the elevators require a level of computational and intellectual powers and abilities far beyond those of mortal men. Wish I could have met up with some for dinner, but I couldn't find anyone. Not to mention the meet was tiring as ever. Thankfully, I got to listen to what I wanted today, and a few things I haven't mentioned, so I'm not sure whether I'll be back tomorrow.
Hope everyone had as great a time as I did. And it's good to see so many new faces. When I was new to head-fi, a lot of the old timers were wondering whether there would be enough new youngsters to take up the hobby. Boy, were they worried for nothing! By the way, since we didn't all have name badges, I was the guy with the pony tail and Bullwinkle shirt.
Sedna Earfit MAX Standard earbud tips. I always liked the sound of the clear tips, but they're the worst in terms of letting in noise. These solve that problem with an inner layer of some chemically goop. As soon as I put them on, that noisy hotel atrium went quiet. And they sound good, too. They sell these on amazon, and I already ordered two sets (total 4 pairs). I tested these to fit my Etymotics, but they have different sets to fit different IEMs, so be careful if you buy on impulse--reach out to them first.
For years, I've been considering getting a set of Audio Technica cans as a second or third set. Listening to three of the models today was disappointing. They still have that same forward sound, but the bass is humpty dumpty compared to the old days. Pass.
HiFiMan Susvara. They're very nicely detailed with a nice frequency response, but the ones everyone likes have seat belts, which is fine if you only listen to music recorded in rooms with 5 layers of blankets and sound deadening material. I also tried the unveiled ones (should there be a drum roll for the unveiling?) which removes the seat belts, but at a cost. Nice listening experience, and I'd try them again if they were in my price range, which they're not. At least new.
Grado Signature S950 was slightly warm but energetic. I really like them. The surprise was the HP100SE which I found more balanced and especially nice for classical music. On the down side, they're also a bit harsh and a bit heavy which, perhaps oddly, affected how they fit more than how heavy they felt.
The other thing I wanted to find was a replacement cable set less than a mile long and somewhat under 7 lbs 4 oz for my Sennheiser HD800S. Effect Audio can make them as a custom job. Looking through my notes and cards again, I see Dekoni Audio also has a balanced XLR cable of 1.2 meters length for the HS800S. And Element Technology (EleTech) might also make them custom. Everyone else seems to be working on it for the future.
Saving the best for last, there was the Austrian Audio Composer, which was a bit of a surprise--something unique in my experience. I'm a details freak that cringes when people call something musical. But the Austrian Audio Composer was lovely at low to medium volume levels. Surprisingly, it's superb at lower volumes, though I can imagine lots of competition if driven at higher volume levels. But at lower volume levels, they were delicately musical while still being detailed enough for this hardcore accuracy freak. It did very well on my basic listening test. In the discussion that followed my session, I was told they're often compared to electrostatics, which is another type of speaker that doesn't work as well at higher volume levels. I won't speculate as to why that is, but I will note that my home speakers are hybrid electrostatics, the Martin Logan ElectroMotion ESL.
For the record, my simplest listening test includes (1) Yours Is No Disgrace by Yes for that delicate bass work and the abrupt stop early on that kills every cheap piece of gear, (2) Southbound by the Alman Brothers (and the middle of Jessica for that rhythmic counterpunctual bliss) or Led Zeppelin for the live acoustic recordings of drumsets with their complicated cacophany of cymbalic overtones bouncing around the room, (3) a string quartet (usually Schubert's Late String Quartets by the Emerson String Quartet on Deutsche Grammophone), (4) a large classical piece (often Scheherazade or Copland), and (5) a small jazz band. Naturally, other pieces get added if time permits and I still care.
That was some meet. Not as noisy as a few I've attended. I thought I was able to listen well enough in the large room to get a general feel for the equipment, but not quiet enough to use for deciding a large purchase decision. The hotel was a little offputting. Is there a more inhospitable hotel lobby? Navigating the elevators require a level of computational and intellectual powers and abilities far beyond those of mortal men. Wish I could have met up with some for dinner, but I couldn't find anyone. Not to mention the meet was tiring as ever. Thankfully, I got to listen to what I wanted today, and a few things I haven't mentioned, so I'm not sure whether I'll be back tomorrow.
