[weexisttocease]

Congrats on your new shiny!

You will have to share more impressions as you get some "ear time" on them?!

Oh WOW! That is crazy... haha

I have the 600S and the 500 Classical. They come with 3.5 termination, balanced is no longer available.

The drivers on these have strong magnets. They need power too. It is recommended at least 100h of burn-in but so far I'm loving it. The speedness of the drivers is really good, it can handle Meshuggah's fast tracks.

The 500 sounds more neutral with emphasis on the mids and upper mids. You can hear very clearly all instruments with excellent separation. Smoother presentation overall.

I'm using the 320MAX with the MASS-kobo 475. The 600S is harder to drive but you instantly can hear better dynamics and little sub-bass boost. Vocals seem more forward. Sharper presentation overall.

These to my ears sound TOTL earbuds. A bargain along with the Yinman 600. The Yinman is warmer and it seems to have a more intimate presentation, probably with even better dynamics.

I will try them later with the RA2B-FE which his is more powerful source on paper. I'm also considering buying the Defiant. I don't know what is happening with me but I don't listen to IEMs for more than a month.

 

[Kyonnie]

I recommend simply getting used to using it with every job because everybody uses silver solder nowadays (for health reasons).

Don't lead free solder have disadvantages? Like whiskers forming and cracking. I preferred using leaded solders because of this and they're much easier to work with. I do know in EU they banned the use of leaded solder for commercial use but not for hobbyist use.

I received the PureSounds PS100 a few days ago. Decided to unpack it and I just realized the included red foams are rotted. This probably was in stock for ages. I only use Hiegi or K's foams, so there's no problem.

Lol, I experienced this too after opening an old stock vintage earbuds it basically turned into dust after me touching it bleghh. Btw congrats on your new shinies!

 

[DBaldock9]

Oh I see. The one you linked is higher power than the one you use. That is more reasonable, thanks

Maybe my best bet is to take the train down to Electric Town Akihabara and look there. I bet I could find something good and cheap.

I still use a $65 Solder Station that I bought in 1986.
I do own a several hundred dollar Solder Rework Station, but I haven't organized my work area to set it up yet.

 

[mt877]

I wish I could like posts more than once Thanks so much!

It won't be my very first time soldering (I have an electrical engineering degree but I've never had to solder outside the classroom lol >_>), but it has been a solid number of years since then, and I never got past the stage where it is tricky and you mess up a lot. I guess my biggest worry off the bat is burning the driver.

No worries about burning the driver. I'll give you (and others that are interested) good guidance. I just took all the pictures I think I need for a soldering tips guide and will post a pdf when I get it together.

 

[Brillig]

That's great! I have to add a few more things to your shopping list which will really make things easier during the build. I'll also give you some DIY tips so you'll be successful on your first go at this stuff. Here's a few suggested items which will make your soldering job neater and easier. I'll think of some other things as well. Anyway, I'm here to help you be successful. I'll do an easy to understand soldering tips pdf.

Spoiler: Additional stuff to buy

Helping hands with magnifier. The MMCX is very tiny and will get very hot when you try to solder the small wires on (you don't want to burn your fingers). Use the alligator clip to hold the MMCX connector, use the magnifying lens to see what you're soldering. You can get these cheap on Amazon or if you visit Akihabura you might be able to source everything there.


Some cheap precision tweezers. This is only an example of some tweezers. I only have straight needle nose and the bent needle nose tweezers, not a complete set. They are pretty cheap. Use them to hold the wires when soldering (burn prevention).


Cheap solder sucker. You may make a solder bridge when soldering or tinning the MMCX connector center pin and common. The only way you can clean up that mess is to heat up the connector where the solder bridge is at and use the solder sucker to vacuum the hot solder away.


A cheap multimeter. Most cheap multimeters will have manual ranges, so you set the volt or resistance (Ohms) range you need to measure. More expensive multimeters have auto-ranging, meaning you set it to what you want to measure and the meter automatically measures and sets the correct range. You could probably get by without a meter, but it's always a good idea to measure the resistance of the speakers before and after you solder the wires to the speaker to be sure A) you didn't receive a defective speaker and B) after soldering the wires that the speaker is still ok. Always expect the resistance to be a little bit higher after the wires are soldered on and the speaker is hot or warm to the touch. After it cools down the resistance should be very close to what you measured before soldering.

