[ChicagoPhil]

Quote:

Originally Posted by John Reeves Hi, Lets try another perspective. Maybe some of you are the same as me and are married with a family. So, you are almost certain to have a TV and if you like movies subscribe to cable etc. You probably pay about $30 to $40 a month for this priviledge and after 3 years, what have you got to show for it. Zilch. You have paid purely for the entertainmment value. So. you like music. Apply the same write off principle to your canal 'phones. We will ignore the media since this will probably last for 10 years or more. On this basis canal 'phones are cheap. Compare them with a high end car stereo, again a valid comparison. Finaly, let us not forget autos. The depreciation on the average car over the first 12 months will more than pay for canal 'phones. It is all a matter of perspective and what your priorities are. If music is your thing then compared to the other items mentioned above canal 'phones are dirt cheap. Regards John

I am looking at it from sort of an opposite perspective. I pay a bit less than $4/day for the pleasure of noisy, cramped and generally unpleasant bus rides to/from work. What fraction of that expense, amortized over a couple/few years, would be worth it for audible isolation, and the happy state into which music can transport me?

I have sennheiser noice cancelling phones that have "listenable" sound quality, but don't block enough of the ambient noise and in the past year something went awry with the cords, making them virtually intolerable now. I demoed both the Etymotic ER-4 and Shure E5C, and for various reasons, including aspects of sound and comfort/fit preferences, couldn't see either as a viable solution.

So, figuring approximatly 230 works days a year for 3 years, at less than $1.50/day to enjoy my $4 of transit (not to mention plane trips and all other uses), doesn't seem so bad...

Cheers,
Phil

 

[iamdone]

Well, I got impatient and called ue to see if they had a tracking number for me. They are actually not finished yet and probably will go out tomorrow. So looks like Friday is a better day to expect my headphones. I forgot to ask them how long they think they'll last once I received them. Sorry.

 

[ChicagoPhil]

Quote:

Originally Posted by deafmutelame Argumentum ad Verecundiam. A classical logical fallacy in the form Authority A believes that P is true. Therefore, P is true.

the key is that Authority A is an "expert" in some field x, where P is outside of the scope of x.

in defense of Toaster, he does own the product to which he refers, thus is in a position to have his impressions and opinions on the product considered...

but i think we all need to realize that nobody can really be an "expert" when it comes to evaluating sound reproduction devices as we all have tastes, preferences and biases that prevent a fully objective account.


cheers,
phil

 

[Spaghetti]

Quote:

Originally Posted by bLue_oNioN Why is their warranty only for one year then?

More then likely their research and develpment team decided that if a manufacturing defect was likely to happen, it would happen within a year.

 

[Blitzula]

Quote:

Originally Posted by naddy Below are direct quotes pasted from an e-mail that Mike Dias at UE sent to me concerning these very issues: "Thank you for your interest in Ultimate Ears. Sorry to hear you got bumped from the Home Stereo but the good news is that Ultimate Ears will solve your problems. If you take care of your monitors, they should last at least 10 years. We warrantee parts and labor for the 1st year and we also offer repair services for minimal costs if there is ever a future problem. Unless you plan on gaining or loosing significant quantities of weight, your canals should not change but if they do, we can easily adjust your monitors." "I'm glad you feel more comfortable because really, you are buying a company - it just so happens that we sell monitors."

I received my e-mail response from Ultimate Ears, from the same Mike Dias. Mike gave me a straight answer and I don't know what context (or if) the quoted comment was made in, so I retract my sleazy salesman comment. If anyone would like a copy of this e-mail, feel free to pm me. I've removed my personal information and some spacing markers, the rest of the e-mail is verbatim (except for the header directly below).

Ultimate Ears life

Mike Dias to me
More options 4:24 pm (6 minutes ago)

Hi John, It really all just depends. 3-5 years is standard. After that
time, a driver may need to be changed or the socket or something. But
Some people have had the same set for longer than that.

Best regards,

Mike

-----Original Message-----
From: John

- Hide quoted text -
Sent: Tuesday, March 01, 2005 4:10 PM
To: Mike Dias
Subject: Re: IEM life cycle.

Hi Mike,

I've been told in the past by UE (in an e-mail inquiry) that the useful
life of these IEMs is 3-5 years. Was I misinformed by UE in the past,
or is there new data that suggests a longer life? My recollection is
that Mindy herself said 3-5 years to me, but I've heard other UE owners
quoting 10 or more years, which is obviously far off from what I was
told. Please let me know.

On Tue, 1 Mar 2005 16:01:15 -0800, Mike Dias <mdias@ultimateears.com
wrote:

Hello John,

Both the UE5c and the 10 Pros should last many years if they are taken
care of. And if there is a problem, we stand behind our reputation and fix it.

Best regards,

Mike Dias

-----Original Message-----
From: John
Sent: Monday, February 28, 2005 8:50 PM
To: ultimate@ultimateears.com
Subject: IEM life cycle.

Hi,

Could you please let me know how long a pair of Ultimate Ears custom
IEMs like the UE5C or UE10 pro should last under normal consumer,
versus musician, use?

--
Thanks,

John

 

[naddy]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Big D Why should a custom product come with a refund policy? UE have remade my UE-10 Pro in hard acrylic and these have been returned 4 times for refitting. Everytime my UEs have been returned I have had them shipped back to the UK by 2 day Fed Ex shipping costing $52 a time, every time at UE's expense. That's $260 total plus the cost of the remakes. I have no doubt that UE have made no profit from my business but are determined that I get just the right fit. While I had my problems with Sensaphonics I think both companies are determined to get fit issues resolved. As you have no experience of UE's customer service you cannot possibly comment on their attitude to their customers, which in my experience has been exemplary.

