More comfortable indeed, the only complaint I have is the quite fragile, and still heavy stock cable. The strain reliefs, apart from the one at the L shaped jack, are nearly non-existent. Had to replace it already due to faulty contact. The original ER-4 cable is quite a bit sturdier in comparison (in my experience), although not "user-replaceable". Would be nice to see Etymotic come up with different cables sold as accessories, just like Westone (braided, MFI, super thin, Bluetooth, silver,... they have them all, optimized for their W/UM Pro products and ready to be paired).