[Kerouac]

Can't wait until next week to see the one that gets most hype falls on the 3rd rank, either A18 and Zeus will kick the dirt, just my prediction.

Zeus will fall next......bwaahhaa

@flinkenick: loved your Warbler review mate!
Although I'm usually somebody who likes to be wowed with an iems signature, your description of the Prelude and its still affordable (compared to most of the others) pricetag makes it a tempting one to try in the future

@ranfan: I think your grannie is save for next Friday.
Have you considered taking her to a CanJam show and put her there at the entry with a big sign: 'WILL DO HANDSTANDS IN TRADE FOR TOTL IEMS'?

 

[ranfan]

FYI it was all just a joke. My grandma doesn't exist. It was a figurative speech. I forgot to add 'JK' at the end of the sentence. JK

IDK which will win, but I think Zeus will score low on bass. I tried the U18 and it sounded pretty good, except the price.

 

[Deezel177]

FYI it was all just a joke. My grandma doesn't exist. It was a figurative speech. I forgot to add 'JK' at the end of the sentence. JK

IDK which will win, but I think Zeus will score low on bass. I tried the U18 and it sounded pretty good, except the price.

For the purposes of its intended signature, the Zeus actually has a very good low end. I can't quite call it "great" because it does lack physicality, visceral-ness, and rumble (especially for a TOTL), but what it does really well is extension, balance between warmth and air, resolution, and separation. I'd say these are the more underrated qualities of bass, but are equally important and shine especially when listening to toms, vintage 808 bass lines, etc. It also has a lot of headroom for EQ, either digitally or through cable-rolling. I personally think the 2-wire 1960s makes its bass absolutely brilliant. The U18 is exceptional technically, but it does so whilst sacrificing tonal accuracy. IMO, its technical merits outweigh its tonal shortcomings, but we'll see if Nic agrees with me

P.S. And, yes, that bloody price tag!

 

[Kerouac]

For the purposes of its intended signature, the Zeus actually has a very good low end. I can't quite call it "great" because it does lack physicality, visceral-ness, and rumble (especially for a TOTL), but what it does really well is extension, balance between warmth and air, resolution, and separation. I'd say these are the more underrated qualities of bass, but are equally important and shine especially when listening to toms, vintage 808 bass lines, etc. It also has a lot of headroom for EQ, either digitally or through cable-rolling. I personally think the 2-wire 1960s makes its bass absolutely brilliant. The U18 is exceptional technically, but it does so whilst sacrificing tonal accuracy. IMO, its technical merits outweigh its tonal shortcomings, but we'll see if Nic agrees with me

P.S. And, yes, that bloody price tag!

Don't know about the U18 part, as I've never heard that one myself. But I couldn't agree more on your (well described) Zeus part

I also haven't heard the SE5 Ult, which of course makes it more difficult to predict the top 3. But my feeling atm says that that one will be up next Friday.
No shame in that at all though, as we've been talking about '17 winners' in this thread from the start

 

[piotrus-g]

Hey Guys, thanks for pinging me into the discussion I was out for the weekend so I couldn't reply earlier.

Let's start with the advantage of going dual over single driver - so we are talking for example a change from Knowles TEC (single) to DTEC (dual TEC) - in DTEC both motors are working in opposite direction canceling each others' vibrations - meaning huge improvement in THD department. Another thing to consider - if you wire that dual driver in series you get same output as TEC driver (let's simplify here), with lower THD compared to TEC, but at the cost of higher impedance and inductance, if you wire it in parallel you get 6dB higher output compared to standard TEC - so depending on designer's goal you can achieve similar things using different configurations, different drivers.

If we are talking about adding extra driver in similar range - so for example let's have a DTEC and CI (very common design) - by adding extra driver you improve headroom - more volume, less distortion, but you also change things like speed of bass, saturation etc, because each of those drivers have different outputs but also different sound signatures; strengths and weaknesses etc - you can mask weaknesses or improve upon strengths - again depends on the goal.

Talking about Harmony 8.2 - it's unique in a sense that while other manufacturers choose to have woofers working as a full-range (because of their typical natural down-slopping fr response - especially after damping) we use actual full-range driver that goes 10Hz-16kHz and we stack upon this driver to add more bass, more mids and more highs and improve upon full-range driver response - so the full range is like a core with "little helpers" in crucial frequency points. Same idea was present in previous 8 and 8 Pro and is also incorporated in Ei.3

The main thing for me when talking overall driver count of the IEM (single BA vs. multi-driver setups) is in dynamics. 8-10-12 drivers will hit you with a wall of sound, single BA's can't do that.
It's similar with speakers - If you ever heard single transducer horn loaded floor speakers you'll know what I mean.

 

[Deezel177]

Hey Guys, thanks for pinging me into the discussion I was out for the weekend so I couldn't reply earlier.

