[AnyDave]

Related to the R&D and technical efforts Etymotic puts towards reaching their target response in their products, did this "Harman target" I keep coming across have any impact on the development of the ER4XR?

 
I would actually say there was some level of impact on the ER4XR.  A couple of us kicked the idea of slightly kicking up the low end on an earphone years ago; there are even a couple of old prototypes kicking around.  The earlier prototypes aren't quite as good as what ended up in the XR and we never ended up making them.  As most Etymotic fans know, adding bass was never really an emphasis of the company.  It took a little while for us to decide it was something we wanted to do.  We also needed to go through a number of different drivers to get to the one we actually wanted to use. 
 
I have definitely read Sean Olive's AES papers (and quite enjoyed them).  They did lead to some internal discussions between the engineers here where we discussed our thoughts on it.  That's fairly common when something interesting like that comes out. 
 
So I wouldn't say that the paper came out and we said "hey, let's do THAT" as some of us were already down that path.  But I do think it did help reinforce why having an otherwise flat earphone with a little bit of additional low end is a good idea.  I couldn't say for certain, but it may have even helped sway some of the "it can only be flat" among us. 

 

[AnyDave]

I'm also curious how exact the two kidels are in the treble. As they are different drivers i would assume they aren't identical. But it will be interesting to compare them..

 
Identical is a strong word as everything has tolerances (even among the same driver).
 
They are really very very close.  I know this can all be fixed by graphs so it'll get easier to discuss when we have something that's fit for print.

 

[imackler]

@EtyDave Was there any consideration of changing the housing? I've owned so many pairs of Ety's ER4S over the years (6-7x's...maybe more!). (And I'll probably buy this new one too!) But in the end, I get tired of the deep insertion, though I feel it can be mitigated a little bit with tip choice. (I find the Westone star tips work pretty well which give good seal but don't go to the gagging-depth.) But with how iem design has changed and manufacturing progressed, was their talk of moving away from the Ety "shaft" design to something that rests outside of the ear canal? I've always got on well with the Noble universal design, or something like a Westone or even Shure. Just curious... 

 

[AnyDave]

  Hey! I'm been using my ER4P/T with the cable, so ER4S for a couple of months now. I'm curious about the effects of changing tips and filters on the ER4S.
 
I can't figure our when it is necessary to make a change. Is wear and tear the indication for change? Or is it if I notice a change in SQ?
 
 
Also, are there different filters for the ER4S besides the stock green ones?
 
Thanks!

 
OK, these are very very good questions.  They are also not easy to answer with absolute certainly.  I will do my best to give the best general answer.
 
1.)  When to change the filter: This is a very difficult question to answer exactly because people produce wax at different rates.  Some folks produce a lot of wax and need to change filters very frequently (I've heard people that change them after a couple of weeks) and some folks can use their earphones for years and never have to change them.  There's really no hard and fast rule.  What's even worse is that, for many usage cases, the change can be slow, so sometimes folks don't even notice the degradation in sound as they have acclimated to it.  Often, the filters are changed when there is so much earwax that it effectively blocks the sound.  It's probably a bad analogy, but it sort of reminds me of vacuum tubes.  Sometimes folks don't realize by listening that the sound has dulled; it's only when the tube is changed that it's obvious.
 
2.)  I tend to err more on the side of caution with ear tips as the material loosens a bit with use.  This can make them feel more comfortable (which is good), but it can also reduce the retention force.  Sometimes, folks use them so long that they barely hold on.  I think that we generally recommend that they should be replaced every 3 months or so.  If you use them less frequently, that may not be necessary.  This isn't the official company recommendation, but I would personally just recommend checking them periodically and using common sense.  If the tips feel real loose on the stem; replace them.  FWIW, this is true for any IEMs you use.
 
3.)  Different filter values: OK, this is sort of a fun one.  As most of you know, the filter basically serves two functions: it protects against ear wax and it shapes the frequency response.  The filter dampers the peaks of the response (we actually call them acoustic dampers in engineering).  The green one (nominally 1500 ohms) does a very good job of damper the primary resonance at 2.7 kHz to where we want it as well as significantly taming a 5kHz resonance that we don't want.  There are a bunch of other values in existence  from 320 ohms all the way to 4.7k ohms or so.  The red one (which is somewhat popular it seems) is 2.2k ohms.  Changing to any value beyond the green will either reduce the level of damping or increase it.  I think the red filters are popular because they further damp the mid and high frequencies.  It's will reduce the accuracy of the earphone, but if you enjoy it, it certainly won't hurt anything.  I suspect that anything above that value would damp way too much for most people, but I could be wrong. 

 

[AnyDave]

  @EtyDave Was there any consideration of changing the housing? I've owned so many pairs of Ety's ER4S over the years (6-7x's...maybe more!). (And I'll probably buy this new one too!) But in the end, I get tired of the deep insertion, though I feel it can be mitigated a little bit with tip choice. (I find the Westone star tips work pretty well which give good seal but don't go to the gagging-depth.) But with how iem design has changed and manufacturing progressed, was their talk of moving away from the Ety "shaft" design to something that rests outside of the ear canal? I've always got on well with the Noble universal design, or something like a Westone or even Shure. Just curious... 

