[Kouzelna]

 
Hi all,
 
After just having them recabled by Etymotic, in which they installed an entirely new cable setup (black and braided, unlike the original one), somehow the L headphone's braided wire has become loose at the mid-joint, where both R and L connect and then turn into a single shielded wire heading toward the plug end.  
 
Lucky me, they are now out of warranty. I cannot afford Etymotic's high repair fees, nor a pile of cash for a quality cable upgrade.  Anyone have any ideas for me?  Also, the connection at the joint on these new cables are so flimsy and delicate, I'm afraid this could just happen again.  Before all went wrong, I'd owned these Etys 8 years without any hiccups.
 
Help please, I use these things on a daily basis and am just dying without them.  I am being forced to listen to the loud pumping pop music they play at my gym.  Torture!  Agony!  
 
 

 

[nickyboyo]

End the agony....the same thing happened to me. This is the set up i use now- Westone cable and Ety P adaptor, it is very sturdy and sounds great. Good for the gym to:
 
Westone ES cable- http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Westone-Epic-Pro-ES-AC-UM2-UM3X-50-IEM-Cable-Black-NEW-/300602768777?pt=AU_Pro_Audio&hash=item45fd523d89
 
Cable to Ety barrel adaptors, your choice P, S and even B
P- http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Westone-Epic-Pro-ES-AC-UM2-UM3X-50-IEM-Cable-Black-NEW-/300602768777?pt=AU_Pro_Audio&hash=item45fd523d89
S- http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/ETYMOTIC-ER4-IN-EARPHONE-CABLE-ADAPTOR-S-/300592438512?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item45fcb49cf0
B- http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/ETYMOTIC-ER4-IN-EARPHONE-CABLE-ADAPTOR-B-/290603356999?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item43a94f5347
 
As i said, i have been using the P set up for over 2 years now with no trouble at all.
 
Good luck

 

[Kouzelna]

No degradation in sound?  The other thing is that I see it's braided all the way through, and I'm worried about durability since I use these when I travel to school nearly every day.
 
Ouch, I'm looking at $100 here, though...  Anyplace to buy a used Ety or Westone cable for cheap?

 

[linuscat]

Sennheiser H-37974PX4 Replacement Cable's share the same male interconnects, visually.  comments please. 

 

[Kouzelna]

I second comments request. If there's a cheaper alternative to shipping to Etymotic, that'd be great!

 

[Spyro]

You got 8 years of daily use out of them?  That's about 5-6 more years than I would expect.
 
Just buy another used pair for $100-150.  There's really no other options.  You are gonna have to spend something.

 

[Kouzelna]

Nah, I've decided to send an SAS Strike Team into Etymotic and have them grab me a stackful of new ones.
 
Oh wait... I'm awake now, and what I did was send it in to them for repair, with a letter begging them to make it cheap because I'm broke.  They are really cool over there, and I'm confident they'll do a great job.  
 
The problem is the new cabling system.  When I bought them, they had the old style red/green cable system.  It made tons of noise when the cable rubbed.  So they rebuilt my unit (after I cut the cable by accident), and put the all black cabling system on it, which was far better - no noise at all, to speak of.  But this new black system has a longer dongle in the middle of it than the old one, and these very fragile headphone wires spring from that.  They are designed in a way that makes them easily wear out with normal movement, I think.  And sure enough, it did.  
 
Pretty soon after I got it, it's worn itself out.  In my letter I asked them to really look into that, as the old one never had such problems.  Hopefully, they'll be able to sort something out and change the design a little bit so that doesn't happen again.  Will report here.

 

[msdisme]

  Cable to Ety barrel adaptors, your choice P, S and even B
P- http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Westone-Epic-Pro-ES-AC-UM2-UM3X-50-IEM-Cable-Black-NEW-/300602768777?pt=AU_Pro_Audio&hash=item45fd523d89
S- http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/ETYMOTIC-ER4-IN-EARPHONE-CABLE-ADAPTOR-S-/300592438512?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item45fcb49cf0
B- http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/ETYMOTIC-ER4-IN-EARPHONE-CABLE-ADAPTOR-B-/290603356999?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item43a94f5347
 
Hi Nicky -
 
What is the difference between the P, S and B?
 
Also, do you know if the sennheisser cables work?
 
Thanks!
 
Michael

 

[Kouzelna]

Oops.  Forgot about my own thread. 

 
To update, Etymotic did indeed look into my connection problem, and they did their best to rig something to solve it.  They put some extra shielding on the cable where it connects to the dongle.  I also bought a tiny heat shield sleeve at my local hardware store, and used that with a little black tape to wrap around and protect the connection.  Worked great.  Now when the headphones are stressed for any reason, or move naturally while I'm in transit, they pull on the shielding instead of on the dongle connection.
 
Most important of all, I now use a hard drive case to store them in for traveling, instead of the tiny headphones bag or case.  This gives them a lot more room to breathe, without stressing or pinching the cable.
 
Though it doesn't help if you're girlfriend is using your backpack as a pillow, when you're laying around the grass together in your local park on a sunny day.  Just lost a pair of different IEMs to that little hiccup.  Her head must've been laying right on 'em, as it pinched the cabling and cut the wire.
 
Worth it though?  Yeah...