Hope everyone had as great a time as I did. And it's good to see so many new faces. When I was new to head-fi, a lot of the old timers were wondering whether there would be enough new youngsters to take up the hobby. Boy, were they worried for nothing! By the way, since we didn't all have name badges, I was the guy with the pony tail and Bullwinkle shirt.
Last edited:
I forgot to take notes today, so I'll jot down some quick impressions before I forget. I might also make more than one post because I want to get dinner at some point.
Hifiman Shangri-La Sr and Shangri-La Jr with the Shangri-La Sr electrostatic amplifier and EF1000DAC:
I really don't like this amp!!! For the past 3 years, I've loved my Shangri-La Jr for its smooth, yet elevated and extended treble presentation. The $32,000 Shangri-La Sr amp makes the Jr sound sharp, rough, and piercing! The amp sounds bad to the point that I don't really see the point in comparing Jr vs Sr on it because the Jr isn't the Jr that I know. I listened to the Jr last night on my Z10e and it was smooth and airy with barely a hint of roughness or sharpness in the treble. Here, it was borderline "ugh". The Sr has a bit more lower treble than the Jr, which makes the roughness of the amp even more repulsive. However, the Sr seemed to have a better sense of frontal depth to the soundstage/imaging, like elements were more clearly localized as being in front of me which was nice. Bass also seemed better, but that may be simply due to earpad variation; the Jr's pads were much more worn than the ones I have at home.
I bought the Jr blind as my first summit-fi purchase and it was the luckiest headphone purchase decision I ever made. If I had demoed it in this setup beforehand, I may never have bought it in the first place. I had never understood why people thought the Jr had rough treble, but now I get it if they had demoed it on this amp.
Grell OAE1:
This one is all over the place, but I could see where Grell was trying to go with this design. The tonal balance is really whack, huge bass, odd midrange, and spiky treble. On the majority of studio-produced tracks that I listened to, it sounded very odd. However, Axel Grell said it was really meant to simulate the experience of listening in a real venue, so I tried out "In mir klingt ein Lied" by Chelsea Guo from her album Chopin: In My Voice. I had just heard her perform this piece live at the Terrace Theater in the Kennedy Center on Wednesday, so this is a piece where I know what this piece is "supposed" to sound like in a real venue. And on this track, the OAE1 produced a sense of spaciousness in front of me that was vaguely reminiscent of the sort of experience I heard on Wednesday night. It's not truly out-of-head, but I got a sense of what the headphone could do on the right track.
The biggest question I have on the OAE1 is if it does anything better than any of the CrossZone headphones. I tried out the CZ-10 Enhanced in Tokyo in December and that headphone produced a distinct sense of forward imaging and spaciousness. That's because it does physical crossfeed with drivers that produce the opposite channel's sound in each earcup. The OAE1 is purely stereo. The OAE1 does produce a nice sense of forward localization in bass, but on other frequency ranges and instruments it often fails to produce the proper illusion, so it comes off as disjointed while the CZ-10 more consistently produced a sense of spatial depth in front of me. The OAE1 was interesting to listen to, but the CrossZone seems to do what it wants to do, better.
FiiO FT1:
This is my second demo of it, and I used the FiiO K17 DAC/amp this time instead of my Walkman. I found the FT1 much better this time. It was not as sharp and stabby in the treble as it was at my first demo during CAF. I really see why people like it so much, the midrange is nicely tuned and the tonal balance in broad strokes is good. I think it's a bit too warm and there's a loss of detail in the low bass (the opening of "Sail (Extended Mix)" by GXD has a low-bass synth line between the big bass beats and that line gets lost amidst the beats on the FT1). The headphone is also lightweight and pretty comfy even without the Capra Audio strap. I honestly think of it as an evolution, both in design and sound, of the Hifiman R7DX that launched back in 2021.
