[Max Choiral]

   
The HD5 and EK5 both have the same impedance.  The MK5 is lower impedance and much higher sensitivity.
 
All of these models sound quite a bit different than the ER4s.  Certainly the impedance is different, but much of the difference can be attributed to the fact that the they use moving coil drivers and not balanced armature.
 
The EK/HD body is a little bit wider than the ER4 body.  I can't do a photo today (I'm at home) but I probably can when I get back to the office.

I was mainly pointing at the difference between Mk5 & HD5

 
If it's possible please also add MC5.
I appreciate your help very much .
 
Thank you in advance.

 

[EYEdROP]

Hey EtyDave, thank you for clearing up the difference between the ety kids 5 vs. Hd 5.

So what about the MC5 vs. MK5? They are both dynamic drivers and priced the same, but have a different housing. Both are listed as having 85% accuracy. Im having trouble finding response graphs. My question is, which one is technically and objectively superior? Which one is closer to the target curve, and which one has lower thd%? Which do you personally prefer?

 

[Traveller]

  In case if someone is interested in http://kopfhoerer-lounge.blogspot.com/2016/06/ER-4S.html"> my thoughts on an oldie but goldie, the ER-4S

 
Very nice review, thanks for sharing! It brings up a design aspect of the ER series that I had long since forgotten. You defined it as "Open Ear Gain" and Etymotic states it as thus:
 
"For earphones to have 100% accuracy, a recording of a live performance must produce exactly the same sound at the eardrum as the original performance. To achieve this, the acoustic properties of the ear must be factored in. The acoustic resonance and horn effects of the ear change a flat audio signal entering the open ear into sound with a (2700 Hz) high-frequency boost, which is the same response heard at the eardrum in a typical ear."
 
A sample graph shows a boost of around 20dB (or 10db?) and the "hump" is indeed peaking around 2.7KHz.
 
My question then; Is it a unique feature of Etymotic IEMs or (now) an industry standard? I recently found a graph of one of my other IEMs posted here (as well as on Head-Fi) and it has no such hump:

the multiple graphs represent variations in the supplied cable's resistor which can be adjusted ~10dB by the user
 
Thanks to any and all for any insight on the topic

 

 

[Aero Dynamik]

 

The way I hear it the XR treble is just perfect. Crystal clear but not detailed to a point to where it would become fatiguing. I've such a hard time imagining how the delicate bass elevation could mask the treble. I really just believe it's a matter of getting used to the overall signature.

You're right. It does sound just perfect now that I got used to it. There's really nothing I would want to change in the XR signature, since it appears to have added whatever was missing from the music I've been listening to for years. There is no free lunch, that's true, you have to pay the price of the IEM, but then the lunch you get tastes bloody delicious.

Couldn't agree with you more! 

 

[castleofargh]

 

  In case if someone is interested in http://kopfhoerer-lounge.blogspot.com/2016/06/ER-4S.html"> my thoughts on an oldie but goldie, the ER-4S

 
Very nice review, thanks for sharing! It brings up a design aspect of the ER series that I had long since forgotten. You defined it as "Open Ear Gain" and Etymotic states it as thus:
 
"For earphones to have 100% accuracy, a recording of a live performance must produce exactly the same sound at the eardrum as the original performance. To achieve this, the acoustic properties of the ear must be factored in. The acoustic resonance and horn effects of the ear change a flat audio signal entering the open ear into sound with a (2700 Hz) high-frequency boost, which is the same response heard at the eardrum in a typical ear."
 
A sample graph shows a boost of around 20dB (or 10db?) and the "hump" is indeed peaking around 2.7KHz.
 
My question then; Is it a unique feature of Etymotic IEMs or (now) an industry standard? I recently found a graph of one of my other IEMs posted here (as well as on Head-Fi) and it has no such hump:

Spoiler: Warning: Spoiler!

the multiple graphs represent variations in the supplied cable's resistor which can be adjusted ~10dB by the user
 
Thanks to any and all for any insight on the topic

 

as written on the graph, it's a compensated curve for what they estimate to be the perceived frequency response. on the very link you provided, they show also what they call measured response. on that graph you see how the golden ear target (doted line) also has the usual 3khz boost.
 
this boost around 3khz is the accepted average compensation but a manufacturer is obviously free to tune his IEM how he likes.