This is great! Thank you for your generosity to the community. I am almost tempted to try it, but I’m not as young as I once was, my eyesight is not as great as it once was, and my hands are not as steady… Oh, well!

 

[mt877]

This is great! Thank you for your generosity to the community. I am almost tempted to try it, but I’m not as young as I once was, my eyesight is not as great as it once was, and my hands are not as steady… Oh, well!

You can do it. The techniques I use and will explain for soldering will minimize unsteady hands. About eyesight... while the helping hands alligator clip with magnifying glass stand is sufficient for 90% of soldering small things, I actually prefer to use a headband magnifier with a light and just the alligator clips on the stand. With a single magnifier lens (like on the stand) you're somewhat forced to view things in mono vision (primarily your dominant eye will look through the magnifier), so depth perception is thrown off which affects soldering accuracy. The headband magnifier allows stereo vision (our natural vision) and depth perception which allows you to judge the distance where the soldering iron tip and object you are soldering accurately.

 

[Kyonnie]

This is great! Thank you for your generosity to the community. I am almost tempted to try it, but I’m not as young as I once was, my eyesight is not as great as it once was, and my hands are not as steady… Oh, well!

You can do it. The techniques I use and will explain for soldering will minimize unsteady hands. About eyesight... while the helping hands alligator clip with magnifying glass stand is sufficient for 90% of soldering small things, I actually prefer to use a headband magnifier with a light and just the alligator clips on the stand. With a single magnifier lens (like on the stand) you're somewhat forced to view things in mono vision (primarily your dominant eye will look through the magnifier), so depth perception is thrown off which affects soldering accuracy. The headband magnifier allows stereo vision (our natural vision) and depth perception which allows you to judge the distance where the soldering iron tip and object you are soldering accurately.

It's a good thing that more and more people are getting into doing DIY, considering how disappointing most earbuds in the TOTL price range are. And tbh, alot of them are just using DIY available parts and dropping them in a shell; some don't even provide cables but I will still buy branded ones lol.

 

[Kenyon]

No the price is for the 380W and no one really needs that wattage.

You can get something like the Aifen A5. The key is to get a high frequency soldering iron and you probably will love using it. These get ready in 4 seconds before you are even ready to solder.
https://www.aliexpress.com/w/wholesale-aifen-a5.html?spm=a2g0o.home.search.0
https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005004984307742.html?spm=a2g0o.productlist.main.3.3d0046f6i5lbYg&algo_pvid=83501882-ff5a-4539-a1f6-28a94a543060&algo_exp_id=83501882-ff5a-4539-a1f6-28a94a543060-1&pdp_npi=4@dis!USD!164.99!52.8!!!164.99!!@2101e54417014080617942192e77df!12000031239324630!sea!HK!2510364788!&curPageLogUid=rYSFxJQTIDVS

You won't believe how stone age those cheap irons feel like compare to something like this.

Can vouch for the recommendation - I use an Aifen A9 - very competent for the price

 

[samandhi]

Don't lead free solder have disadvantages? Like whiskers forming and cracking. I preferred using leaded solders because of this and they're much easier to work with. I do know in EU they banned the use of leaded solder for commercial use but not for hobbyist use.

The flux will help with whiskers and such.

I prefer lead based as well, but if you do any sort of re engineering, or rebuilding, silver solder is where everything is moving to.

 

[lordearl]

Yep when starting out lead solder is the best - easy to work with. Another good idea is to toy around with a cheap PCB or some loose wires and just get into the swing of soldering (and de-soldering). It's like anything, practice makes perfect!

