I've just had my very first DUNU DN-2000 session and it sounds better than I had dared hope for. It's not only awfully competent but also very pleasantly tuned. Although it has a different signature than my beloved Carbo Tenore, its tonality is really satisfying and not far at all in quality from my Carbo Tenore, which I consider a true tonality masterpiece. Technically though - and as expected - it is waysuperior to the Carbo Tenore (single dynamic micro driver).
It's too early to describe my DN-2000 with any elaborate details, but one of many things that have caught my attention is its exquisite treble; very resolving, very articulate, and very pleasantly tuned. It really sparkles but without any unpleasant side effects. I was worried about the bass as I was under the impression it might be too lame, but these fears have completely come to naught. No doubt, the DN-2000 has a high fidelity very well controlled and pleasant bass. The mid bass rocks just as much as it should and the sub bass has just the kind of authority needed to make me tremble when the music calls for it. The dynamic bass driver is sure doing an excellent job! Don’t know what to say about the mids yet as this is my most sensitive area, but I’ll come back to that. No coherency issues with the mix of the dynamic and balanced armature drivers; none that I can hear anyway! I’ve only started to experiment with the various ear tips and the differently colored extension rings. I get a really decent fit (and sound as described) with the help of the red rings and the medium 2K tips, but I’m far from done with testing the various combinations.
I believe I might come to enjoy this hybrid as much as I did my AKG K3003i which I sold, but – as I said – it’s a bit early for any conclusive opinions. I’ve been very enthusiastic about certain phones in the past only to sell them a few months later. As of now, it feels like the DUNU DN-2000 has the potential to become a phone that I’ll keep for a long time.
For the love of all that is Head-fi do not buy these http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/EarSweets-Memory-Foam-In-Ear-Headphone-Tips-Not-Comply-4-6-Pairs-UK-Seller-/191168745811?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_3&var=&hash=item2c828b9153 !
I will elaborate I may have been a tad skeptical to ear tips changing the sound until now. My gosh I've never heard the Dunu sound so muffled, it's such a shame as the ear tips certainly seem more durable than the comply ts-400.
Need to find the original Dunu foamies on sale or an alternative. Anyone try anything as comfortable as the foam ear tips without loss of sound quality ??
I will elaborate I may have been a tad skeptical to ear tips changing the sound until now. My gosh I've never heard the Dunu sound so muffled, it's such a shame as the ear tips certainly seem more durable than the comply ts-400.
Need to find the original Dunu foamies on sale or an alternative. Anyone try anything as comfortable as the foam ear tips without loss of sound quality ??
Areo Dynamik, glad that you have received the dn2000s. I own the tenore too and agree that its tuning is a masterpiece. Btw your impressions about the dn2000's treble exactly mirrors mine.
Thanks for the question! I'll let you know a bit later as right now I'm too busy listening! Yesterday I felt a bit uneasy about the mid-range but I've now sorted it out and I will have some very positive things to say about it. I'll be back!
Areo Dynamik, glad that you have received the dn2000s. I own the tenore too and agree that its tuning is a masterpiece. Btw your impressions about the dn2000's treble exactly mirrors mine.
Well, I’ve been listening critically to IEMs for some years now and I’ve had a few TOTL phones ("FitEar ToGo! 334", "AKG K3003i", "EarSonics EM6", "Etymotic Research ER-4") and I feel my hearing abilities have developed quite a bit during these years, and I am naturally (as most of us are) more sensitive to and more critical to what I hear in the mid-range than to what I hear in the bass and treble.
This is quite natural as our hearing works the best in the mid-range. That’s why we feel we have “super hearing abilities” with V-shaped sound signatures where we hear bass and treble louder and mid-range with lower volume than in reality. It is very exciting in the beginning but exhausting in the long run.
The DN-2000’s mid-range didn’t sound perfectly right to me during my first session; very good indeed but not just as satisfying as the bass and treble. I felt it was a bit recessed and having a slight veil. Especially reverb and decay in voices felt a bit smothered and distant. It just didn’t excite me enough, and when A/Bing with my Carbo Tenore I unfortunately felt it was confirmed. This was disappointing as I had hoped that it would only be a matter of too tired ears, but it wasn’t.
