[Francisk]

I connected the KZ ES3's "correctly" the cable is same as the KZ ZST cable apart from the top where there is black plastic which you can bend in shape over & around your ears like the KZ ZS3' cable, I have a problem though, the right side seals perfectly can even feel the suction using the biggest tips provided but the left side keeps popping out no matter how I adjust it, got a lil discomfort & pain now lol, will try other tips later just left music playing on them for now, not comfortable as KZ ZST & KZ ZS3 for me atleast, will experiment more later, with a brief listen when I had a good seal momentarily the mids where dancing away, a lot of detail too, i don't know why the left side keeps coming out wasn't a problem with the ZST's quite frustrating.

Thanks for the 1st impression...improved mids alone is enough to get me all excited...hope the ES3 retain the frequency extension on both ends too. Hopefully you'll get a good seal with the ES3 soon. Btw, have you tried the Comply T400 tips? This might help your seal issue.

 

[Octave0]

Thanks for the 1st impression...improved mids alone is enough to get me all excited...hope the ES3 retain the frequency extension on both ends too. Hopefully you'll get a good seal with the ES3 soon. Btw, have you tried the Comply T400 tips? This might help your seal issue.

I was about to try other tips when I took one off i realized one of the mesh's wasn't glued on properly it was stuck in the tip so i removed it & glued it back took a lot of work I'm sure i got a little bit of glue inside the nozzle i hope I never messed them up, hard work these KZ's I tighten the plastic mould around my ear fit was much better suddenly, just letting the nozzle dry, I think these don't have as much sharp treble as the ZST's but its still is bright, the mid seems more natural to me & less sharp, bass is similar goes fairly but I need to listen more, I wish I never ran in to these problems lol just plug play & enjoy would of been nice.

 

[vector84]

I measured my ZS5's impedance. Both left and right are 4.0 ohm. It's much lower than the specs on penonaudio.

I'm not sure my pair is defective or the specs are wrong. It sounds good though.

Out of curiosity, how are you measuring that? Like what frequency is that at? Sounds like you might be trying to extrapolate from DC resistance?

Nominal impedance measurements are normally taken at 1kHz, and in a well behaved device you can sometimes extrapolate that from DC resistance.
But 4 drivers wired in parallel without a crossover does not a well behaved device make, and a very low DC resistance is an expected thing there.

@slaterlovesspam et al.. Are all kz products full spectrum??

Most are - some of their early products had a crossover, I believe, and apparently the ZS6 will have one.

 

[Skullophile]

Now I ripped out the red and green wires from the DD that isn't in the nozzle.

Now I have 4 wires sticking out!



Plugged them in and guess what!!


They sound the same. As before or at least I don't hear a significant difference between the left and right sides. So as far as I am concerned these are a 1 + 1

 

[vector84]

Now I ripped out the red and green wires from the DD that isn't in the nozzle.

Now I have 4 wires sticking out!



Plugged them in and guess what!!


They sound the same. As before or at least I don't hear a significant difference between the left and right sides. So as far as I am concerned these are a 1 + 1

Don't suppose you have anything to take measurements, even crude ones?
You did mention you hate the way they sound... so I can't help but wonder how much patience you'd have to listen for differences...

Still... very interesting.


While you've got them like that, here's another thought: at the very least, disconnecting those drivers should change their source matching properties quite a bit?
Do they now sound better or worse on a low quality source like a random phone or laptop jack maybe?

 

[vladstef]

Now I ripped out the red and green wires from the DD that isn't in the nozzle.

Now I have 4 wires sticking out!



Plugged them in and guess what!!


They sound the same. As before or at least I don't hear a significant difference between the left and right sides. So as far as I am concerned these are a 1 + 1

Even without equipment, I'd suggest trying a Sine Gen and manually going through frequencies, just to get an idea of what changed (obviously do this with modded one and regular one separately). You can also put them both inside, and you should probably notice how sound is changing position, being in the middle where both sides are similarly loud and sweeping to one side if it gets louder, that is, where 2 disconnected drivers would contribute or in this case, remove some of the sound loudness. This might give you a better idea, but even this is probably not gonna give very definitive answers, it is quite clear that these 2 drivers only influence the sound a little at certain frequencies.
Both DD drivers in ZS5 are full range drivers and it's a miracle that they are not creating some audible phasing issues given how there is no crossover. BA in the bore gives most of the treble and BA in the body is for transition mids-highs, but again, big DD alone will cover the whole range and other drivers are just there to contribute a bit (no one has quite done the full measurements of individual drivers, this is just based on the information that we have, some of the things that I've said might have an update and are in fact somewhat different in reality)

 

[Slater]

I doubt that they can make it precise enough for a screw to hold only by it's side (it would require some amazingly small margin of error), but that screw looks longer than it needs to be, so, who knows.
That square is probably where BA was in the ZS5 v1 and they obviously intended ZS6 to inherit the same structure as ZS5 v1. It appears that the change happened quite late in the development and they only ended up plugging that hole on the underside that we can't see (this can be seen on some ZS5 v2 renders). ZSR will have 1DD+2BA and ZS10 will be the previously rumored ZSR with 1DD+4BA (here)

Spoiler: ZS5 2 versions - comparison of internal chambers

OK, I forgot it was renamed the ZS10. It was originally known as the ZSR Pro. Anyways, that's what I was referring to (ie the 5-driver IEM).