FiiO K17:
This is the successor of the K9 Pro DAC/amp (which I used for years) and I think it's a worthy successor. It has an attractive yet simple form factor and the use of knob switches instead of stubby slider switches for selecting gain and output mode is a huge improvement in useability. The touchscreen menu system (with an additional knob for physical control) is also a nice touch and offers tons of DSP features. I can't say much about the sound; I didn't hear it with any headphones that I normally use so I have no way to compare the subtleties of amp/DAC differences. The main thing I disliked was the small and wobbly knobs (both menu and volume knobs). They did not feel good to use. But in every other way, it has basically the same hardware feature set as my TEAC UD-507 amp, plus EQ options, at only $900. If I hadn't already gotten the TEAC, this would be on my radar for an upgrade to the K9 Pro.
Stax SRM-T8000 (with SR-X9000):
I wanted to get another listen of the T8000 and see what Stax think Stax headphones should sound like. I had heard it in Tokyo, but only for 2 minutes and from a cold start. The Hugo 2 was used as the DAC with the green filter enabled.
The T8000 gives percussion notes a "bouncy" texture. There's not as much of the deep-hitting sub-bass components and more of the upper bass and midrange components of a drum hit so that it's more like "Bam!" than "Bom!". The sound is also more sparkly in the treble. Comparing T8000 and BHSE, they aren't all that different, but the BHSE seems to go a bit deeper in percussion notes for that "Bom!" that digs deeper with a bit more body and weight and the treble is a bit more focused and less splashy on things like cymbals.
I want to listen more tomorrow because during my demo session, the guy next to me was playing music extremely loudly. It was often hard to hear my music over his and it was quite frankly irritating to me that this guy was blasting his songs without a care for others around him. This guy, yeesh.
Meze Poet:
It's kind of like an open-back Liric 2. Nice bass quantity, inoffensive midrange, but a few treble spikes, though those can contribute to the crisp attack on percussion notes. I listened on the Topping DX9 at the Headphones.com booth and I'll want to listen to it again tomorrow.
DCA Noire X:
I thought this was a very good DCA headphone, and possibly better than the E3, which was my previous holder of "best DCA headphone". The percussive impact or punch/slam was decent, though it had that same sort of "bouncy" drum texture that I heard on the T8000 + X9000 and on the Aeon 2 Noire without any filters, though much less offensive in the treble than the original Noire. I just wasn't a fan of the upper midrange, it sounds slightly raspy or dry and I don't like that sort of sound even if I could see it being more neutral. Treble was more controlled than the Poet (which I A/Bed against). It's interesting because Meze licensed the AMTS from DCA for use in the Poet, but DCA still does it better with a smoother treble tuning on the Noire X.
I also listened to the Stealth for a bit to compare vs the Noire X. After a few seconds, I was like "nope". There's a distinct lack of percussive impact on the Stealth, though no lack of bass quantity, which makes music uniformly unenjoyable for me.
Audio Technica ADX3000:
Worse than the ADX5000 in my opinion. Vocals are harsh and coarse, as if the singers were all hoarse. Bass was lacking, while the treble was packing. Bright, harsh, and thin throughout.
ADX5000:
I had long thought that if I were to "retire" from this hobby and go down to a single headphone, it would be the Susvara. Now, the ADX5000 makes a pretty good run for the money. I've always had a soft spot for the Audio Technica tuning, and while the ADX5K isn't really the traditional AT tuning, it's basically what I always wished the HD800S was. It is crisp, snappy, and airy rather than limp and tinny.
I listened to more, but I think I'll head out to dinner now, so there will be part 2 later.
Hifiman Shangri-La Sr and Shangri-La Jr with the Shangri-La Sr electrostatic amplifier and EF1000DAC:

I really don't like this amp!!! For the past 3 years, I've loved my Shangri-La Jr for its smooth, yet elevated and extended treble presentation. The $32,000 Shangri-La Sr amp makes the Jr sound sharp, rough, and piercing! The amp sounds bad to the point that I don't really see the point in comparing Jr vs Sr on it because the Jr isn't the Jr that I know. I listened to the Jr last night on my Z10e and it was smooth and airy with barely a hint of roughness or sharpness in the treble. Here, it was borderline "ugh". The Sr has a bit more lower treble than the Jr, which makes the roughness of the amp even more repulsive. However, the Sr seemed to have a better sense of frontal depth to the soundstage/imaging, like elements were more clearly localized as being in front of me which was nice. Bass also seemed better, but that may be simply due to earpad variation; the Jr's pads were much more worn than the ones I have at home.
