[Berke]

My first post ever...

Hi everyone,

I'm looking for a IEM for my iphone. I have listened to cx500 and liked it very muchly, but dranoel4190's post here led me to start this thread.

I really want to consider MM50ip to have only one set of earphones for both listening to music and talking, and I'm seeking cx500's quality.

Can anybody enlighten me on how the MM50 compares to its mic-less siblings? Now I've heard cx500, I can't go back on sound quality, so I want to consider MM50 if the bass handling and mid and high balance is as good as the cx500.

On the other hand, if it's not as good, I'll stick with cx500 and a regular extra Bluetooth headset. But that's not really what I want (carrying two earphones all the time?)

If it's of any help, I gathered specs of the three here:
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MM50ip:

# Headphones Frequency response: 18 – 22,000
# Hz Impedance: 16 Ω
# Sound pressure level: 106 dB
# Microphone Frequency response: 80 – 15,000 Hz
# Pick up pattern: Omni-directional
# Sensitivity: -44 dBv/Pa


CX400:

Frequency response 17 - 21000 Hz
Cable length Symmetric (earphone -> separator: 300 mm; separator -> plug: 300 mm). 1 m extension cable.
Impedance 16 Ohm
THD, total harmonic distortion < 0.2 %
Sound pressure level (SPL) 113 dB


CX500:

Impedance 16 Ohms
Frequency range 17-22000Hz
Total harmonics distortions (THD) 0.2 %
Sound pressure level (SPL) 113 dB SPL
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I don't know if these specs should tell me something, It's (a better than cx300) balance that I'm after.

Please help me out,

 

[khtse]

I always thought that the CX400 is just CX500 with short cable (and bundle with an extension cable), but looking at the frequency range that you post, it seems that they are different. If they are indeed the same, that you can get the CX400 and buy one of the many microphone adapters for iPhone available on the market.

Just by looking at it, it seems that the MM50ip is based on the CX300. It could be based on something worse than CX300, I don't know. I always wonder why there is yet any serious attempt from Sennheiser to enter this iPhone mic+headphone market. For example, they could easily produce a replacement cable with iPhone compatible mic & remote control for IE8...

 

[Berke]

Thank you for the reply,

I should clarify that I pulled the specs from different websites, so I'm not too sure they are accurate. But are the freq responses and sound pressure levels relevant to bass-treble balance?

I wish I had the chance to compare cx500 and mm50ip...

If they had the same quality, that would be perfect for me.


Edit: And yeah! What about those extension cables with mic on them? Sennheiser doesn't seem to have one, but I might end up just buying cx500 and Griffin's smarttalk cable. (IE8 is just way out of my league now)

 

[khtse]

The CX500 sounds significantly better than CX300 in every way, and thus I guess the CX500 would sound much better than the MM50ip.

You can try to email Sennheiser regarding the difference between CX400 and CX500, they usually reply email fairly quickly. If they are indeed the same, beside the cable, CX400 would be a better choice for you because of the short cable (you don't want the mic to end up somewhere below your stomach). There are plenty of mic cables for iPhone on the market, try searching "iphone microphone" on Amazon.