MyPants
100+ Head-Fier
My first impressions of the Shuoer Tape. I'm really impressed with the imaging in particular.
Chinese / Asian Brand IEM Info Thread
- Thread starter Brooko
- Start date
I posted my thoughts on this on discord a while back about doping plastic with beryllium or any metal. People who say it doesn't change anything... well it's going to change something right? The material properties are inherently going to change if you deposit another material on it. For a driver, stiffness matters a lot -- or at least that's what I am assuming. If you have a soft plastic which doesn't have a high modulus of elasticity, then putting a layer of metal will increase it's stiffness. That said, if you coat too little or too much it may affect other things too. And that's not to say that the coating could also be brittle or other factors.
So, yea, I believe the proper combination of base material thickness and coating thickness can inherently change the properties to make it sound better, or sound worse than the original material.
(I'm a materials engineer by trade -- and i'm also listening to my beryllium-coated Verite right now haha)
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MyPants
100+ Head-Fier
How much is the A6 mini going for? I haven't had an LZ earphone since the A4, and that sadly ended up with my ex-wife.Haven't received it yet, I'll answer you next week
Yeah fully agree with u, I do believe these materials work, but the question is whether the budget CHIFI segment are riding on it for marketing purposes or these budget CHIFI truly implement the coating/materials on the drivers properly.
That's why I quoted the DUNU reps as them saying it needs to be coated properly and implemented properly to truly make a difference: "The PVD layer has to be thick enough and the microscopic grain pattern has to be regular enough to confer that pistonic motion beryllium is so famous for. That's why our sub-$100 products (DM-380 and DM-480) are still titanium drivers. Even the TITAN 6, at $139, is only coated on one side."
Even DUNU says they have difficulty implementing this in their sub $100 USD gear. We see unit variation already in macroscopic areas in these budget CHIFI in terms of sound and build, so I'm a bit skeptical that some $30 - 50 USD CHIFI budget IEMs can ensure good QC for all their units when it comes to microscopic application of these materials. (Though maybe I might be wrong and maybe these Chinese companies can somehow do the microscopic applications of coating with low costs).
But definitely for the more expensive and established brands with products like the Verites and Utopia, I've no doubt they can ensure consistent QC on a microscopic level and this makes a difference for the coating (and hence also adds to the cost).
I saw the A6 mini on AE for around $130 during sales previously. Strangely, on taobao, it is sometimes at $56ish USD, but taobao as I understand is more catered to the domestic China clientiele and you would need to be proficient in Chinese to communicate with the sellers.
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LZ A6, IT03, FLC8N, OH300
hi, is there somwhere i can find some info on these chifi companies, their history, their moto, their size, do they develop their own drivers or use off the shelve drivers from bigger brands ? who is a subbrand of who (kz, cca) and why subbrands if they sell similar products at similar prices, thanks
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The one and only CHIFI motto all of us follow now is BLON (Belief, Let Music Burn, Oppoty, Never Give Up).
Anyway on a serious note, there are many CHIFI companies, so this will be quite a task to garner all the info.
But KZ is probably the biggest player in the budget CHIFI segment. Their sister company is CCA, and they make OEMs for other smaller companies like Tripowin. And I think some other companies like TRN broke off from KZ. Previously CCA was marketed as a sort of less V shaped tuning than the usual V shaped KZ tuning, but the recent CCA C12/KZ ZSX releases turned this opinion on its head. So I've no idea why these companies are forming sister brands with IEMs that are sort of competing. Maybe it's to diversify risks and increase sales?