Let's start with the advantage of going dual over single driver - so we are talking for example a change from Knowles TEC (single) to DTEC (dual TEC) - in DTEC both motors are working in opposite direction canceling each others' vibrations - meaning huge improvement in THD department. Another thing to consider - if you wire that dual driver in series you get same output as TEC driver (let's simplify here), with lower THD compared to TEC, but at the cost of higher impedance and inductance, if you wire it in parallel you get 6dB higher output compared to standard TEC - so depending on designer's goal you can achieve similar things using different configurations, different drivers.

If we are talking about adding extra driver in similar range - so for example let's have a DTEC and CI (very common design) - by adding extra driver you improve headroom - more volume, less distortion, but you also change things like speed of bass, saturation etc, because each of those drivers have different outputs but also different sound signatures; strengths and weaknesses etc - you can mask weaknesses or improve upon strengths - again depends on the goal.

Talking about Harmony 8.2 - it's unique in a sense that while other manufacturers choose to have woofers working as a full-range (because of their typical natural down-slopping fr response - especially after damping) we use actual full-range driver that goes 10Hz-16kHz and we stack upon this driver to add more bass, more mids and more highs and improve upon full-range driver response - so the full range is like a core with "little helpers" in crucial frequency points. Same idea was present in previous 8 and 8 Pro and is also incorporated in Ei.3

The main thing for me when talking overall driver count of the IEM (single BA vs. multi-driver setups) is in dynamics. 8-10-12 drivers will hit you with a wall of sound, single BA's can't do that.
It's similar with speakers - If you ever heard single transducer horn loaded floor speakers you'll know what I mean.

 

[dongster]

Hey Guys, thanks for pinging me into the discussion I was out for the weekend so I couldn't reply earlier.

Let's start with the advantage of going dual over single driver - so we are talking for example a change from Knowles TEC (single) to DTEC (dual TEC) - in DTEC both motors are working in opposite direction canceling each others' vibrations - meaning huge improvement in THD department. Another thing to consider - if you wire that dual driver in series you get same output as TEC driver (let's simplify here), with lower THD compared to TEC, but at the cost of higher impedance and inductance, if you wire it in parallel you get 6dB higher output compared to standard TEC - so depending on designer's goal you can achieve similar things using different configurations, different drivers.

If we are talking about adding extra driver in similar range - so for example let's have a DTEC and CI (very common design) - by adding extra driver you improve headroom - more volume, less distortion, but you also change things like speed of bass, saturation etc, because each of those drivers have different outputs but also different sound signatures; strengths and weaknesses etc - you can mask weaknesses or improve upon strengths - again depends on the goal.

Talking about Harmony 8.2 - it's unique in a sense that while other manufacturers choose to have woofers working as a full-range (because of their typical natural down-slopping fr response - especially after damping) we use actual full-range driver that goes 10Hz-16kHz and we stack upon this driver to add more bass, more mids and more highs and improve upon full-range driver response - so the full range is like a core with "little helpers" in crucial frequency points. Same idea was present in previous 8 and 8 Pro and is also incorporated in Ei.3

The main thing for me when talking overall driver count of the IEM (single BA vs. multi-driver setups) is in dynamics. 8-10-12 drivers will hit you with a wall of sound, single BA's can't do that.
It's similar with speakers - If you ever heard single transducer horn loaded floor speakers you'll know what I mean.

What a great read! Learned so much, thank you piotrus-g

If i understood correctly, "adding extra driver in similar range" with DTEC + CI covers the 2 frequency bands lows+mids.
(1) What are the potential advantages of having 4 vs 2 in the same frequency band (for example 4 per way for 3-way)? or even 8 per frequency band? Are there things only possible with 4+ per band driver counts? *Assuming the engineer is only limited by the components available, not his/her knowledge/ability.
(2) Sonic downsides for 4+ drivers per band? ive read size factor limits drive choice.

 

[Deezel177]

What a great read! Learned so much, thank you piotrus-g

If i understood correctly, "adding extra driver in similar range" with DTEC + CI covers the 2 frequency bands lows+mids.
(1) What are the potential advantages of having 4 vs 2 in the same frequency band (for example 4 per way for 3-way)? or even 8 per frequency band? Are there things only possible with 4+ per band driver counts? *Assuming the engineer is only limited by the components available, not his/her knowledge/ability.
(2) Sonic downsides for 4+ drivers per band? ive read size factor limits drive choice.

The most common/general sonic downside to having a lot of drivers in an IEM (whether in a single band or as a whole) is phasing and coherence. With more drivers to tune, it's more difficult to make sure everything arrives at the ear at the same time and make sure they form a coherent and linear sound from top to bottom.

The size of the driver is definitely a physical downside to multi-driver configurations. I believe most manufacturers use TWFKs if an extra driver(s) is required as it's the type with the smallest footprint.

 

[PinkyPowers]

Hey Guys, thanks for pinging me into the discussion I was out for the weekend so I couldn't reply earlier.