Anyway, as I’ve been doing this for a few years now I had a gut feeling this mid-range problem wasn’t necessarily in the phones themselves but in the ear tips. Taking a closer look at the stock 2K tips - which I was using - I realized they were covering a fair bit of the nozzle. Now, as I’ve had some experience of this from the FitEar ToGo! 334, I slipped on the ear tips with the widest bore I have, which are my Skullcandy tips which I used very successfully with my ToGo 334. (Skullcandy’s ear tips are excellent). The wide Skullcandy ear tips made a very substantial and very crucial difference. It opened up the entire phone. Not only did it fix the slight problems with the veil and recess I heard in mid-range but improved the SQ of the entire phone, making it noticeably more open and airy. I can’t stress this enough; ear tips with a wide opening on the DN-2000 seem to make all the difference!
This reminds me of the AKG K3003i with its various filters to tweak its sound signature. The DN-2000 silicone stock tips remind me (in a fundamental way) of the K3003’s “reference filters” which most K3003 owners seem to prefer but that I feel subtract from the K3003’s full capability. I always preferred the filters that were named “high boost”. These filters weren’t filters in the conventional sense but just a grill for protection from ear wax. So, maybe the narrow bore on the DN-2000’s silicone stock tips isn’t a coincidence but a very carefully thought out and tested method to tune the DN-2000 for “reference sound”. However, if you ask me it has not been a successful method as the silicone stock tips definitely smothers the DN-2000.
Except for the stock foam tips, all supplied stock silicone tips suffer from a too narrow bore. I must say I’m surprised the DN-2000 isn’t delivered with at least one set of silicone ear tips with a wide opening. It’s a shame really! Fortunately the foam tips have a wide bore and sound pretty much the same as my Skullcandy tips. Well, perhaps a tad bit less airy (or it’s just in my mind). Unfortunately the foam tips are difficult to put on and take off the nozzle as they seem to be a bit small. Also, the foam seems to expand too fast giving you only a few seconds to put them into your ears before it’s too late. I would guess Comply’s 500 foam tips series would be a better option.
Now that I’ve found the right ear tips for my DN-2000 I feel more and more excited about it. It does so many things right. I will probably want to write about it in a bit more detail in the future, but so far I’ve noticed first rate:
separation/layering,
resolution (nuances are easier to pick up than ever before),
overall note weight (very full, the Tenore is rather lightweight in comparison),
3D sound stage (which I usually have a hard time to perceive at all),
forward projection (sound mostly in front of you, but a bit tip dependent).
I must also mention - again - that the DN-2000’s treble has a very special place in my heart right now. It is just magic! What else? Hm… Need to do some more listening which I right now really can’t get enough of with the DN 2000.
If I get the opportunity I will eventually compare the AKG K3003i and the DUNU DN-2000. From what I can remember of my now sold K3003 I’m not absolutely convinced I will prefer the K3003i.
If you get the chance, do try the JVC Spiral Dot tips with the DN2000. ( The supplied spacers might come in handy here due to the shorter stem length of the JVCs).
I got my hands on some today (M-sized) and right of the bat I seem to prefer them over the stock silicon tips.
A more thorough listening session is needed to ascertain the exact improvements, but i'm currently too engrossed with listening to my Roxanne Universals with the JVC spiral dots to switch to my DN2000s
i ended up sending mine back to amazon....loved the sound stage, the bass, the attack....the rock music came alive but i couldnt get a comfortable fit where they wouldn't come out.
plus they were not good for noise cancellation.....sooooo thank you amazon for the great return policy.
Well, I’ve been listening critically to IEMs for some years now and I’ve had a few TOTL phones ("FitEar ToGo! 334", "AKG K3003i", "EarSonics EM6", "Etymotic Research ER-4") and I feel my hearing abilities have developed quite a bit during these years, and I am naturally (as most of us are) more sensitive to and more critical to what I hear in the mid-range than to what I hear in the bass and treble.
