[ShaneyMac]

Another great budget bud is Ksearphone K64....

... WAS great bud... Unfortunately these are out of stock, too. Probably discontinued. What a shame, indeed...

 

[Surf Monkey]

Cheap enough to capture my attention after budgetary indiscretions over Xmas!

TRN EMA was a ... disappointment.

For real. Best $10 I spent all year.

 

[SuperMAG]

Well, these Yincrow X6 phones are real winners for sure. I’m using them with silicon gaskets under stock foams right now and it’s very good. The fit is solid and the sound is perfect. THICK and textured bass. Nice mid forward presentation generally. Sparkly treble with good detail and most surprising of all, pretty great separation to boot.

I know these are old news for most of the buds crowd, but they deserve the spotlight. For around $10 these are easily as good as several of my vastly pricier IEMs.

Agreed with this, I have bought monk plus and thought those were great then bought vidos, monk were better then bought the emx500 which were the best and much better then both vido and monk.

Then few months ago, I bought this x6 and emx500 again as mine was torn by my kid. And I was never shocked like this, these has huge soundstage and presentation and every sound is thick and big but also clear, I was totally in love, thought I found my endgame that's worth only 10$.

But then everyone was raving about ff3 and I felt being left out, and I finally caved at 11/11, bought for only 61$.

Don't get me wrong FF3 are good but X6 is equally good in some things and better or worse in others and the price difference is no way worth it, but I dont regret ff3, the bass on these things is ridiculous but I wanted more resolution but oh well these are not bad.

I will post my comparison later, but for those who say vido are cheaper and same, A big NO, they are not, I have like 4 different vido, they are not same at all.

Yincow X6 so far to me are the best 10$ you can spend on earbuds, planning on buying another as backup set.

 

[Surf Monkey]

Agreed with this, I have bought monk plus and thought those were great then bought vidos, monk were better then bought the emx500 which were the best and much better then both vido and monk.

Then few months ago, I bought this x6 and emx500 again as mine was torn by my kid. And I was never shocked like this, these has huge soundstage and presentation and every sound is thick and big but also clear, I was totally in love, thought I found my endgame that's worth only 10$.

But then everyone was raving about ff3 and I felt being left out, and I finally caved at 11/11, bought for only 61$.

Don't get me wrong FF3 are good but X6 is equally good in some things and better or worse in others and the price difference is no way worth it, but I dont regret ff3, the bass on these things is ridiculous but I wanted more resolution but oh well these are not bad.

I will post my comparison later, but for those who say vido are cheaper and same, A big NO, they are not, I have like 4 different vido, they are not same at all.

Yincow X6 so far to me are the best 10$ you can spend on earbuds, planning on buying another as backup set.

Truth. They sound great. They remind me a lot of the IKKO OH10, even though that’s an IEM. I continue to be stunned by how big the sound is coming out of these.

 

[Ronion]

What is with all these high value buds being out of stock...

The Vido and the X6 used to have the same driver and tuning...... I haven't kept up on these things but I do have an X6.

 

[ttorbic]

Not quite audio related, but fascinating nevertheless: https://www-wired-com.cdn.ampprojec...-to-get-in-your-ears-and-watch-your-brain/amp

They use a laser 3D scanner to build custom moulds! @o0genesis0o @Ronion you two would especially dig this

 

[SuperMAG]

What is with all these high value buds being out of stock...

The Vido and the X6 used to have the same driver and tuning...... I haven't kept up on these things but I do have an X6.

I have old and new versions of vido and colored versions, the sound is completely different from X6.

 

[o0genesis0o]

Not quite audio related, but fascinating nevertheless: https://www-wired-com.cdn.ampprojec...-to-get-in-your-ears-and-watch-your-brain/amp

They use a laser 3D scanner to build custom moulds! @o0genesis0o @Ronion you two would especially dig this

Thanks for sharing! Fascinating indeed. I am impressed by the resourcefulness and initiative of the project lead to continue the project despite all the cancellations. A role model for struggling academics like myself, I would say.

AFAIK, the 3d scanning for in ears have been around for a decade or so. I have seen a video from ultimate ears with the same kind of device. Apple does that with the LIDAR nowadays. If you have AirPods Pro and iPhone, you can activate the personalised spatial sound and use the phone to make a 3d scan of your head and ears. In my case, I hear a noticeably increase in ear gain region. When the mix hits just right, the effect of this personalised HRTF can be very uncanny, like the sound actually appears in the room.

 

[AsciiJC]

I would like to ask a general question!
What do you all consider to be a TOTL earbud, whether you believe in it or not, thats currently available or was!

 

[baskingshark]

I would like to ask a general question!
What do you all consider to be a TOTL earbud, whether you believe in it or not, thats currently available or was!

I would consider earbuds like the Yincrow RW2000 to be the kind of benchmark in sound if I would term something as TOTL in the earbud world.

Generally, I would consider $100USD and above as the TOTL bracket for earbuds. But certainly price doesn't correlate with sound quality, there are some very expensive earbuds that are stinkers (eg Smabat ST20 Pro), and cheaper stuff that are very good sounding. The DIY stuff some of our esteemed DIYers here make arguably give excellent sound for low price, definitely more cost effective than some of the so called TOTL buds from the usual big name manufacturers.