 

[Traveller]

this boost around 3khz is the accepted average compensation but a manufacturer is obviously free to tune his IEM how he likes.

Thank you for your feedback! Yes you are quite right - however the measured-FR graph also has no "formal" representation of this gain.
 
I can then assume it's a standard (based on the "target" response) that evidently, not everyone in the industry adheres to... .
 
If a designer / manufacture ignores this characteristic and does NOT boost said region, how would the music sound? In other words, what term would be used to describe this "high-mids" "low-treble" range?

 

[Traveller]

...what term would be used to describe this "high-mids" "low-treble" range?

 
EDIT: Listener fatigue seems to be related to the 2~4KHz range and how it's handled...

 

[AnyDave]

  Thank you for your feedback! Yes you are quite right - however the measured-FR graph also has no "formal" representation of this gain.
 
I can then assume it's a standard (based on the "target" response) that evidently, not everyone in the industry adheres to... .
 
If a designer / manufacture ignores this characteristic and does NOT boost said region, how would the music sound? In other words, what term would be used to describe this "high-mids" "low-treble" range?

 
If you listened to a perfectly flat pair of speakers in a room with flat acoustic response, by the time the sound reached your eardrum, it would have a significant resonant peak due to the acoustics of your ear canal, pinna, and a few other bits and bobs of your physiology.
 
The 2.7kHz peak we use as our target was derived from probe measurements of human subjects at the eardrum.  There is a bit of variability from person to person, but 2.7kHz-2.8kHz is the average resonance.  Others have performed similar experiments and gotten similar results.
 
We've always made our claims of fidelity based on our adherence to this target curve.  I've probably mentioned it already on this long thread, but we used to perform demos at shows with a Kemar acoustic mannequin where we would play a piece of music through the ER4S and make a binaural recording through the microphones mounted in Kemar's ears.  We would then use the recording as the source and then make another recording.  We repeated the process a few times so that you had a recording of a recording of a recording.  At the end, the music was slightly changed (nothing is perfectly accurate) but very similar to the original.  We repeated the process with other earphones and usually the recordings were very muddy or very bright by the third pass as the embellished areas of the frequency response became more embellished with each pass.
 
That's not to say one design choice is right and another is wrong.  There are many reasons why designers choose different frequency response.  This demonstration was purely a way to prove accuracy (or fidelity if you prefer).

 

[HiFiChris]

 

  In case if someone is interested in http://kopfhoerer-lounge.blogspot.com/2016/06/ER-4S.html"> my thoughts on an oldie but goldie, the ER-4S

 
Very nice review, thanks for sharing! It brings up a design aspect of the ER series that I had long since forgotten. You defined it as "Open Ear Gain" and Etymotic states it as thus:
 
"For earphones to have 100% accuracy, a recording of a live performance must produce exactly the same sound at the eardrum as the original performance. To achieve this, the acoustic properties of the ear must be factored in. The acoustic resonance and horn effects of the ear change a flat audio signal entering the open ear into sound with a (2700 Hz) high-frequency boost, which is the same response heard at the eardrum in a typical ear."
 
A sample graph shows a boost of around 20dB (or 10db?) and the "hump" is indeed peaking around 2.7KHz.
 
My question then; Is it a unique feature of Etymotic IEMs or (now) an industry standard? I recently found a graph of one of my other IEMs posted here (as well as on Head-Fi) and it has no such hump:

Spoiler: Warning: Spoiler!

the multiple graphs represent variations in the supplied cable's resistor which can be adjusted ~10dB by the user
 
Thanks to any and all for any insight on the topic

 

 
As @castleofargh already replied to you, the most headphone measurement plots we get to see (including yours) are already compensated (and as you probably know, while there is one commonly accepted diffuse-field target (the one Etymotic has researched a good while back but more modern researches as for example by Hammershøi and Møller are almost spot-on identical, as the target was the same (getting an average HRTF out of the measurement of many peoples' individual curves)), there are various other compensation targets, too, and Golden Ears is also using a correction curve that is somewhat off-standard). So when compensated, the graph you posted should ideally be about ruler-flat above 1 kHz when the compensation target is applied.
 