I bought the Jr blind as my first summit-fi purchase and it was the luckiest headphone purchase decision I ever made. If I had demoed it in this setup beforehand, I may never have bought it in the first place. I had never understood why people thought the Jr had rough treble, but now I get it if they had demoed it on this amp.
Grell OAE1:
This one is all over the place, but I could see where Grell was trying to go with this design. The tonal balance is really whack, huge bass, odd midrange, and spiky treble. On the majority of studio-produced tracks that I listened to, it sounded very odd. However, Axel Grell said it was really meant to simulate the experience of listening in a real venue, so I tried out "In mir klingt ein Lied" by Chelsea Guo from her album Chopin: In My Voice. I had just heard her perform this piece live at the Terrace Theater in the Kennedy Center on Wednesday, so this is a piece where I know what this piece is "supposed" to sound like in a real venue. And on this track, the OAE1 produced a sense of spaciousness in front of me that was vaguely reminiscent of the sort of experience I heard on Wednesday night. It's not truly out-of-head, but I got a sense of what the headphone could do on the right track.
The biggest question I have on the OAE1 is if it does anything better than any of the CrossZone headphones. I tried out the CZ-10 Enhanced in Tokyo in December and that headphone produced a distinct sense of forward imaging and spaciousness. That's because it does physical crossfeed with drivers that produce the opposite channel's sound in each earcup. The OAE1 is purely stereo. The OAE1 does produce a nice sense of forward localization in bass, but on other frequency ranges and instruments it often fails to produce the proper illusion, so it comes off as disjointed while the CZ-10 more consistently produced a sense of spatial depth in front of me. The OAE1 was interesting to listen to, but the CrossZone seems to do what it wants to do, better.
FiiO FT1:
This is my second demo of it, and I used the FiiO K17 DAC/amp this time instead of my Walkman. I found the FT1 much better this time. It was not as sharp and stabby in the treble as it was at my first demo during CAF. I really see why people like it so much, the midrange is nicely tuned and the tonal balance in broad strokes is good. I think it's a bit too warm and there's a loss of detail in the low bass (the opening of "Sail (Extended Mix)" by GXD has a low-bass synth line between the big bass beats and that line gets lost amidst the beats on the FT1). The headphone is also lightweight and pretty comfy even without the Capra Audio strap. I honestly think of it as an evolution, both in design and sound, of the Hifiman R7DX that launched back in 2021.
FiiO K17:
This is the successor of the K9 Pro DAC/amp (which I used for years) and I think it's a worthy successor. It has an attractive yet simple form factor and the use of knob switches instead of stubby slider switches for selecting gain and output mode is a huge improvement in useability. The touchscreen menu system (with an additional knob for physical control) is also a nice touch and offers tons of DSP features. I can't say much about the sound; I didn't hear it with any headphones that I normally use so I have no way to compare the subtleties of amp/DAC differences. The main thing I disliked was the small and wobbly knobs (both menu and volume knobs). They did not feel good to use. But in every other way, it has basically the same hardware feature set as my TEAC UD-507 amp, plus EQ options, at only $900. If I hadn't already gotten the TEAC, this would be on my radar for an upgrade to the K9 Pro.
Stax SRM-T8000 (with SR-X9000):

I wanted to get another listen of the T8000 and see what Stax think Stax headphones should sound like. I had heard it in Tokyo, but only for 2 minutes and from a cold start. The Hugo 2 was used as the DAC with the green filter enabled.
