[miow]

I got rid of ALL the remaining sibilance and harshness

I stressed them out completely with a set of highly selected music with twice as much higher frequencies than Pink Noise (as shown on the graphic equalizers) during 48 hours (this was done after a "normal" burn-in of aprox 100 hours). Plus I did something that some people do with Hi-Fi speakers. Place them close to each other. I did the same with the Hippo VBs ear canals, making the sound of each one enter the ear canal of the other one. After 48 hours the sibilance gone completely and the treble is now CRYSTAL CLEAR

This was done after aprox. 100 hours "normal" burn-in, so I recommend that you just do this when your drivers have enough flexibility to be prepared for such stress levels.

Try this everyone, do exactly as I did and please tell me the results ASAP.

Search for music such as Trance/Psychedelic, that shows all the frequencies all the time, all the way up at the very top of Windows Media Player graphic equalizer, for eg. If you need feel free to PM me and I send you my set, since its proven.

EDIT: not only the highs are crisp and clear, as well as instrument separation is much more evident now, pretty much like the IE8s. Wow!

 

[Kaviar]

Holy cow... I just received an e-mail from Jaben Store.

Quote:

Hi [name], Thank you for your purchase from Jaben! Through some internal error, another Hippo VB has been sent to you, so do not be alarmed when you receive 2 Hippo VBs. However, this was a mistake on our part, and so there is no need for any payment for the extra Hippo VB, nor do you need to send it back. Instead, please consider the extra unit as a gift from us. We hope you enjoy your purchase, and look forward to serving you again!

That`s what I call service! Can`t wait to give those bad boys a go. After reading the review on anythingbutipod.com I just knew I had to have them.

 

[daouda]

I think that if you have gotten used to darkish sound signatures and are especially sensitive to treble harshness & sibilance, there's a lot of chances that you will be disappointed at first, but dont give up on them : give them some (unlistened) burn-in, throw some foam into the canals if necessary, then give them a few hours of listening and i think they will not let you down...

Since you'Re gonna get 2 pairs of VBs, you could do something for the community : first listen to both pairs briefly to see if they sound the same, especially treble-wise (i suspect there might be some variability depending on the batch), if they do, put one on the side and do all the burn-in (unlistened with music and/or pink noise if you want, then listened for a few hours) that you think is necessary, then after a few days of use, pick up the pair that you havent used yet and A/B both pairs (with special attention to treble harshness & sibilance)..... then give us your conclusions!

 

[Kaviar]

Quote:

Originally Posted by daouda /img/forum/go_quote.gif I think that if you have gotten used to darkish sound signatures and are especially sensitive to treble harshness & sibilance, there's a lot of chances that you will be disappointed at first, but dont give up on them : give them some (unlistened) burn-in, throw some foam into the canals if necessary, then give them a few hours of listening and i think they will not let you down... Since you'Re gonna get 2 pairs of VBs, you could do something for the community : first listen to both pairs briefly to see if they sound the same, especially treble-wise (i suspect there might be some variability depending on the batch), if they do, put one on the side and do all the burn-in (unlistened with music and/or pink noise if you want, then listened for a few hours) that you think is necessary, then after a few days of use, pick up the pair that you havent used yet and A/B both pairs (with special attention to treble harshness & sibilance)..... then give us your conclusions!

Hey now that`s an excellent idea! Experience tells me it will be another 2-3 weeks before I receive them though. I figure I might as well use pink noise instead of music and give them 100 hours or so, just to be sure that they are properly burned in. I did notice a lot of difference in my Bi-metals. Not so much in my Sony`s. ATH-A700`s were somewhere in between.

I don`t have that much experience describing sound in English, but I will give it my best shot. I would love to be able to contribute with something substantial.

 

[miow]

That will be of value. Let us know

 

[brendon]

^^^ Yes ! You can strike a big blow for either the burn-in believers or the burn-in disbelievers !

 

[Aardvarks]

Brilliant idea but this needs to be an ABX test under blinded conditions.

You will need an assistant.

Add a small sticker to each pair down near the plug, mark each with either A or B. Make sure you know which pair you burned in.

Listen to each pair under unblinded conditions to see if you can hear any difference. describe what you hear.

Now get a friend to blindfold you and pass you the iems under a random fashion say 10 times. All you have to do is say if it is pair A or Pair B. If there is real difference you should be able to tell 10 out of 10 which is which.

If you cant then it goes to show that even if you thought your heard a difference originally, in actuality you can not reproduce the perception of this difference.

And, I bought mine after reading dfkt's thread on ABI as well.

Varkie

 

[Kaviar]

Sure thing Varkie. Wikipedia seems articulate the rules of the test quite well. It says 10-25 trials. Am I allowed to listen to the first 20 seconds of say 5 different tracks before I make up my mind in each trial, or can I only choose one single test track?

I am already composing a playlist in foobar. This is going to be a lot of fun, and a bit scary too as I have always claimed to be one of those who are able to tell the difference. My lovely girlfriend has agreed to act as my assistant. As compensation she will be awarded a pair of Hippo VB`s

 

[daouda]

Hehe this is going to be interesting... Now dont forget to report if you can sense a difference between the 2 unburned-in pairs (in their out-of-the box state) - you could also do the ABX protocol for that if you dont mind bothering. Off course this could be impossible if you receive the second pair much later than the first which you obviously wont resist trying in the mean time. I would really like to know if the extreme sibilance some of us experienced with the VBs pre-burn-in (when others reported just a very decent amount of sibilance) is the result of an irregular quality between different batches due to poor quality control, or the result of very different individual sensitivities to sibilance. This could either prove that there actually IS a varying quality if the brand new phones are different out of the box, or prove nothing at all if you find them similar (they can very well belong to the same batch, or you could not have that special sensitivity to sibilance that i suspect some of us are unfortunate to possess).