As far as the machining, you can most certainly get the tolerance that close. Since the shell is CNC machined, you can most certainly get the tolerances to within 1-2 thousandths of an inch (which is 1/4-1/2 the thickness of a single human hair).

 

[Fox2twenty]

So Zs5 = full spectrum
An Zs6 = crossover

Is this correct?

 

[Skullophile]

Yes, I did mention that I don't like how they sound. That's why I opened them up and started ripping out wires. This exercise was more about the driver count then anything else.

The point of me opening them up was just to see if all 4 drivers per side were contributing considerably to their sound. @vector84.I had a listen with my android m8, Aune M1s and my acer aspire laptop and didn't find anything funny happening between left and right in regards to source matching.

And @vladstef I have never really been into sine gen's and stuff like that I only have ever trusted my ears. My ears tell me there's no significant difference if I disconnect a BA and a DD in one side
to the sound of the other side. Subjectively and non-scientifically I would have thought there would have been an obviously audible difference if those drivers were doing even a little bit of work.

They might be doing a very slight amount of work but I have proved what I set out to prove. If they are doing anything it's very little is all my ears can say for sure.

 

[Holypal]

Out of curiosity, how are you measuring that? Like what frequency is that at? Sounds like you might be trying to extrapolate from DC resistance?

Nominal impedance measurements are normally taken at 1kHz, and in a well behaved device you can sometimes extrapolate that from DC resistance.
But 4 drivers wired in parallel without a crossover does not a well behaved device make, and a very low DC resistance is an expected thing there.

You're right. I measured the DC resistance with a multi-meter. So the 4 drivers wired in parallel.

And in this case, does it mean ZS5 is very source dependent? Thanks.

 

[randomnin]

Yes, I did mention that I don't like how they sound. That's why I opened them up and started ripping out wires. This exercise was more about the driver count then anything else.

The point of me opening them up was just to see if all 4 drivers per side were contributing considerably to their sound. @vector84.I had a listen with my android m8, Aune M1s and my acer aspire laptop and didn't find anything funny happening between left and right in regards to source matching.

And @vladstef I have never really been into sine gen's and stuff like that I only have ever trusted my ears. My ears tell me there's no significant difference if I disconnect a BA and a DD in one side
to the sound of the other side. Subjectively and non-scientifically I would have thought there would have been an obviously audible difference if those drivers were doing even a little bit of work.

They might be doing a very slight amount of work but I have proved what I set out to prove. If they are doing anything it's very little is all my ears can say for sure.

Remove the last BA, if at all possible. I have my doubts about any BA contributions in cheap Chinese hybrids in general.

 

[vladstef]

So Zs5 = full spectrum
An Zs6 = crossover

Is this correct?

There is absolutely nothing pointing towards an actual crossover for ZS6. In fact, a few pages back there was a promo picture showing that both DD drivers inside ZS6 will cover at least 20-20k range. I think BAs start to kick in after 5k (maybe even later), so we will have 4 drivers of 3 types trying to produce treble. This is a recipe for disaster generally with all kinds of phasing issues waiting to happen, but KZ appears to be swimming fine in these waters (same thing is happening with ZS5, albeit in different configuration, and we know that ZS5 is at least good)

E: It is possible that they included 3 way crossover, photo in the post below

 

[vector84]

There is absolutely nothing pointing towards an actual crossover for ZS6. In fact, a few pages back there was a promo picture showing that both DD drivers inside ZS6 will cover at least 20-20k range. I think BAs start to kick in after 5k (maybe even later), so we will have 4 drivers of 3 types trying to produce treble. This is a recipe for disaster generally with all kinds of phasing issues waiting to happen, but KZ appears to be swimming fine in these waters (same thing is happening with ZS5, albeit in different configuration, and we know that ZS5 is at least good)

Got this spec list for the ZS6 from a shopee seller. Check it out.

Okay, from the same seller. Spec list for the ZS5.

Not saying the seller is right, but that's something right? ZS6 mentions "electronic crossover" where ZS5 instead mentions "meticulous driver placement"

 

[Adide]

Remove the last BA, if at all possible. I have my doubts about any BA contributions in cheap Chinese hybrids in general.

Hardcore FTW!
Yeah, do it!

 

[vector84]

You're right. I measured the DC resistance with a multi-meter. So the 4 drivers wired in parallel.

And in this case, does it mean ZS5 is very source dependent? Thanks.

EDIT: Actually I'm not so sure about that - obviously the two drivers that were able to be disconnected were wired in parallel somewhere (or not really connected at all), but from the pics, I can't tell what's going on with the gold colored grounding wire on the main BA.

They certainly look wired in parallel based on breakdowns, but I can't say I've taken mine apart to check.
And conventional wisdom would suggest that would tend to make them incredibly source dependent, yes, which coincides with much of what's been written here about them.

However the current experiments being conducted and discussed would draw this sharply into question


I'll readily admit I'm pretty intrigued (and a touch confused) by the results - some changes at least would be expected unless they're entirely non-functional in the first place.
(but if that were the case, they shouldn't have such absurdly low DC resistance...)