Let's start with the advantage of going dual over single driver - so we are talking for example a change from Knowles TEC (single) to DTEC (dual TEC) - in DTEC both motors are working in opposite direction canceling each others' vibrations - meaning huge improvement in THD department. Another thing to consider - if you wire that dual driver in series you get same output as TEC driver (let's simplify here), with lower THD compared to TEC, but at the cost of higher impedance and inductance, if you wire it in parallel you get 6dB higher output compared to standard TEC - so depending on designer's goal you can achieve similar things using different configurations, different drivers.

If we are talking about adding extra driver in similar range - so for example let's have a DTEC and CI (very common design) - by adding extra driver you improve headroom - more volume, less distortion, but you also change things like speed of bass, saturation etc, because each of those drivers have different outputs but also different sound signatures; strengths and weaknesses etc - you can mask weaknesses or improve upon strengths - again depends on the goal.

Talking about Harmony 8.2 - it's unique in a sense that while other manufacturers choose to have woofers working as a full-range (because of their typical natural down-slopping fr response - especially after damping) we use actual full-range driver that goes 10Hz-16kHz and we stack upon this driver to add more bass, more mids and more highs and improve upon full-range driver response - so the full range is like a core with "little helpers" in crucial frequency points. Same idea was present in previous 8 and 8 Pro and is also incorporated in Ei.3

The main thing for me when talking overall driver count of the IEM (single BA vs. multi-driver setups) is in dynamics. 8-10-12 drivers will hit you with a wall of sound, single BA's can't do that.
It's similar with speakers - If you ever heard single transducer horn loaded floor speakers you'll know what I mean.

OUTSTANDING!

That's the sort of information we just don't get around here. We are more than a little starved for it. Thanks so much for taking the time to share these design philosophies with us. I greatly appreciate it!

 

[piotrus-g]

What a great read! Learned so much, thank you piotrus-g

If i understood correctly, "adding extra driver in similar range" with DTEC + CI covers the 2 frequency bands lows+mids.
(1) What are the potential advantages of having 4 vs 2 in the same frequency band (for example 4 per way for 3-way)? or even 8 per frequency band? Are there things only possible with 4+ per band driver counts? *Assuming the engineer is only limited by the components available, not his/her knowledge/ability.
(2) Sonic downsides for 4+ drivers per band? ive read size factor limits drive choice.

The idea is basically the same - increasing headroom, but more drivers give you more flexibility if you want to add additional cross-over points. You could also consider advantages of a design consisting of say 8 smaller (lighter) diaphragms vs 4 big heavy diaphragms - the headroom achieved could be comparable, but the difference in drivers used will lead you to different sound signatures. There are things that are mostly possible with only one specific model of driver that you'd have to work really hard to achieve using couple of others. Sometimes that's where proprietary driver solutions are used, because the design requires a shift to different resonance at different frequency or damping at specific range - proprietary designs should be considered shortcuts to the final design.

As for 2) - depends if we are talking 4 same drivers - there should be none as long as they are filtered correctly.
If we are talking 4 different drivers covering same range (think midrange + tweeters) - phase issues, time issues and final coherency of sound.

OUTSTANDING!

That's the sort of information we just don't get around here. We are more than a little starved for it. Thanks so much for taking the time to share these design philosophies with us. I greatly appreciate it!

Not a problem! Thanks!

 

[dongster]

The idea is basically the same - increasing headroom, but more drivers give you more flexibility if you want to add additional cross-over points. You could also consider advantages of a design consisting of say 8 smaller (lighter) diaphragms vs 4 big heavy diaphragms - the headroom achieved could be comparable, but the difference in drivers used will lead you to different sound signatures. There are things that are mostly possible with only one specific model of driver that you'd have to work really hard to achieve using couple of others. Sometimes that's where proprietary driver solutions are used, because the design requires a shift to different resonance at different frequency or damping at specific range - proprietary designs should be considered shortcuts to the final design.

As for 2) - depends if we are talking 4 same drivers - there should be none as long as they are filtered correctly.
If we are talking 4 different drivers covering same range (think midrange + tweeters) - phase issues, time issues and final coherency of sound.


Not a problem! Thanks!

Man your job is so cool~
How did you get into this field? Do you have an electronics or control systems background?

 

[proedros]

great post Piotr , thanx for the inside info on hw you make those little buggers

 

[piotrus-g]

Man your job is so cool~
How did you get into this field? Do you have an electronics or control systems background?

Nah, I was reviewer of IEMs, headphones and DAPs and I got a little bit "too interested" in the balanced armature technology

 

[flinkenick]

Nah, I was reviewer of IEMs, headphones and DAPs and I got a little bit "too interested" in the balanced armature technology

I should probably build my own ciem too so I can rank it first next time.

 

[PinkyPowers]

I should probably build my own ciem too so I can rank it first next time.

You corrupt, biased mofo!