NickMit
100+ Head-Fier
Hey, people. Here me out and maybe you will help me in my search for the better sound. For myself.
I always loved music. I cannot imagine myself living without it even for a week. So, I am a melomane, I suppose. And as I started with such introduction, let me briefly mention my preferences: basically, I listen to almost everything. Except from rap. Almost except. So, here is my brief list of..hm…favourites, which is not concluded, but is represented by:
About 5 years ago I bought my first so-called “Hi-Fi” setup. I didn’t want to spend a lot of money, but was eager to see, if there is some depth to the music I am listening. So, after some consideration, I bought iBasso DX80 + Dunu DN200J. I was satisfied and quite happy. I also looked onto Oppo smth smth headphones as a possible future purchase, but then decided to go with home acoustic system. So, after 1-2 years I bought Dali Zenzor 3 + Dali E12F + Cambridge audio CXA80. Still believe that it is the best, or at least one of the best systems in its price range. Due to the situation at that time I almost stopped listening to my portable system, and was not paying any attention to what was going on the portable market.
Not so long ago, I moved to Australia. So, I returned to my dx80+iems and understood that the time for an upgrade has come, I listened to the system and was constantly noticing some moments that I was not satisfied with. At that time I believed that sound dependence is following:
Recording -> system (acoustic/headphones/iems) -> source -> recording -> cables (in case of really crappy ones or long distances).
Here I should point that I am not pretending to replace your opinion with mine. Everyone finds smth to believe in for themselves, even immortal almighty beings. But, based on logic and science, I am not a cable believer, or that copper version of DAP sound anyhow differently than stainless steel one, or that there can be any reason to buy 1000$ iems for your phone, or that one can hear difference between 0.01 and 0.02% distortion levels. I am writing this here not to offend anyone, but so that you will fully understand my point of view and my preferences. In the end, still, I am asking your advice and not vice versa.
At first, I was thinking to buy DX220, but unfortunately, I could not listen to it in the shop. When I was buying my DX80 I have listened to some A&K A320 or smth, but wasn’t impressed of what you get for the price. But now, when I went to the local shop and listened to SP2000, my world just collapsed. I understood that before that I was getting only around 50% of the music, which was really there. I was fascinated. It was there. All this time. And I just had no idea about it. Even on my acoustic system (Well, the whole system is still cheaper than one portable DAP). So, there was a great deal and I bought SP1000. 2000 is slightly more delicate to my taste, but the difference is not significant at all to pay much more (in my case with the discount on sp1000).
So, source and system changed places in my dependence sequence. I was wrong all the time. Just for fun I took cheap AKG IEMs which come with Samsung phones, and they sounded better than my DX80 with 2000J, or actually with any IEMS.
Due to the virus, audition at the shop was closed, so I had second honeymoon with my Dunu IEMs and new DAP. They match good with each other, but on some tracks (Sinatra’s Sweet Dreams) IEMs sound too harsh and also I was eager now to learn what level of pleasure (hey, Slaanesh) can I achieve by adding some top IEMs to my new player.
So, when the lockdown finished I rushed to the shop to listen to all those flagships and….was disappointed. I would think that I am just too used to the sound signature of my Dunu’s and do not understand what is the correct sound. But I listened to 25k system with headphones and believe they represent precise enough of how the music should be heard. And top IEMs sound very different (in terms of sound signature, I am not that mad to seriously compare IEMS and headphones).
Now, I want to list the IEMs that I have listened and what was wrong with them in my opinion:
Andromeda – amazingly unenjoyable. They are very balanced, but somehow (and this I believe is the hard achievement) they manage to sound incredibly boring. It is especially noticeable on classic and soundtracks. Also, while they have good balance between the frequency range, they are not “clear-sounding”. Instead, they tend to be more “Sony Z1R approach”-ish.
Solaris (Solaris SE actually, but they are the same, so doesn’t matter) – Well, there is an amazing bass punches…on some tracks. Aside from this, they are basically a worse version of IER Z1R.
