Joe Bloggs
Sponsor: HiByMember of the Trade: EFO Technologies Co, YanYin TechnologyHis Porta Corda walked the Green Mile
Since I saw my old beloved Sony E837 earbuds up for sale again (I had an old broken pair and was told before that they were 'discontinued'--what salespeople here always say if they don't have something in stock it seems
) so I bought a pair home, thinking that it just might sound better than my infamous EX70 when both are unEQed.
At the era when I last used the E837 it thought it must have anemic bass that must be EQed up or something--they're just ordinary earbuds, and all earbuds must have anemic bass right?
Well, now that I have the perfect reference (in terms of frequency response) in the form of the EQ'ed EX70, I found that this is not the case.
Let's just say that the bass on the E837 is less overblown than on the EX70, but by no means is it lacking. In fact, after I matched frequency response with the EX70 EREQ, I found that it has just the right amount of low bass response but too much lower midrange.
This can be illustrated graphically:
Invert the EQ and you have a rough sketch of the frequency response of the MDR-E837--relative to the 'ideal frequency response' for earphones as given by Etymotics Research.
(If you have listened to their phones I bet you'll agree with them
)
I can't decide which phone sounds better un-EQed, the E837 or the EX70--the EX70 probably sounds more fun, with its built in mega bass
but the E837 probably sounds truer to the source, albeit with a telephoney / ancient record colouration to it...
The E837 also has an extreme HF rolloff... its response above 15kHz is down off the charts--the boost I put in that EQ is not really enough but there's not much point in boosting it further as it would push the overall volume level down too much...
Perhaps it's just because these buds fit my ear so well that I get decent bass response out of them? These are 13.5mm diameter and fit my ears like a glove
and sits really close to the entrance to my ear canal. Any bigger and it gets uncomfortable
At the era when I last used the E837 it thought it must have anemic bass that must be EQed up or something--they're just ordinary earbuds, and all earbuds must have anemic bass right?
Well, now that I have the perfect reference (in terms of frequency response) in the form of the EQ'ed EX70, I found that this is not the case.
Let's just say that the bass on the E837 is less overblown than on the EX70, but by no means is it lacking. In fact, after I matched frequency response with the EX70 EREQ, I found that it has just the right amount of low bass response but too much lower midrange.
This can be illustrated graphically:
Invert the EQ and you have a rough sketch of the frequency response of the MDR-E837--relative to the 'ideal frequency response' for earphones as given by Etymotics Research.
(If you have listened to their phones I bet you'll agree with them
I can't decide which phone sounds better un-EQed, the E837 or the EX70--the EX70 probably sounds more fun, with its built in mega bass
The E837 also has an extreme HF rolloff... its response above 15kHz is down off the charts--the boost I put in that EQ is not really enough but there's not much point in boosting it further as it would push the overall volume level down too much...
Perhaps it's just because these buds fit my ear so well that I get decent bass response out of them? These are 13.5mm diameter and fit my ears like a glove
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