Well here's a post that's somewhat different to my others.
I work in a scanning office. Two to three very large scanners going most of the time (ibml image trac if anyone want's a reference!) along with the three smaller scanners (kodak I620) one of which I use. These are running most of the day (two shifts, 6-2 2-10, I'm 8:30 4:30) so that along with the usual coming and going of staff it can as you imagine get quite noisy which is why I started looking at iems and then customs in the first place to block out the noise. Unfortunately I am blind on my right side. That's not normally an issue as I sit facing forward and can see everything going around me or coming towards me.
However yesterday was different, as my scanner decided it was throwing a hissy fit and didn't want to work properly so I had to swop. So now I'm facing forward, got that? Good. So I decide to give the ma models another spin just to see if I am right in that they need to go back (they do, I get a seal but it doesn't hold and makes my ear sore after a while so I guess it needs thickening up!)I've had them in for about half an hour, running out of an ipod classic with the volume fairly low. Two of the large machines running, plus mine. I'm concentrating on my screen when suddenly I jump as something touches my shoulder. I take my iems out and turn, there's a colleague there and says to me "I've been trying to get your attention for the last five minutes!" Hadn't heard a thing
I explained and we both had a good laugh about it!
So I guess what I'm trying to say is that for anyone who's interested in the ma's but worried about isolation don't be. It seems fine. I just can't wait to get them back with the fit sorted. My only regret is that its' the single version (I think phil said that the ma2 driver was too big for my shells!). It's pleasent enough but lacks that something. Don't know if it'll change after it's been thickened.
Cheers