JH Roxane Aion – have intriguing sound signature, but are too harsh to listen. Some tracks sound fine, but others are just trash. Also, the fit. It just doesn’t exist in this universe. Really wonder who was their ear model for the design. Elephant?
Here I want to take a break and say following. I see the problem with all those expensive IEMs in that each of them tried to go all the way to perfection for some particular part of the sound. But reaching the height in instruments, for example, they dropped down everything else. All of them do not have balance in sound. The only one within them which has some balance is Andromeda, but it provides such dead sound that I am impressed with how unimpressed I was with it. In my case the problem is even more noticeable, as I listened to very different music. For me IEM need to be able to reproduce everything on the same quality level. I don’t care how good bass sounds on 1 or 2 of my tracks (yes, Solaris, it’s you I am talking about), if other 18 sound just meh (but those punches were really good, incredible, how they managed to achieve this with IEMS). I want everything to sound as it should be. And also I am a sucker for clarity and I guess, you can call it airiness. Because I love resolution, but when you have resolution with sufficient clarity and space, it just becomes very unenjoyable and muddy. More on this later.
And here the cherry – I genuinely believe that my 200$ Dunu DN2000j is better IEM than any of those as combination to SP1000 (haven’t tried other DAPs, maybe in future I will). Even if it was priced 2000$ I would take them instead of any above. Yes, it doesn’t have the best resolution, nor the best representation of the instrument sound, nor the best vocal experience, and it can be quite harsh sometimes. But it has the best balance and clarity, and in the same time it is able to provide you the life and enjoyment of the music. And this is why it is suitable for any genres you throw at it. The only exception I found within my music is Green Day. But to be fair, only IEMs who focuses on vocals are able to do that. The reason is simple – recording. So, returning to the topic, I can listen to anything and may get not the best experience but very decent one. And my ears won’t bleed a single time. Thus, from my point of view, I just don’t understand the excuse of existence of those top IEMs. Or their pricing. It’s like Fallout 76 or another crappy AAA game or film (star khm…) with huge budget.
Dunu, take this into consideration and thanks for such product)
Now somewhat middle range. Still I prefer mine over those. And most of what was said about previous IEMs can be applied to the next ones, but on the lower scale.
IER Z1R – quite challenging to judge one. It has good instrument sound (sparkly treble, yes, I get it). But, first of all, they are murmurous, thus voices struggle, especially on Whitney Houston tracks, which is ridiculous as she HAS the voice. Z1R puts voices too much behind and shield them with instruments. Wouldn’t say though that Sinatra struggled as much, as mr. crinacle stated. Herp Albert did. Yet, this happens not on all of the tracks, Queen were free from this issue. The second – they are quite harsh sometimes. This is especially an issue, as you need to turn the volume upper compared to almost all other IEMs. Soundstage due to the dumped sound signature is also not as huge as I would like. And also, they are very fatiguing, it’s hard to listen to them for a long period of time. To sum up, I have following metaphor of my experience – Z1R is like some student in the film, who is running after the teacher (you) with his science project. He has good intentions and he is a good person. But as he is trying to please you so much with everything (homework, project, help with the desk, etc. etc.) simultaneously, he fails in everything and ends up staying in the middle of the class with broken model of the space craft and pants down. And you feel just…annoyance. He shouldn’t have tried all of this at once. Instead he should just relax a little bit.
Noble TUX 5 – quite good actually. But does not have sufficient soundstage, thus separation. Soundtracks and classic on them are not as enjoyable as rock. During the listening I was constantly thinking that there is music parts hidden from me.
Lcd-i3 – does provide the “another level” experience, but are in general just small headphones with connected tubes to them and without the headband. Thus the sound feels quite far away from you, probably too far. Which feels weird. While standard headphones push the music into your ears, here you have an impression that it flows away. Which is funny, considering that they are “open” and you expect them to bleed sound, but they actually have sufficient isolation and no one around will ever hear what you are listening. However, should be mentioned – they are one of only two IEMs that I have listened yet, that were able to handle all tracks from my comparison list in the way that I didn’t think: What, this is just garbage sound, I can’t listen to it.