The T8000 gives percussion notes a "bouncy" texture. There's not as much of the deep-hitting sub-bass components and more of the upper bass and midrange components of a drum hit so that it's more like "Bam!" than "Bom!". The sound is also more sparkly in the treble. Comparing T8000 and BHSE, they aren't all that different, but the BHSE seems to go a bit deeper in percussion notes for that "Bom!" that digs deeper with a bit more body and weight and the treble is a bit more focused and less splashy on things like cymbals.
I want to listen more tomorrow because during my demo session, the guy next to me was playing music extremely loudly. It was often hard to hear my music over his and it was quite frankly irritating to me that this guy was blasting his songs without a care for others around him. This guy, yeesh.
Meze Poet:
It's kind of like an open-back Liric 2. Nice bass quantity, inoffensive midrange, but a few treble spikes, though those can contribute to the crisp attack on percussion notes. I listened on the Topping DX9 at the Headphones.com booth and I'll want to listen to it again tomorrow.
DCA Noire X:
I thought this was a very good DCA headphone, and possibly better than the E3, which was my previous holder of "best DCA headphone". The percussive impact or punch/slam was decent, though it had that same sort of "bouncy" drum texture that I heard on the T8000 + X9000 and on the Aeon 2 Noire without any filters, though much less offensive in the treble than the original Noire. I just wasn't a fan of the upper midrange, it sounds slightly raspy or dry and I don't like that sort of sound even if I could see it being more neutral. Treble was more controlled than the Poet (which I A/Bed against). It's interesting because Meze licensed the AMTS from DCA for use in the Poet, but DCA still does it better with a smoother treble tuning on the Noire X.
I also listened to the Stealth for a bit to compare vs the Noire X. After a few seconds, I was like "nope". There's a distinct lack of percussive impact on the Stealth, though no lack of bass quantity, which makes music uniformly unenjoyable for me.
Audio Technica ADX3000:
Worse than the ADX5000 in my opinion. Vocals are harsh and coarse, as if the singers were all hoarse. Bass was lacking, while the treble was packing. Bright, harsh, and thin throughout.
ADX5000:
I had long thought that if I were to "retire" from this hobby and go down to a single headphone, it would be the Susvara. Now, the ADX5000 makes a pretty good run for the money. I've always had a soft spot for the Audio Technica tuning, and while the ADX5K isn't really the traditional AT tuning, it's basically what I always wished the HD800S was. It is crisp, snappy, and airy rather than limp and tinny.
I listened to more, but I think I'll head out to dinner now, so there will be part 2 later.
geoffalter11
Headphoneus Supremus
Thanks for providing actual thoughts on what you heard. Lots of pictures of pizza. Being a chef and someone who has spent a lot of time in NYC, the music and what you heard are all I care about reading. And your choice of Allman tracks and why you use them for listening is inspiring. You inspired me to listen to the 16 minute acoustic version of Jessica from 04' on Tidal right now, so thank you!You sleep late for a year or 15 and hardly anyone's there that you remember. Only met 5 people I knew from back in the day (I was at the first 5 canjams from 2006-2010, but have been hibernating on and off since), though there were a few others that seemed familiar. Those who know me (all 8 of you) know I've always said I hate headphones. Which is to say I'd much rather listen to speakers. Blasphemy around here, I know. But I'm fortunate that I rarely need to use cans except on the go, which means IEMS, which brings me to the first thing I liked.
Sedna Earfit MAX Standard earbud tips. I always liked the sound of the clear tips, but they're the worst in terms of letting in noise. These solve that problem with an inner layer of some chemically goop. As soon as I put them on, that noisy hotel atrium went quiet. And they sound good, too. They sell these on amazon, and I already ordered two sets (total 4 pairs). I tested these to fit my Etymotics, but they have different sets to fit different IEMs, so be careful if you buy on impulse--reach out to them first.
For years, I've been considering getting a set of Audio Technica cans as a second or third set. Listening to three of the models today was disappointing. They still have that same forward sound, but the bass is humpty dumpty compared to the old days. Pass.