 

[ttorbic]

Thanks for sharing! Fascinating indeed. I am impressed by the resourcefulness and initiative of the project lead to continue the project despite all the cancellations. A role model for struggling academics like myself, I would say.

AFAIK, the 3d scanning for in ears have been around for a decade or so. I have seen a video from ultimate ears with the same kind of device. Apple does that with the LIDAR nowadays. If you have AirPods Pro and iPhone, you can activate the personalised spatial sound and use the phone to make a 3d scan of your head and ears. In my case, I hear a noticeably increase in ear gain region. When the mix hits just right, the effect of this personalised HRTF can be very uncanny, like the sound actually appears in the room.

Haha I'm a former-struggling academic, now a less struggling but still insecure scientist in industry the pace of R&D in huge tech companies like Google is just mind boggling. I'm glad they're collaborating with academic labs - really need those deep insights as well as practical answers during development

 

[FranQL]

Agreed with this, I have bought monk plus and thought those were great then bought vidos, monk were better then bought the emx500 which were the best and much better then both vido and monk.

Then few months ago, I bought this x6 and emx500 again as mine was torn by my kid. And I was never shocked like this, these has huge soundstage and presentation and every sound is thick and big but also clear, I was totally in love, thought I found my endgame that's worth only 10$.

But then everyone was raving about ff3 and I felt being left out, and I finally caved at 11/11, bought for only 61$.

Don't get me wrong FF3 are good but X6 is equally good in some things and better or worse in others and the price difference is no way worth it, but I dont regret ff3, the bass on these things is ridiculous but I wanted more resolution but oh well these are not bad.

I will post my comparison later, but for those who say vido are cheaper and same, A big NO, they are not, I have like 4 different vido, they are not same at all.

Yincow X6 so far to me are the best 10$ you can spend on earbuds, planning on buying another as backup set.

Yeeeeeep, I affirm that they are absolutely the same, that is, the same shell, the same driver and the same setting. I'm not going to get into intangibles, or what each person's mind can perceive... but the difference between Vido and X6 is as big as it can be from one unit of X6 to another X6. Or maybe the cable also works its magic... in that case we would already enter into another debate, in which I can contribute very little.

 

[AsciiJC]

I would consider earbuds like the Yincrow RW2000 to be the kind of benchmark in sound if I would term something as TOTL in the earbud world.

Generally, I would consider $100USD and above as the TOTL bracket for earbuds. But certainly price doesn't correlate with sound quality, there are some very expensive earbuds that are stinkers (eg Smabat ST20 Pro), and cheaper stuff that are very good sounding. The DIY stuff some of our esteemed DIYers here make arguably give excellent sound for low price, definitely more cost effective than some of the so called TOTL buds from the usual big name manufacturers.

Thanks for the response! Never expected someone to reply.

I've found that DIY has indeed been taking over the higher bud priced names. Which in a way is a good and bad thing, but i would like to see buds being picked up again by manufacturers in some capacity. I'm planning on working with some groups to make a high end bud myself, but thats for another day!

For now, all I really do is endlessly experiment with acoustics and so on in buds!

 

[FranQL]

I would like to ask a general question!
What do you all consider to be a TOTL earbud, whether you believe in it or not, thats currently available or was!

It's not that I don't want to answer, it's that maybe my tastes aren't the most appropriate to say that something is or isn't TOLT, I have a great facility to say what I don't like or what is wrong when I hear any thing (IMO), but once everything is in place I can't say things like "holographic" (because there can't be that term for sound), or certain technical terms by which people can bring something to god level.

An example is LBB / LBBs, it just seemed rubbish to me, and it is a beloved and loved bud by many.

In summary, something tolt for me cannot be a reference for anything or anyone, and the buds that I consider TOLT are the ones that make me listen to music and while I think... uff my goodness, how does this sound!

 

[baskingshark]

Thanks for the response! Never expected someone to reply.

I've found that DIY has indeed been taking over the higher bud priced names. Which in a way is a good and bad thing, but i would like to see buds being picked up again by manufacturers in some capacity. I'm planning on working with some groups to make a high end bud myself, but thats for another day!

For now, all I really do is endlessly experiment with acoustics and so on in buds!

Good luck with your DIY projects. I remember you were making a planar earbud right? How is the progress?


With regards to manufacturers focusing on earbuds, sadly, I think they might do R&D mostly in IEMs and headphones, or even TWS, rather than earbuds. Earbuds are probably too niche for the manufacturers, I think there's not a huge market pie for them to readily invest time and money into making earbuds.

We have exceptions with Fiio making the FF3 and FF5 recently, but most of the big boys still churn out IEMs faster than earbuds. Haha anyway, we'll keep this earbud audio nirvana as our little secret here, it might be good in a way that earbuds aren't so mainstream. I get jaded now seeing budget IEMs being dumped on a weekly basis, and majority are just sidegrades that are forgotten after a few weeks.