A8000 – very dynamic ones (get it? because they have dynamic driver, eh? eh?). They are on the brighter side, but are quite soft. My biggest problem with them – too flat. It’s just like you are listening to the picture instead of the stage. Very different in sound signature to everything else.
Now, from here go IEMs that I think are overall better than mine, but still were not able to satisfy me completely, as I don’t want to pay several thousands to get “meh, good enough” sound.
JH Layla – dark ones. But the stage – oh yes. And everything is here. Somehow remind me Z1R, but more matured one, more calmed down. Especially great on orchestral music. Almost what I want, but on a darker side from the ideal. And there is another issue – from 20 songs on my comparison list one (Chalkeaters Bowsette) was just awful. You can say –it is 5%, so just ignore. But I tried to represent all my tastes and who knows, how many tracks will be the same. And I can’t sit and listen to my whole library to see if it’s true or not.
Earsonics EM6 or smth like that, demo for customs – I would say, best at this point. They are slightly on the brighter side from my preferences, and doesn’t have the Layla’s stage, but they trade it for more enjoyable sound and clarity. This is the second IEM which can handle all my tracks without any casualties. Separation is still here, although because everything is bright: voices, instruments, there is not as much bass and sometimes it can become a little bit muddy, so I would say not enough airiness in those.
If you read everything up to here – Wow, I am impressed.
To everyone else some conclusions:
Do not like Campfire lineup, Z1R, Noble, JH audio Roxanne AION, A8000.
Still not what I want, but closer – Layla and Earsonics.
Will try to listen to lcd-i4, earsonics flagship, Layla AION, maybe others from JH.
Also really want to try, and maybe will, DK3001pro, 4001, Luna.
Looking for resolution, natural sound, balance, clarity and airiness. Don’t want to have ten different IEMs for each music genre.
What IEM do you suggest can be of my taste?
I always loved music. I cannot imagine myself living without it even for a week. So, I am a melomane, I suppose. And as I started with such introduction, let me briefly mention my preferences: basically, I listen to almost everything. Except from rap. Almost except. So, here is my brief list of..hm…favourites, which is not concluded, but is represented by:
- Whitney Houston, Adele, Katy Perry, Pink, Sia, Rag n Bone, 21 pilots, Sam Smith
- Sinatra, Armstrong, Hue Lori, Glenn Yarbrough, Joe Dassin, Beirut, etc.
- Queen, Beatles, Green Day, Killers, Russian Rock
- Soundtracks, a lot of soundtracks (Halo, Mad Max, LoTR, etc.)
- Classic, a lot of classic (Carmina Burana, Grieg, Beethoven, Debussy, etc.)
About 5 years ago I bought my first so-called “Hi-Fi” setup. I didn’t want to spend a lot of money, but was eager to see, if there is some depth to the music I am listening. So, after some consideration, I bought iBasso DX80 + Dunu DN200J. I was satisfied and quite happy. I also looked onto Oppo smth smth headphones as a possible future purchase, but then decided to go with home acoustic system. So, after 1-2 years I bought Dali Zenzor 3 + Dali E12F + Cambridge audio CXA80. Still believe that it is the best, or at least one of the best systems in its price range. Due to the situation at that time I almost stopped listening to my portable system, and was not paying any attention to what was going on the portable market.
Not so long ago, I moved to Australia. So, I returned to my dx80+iems and understood that the time for an upgrade has come, I listened to the system and was constantly noticing some moments that I was not satisfied with. At that time I believed that sound dependence is following:
Recording -> system (acoustic/headphones/iems) -> source -> recording -> cables (in case of really crappy ones or long distances).
Here I should point that I am not pretending to replace your opinion with mine. Everyone finds smth to believe in for themselves, even immortal almighty beings. But, based on logic and science, I am not a cable believer, or that copper version of DAP sound anyhow differently than stainless steel one, or that there can be any reason to buy 1000$ iems for your phone, or that one can hear difference between 0.01 and 0.02% distortion levels. I am writing this here not to offend anyone, but so that you will fully understand my point of view and my preferences. In the end, still, I am asking your advice and not vice versa.
