Earbuds Round-Up

[Ace Bee]

Got the @RikudouGoku Grand Rider 2 today.

First of all, it knocked the air out of me with the bass! Coming from Rider 1, I sure as hell was not expecting that deep and strong yet masterfully controlled bass! Simply delightful! I was grinning ear to ear.

Compared to Rider 1 these have a smoother approach, but with no loss of detail. Notes have slightly better depth, stage is bigger with more width and depth. The fit is out-of-the-world comfortable and secure! Just unparallelly great! Completely enamoured with them. The perfect alternate pair to my Serratus!

 

[itwasluck]

Got the @RikudouGoku Grand Rider 2 today.

First of all, it knocked the air out of me with the bass! Coming from Rider 1, I sure as hell was not expecting that deep and strong yet masterfully controlled bass! Simply delightful! I was grinning ear to ear.

Compared to Rider 1 these have a smoother approach, but with no loss of detail. Notes have slightly better depth, stage is bigger with more width and depth. The fit is out-of-the-world comfortable and secure! Just unparallelly great! Completely enamoured with them. The perfect alternate pair to my Serratus!

I been really enjoying the GAS2, wish it had more sub-bass extension though. Have you tried the GAS2 as well?

 

[Ace Bee]

having to part with the TGXEar Red Serratus as well, check the signature!

Had I not have the SS Bell Serratus already, I would have jumped at this deal! Love the colour!

 

[Ace Bee]

I been really enjoying the GAS2, wish it had more sub-bass extension though. Have you tried the GAS2 as well?

No I haven't, but I am more than satisfied with GR2 bass, need no more. And since riku said GAS2 has a stronger low end than GR2, I doubt I would go for it.

 

[Carrow]

Had I not have the SS Bell Serratus already, I would have jumped at this deal! Love the colour!

it looks so good, TGX threw in the adapter for free as well which I really appreciate. hoping to try another of his sets.

 

[Ace Bee]

it looks so good, TGX threw in the adapter for free as well which I really appreciate. hoping to try another of his sets.

I already ordered the Ripples from him. Will keep the Serratus and the Ripples as two of my TOTL pair, one for details and one for the musicality.

 

[bk123]

Got the @RikudouGoku Grand Rider 2 today.

First of all, it knocked the air out of me with the bass! Coming from Rider 1, I sure as hell was not expecting that deep and strong yet masterfully controlled bass! Simply delightful! I was grinning ear to ear.

Compared to Rider 1 these have a smoother approach, but with no loss of detail. Notes have slightly better depth, stage is bigger with more width and depth. The fit is out-of-the-world comfortable and secure! Just unparallelly great! Completely enamoured with them. The perfect alternate pair to my Serratus!

Please be gentle on our wallet and stop teasing us

 

[itwasluck]

No I haven't, but I am more than satisfied with GR2 bass, need no more. And since riku said GAS2 has a stronger low end than GR2, I doubt I would go for it.

Thank you for that! I will stick to the Yinman 2.0 600s then. I am also having a special bud made from someone that has been mentioned earlier in this thread. Won't name any names but

 

[Touchowl]

So I wired up my bluebells and unfortunately they're a bit of a dud. Very shrill with almost no sound below 600Hz and very little below 1k. Part of that is my goofy enclosure design; covering the grills definitely helps the low end; but the drivers are also clearly not up to the job, even minor EQ adjustments below 1k makes them crack and pop. Pretty good treble extension though! A 2-driver setup with them like those old technics earbuds could be a funny gimmick. My next project will be an IEM, but I'll definitely come back to earbuds sometime.

 

[Ronion]

So I wired up my bluebells and unfortunately they're a bit of a dud. Very shrill with almost no sound below 600Hz and very little below 1k. Part of that is my goofy enclosure design; covering the grills definitely helps the low end; but the drivers are also clearly not up to the job, even minor EQ adjustments below 1k makes them crack and pop. Pretty good treble extension though! A 2-driver setup with them like those old technics earbuds could be a funny gimmick. My next project will be an IEM, but I'll definitely come back to earbuds sometime.

Are you sure about that? I don't know of any DIY drivers that can't do 200Hz efficiently in an MX500 and those are the worst I know of in that regard. I'd start fresh with the tuning and remove all damping material and try again.