Hey Big D, if you don't mind me asking, what is your opinions on the UE-10s vs. the Sensa's?

 

[deafmutelame]

Quote:

Originally Posted by machead Let's face it -- buying custom IEMs is a leap of faith. The price is high, I believe, because a majority of purchasers either don't care what they cost, or know that the IRS will end up paying 40%, or both. You don't get to try them out before you buy, and you don't get your money back if you don't like them.

Agreed. Faith is a good part of the deal. Maybe this kind of product has been targeted for the Pro market for something.

Quote:

Originally Posted by machead The few minutes I have spent listening to the phones before reaching for yet another Jiffy Bag have left me totally underwhelmed by the sound quality; I pray that this is largely a result of the poor fit and not an inherent limitation of the drivers.

Now this is worrying. I wouldn't like to expect anything less than an almost instant "yes, this is the thing" as soon as I tried them. I'm taking it for granted that the average population here knows what he wants to hear and what to expect from such a pair of headphones. None of my friends can instantly tell the difference between a 160 CBR mp3 and a LAME -aps one. I do.

Let's hope it has to do with the fit. Please let us know about it.

Quote:

Originally Posted by machead If it weren't for the small group of Sensa enthusiasts at Head-Fi who can't praise their 2X-S highly enough, I would have given up some time ago and simply accepted that I wasted my money.

A honest comment. It is hard enough to justify the cost of this to accept that the purchase wasn't worth it after all. If I end up going for them and I'm not 100% satisfied, I would post it here to add more helpful information so that others could weight the decision properly.

There are honest people on this board, but without naming anybody, you find people getting defensive about the possibility of maybe having wasted their money not realising how long they would expect them to last instead.

Quote:

Originally Posted by machead I would not recommend that anybody, particularly an audiophile, consider custom molded IEMs unless s/he has given universal fit models from Etymotics and/or Shure a lengthy and comprehensive trial and still finds their comfort or sound quality to be unacceptable. You can buy both an ER4S and an E5c with extra fit kits for less than the cost of a 2X-S or UE10, and you can always resell them if you're not happy.

Actually I'm going to consider this last possibility a bit closer now.

 

[Kurt]

Quote:

Originally Posted by deafmutelame An absolute judgement is that 139$ a year is worth the life of a child and 900$ lasting 5 years is worth the lives of more than 5 children.

And how many children did you save 2004?
So, absolute judgement wise.

 

[bLue_oNioN]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Blitzula Ultimate Ears life Mike Dias to me More options 4:24 pm (6 minutes ago) Hi John, It really all just depends. 3-5 years is standard. After that time, a driver may need to be changed or the socket or something. But Some people have had the same set for longer than that. Best regards, Mike

Well, there you have it folks, the answer to this thread, straight from the source. I'm sure the people in the business who have handled more custom canalphones than we ever will have a good estimate on their own product's average lifespan.

 

[jbr]

Quote:

Originally Posted by deafmutelame None of my friends can instantly tell the difference between a 160 CBR mp3 and a LAME -aps one. I do.

deafmutelame,

So which of the above two formats do you favor, and why?

 

[deafmutelame]

Quote:

Originally Posted by jbr deafmutelame, So which of the above two formats do you favor, and why?

The answer to this is a bit off-topic, but if you are interested on the topic (and I think that any audiophile concerned about preserving his CDs and dumping them to mp3 might be) you can find it here:

http://www.hydrogenaudio.org/forums/...howtopic=28124

Basically, LAME has been tuned so that with the --alt-preset standard setting can be considered almost transparent, where transparent means that, for the average listener, doing double blind ABX comparisons, he is not able to tell the original WAV from the encoded MP3.

But don't take my word for it, I suggest doing some blind tests for yourself. Some people, with their particular audio setup are more than happy with 128 kbps CBR mp3, others prefer 192 CBR, others don't encode to anything less than APX. Personally, I have found APS to be sufficient for my needs.

 

[Blitzula]

Here is the Sensaphonics e-mail response, both companies are consistent...
3-5 years life for UE, 4-5 for Sensaphonics.

-----Original Message-----
From: julie@sensaphonics.com [mailto:julie@sensaphonics.com]
Sent: Thursday, March 03, 2005 7:46 AM
To: John
Subject: Re: Fw: Product life question.


Hi John,

Sorry it has taken me a few days to get back to you as I was out with the flu. We say that the IEM should last approximately 4-5 years. This is usually dependent on how they are cared for - we will repair them for up to 3 years and there is a repair charge of $150 per ear.

Please let me know if you have any other questions.

Best regards,

Julie Glick

----- Original Message -----
From: John
To: saveyourears@sensaphonics.com
Sent: Monday, February 28, 2005 10:55 PM
Subject: Product life question.


Hi,

Could you please let me know how long a Sensaphonics custom IEM like
the 2X-S should last under normal consumer, versus musician, use?

--
Thanks,

John

 

[Imyourzero]

I think someone earlier in this thread expressed concern or had second thoughts about buying E5s if this whole 3-5 year lifespan thing turned out to be true. I just wanted to say that evidently it's only an issue with custom IEMs. This is directly from the back page of the manual that came with my Westone UM2s:

Quote:

Originally Posted by The Westone UM2 manual Used wisely, your new sound equipment will provide a lifetime of enjoyment.

 

[Blitzula]

That's awesome...so they provide a lifetime warranty to back that up?

 

[Imyourzero]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Blitzula That's awesome...so they provide a lifetime warranty to back that up?

Was that sarcasm?

At any rate, no. The Westones have a 1-year warranty just like Ultimate Ears provides.

The point I was trying to make is that Westone says that their monitors should last a lifetime with proper care. They aren't saying that the product should only last 3-5 years under normal use.