Maybe u can google about these companies for their history and motto --> notable but not exhaustable list of CHIFI include:
- Audiosense
- Auglamour
- BGVP
- BLON
- BQEYZ
- Dunu
- Einsear
- FAAEAL
- Fearless Audio
- FIIO
- Hifi boy
- Hifiman
- Hisenior
- iBasso
- IKKO
- Hidizs
- Kinera
- Kbear
- KZ/CCA
- LZ
- Macaw
- Magaosi
- Moondrop
- NiceHCK
- NS audio
- Ostry
- Pai audio
- QDC
- Semkarch
- Shouer
- Shozy
- Simgot
- Superlux
- Takstar
- Tanchjim
- Tenmark
- TFZ
- Tin HIFI/Tin Audio
- Toneking (previously musicmaker)
- Tripowin
- TRN
- UiiSii
- Venture electronics
- Vsonic
- Whizzer
- 1More
That's all I can remember off the top of my head, maybe the others can add more that I've left out.
Some brands are banned here so u might need to look at other forums.
You can also ask some CHIFI industry insiders like kopiokaya?
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FastAndClean
Previously known as presata
@Slater when you gonna have your FAAEAL earphone?
chickenmoon
1000+ Head-Fier
The one and only CHIFI motto all of us follow now is BLON (Belief, Let Music Burn, Oppoty, Never Give Up).
Anyway on a serious note, there are many CHIFI companies, so this will be quite a task to garner all the info.
But KZ is probably the biggest player in the budget CHIFI segment. Their sister company is CCA, and they make OEMs for other smaller companies like Tripowin. And I think some other companies like TRN broke off from KZ. Previously CCA was marketed as a sort of less V shaped tuning than the usual V shaped KZ tuning, but the recent CCA C12/KZ ZSX releases turned this opinion on its head. So I've no idea why these companies are forming sister brands with IEMs that are sort of competing. Maybe it's to diversify risks and increase sales?
Maybe u can google about these companies for their history and motto --> notable but not exhaustable list of CHIFI include:
- Audiosense
- Auglamour
- BGVP
- BLON
- BQEYZ
- Dunu
- Einsear
- FAAEAL
- Fearless Audio
- FIIO
- Hifi boy
- Hifiman
- Hisenior
- iBasso
- IKKO
- Hidizs
- Kinera
- Kbear
- KZ/CCA
- LZ
- Macaw
- Magaosi
- Moondrop
- NiceHCK
- NS audio
- Ostry
- Pai audio
- QDC
- Semkarch
- Shouer
- Shozy
- Simgot
- Superlux
- Takstar
- Tanchjim
- Tenmark
- TFZ
- Tin HIFI/Tin Audio
- Toneking (previously musicmaker)
- Tripowin
- TRN
- UiiSii
- Venture electronics
- Vsonic
- Whizzer
- 1More
That's all I can remember off the top of my head, maybe the others can add more that I've left out.
Some brands are banned here so u might need to look at other forums.
You can also ask some CHIFI industry insiders like kopiokaya?
Astrotec
Brainwavz
FLC
Ourart
****
Shanling
SoundMagic
xDuoo
****
And plenty more cheap brands listed at https://audiobudget.com
Thanks for the added info!
Haha some of your brands cannot be mentioned in headfi. shhhhhhhhhhhh.
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NymPHONOmaniac
Headphoneus Supremus
I try to love the TRN V90...really do....cause technicaly its very capable.
Imaging, clarity, details, soundstage deepness=Wow.
Timbre=thin, dryish.
Bass=too much sub bass not enough mid bass so it lack punch (i read here people suggest these for punch WTH!?)
Mids=kinda artificial and thin and some upper mids sibilance can occur.
Treble=quite impressive, sharp with good brilliance without being trebly.
Anyway, i can understand why people dig the V90, but i prefer a more calibrated low end as well as lusher mid range.
Imaging, clarity, details, soundstage deepness=Wow.
Timbre=thin, dryish.
Bass=too much sub bass not enough mid bass so it lack punch (i read here people suggest these for punch WTH!?)
Mids=kinda artificial and thin and some upper mids sibilance can occur.
Treble=quite impressive, sharp with good brilliance without being trebly.
Anyway, i can understand why people dig the V90, but i prefer a more calibrated low end as well as lusher mid range.
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