Also, it would be interesting if you could provide us with your test playlist, so we could collectively improve it with songs where some us us feel the vocal sibilance & treble harshness is especially noticeable or bothering with the hippo VBs.

This is going to be a VERY interesting experiment especially for us hippo VB owners, but whatever the results it's not going to be THAT significant to be able to draw definitive conclusions about the issue of burn-in. This is only going to tell us about the issue (or non-issue) of burn-in for one specific model of IEMs (VBs) for one specific individual (kaviar). To be able to draw scientifically significant conclusions about the effect of "burn-in" specifically for the hippo VBs, we would need a much larger population sample. Now we could slightly increase the value of the test if your girlfriend (and maybe other friends?) accepted to conduct the same ABX test herself...

Only until a big scale scientific study has been conducted (double-blind experiments with large enough population samples, and many different earphones) will we be able to know anything definitive about the burn-in phenomenon. And i'm one that thinks it's about time some headphone company spend the cash for that... they could benefit from that if it proves that burn-in is necessary. Especially for high-end earphones, they could provide scientifically proven disclaimers and instructions about the issue that will make for more satisfied (and likely less frustrated) customers in the long run

 

[Aardvarks]

Kaviar and Daouda, your commenst are solid and I agree.

This will demnstrate the effects, or not, of burn in for one listener and one particular set of phones, and so can only give us this answer. But this can be viewed as another piece of solid scientific evidence.

I just had a thought that once both are fully burned in, and assuming no further differences can be heard, we can start the whole ABX process again for any tweaks or addition of foam to sound canals, that is, is it genuine or again is it just a placebo perception....for one person on one defined set of phones

I think this is going to be terrific and I applaud Kaviar for the effort and science.

daouda, great idea in suggesting particular tunes which cause known sibilance problems for you and your VBs.

I am ot sure how many tunes you would need to listen to , but I suspect 3 should be enough if they are chosen for the ability to acccentuate certain nuances and frequencies.

 

[Kaviar]

That`s right Daouda! Thank you for clarifying the limited scope of the test from a scientific point of view. As a masters student, I am used to the significance of my research amounting to next to nothing. Having fun while being rigorous so we can learn as much as possible seems to be a reasonable goal.

Regarding a collaborative playlist: I think its a good idea. Allthough, If I only listen to differences in sibilance and treble harshness, I`m not sure I will be able to do so well in the ABX-test. I need some general test tracks in there as well. Some of them needs to be familiar to me, I need prior listening experience. This need not be the case with all the songs, so I am willing to substitute almost all of them with whatever you guys feel is appropriate. Let me share what I have so far.

1. Chris Jones - Long After Your Gone
2. Band Of Horses - No One`s Gonna Love You
3. Foo Fighters - The Pretender
4. Opeth - Heir Apperent
5. R.A.T.M. - Bombtrack
6. S.O.A.D. - Deer Dance
7. Madrugada - Honey Bee
8. Florence And The Machine - Rabbit Heart
9. Max Richter - On The Nature of Daylight
10. Max Richter - Shadow Journal

1. It`s a great general test track
2. Lead guitar is high pitched
3. snare drum and guitar may invoke sibilance
4. Lots of high pitched action
5. Lots of high-hat smashing and the record is well mastered
6. Lots of "screeching" highs
7. Norwegian band. Great general test track.
8. Harp and vocals are pretty high pitched.
9. Violin is divine and soundstage is huge. General test track.
10. Sub-bass is almost impossible to reproduce without becoming a muddy, smeary mess.

Note that 9 and 10 are mp3`s. The rest is lossless.



Update: received first pair today (25th of January). Tried them on for a couple of minutes and managed to put them aside. First impression was good. Awaiting next pair. And please contribute to the playlist. I have already made some modifications to the playlist since the above was written so don`t be shy.

 

[dfkt]

Quote:

Originally Posted by daouda /img/forum/go_quote.gif So yeah, thanks dfkt for the recommendation, although i feel the quest is not over for me yet...

It never is...

 

[theKraken11]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Aardvarks /img/forum/go_quote.gif Brilliant idea but this needs to be an ABX test under blinded conditions. You will need an assistant. Add a small sticker to each pair down near the plug, mark each with either A or B. Make sure you know which pair you burned in. Listen to each pair under unblinded conditions to see if you can hear any difference. describe what you hear. Now get a friend to blindfold you and pass you the iems under a random fashion say 10 times. All you have to do is say if it is pair A or Pair B. If there is real difference you should be able to tell 10 out of 10 which is which

That's a good idea, with the exception of the assistant choosing the IEMs to give him each time. She might pick a pattern (A, B, A, B and so on) even inadvertently and color the results of the experiment, so it's important for the assistant to decide it randomly each time, say, by flipping a coin each time.

 

[Kaviar]

I will incorporate your fine suggestion Kraken!

Received the 2. pair today. I am utterly unable to hear a difference in sibilance between pair A and pair B. They sound exactly the same.

Anyway, I`m initiating burn in of pair A now, so the results should be in soon - hopefully before the end of the week.

I have to say, I will be surprised if the results turns out to be positive. Wikipedia says a 95% confidence level is commonly considered statistically significant. That`s not going to be easy. In any case, nobody should put a lot of emphasis on the results. My ears are not "golden". It`s going to be fun though

 

[Kaviar]

I forgot to mention that I really don`t think sibilance is a problem with these IEM`s. Maybe there really is a lack of standardisation in the production process that leads to some batches being more prone to the problem than others. I dont know. What I do know though is that my Bi-metals did indeed had a sibilance issue, and that they became a lot better after burn in.