 

[Brillig]

You can do it. The techniques I use and will explain for soldering will minimize unsteady hands. About eyesight... while the helping hands alligator clip with magnifying glass stand is sufficient for 90% of soldering small things, I actually prefer to use a headband magnifier with a light and just the alligator clips on the stand. With a single magnifier lens (like on the stand) you're somewhat forced to view things in mono vision (primarily your dominant eye will look through the magnifier), so depth perception is thrown off which affects soldering accuracy. The headband magnifier allows stereo vision (our natural vision) and depth perception which allows you to judge the distance where the soldering iron tip and object you are soldering accurately.

You've got me thinking!

 

[jwilliamhurst]

Venture Electronics Prime Dac and Megatron with Runabout 2B-FE

This little stack is amazing!!

Impactful, Punchy Dynamics for dayzzzz and razor sharp transients with tons of headroom, a large stage width and depth and resolving power in spades! Makes my hard to drive buds sing with Glory!!

Highly Recommended

 

[saldsald]

Interesting that you find that. I am normally a fan of "thinner is better". As long as the cable impedance is fairly low (though some sets do better with higher impedance cables). I have only one or two 16 core cable, and quite a few 8 core cables, but I like the 4 core cables for earbuds. Just my thoughts on the subject.

From my cabling experiments, I honestly don't think impedance determines SQ, as long as it's not unreasonably high. I just happened to have made a cable with very low DC resistance and it's not that good. Number of cores is actually not too meaningful because 99% of the wires are litzed so it only means more plastic insulation skin when you get more cores or less conductor.

The thickness of the cable isn't so much about the voltage, but more the current. If a cable is not sufficiently thick enough (overall) to get the current you need, you will know because it will get hot, or even burn the conductors up in the circuit. As for having enough power to excite the drivers, I think it will more than likely come down to the combination of impedance of your source output, cable, and drivers themselves.

I agree, when a cable is thick enough it's thick enough. However impedance, conductance and capacitany are all quite theoretical in music. Using transmission line theory to explain whether the signal is affected or euphonic is like using an oscilloscope to explain music IMO, assuming there is only one electron, passing through one single path at a time which is probably in the territory of quantum electrodynamics and I have never touched. And since we can hear the differences swapping cables it can only mean the sound is affected and we will need a whole University degree to learn how we human percept sound and also noise as music. And considering these sre definitely not the only factors affecting the sound, I think it is best to not consider the theory behind but experiment with the cable components instead - plug, solder, wire and plugs again, some may even experiment with the braiding method thou I don't think it matters.

As for myself, I use DAPs that have less than 1ohm output impedance. This number is very important to me, as it does indeed change the sound quality (and not for the better) with higher impedance. The rule of thumb is 1/8th. Your output impedance should be not more than 1/8th of the driver impedance (and you should be adding the cable impedance to the source impedance to get that number).

For the best sound (and like they do with speaker systems), you should get as close to 1/8th as you can; not too much under, and not too much over. Also, known as matching the amplifier to the speakers.

BTW! Not trying to insult you if you know all of this already...

Impossible! I am uninsultable. Yes I do have a few DAPs with lower output impedance but I like the M15s more so I just use it instead. Honestly I usually just don't care about the number but just listen with my ears.

 

[saldsald]

Not sure about statistics, probably you are right. At any case it is possible to find portable sources with output impedance below, say, 0.5 Ohm.

RS6 is 0.4 (SE) and 0.8 (balanced) I should take it out from my drawer then.

By the way, I guess source output impedance ignoring is one of the reason (I don't say the main one) high impedance buds are popular (especially when tube amps are in use). Output impedance per se isn't important. Dumping factor (Zbud / Zsource) is.

Thanks for the insights. Oh wait you mean damping factor, right? The RW3000 is advertised as easily driven even with a mobile phone but it's not actually as forgiving as other higher impedance buds then, maybe?

 

[Brillig]

Venture Electronics Prime Dac and Megatron with Runabout 2B-FE

This little stack is amazing!!

Impactful, Punchy Dynamics for dayzzzz and razor sharp transients with tons of headroom, a large stage width and depth and resolving power in spades! Makes my hard to drive buds sing with Glory!!

Highly Recommended

I lust after this stack, but I have a Megatron and I have always been very curious as to how the Megatron compares. Can you offer any impressions? Or anyone else? Obviously, the stack is “better,“ but any details?