Options to reduce harsh highs on IEMs?

Metalomaniac · May 31, 2020 at 8:45 PM

As a newbie, I've been trying to tame the harsh highs on my Empire Ears Nemesis. Duffy's vocals on Mercy are so bad it's grating, and it can get bad on other types of music as well. I haven't had anything like this happen on my earlier (much cheaper) IEMs, and am quite surprised this is what it has come to.

It's taken me on unexpected paths:

Trying different insertion depths for my tips, which didn't help much, if at all
Trying no-brand Chinese foam tips, no effect
Trying an inline USB DAC instead of Hiby R5, no change
Shoving tiny cotton balls into the tip. This resulted in a muffled sound, though harshness was gone.
Trying out SoundID app, which uses A/B testing and hearing tests to supposedly customize the frequency response to my liking and ears. It made the harsh highs worse. Much worse.
Covering the nozzle with one or two layers of surgical tape. Latter worked quite well, but wasn't enough to fully remove the harshness. After I figure out which of the four nozzles on the Nemesis is for treble, I'll poke holes in the rest.
Using a 10-band EQ called PowerEQ. You have to pay 3 EUR for it, but it has pretty nice features - for example, it can change the EQ settings based on what output is connected (BT or wired).

Do any of these introduce unwanted coloring or deterioration of sound quality?

In the end I got very good results combining the latter two options. There's still some harshness left to my tastes, but at least it doesn't feel like someone scratching a blackboard.

I have some tips on order, and will get Spinfits after I figure out what size to use. I have also requested several cable manufacturers for their recommendations. The Nemesis comes with Effect Audio Ares II, and I'm considering Eletech's Fortitude after good tips and recommendation from Eletech's Eric Chong.

Anything else I should take a look at?

Also, am I crazy doing all this? Should I just get different IEMs instead of wrangling these?

baskingshark · May 31, 2020 at 9:57 PM

Metalomaniac said:
As a newbie, I've been trying to tame the harsh highs on my Empire Ears Nemesis. Duffy's vocals on Mercy are so bad it's grating, and it can get bad on other types of music as well. I haven't had anything like this happen on my earlier (much cheaper) IEMs, and am quite surprised this is what it has come to.

It's taken me on unexpected paths:

Trying different insertion depths for my tips, which didn't help much, if at all

Trying no-brand Chinese foam tips, no effect

Trying an inline USB DAC instead of Hiby R5, no change

Shoving tiny cotton balls into the tip. This resulted in a muffled sound, though harshness was gone.

Trying out SoundID app, which uses A/B testing and hearing tests to supposedly customize the frequency response to my liking and ears. It made the harsh highs worse. Much worse.

Covering the nozzle with one or two layers of surgical tape. Latter worked quite well, but wasn't enough to fully remove the harshness. After I figure out which of the four nozzles on the Nemesis is for treble, I'll poke holes in the rest.

Using a 10-band EQ called PowerEQ. You have to pay 3 EUR for it, but it has pretty nice features - for example, it can change the EQ settings based on what output is connected (BT or wired).

Do any of these introduce unwanted coloring or deterioration of sound quality?

In the end I got very good results combining the latter two options. There's still some harshness left to my tastes, but at least it doesn't feel like someone scratching a blackboard.

I have some tips on order, and will get Spinfits after I figure out what size to use. I have also requested several cable manufacturers for their recommendations. The Nemesis comes with Effect Audio Ares II, and I'm considering Eletech's Fortitude after good tips and recommendation from Eletech's Eric Chong.

Anything else I should take a look at?

Also, am I crazy doing all this? Should I just get different IEMs instead of wrangling these?

Those are very good suggestions u have done.

I find that in general, foam tips (try other brands/types) do lower the treble. Also narrow bore silicone tips do help too (by boosting the bass, so the entire frequency spectrum taken as a whole sounds less bright in the treble).

U can potentially try pairing a warmer source with it, or playing it at softer volumes (Fletcher munson curve - the ears perceive the sound to be more V shaped with boosted trebles at higher volume; at lower volumes it is more U shaped). Copper cables may help (if u ain't a cable skeptic), but the changes in cables to me personally are not light and day, but rather more subtle than the above changes.

I realized a lot of the time, what I initially thought to be treble harshness was actually upper mids harshness (I consider that to be the 2 - 4 kHz band). This upper mids area harshness can be tamed with EQ or with putting a 3M micropore over the nozzle (don't cover the entire nozzle if not it will sound muffled). YMMV.

Metalomaniac · Jun 1, 2020 at 7:03 AM

The harshness is definitely alleviated at lower volumes, didn't know there was a term for it!

I'll try out EQing upper mids, thanks for the tip!

IEMusic · Jun 1, 2020 at 12:04 PM

Over time, I’ve found that I also am quite sensitive to upper mids, that when boosted, sound very shouty. They tend to bother me a bit more than bright treble. Tips, micropore tape, and EQ are probably the best techniques. MP tape is more challenging when there are multiple small sound tubes. Just puncture the tape with a needle, so the tube is not fully covered.