At first, I was thinking to buy DX220, but unfortunately, I could not listen to it in the shop. When I was buying my DX80 I have listened to some A&K A320 or smth, but wasn’t impressed of what you get for the price. But now, when I went to the local shop and listened to SP2000, my world just collapsed. I understood that before that I was getting only around 50% of the music, which was really there. I was fascinated. It was there. All this time. And I just had no idea about it. Even on my acoustic system (Well, the whole system is still cheaper than one portable DAP). So, there was a great deal and I bought SP1000. 2000 is slightly more delicate to my taste, but the difference is not significant at all to pay much more (in my case with the discount on sp1000).
So, source and system changed places in my dependence sequence. I was wrong all the time. Just for fun I took cheap AKG IEMs which come with Samsung phones, and they sounded better than my DX80 with 2000J, or actually with any IEMS.
Due to the virus, audition at the shop was closed, so I had second honeymoon with my Dunu IEMs and new DAP. They match good with each other, but on some tracks (Sinatra’s Sweet Dreams) IEMs sound too harsh and also I was eager now to learn what level of pleasure (hey, Slaanesh) can I achieve by adding some top IEMs to my new player.
So, when the lockdown finished I rushed to the shop to listen to all those flagships and….was disappointed. I would think that I am just too used to the sound signature of my Dunu’s and do not understand what is the correct sound. But I listened to 25k system with headphones and believe they represent precise enough of how the music should be heard. And top IEMs sound very different (in terms of sound signature, I am not that mad to seriously compare IEMS and headphones).
Now, I want to list the IEMs that I have listened and what was wrong with them in my opinion:
Andromeda – amazingly unenjoyable. They are very balanced, but somehow (and this I believe is the hard achievement) they manage to sound incredibly boring. It is especially noticeable on classic and soundtracks. Also, while they have good balance between the frequency range, they are not “clear-sounding”. Instead, they tend to be more “Sony Z1R approach”-ish.
Solaris (Solaris SE actually, but they are the same, so doesn’t matter) – Well, there is an amazing bass punches…on some tracks. Aside from this, they are basically a worse version of IER Z1R.
JH Roxane Aion – have intriguing sound signature, but are too harsh to listen. Some tracks sound fine, but others are just trash. Also, the fit. It just doesn’t exist in this universe. Really wonder who was their ear model for the design. Elephant?
Here I want to take a break and say following. I see the problem with all those expensive IEMs in that each of them tried to go all the way to perfection for some particular part of the sound. But reaching the height in instruments, for example, they dropped down everything else. All of them do not have balance in sound. The only one within them which has some balance is Andromeda, but it provides such dead sound that I am impressed with how unimpressed I was with it. In my case the problem is even more noticeable, as I listened to very different music. For me IEM need to be able to reproduce everything on the same quality level. I don’t care how good bass sounds on 1 or 2 of my tracks (yes, Solaris, it’s you I am talking about), if other 18 sound just meh (but those punches were really good, incredible, how they managed to achieve this with IEMS). I want everything to sound as it should be. And also I am a sucker for clarity and I guess, you can call it airiness. Because I love resolution, but when you have resolution with sufficient clarity and space, it just becomes very unenjoyable and muddy. More on this later.
And here the cherry – I genuinely believe that my 200$ Dunu DN2000j is better IEM than any of those as combination to SP1000 (haven’t tried other DAPs, maybe in future I will). Even if it was priced 2000$ I would take them instead of any above. Yes, it doesn’t have the best resolution, nor the best representation of the instrument sound, nor the best vocal experience, and it can be quite harsh sometimes. But it has the best balance and clarity, and in the same time it is able to provide you the life and enjoyment of the music. And this is why it is suitable for any genres you throw at it. The only exception I found within my music is Green Day. But to be fair, only IEMs who focuses on vocals are able to do that. The reason is simple – recording. So, returning to the topic, I can listen to anything and may get not the best experience but very decent one. And my ears won’t bleed a single time. Thus, from my point of view, I just don’t understand the excuse of existence of those top IEMs. Or their pricing. It’s like Fallout 76 or another crappy AAA game or film (star khm…) with huge budget.