HiFiMan Susvara. They're very nicely detailed with a nice frequency response, but the ones everyone likes have seat belts, which is fine if you only listen to music recorded in rooms with 5 layers of blankets and sound deadening material. I also tried the unveiled ones (should there be a drum roll for the unveiling?) which removes the seat belts, but at a cost. Nice listening experience, and I'd try them again if they were in my price range, which they're not. At least new.
Grado Signature S950 was slightly warm but energetic. I really like them. The surprise was the HP100SE which I found more balanced and especially nice for classical music. On the down side, they're also a bit harsh and a bit heavy which, perhaps oddly, affected how they fit more than how heavy they felt.
The other thing I wanted to find was a replacement cable set less than a mile long and somewhat under 7 lbs 4 oz for my Sennheiser HD800S. Effect Audio can make them as a custom job. Looking through my notes and cards again, I see Dekoni Audio also has a balanced XLR cable of 1.2 meters length for the HS800S. And Element Technology (EleTech) might also make them custom. Everyone else seems to be working on it for the future.
Saving the best for last, there was the Austrian Audio Composer, which was a bit of a surprise--something unique in my experience. I'm a details freak that cringes when people call something musical. But the Austrian Audio Composer was lovely at low to medium volume levels. Surprisingly, it's superb at lower volumes, though I can imagine lots of competition if driven at higher volume levels. But at lower volume levels, they were delicately musical while still being detailed enough for this hardcore accuracy freak. It did very well on my basic listening test. In the discussion that followed my session, I was told they're often compared to electrostatics, which is another types of speaker that doesn't work as well at higher volume levels. I won't speculate as to why that is, but I will note that my home speakers are hybrid electrostatics, the Martin Logan ElectroMotion ESL.
For the record, my simplest listening test includes (1) Yours Is No Mistake by Yes for that delicate bass work and the abrupt stop early on that kills every cheap piece of gear, (2) Southbound by the Alman Brothers (and the middle of Jessica for that rhythmic counterpunctual bliss) or Led Zeppelin for the live acoustic recordings of drumsets with their complicated cacophany of cymbalic overtones bouncing around the room, (3) a string quartet (usually Schubert's Late String Quartets by the Emerson String Quartet on Deutsche Grammophone), (4) a large classical piece (often Scheherazade or Copland), and (5) a small jazz band. Naturally, other pieces get added if time permits and I still care.
That was some meet. Not as noisy as a few I've attended. I thought I was able to listen well enough in the large room to get a general feel for the equipment, but not quiet enough to use for deciding a large purchase decision. The hotel was a little offputting. Is there a more inhospitable hotel lobby? Navigating the elevators require a level of computational and intellectual powers and abilities far beyond those of mortal men. Wish I could have met up with some for dinner, but I couldn't find anyone. Not to mention the meet was tiring as ever. Thankfully, I got to listen to what I wanted today, and a few things I haven't mentioned, so I'm not sure whether I'll be back tomorrow.
Hope everyone had as great a time as I did. And it's good to see so many new faces. When I was new to head-fi, a lot of the old timers were wondering whether there would be enough new youngsters to take up the hobby. Boy, were they worried for nothing! By the way, since we didn't all have name badges, I was the guy with the pony tail and Bullwinkle shirt.
UnderTheHill
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Agree! I tried EE Triton, 64 Audio Volur, Campfire Audio Clara, then the Legion, I was blown away how great it was, and at the price that will be offered when it's available in the US at the end of March.So glad more people are checking the Legion. FlipEars hit a home run with it.
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I agree completely.....it threw my game off! I started the day with a Macbeth........2 IEMs later, a really nice water cooler guy (found out later) said "Hey, wanna check these out? Don't ask the price 1st." I knew already and said that it won't influence me.....it didn't and WOWEE HOLY MOLYSo glad more people are checking the Legion. FlipEars hit a home run with it.
It threw my thinking, all my careful planning for testing at CanJam out the window! LOL. I'm now bargaining with myself 'You were gonna buy XYZ for 4K, don't, get a different one for 3, then you can get LEGION too! And I'd save 150 as well. Yes honey, I saved so much money I could get 2 : > )
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