So it is no unique Ety-thing but quite known among most headphone designers.
However the question might come up why most in-ears aren't greatly tuned towards this target response. I think there are a couple of factors that play in, however let's just imagine for a moment that every headphone developer could tune every driver(s) on the market to the exact same target curve, which is of course utopian:
 

1. Most in-ears and headphones aren't even intended to meet a strict neutral target but a hi-fi/bassy/v-shaped/relaxed/warm/whatever response (how many of those expen$ive passive hi-fi speakers out there do you think do measure strictly neutral? Some, but many are intentionally slightly sounded to a certain degree to give a more "pleasant" presentation than about ruler-flat studio monitors (and let's of course not ignore the acoustic influence of the room that often not treated enough and colours the reproduced sound even more)).
   The number of people who are out for a truly neutral, flat, lifeless and absolutely uncoloured sound is just pretty small compared to those who want a consumer-oriented sound.
2. A good amount of people perceive a headphone/IEM that is tuned to meet the diffuse-field target response to be somewhat shouty in the mids as well as fatiguing.
3. With headphones and even more so with IEMs, we lose the body-borne noise we are hearing (actually perceiving) when listening to speakers (or any other objects like a starting plane). I remember a case of someone in the German community who registered and was looking for - well, I don't know anymore. But he equalized an already bassy headphone to have an additional 30 dB boost in the bass along with subtracting 20 dB in the treble (yikes, that's at least 10 times more low-end than treble). And if I remember correctly, he wanted even more low-end quantity. Many users, including the owner of a in-ear manufacture and former audiologist, suggested that he is missing the body-borne noise he knows from speakers and should invest in a body shaker to get a perceived effect that comes close to the effect of body-borne noise. So while he might have been a very extreme example, body-bourne noise is of course lost with headphones and IEMs (well, Skullcandy had an active vibration mechanism built into their first gen Crusher headphones, but the effect was pretty underwhelming; there is (still) a crowdfunding going on by a different company for a headphone that also simulates body-borne noise but that seems not to bee poorly implemented at all, and I think it was Head-Fier @Luckbad who auditioned a prototype some time ago and wrote a quite promising test report).
   To kind of compensate for this lack of body-borne noise, a good number of in-ears that are generally perceived as relatively neutral has got some moderate boost in the lows to at least slightly give the listener the impression that he is not losing any bass impact due to the lack of that body-borne noise one would get through speakers.
4. While many headphone/IEM developers do realise the diffuse-field target response, the final tuning is sometimes done by ear (when the UERM was made, Logitech/Ultimate Ears/Capitol Studios even said that it was tuned for subjective neutrality, hence it is not as diffuse-field-target-neutral as an Etymotic ER-4 in-ear but still much more neutral than most in-ears around (that are however not even tuned to meet a neutral target)).
5. And lastly, in context with my previous point, to be on the safer side and as individual HRTF can still be different, I think many manufacturers go a little below the diffuse-field target.

 

[vapman]

I hope that guy found out about the SZ2000 eventually cause that sounds just like my EQ...

 
I always felt the ER4 original benefitted from amping or otherwise powerful sources the most (pro audio stuff) but the ER4XR I love to use directly with a DAP and don't even have any complaints having used it with my phone. XR is the perfect ety for me. I would happily use it for referential work.

 

[mdiogofs]

Thomann DE is now sending the XR! Mine went today on UPS, arriving very soon.

 

[Traveller]

...  