This is quite natural as our hearing works the best in the mid-range. That’s why we feel we have “super hearing abilities” with V-shaped sound signatures where we hear bass and treble louder and mid-range with lower volume than in reality. It is very exciting in the beginning but exhausting in the long run.
The DN-2000’s mid-range didn’t sound perfectly right to me during my first session; very good indeed but not just as satisfying as the bass and treble. I felt it was a bit recessed and having a slight veil. Especially reverb and decay in voices felt a bit smothered and distant. It just didn’t excite me enough, and when A/Bing with my Carbo Tenore I unfortunately felt it was confirmed. This was disappointing as I had hoped that it would only be a matter of too tired ears, but it wasn’t.
Anyway, as I’ve been doing this for a few years now I had a gut feeling this mid-range problem wasn’t necessarily in the phones themselves but in the ear tips. Taking a closer look at the stock 2K tips - which I was using - I realized they were covering a fair bit of the nozzle. Now, as I’ve had some experience of this from the FitEar ToGo! 334, I slipped on the ear tips with the widest bore I have, which are my Skullcandy tips which I used very successfully with my ToGo 334. (Skullcandy’s ear tips are excellent). The wide Skullcandy ear tips made a very substantial and very crucial difference. It opened up the entire phone. Not only did it fix the slight problems with the veil and recess I heard in mid-range but improved the SQ of the entire phone, making it noticeably more open and airy. [COLOR=FF0000]I can’t stress this enough; ear tips with a wide opening on the DN-2000 seem to make all the difference![/COLOR]
This reminds me of the AKG K3003i with its various filters to tweak its sound signature. The DN-2000 silicone stock tips remind me (in a fundamental way) of the K3003’s “reference filters” which most K3003 owners seem to prefer but that I feel subtract from the K3003’s full capability. I always preferred the filters that were named “high boost”. These filters weren’t filters in the conventional sense but just a grill for protection from ear wax. So, maybe the narrow bore on the DN-2000’s silicone stock tips isn’t a coincidence but a very carefully thought out and tested method to tune the DN-2000 for “reference sound”. However, if you ask me it has not been a successful method as the silicone stock tips definitely smothers the DN-2000.
Except for the stock foam tips, all supplied stock silicone tips suffer from a too narrow bore. I must say I’m surprised the DN-2000 isn’t delivered with at least one set of silicone ear tips with a wide opening. It’s a shame really! Fortunately the foam tips have a wide bore and sound pretty much the same as my Skullcandy tips. Well, perhaps a tad bit less airy (or it’s just in my mind). Unfortunately the foam tips are difficult to put on and take off the nozzle as they seem to be a bit small. Also, the foam seems to expand too fast giving you only a few seconds to put them into your ears before it’s too late. I would guess Comply’s 500 foam tips series would be a better option.
Now that I’ve found the right ear tips for my DN-2000 I feel more and more excited about it. It does so many things right. I will probably want to write about it in a bit more detail in the future, but so far I’ve noticed [COLOR=FF0000]first rate[/COLOR]:
separation/layering,
resolution (nuances are easier to pick up than ever before),
overall note weight (very full, the Tenore is rather lightweight in comparison),
3D sound stage (which I usually have a hard time to perceive at all),
forward projection (sound mostly in front of you, but a bit tip dependent).
I must also mention - again - that the DN-2000’s treble has a very special place in my heart right now. It is just magic! What else? Hm… Need to do some more listening which I right now really can’t get enough of with the DN 2000.
If I get the opportunity I will eventually compare the AKG K3003i and the DUNU DN-2000. From what I can remember of my now sold K3003 I’m not absolutely convinced I will prefer the K3003i.
I'd like to ask a favor from those of you who bought your DN-2000 new. Please take a look at these pictures, then take a close look at your own DN-2000 and let me know if yours looked the same. Thanks!
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, but i wish it could have a bit more bass and more punchy（not bass heavy）, and i thk it is little bit bulky.