Dunu, take this into consideration and thanks for such product)
Now somewhat middle range. Still I prefer mine over those. And most of what was said about previous IEMs can be applied to the next ones, but on the lower scale.
IER Z1R – quite challenging to judge one. It has good instrument sound (sparkly treble, yes, I get it). But, first of all, they are murmurous, thus voices struggle, especially on Whitney Houston tracks, which is ridiculous as she HAS the voice. Z1R puts voices too much behind and shield them with instruments. Wouldn’t say though that Sinatra struggled as much, as mr. crinacle stated. Herp Albert did. Yet, this happens not on all of the tracks, Queen were free from this issue. The second – they are quite harsh sometimes. This is especially an issue, as you need to turn the volume upper compared to almost all other IEMs. Soundstage due to the dumped sound signature is also not as huge as I would like. And also, they are very fatiguing, it’s hard to listen to them for a long period of time. To sum up, I have following metaphor of my experience – Z1R is like some student in the film, who is running after the teacher (you) with his science project. He has good intentions and he is a good person. But as he is trying to please you so much with everything (homework, project, help with the desk, etc. etc.) simultaneously, he fails in everything and ends up staying in the middle of the class with broken model of the space craft and pants down. And you feel just…annoyance. He shouldn’t have tried all of this at once. Instead he should just relax a little bit.
Noble TUX 5 – quite good actually. But does not have sufficient soundstage, thus separation. Soundtracks and classic on them are not as enjoyable as rock. During the listening I was constantly thinking that there is music parts hidden from me.
Lcd-i3 – does provide the “another level” experience, but are in general just small headphones with connected tubes to them and without the headband. Thus the sound feels quite far away from you, probably too far. Which feels weird. While standard headphones push the music into your ears, here you have an impression that it flows away. Which is funny, considering that they are “open” and you expect them to bleed sound, but they actually have sufficient isolation and no one around will ever hear what you are listening. However, should be mentioned – they are one of only two IEMs that I have listened yet, that were able to handle all tracks from my comparison list in the way that I didn’t think: What, this is just garbage sound, I can’t listen to it.
A8000 – very dynamic ones (get it? because they have dynamic driver, eh? eh?). They are on the brighter side, but are quite soft. My biggest problem with them – too flat. It’s just like you are listening to the picture instead of the stage. Very different in sound signature to everything else.
Now, from here go IEMs that I think are overall better than mine, but still were not able to satisfy me completely, as I don’t want to pay several thousands to get “meh, good enough” sound.
JH Layla – dark ones. But the stage – oh yes. And everything is here. Somehow remind me Z1R, but more matured one, more calmed down. Especially great on orchestral music. Almost what I want, but on a darker side from the ideal. And there is another issue – from 20 songs on my comparison list one (Chalkeaters Bowsette) was just awful. You can say –it is 5%, so just ignore. But I tried to represent all my tastes and who knows, how many tracks will be the same. And I can’t sit and listen to my whole library to see if it’s true or not.
Earsonics EM6 or smth like that, demo for customs – I would say, best at this point. They are slightly on the brighter side from my preferences, and doesn’t have the Layla’s stage, but they trade it for more enjoyable sound and clarity. This is the second IEM which can handle all my tracks without any casualties. Separation is still here, although because everything is bright: voices, instruments, there is not as much bass and sometimes it can become a little bit muddy, so I would say not enough airiness in those.
If you read everything up to here – Wow, I am impressed.
To everyone else some conclusions:
Do not like Campfire lineup, Z1R, Noble, JH audio Roxanne AION, A8000.
Still not what I want, but closer – Layla and Earsonics.
Will try to listen to lcd-i4, earsonics flagship, Layla AION, maybe others from JH.
Also really want to try, and maybe will, DK3001pro, 4001, Luna.
Looking for resolution, natural sound, balance, clarity and airiness. Don’t want to have ten different IEMs for each music genre.
What IEM do you suggest can be of my taste?