 

[Touchowl]

Are you sure about that? I don't know of any DIY drivers that can't do 200Hz efficiently in an MX500 and those are the worst I know of in that regard. I'd start fresh with the tuning and remove all damping material and try again.

These are 13mm biodynamic drivers from aliexpress so they're already smaller than the average DIY driver so I'm not sure about their quality. You're right though there's not much intensive damping(in fact besides some tissue behind the driver there's almost none). What would you recommend to improve it?
Edit: frankly though I'm pretty sure the shells are the main culprit. They're so flat that the magnet of the driver touches the back wall, there's hardly any air volume for the drivers to actually make bass.

 

[samandhi]

I was hoping everyone got the joke in the link. It was a reference to the joke I made regarding @FranQL's Foot uh, how do I say? Fascination.

I was going to ask what the heck that was supposed to be. ROFL

Got the @RikudouGoku Grand Rider 2 today.

First of all, it knocked the air out of me with the bass! Coming from Rider 1, I sure as hell was not expecting that deep and strong yet masterfully controlled bass! Simply delightful! I was grinning ear to ear.

Compared to Rider 1 these have a smoother approach, but with no loss of detail. Notes have slightly better depth, stage is bigger with more width and depth. The fit is out-of-the-world comfortable and secure! Just unparallelly great! Completely enamoured with them. The perfect alternate pair to my Serratus!

Congrats on your new shiny!

So I wired up my bluebells and unfortunately they're a bit of a dud. Very shrill with almost no sound below 600Hz and very little below 1k. Part of that is my goofy enclosure design; covering the grills definitely helps the low end; but the drivers are also clearly not up to the job, even minor EQ adjustments below 1k makes them crack and pop. Pretty good treble extension though! A 2-driver setup with them like those old technics earbuds could be a funny gimmick. My next project will be an IEM, but I'll definitely come back to earbuds sometime.

Thats a shame because they are pretty cool looking.

I have the same issue with the Smabat M4. There just isn't any room behind the driver in the shell, but there also isn't anywhere you can drill more ports to increase the bass and rid them of the shrill nature. Have you considered either more porting or larger diameters for the existing ones?

 

[Touchowl]

I was going to ask what the heck that was supposed to be. ROFL

Congrats on your new shiny!

Thats a shame because they are pretty cool looking.

I have the same issue with the Smabat M4. There just isn't any room behind the driver in the shell, but there also isn't anywhere you can drill more ports to increase the bass and rid them of the shrill nature. Have you considered either more porting or larger diameters for the existing ones?

There might be some room to drill, although I'll have to check how thick the drill bits I have are. Ideally how wide are ports usually?

 

[samandhi]

There might be some room to drill, although I'll have to check how thick the drill bits I have are. Ideally how wide are ports usually?

I don't know if there is a standard size per se, but it will probably depend on the tuning you seek, nature of the drivers natural sound, acoustics of the shell, shell composition etc... I am only theorizing and not from actual experience mind you.

This is why a lot of DIYers probably go through a lot of shells...experimenting. Having said that, I am sure there are a lot of DIYer on here that could be a lot more specific than I can be (with my mere assumptions, lacking experience), and would be glad to be of assistance to you.

 

[Ronion]

These are 13mm biodynamic drivers from aliexpress so they're already smaller than the average DIY driver so I'm not sure about their quality. You're right though there's not much intensive damping(in fact besides some tissue behind the driver there's almost none). What would you recommend to improve it?
Edit: frankly though I'm pretty sure the shells are the main culprit. They're so flat that the magnet of the driver touches the back wall, there's hardly any air volume for the drivers to actually make bass.

Those are likely either the Apple drivers or a copy. The Apple drivers are actually good ones. I would try experimenting with those shells more as far as damping goes because I love the look of those shells and I bet they fit beautifully. Your design skills are impressive. You should be able to find some IEM tuning papers on AE and those shells may require like Y4 or 5 or even 6. You can even buy sheets of tuning paper to make custom sizes that would fit your shells perfectly. If that doesn't work, I'd make bigger shells--the MX500 size works really well as far as bud tuning goes, but even the Lite shells can be tuned close to MX500 levels and they fit like a dream as I bet yours do.