1. Most in-ears and headphones aren't even intended to meet a strict neutral target but a hi-fi/bassy/v-shaped/relaxed/warm/whatever response...
2. A good amount of people perceive a headphone/IEM that is tuned to meet the diffuse-field target response to be somewhat shouty in the mids as well as fatiguing.
3. With headphones and even more so with IEMs, we lose the body-borne noise we are hearing (actually perceiving) when listening to speakers...
4. ...the final tuning is sometimes done by ear (when the UERM was made, Logitech/Ultimate Ears/Capitol Studios even said that it was tuned for subjective neutrality, hence it is not as diffuse-field-target-neutral as an Etymotic ER-4 in-ear ...)
5. ...to be on the safer side and as individual HRTF can still be different, I think many manufacturers go a little below the diffuse-field target.

Thanks again for your most informative feedback, sir

 
I have to admit that I fall under the category of finding IEMs modeling "diffuse-field target Response" fatiguing during extended listening sessions... 

Conversely, Most IEMs I've auditioned right before or after the ER-4S sound rolled-off (HFs) or at best, much warmer. While 2.7K is not quite treble / HF range, I have to wonder if this impression of a roll-off is associated to the HRTF Freq. range...
 
I've been to enough Rock concerts and have "registered" this body-borne LF and I can somewhat get the same from my economic Logitec 5.1 PC-setup but I sincerely doubt my 55Hz-20KHz PSB Stratus Mini contribute to this phenomena... . It may still be asking too much but my goal would be to find IEMs that can mimic what I hear from those modestly-spec monitors. Any IEM I try that produces more LF will immediately be labeled as bloated. As for the HF range, I've never suffered from listening fatigue from the Stratus Minis yet I'm under the strong impression that they are more than capable of reasonably recreating* (Jazz) brass and piano's timbre including the instruments' overtones... .
*I think that the ER-4S/SR are maybe the only thing in the known Universe to achieve near-perfect (92%) fidelity

 

[Happytalk]

I don't need body born vibrations. I just want to hear clear bass notes and accurate attack. Seems nearly impossible at times and great at others. Likely too many variables from the beginning. Starts with the player, strings, mic, connectors, cables, recording engineer, tubes, tape, re-master, then to the listening gear all the way to the physiology of the person listening. One thing I'll say is bass impact to me is a moot point with iems. As well as a dramatic emotional response. Again this is for me. If I am reacting too emotionally to music with iems I may have them too loud. One of the great things about iems, particularly the er4s line is the ability to keep the volume low and hear all the musical information. To me I find I can enjoy it more this way over time.

 

[promenader]

Hello everybody,
 
Is it possible to unpack and try the ER4SR/XR without damaging parts of the packaging?
 
Although I lean towards the SR model, I'd like to try both before I'm convinced and keep one. I do have a pack of spare flanges which should avoid any hygiene issues. But if they come in a sealed packaging, I might risk a fee for having unpacked them.
 
 
My second question is a follow-up to a reply from @EtyDave from several pages back:
 

 Originally Posted by EtyDave /img/forum/go_quote.gif

From what we can tell, the new cables should definitely be an improvement in reliability.  Time will tell how much better, but we will definitely be keeping an eye on things.  I'm realistic that it's impossible for there to be zero cable failures as that tends to be the most abused part of an earphone.  Given enough time and flexes, anything can fail, even if we made the cable out of steel conduit.  The good news is that it'll be much easier for us to deal with any issues now that the cables are field replaceable.

 

Can we also expect a successor to the HF5 with user replaceable cables anytime soon?

 

I like the HF5 in every respect, except for the cables that would not remain intact for too long. I can't rule out occasional abuse, however, that might be only part of the problem. Even with the ER38-18 large triple flanges, the earpieces slip very far into my ears. The cables won't hang straight down but bend outwards as they run down my earlobes. It's always at this bend where the small fissures in the cable sheath appeared first.

 

Thanks in advance for your replies. You've been a great source of information so far.

 

[Aero Dynamik]

  Thomann DE is now sending the XR! Mine went today on UPS, arriving very soon.

Looking forward to your impressions!