 
For good or bad, the deep insertion is important to get that ER4 sound.  We could certainly create an eartip that was designed for more shallow insertion, but it wouldn't sound the same.

 

[Hutnicks]

   
For good or bad, the deep insertion is important to get that ER4 sound.  We could certainly create an eartip that was designed for more shallow insertion, but it wouldn't sound the same.

Musings.
 
A) I think you are overly gracious to Mr Olive as I have heard his curve owes more than a little to the original ER4's specs.
 
B) You guys have done so much "on the mark" development that I find it hard to believe that the tips have been overlooked for so long. I suspect that if the development team were to take a few weeks off and come out slugging we may well see a tip solution that would come in as a type of memory foam and after insertion for an hour or so would form to the users ear canal. Something like 2part foam encapsulated in a very thin membrane of silicone may do it. I would love to see you take that one on as a company.

 

[AnyDave]

 
Musings.
 
A) I think you are overly gracious to Mr Olive as I have heard his curve owes more than a little to the original ER4's specs.
 
B) You guys have done so much "on the mark" development that I find it hard to believe that the tips have been overlooked for so long. I suspect that if the development team were to take a few weeks off and come out slugging we may well see a tip solution that would come in as a type of memory foam and after insertion for an hour or so would form to the users ear canal. Something like 2part foam encapsulated in a very thin membrane of silicone may do it. I would love to see you take that one on as a company.

 
Yeah, I agree that some new eartip styles would be a good idea.  I'm not sure the few weeks timeline is accurate, however. 

 

[Hutnicks]

   
Yeah, I agree that some new eartip styles would be a good idea.  I'm not sure the few weeks timeline is accurate, however. 

Depends. I recall a certain gentleman from Israeli MI recollecting the only way he got them and Mossad to work together was to send them off to a club med for a fortnight.  Food thoughts and brilliant minds can do wonders off the clock.
 
 Notice you are not commenting on the Olive files.  Then again methinks Floyd Toole covered that before

 

[AnyDave]

 
Depends. I recall a certain gentleman from Israeli MI recollecting the only way he got them and Mossad to work together was to send them off to a club med for a fortnight.  Food thoughts and brilliant minds can do wonders off the clock.
 
 Notice you are not commenting on the Olive files.  Then again methinks Floyd Toole covered that before

Well, the target curve we use is derived from measurements made by Mead Killion and others (Mead's the founder of Etymotic) decades ago.  These tests were done with probe measurements at the ear drum on live subjects.
 
Others have done similar independent testing and come up with similar curves.  It's always wonderful when different people do similar experiments and get comparative results.  At this point, I believe most people accept that this is basically the correct answer.  I'm not sure if Sean Olive repeated the testing or if he used data from measurements done by others.  Either way, I am not sure if it really matters.  He's definitely knowledgeable on the subject.
 
As far as Floyd Toole, I don't remember if he covered it before or not.  He's covered a LOT of ground in his lifetime.  A true pioneer.

 

[AnyDave]

 
Depends. I recall a certain gentleman from Israeli MI recollecting the only way he got them and Mossad to work together was to send them off to a club med for a fortnight.  Food thoughts and brilliant minds can do wonders off the clock.
 
 Notice you are not commenting on the Olive files.  Then again methinks Floyd Toole covered that before

 
As far as the Club Med suggestion, I think you may be on to something.  I'll pitch it as a means of improving productivity.  That's gotta work, right?

 

[Hutnicks]

   
As far as the Club Med suggestion, I think you may be on to something.  I'll pitch it as a means of improving productivity.  That's gotta work, right?

I adore the way you parfait over the big issues.

 
Then again, on a public board, at any given time  you never know who you may be dealing with. The very razors edge of political correctness is the corporate standard.
 
  Cavalier it may have been but IM was and are the masters if not the originators of outside the (sand)box thinking. A geopolitical anomaly that may or should not be lost on Etymotic as you have occupied a very similar position within the high end audio scene for some 2 decade plus.
 
 While the modesty the company has exhibited in those decades is admirable and perhaps a tone the industry in general could learn from, it may in all honesty be the time here to "come out swinging" albeit in a velvet fist mode.
 
Look at the industry now and see what everything gets comapred to. It right now reminds me very much of not so long ago when everyone compared their wares to the QUAD ESL. Right now be it vagus nerve stimulators 10 drivers per side, harmonic bifurcating asteroid mined cable enhancement................. It still is compare yourself to Stax, Senni HD800's or the ER4
 
  To look at it in a HS Thomsoneque manner, did we hit the high water mark, and just not notice it?  Is it just possible that ETY is now introducing an Incremental performance gain rather that the revolutional  performance gain touted by others?
 
Either way. To paraphrase Heston " You'll get my original first year ER4S's ""from my cold dead hands"""

 

[gixxerwimp]

 

... are there different filters for the ER4S besides the stock green ones?

 
...
 
3.)  Different filter values: OK, this is sort of a fun one.  As most of you know, the filter basically serves two functions: it protects against ear wax and it shapes the frequency response.  The filter dampers the peaks of the response (we actually call them acoustic dampers in engineering).  The green one (nominally 1500 ohms) does a very good job of damper the primary resonance at 2.7 kHz to where we want it as well as significantly taming a 5kHz resonance that we don't want.  There are a bunch of other values in existence  from 320 ohms all the way to 4.7k ohms or so.  The red one (which is somewhat popular it seems) is 2.2k ohms.  Changing to any value beyond the green will either reduce the level of damping or increase it.  I think the red filters are popular because they further damp the mid and high frequencies.  It's will reduce the accuracy of the earphone, but if you enjoy it, it certainly won't hurt anything.  I suspect that anything above that value would damp way too much for most people, but I could be wrong. 

 
@atoniolin you can take a look at this thread for tips on changing the filters to get more bass (while also affecting other freq. ranges).
http://www.head-fi.org/t/626457/nrb-mod-nut-rattlin-bass-from-an-ety-yes-yes-yes-how-to-nrb-mod
 
Thanks to EtyDave's instructions, I was able to get my metal red filters out and have just popped in the orange ones I have. To my ears, the differences are a subtle but noticeable increase in bass response from green > red > orange. I'm not as sensitive to differences in the highs so haven't found the changes there detrimental.
 
I suggest getting the OEM Etymotic plastic filters rather than the metal ones as they're easier to remove and there's less risk of damaging your Etys in the process.

 

[HiFiChris]

@EtyDave
 
I know it's somewhat offtopic, but I hope that you can probably help. I recently imported a new (!) Audio Technica ATH-IM03 directly from Japan but noticed some imbalance in the mids and treble (the measurement I made then showed the same what I heard). Upon closer inspection, I realised that it was caused by a missing filter in the nozzle of the left side. I contacted Audio Technica Germany who got in touch with their Japanese colleagues (the IM03 was never sold in Europe by Audio Technica) but I haven't got a reply after weeks. I browsed the web and couldn't find a replacement filter listing. Recently, I somehow stumbled across those Etymotic MC wax filters (http://etymoticdirect.co.uk/accessories-spares/etymotic-wax-filter2). Do you know whether they are the same?
 
  

 

[AnyDave]

  @EtyDave
 
I know it's somewhat offtopic, but I hope that you can probably help. I recently imported a new (!) Audio Technica ATH-IM03 directly from Japan but noticed some imbalance in the mids and treble (the measurement I made then showed the same what I heard). Upon closer inspection, I realised that it was caused by a missing filter in the nozzle of the left side. I contacted Audio Technica Germany who got in touch with their Japanese colleagues (the IM03 was never sold in Europe by Audio Technica) but I haven't got a reply after weeks. I browsed the web and couldn't find a replacement filter listing. Recently, I somehow stumbled across those Etymotic MC wax filters (http://etymoticdirect.co.uk/accessories-spares/etymotic-wax-filter2). Do you know whether they are the same?
 
  

 
Well, I can't tell definitively without actually seeing it in person, but it does look like it could work.
 
Those white filters have the same physical dimensions as the green filters used in the ER4.  Do you have any extra green filters lying around so you could check fit before ordering white ones?

 

[HiFiChris]

   

Spoiler: Warning: Spoiler!

  @EtyDave
 
I know it's somewhat offtopic, but I hope that you can probably help. I recently imported a new (!) Audio Technica ATH-IM03 directly from Japan but noticed some imbalance in the mids and treble (the measurement I made then showed the same what I heard). Upon closer inspection, I realised that it was caused by a missing filter in the nozzle of the left side. I contacted Audio Technica Germany who got in touch with their Japanese colleagues (the IM03 was never sold in Europe by Audio Technica) but I haven't got a reply after weeks. I browsed the web and couldn't find a replacement filter listing. Recently, I somehow stumbled across those Etymotic MC wax filters (http://etymoticdirect.co.uk/accessories-spares/etymotic-wax-filter2). Do you know whether they are the same?
 
  

 
Well, I can't tell definitively without actually seeing it in person, but it does look like it could work.
 
Those white filters have the same physical dimensions as the green filters used in the ER4.  Do you have any extra green filters lying around so you could check fit before ordering white ones?

 

 
Dave - checking whether the filters of my beloved ER-4S have the same dimensions as the IM03's was a brilliant idea.
So I took out my ER-4S's box and grabbed one of the spare filters I still have - and indeed, the diameter is identical. I wasn't sure about the length as it is difficult to judge through the nozzle (visual magnification due to the shape). I thought I could avoid it, but I ended up carefully removing the white IM03 filter with the help of the die that comes with the ER-4S (using it carefully to prevent the mesh from being damaged) and the outer dimensions as well as shape (rounded inner-facing end) are indeed identical.
 
Now I would only need you to tell me whether the filter mesh density (last two pics) looks like the one I linked and the white Ety filters really are the correct ones (as who knows, they could have also used a similarly looking filter with the same casing but different filter mesh density). By now I am 90% sure that AT used the white Ety filters, but I would just need your professional eyes to give me 99% security.