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Originally Posted by HeadphoneAddict /img/forum/go_quote.gif
I have about 245 hours on the IE8 now. They sound different that they did just 24 hours ago, after very loud electronic music blasting through them. The biggest changes have occurred in the first 24 hours and in the last 24 hours of a 10 day burn-in - very strange, but then so is the burn-in for an Ultrasone too!
In Summary - The mids are still a little recessed, but detailed. The highs are starting to sound more like what I have been expecting from them, and the bass is still powerful but not quite as overwhelming like it has been in the past. Although the sound is not completely fixed with burn-in, the IE8 are starting to sound a little more fun than the Phonak Audeo or Livewires with some music, but it's not as detailed or transparent as those two which are closer to a studio monitor in sound.
I still find the bass to be overboard at times, for instance with Robert Plant and Alison Krauss "Raising Sand" and Shelby Lynn "Just a little Lovin" or . But it is less intrusive into the lower mids of the vocals than it was before - it's like having a loudness control with some CDs and I have to listen at low volumes or the bass is just too much. Yet, the bass is just right with some other music like Diana Krall "Live in Paris" or BB King and Eric Clapton "Riding with the King". The bass is pretty delicious with music like Renaud Garcia-Fons and Gary Karr who play the bass fiddle, or even Yo-Yo Ma's Cello. And, of course it is nice to have the punch and power behind the bass line in electronic music as well.
The slightly recessed mids though do make it more difficult to appreciate the details imbedded in the music. In the song "Riding with the King" King and Clapton singing and the piano all sound like an afterthought hiding behind the sound of the drums and guitars. Boosting the 500-2K range by a couple of dB really brings out their voices. Most recordings get by with the stock IE8 mids and no EQ without as much problems, but I just wanted to bring this up.
The treble is still very picky about the recording, and listening to Jennifer Knapp "Live" really drills into my head and it isn't sounding pleasant at all. This is a new finding and if the treble increases any more it will be a bad thing. I do find I can tone down the treble some if I push the IEM deeper into my ears, at the expense of more bass. With Jennifer Knapp "Live", that happens to be a good solution in that case. Switching from the stock bi-flange to the eBay bi-flange help take some of that edge off the treble, and even "Live in Paris" is less sibilant with the eBay bi-flange tips.
On the other hand, listening to Nils Lofgren "Acoustic Live" or John H. Clarke "Acoustik Guitar" plus some other classical acoustic guitar recordings is sounding good enough to enjoy with either tips. Jazz at the Pawnshop, my old standard jazz nightclub music test for transparency is not bad sounding, but still not at the same level as the Westone 3. Then there are some CD that seem to be made just for the IE8, like Patricia Barber "Companion". They do also seem to excel with electronic music like Infected Mushroom, Kenji Williams, Karunesh or Aaron Spectre. But, going in the opposite direction I still put on some classical music, a Mozart 24/96 recording (4608 kbps) that I downloaded from High Resolution Music for free. I enjoyed the IE8 with this recording and the soundstage is much improved from the early days, being wider and more spacious than I recall. As I type this I had to go look at my EQ settings and twice, and also had to make sure that the SRS iWOW plug-in was not activated.
The isolation still sucks, but this could be the IEM that I use when I'm not in the mood for a full size can but I need to hear my wife or kids calling for me. As for sound quality, the Westone ES3X and Westone 3 still beat these for me. But like I said, these IE8 might have a roll in being the IEM I use when I don't want total isolation - that used to be the roll of my Denon C700 for so long (I've had those for almost 2 years now).
As I get through each phase of burn-in, the best tips and the best amps to use with them change, so I will be spending more time with my other amps (currently using iBasso D10 with LTC6241HV opamp) and the other tips again. It might be time to revisit the medium single flange and the Complys T400 again as well. I will probably give these up to 300 hours for burn-in as well. I'll try them with the headphone out of my 4G Nano and iPhone 3G too, and report back.
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I'm at approximately 270 hours with my IE8 and they sound pretty much like when I did my mini-review at 245 hours. I said I would play with tips some more, and I have.
I can tame the excess bass if I use the stock medium single flange tips or small stock bi-flange tips using a loose and shallow insertion, i.e. making sure they leak a little, but that exaggerates the highs too much, pulls back the mids, and kills isolation.
The Complys T400 foam tips still tame the highs too much, while giving the same bass as the eBay bi-flange or RE2 bi-flange tips but with better isolation. I'm not ready to destroy a foam tip to slide onto the stalk of a silicone tip yet (to go under the mushroom or umbrella of the silicone tip). With the T400 it kinda reminds me of the HD650 or Stax O2 on the wrong amp, smooth and detailed and refined but a little too dark until you get used to them.
So, the eBay clear bi-flange tips with a losse shallow fit still work best for me at the moment, in terms of balance between lows mids and highs, since they don't exaggerate the highs when used in a loose or shallow fit. But the IE8 bass is still just too much for me at times, especially if I push those tips in for a tighter seal - and that's coming from someone who can be a basshead most of the time. I'd say with a tight seal the IE8's upper bass is still at least 3 dB more than I want. Yes, I have to EQ out at least 3 dB at 64, 125 and 250 Hz with the IE8 on my Macbook and D10 (or other amps) to get the sound to be closer to where it should be. At least I don't have to bump the mids EQ like before. However, the IE8 are still dark sounding when I switch to them after listening to my Phonak or W3 for a while.
I've been going back and forth between the IE8 and my Phonak Audeo tonight. The Phonak are a great IEM, and while they lack the powerful bass presence of the IE8 the Phonak have a very present and vivid midrange detail/tone to make up for it. The Phonak are a little more transparent and uncolored than the IE8, and while the Phonak bass is tighter and faster than the IE8 the Phonak's bass is still 2 about dB less than what I really want (adding in EQ of 2 dB from 32-64 or 32-125 Hz with either black or grey filters helps a lot).
So, with the IE8 fitting loosely and using the eBay bi-flange tips I'd say they are near the same level of performance as the Phonak Audeo, but with a different kind of sound - it's a smooth, warm, rich and a more laid back sound
vs a tight crisp energetic crystal-clear and transparent sound that lacks the last bit of bass presence needed for a more complete illusion of the performance. It's like trying to decide between a modded D5000 and an RS-1, sometimes you need both, sometimes you need neither (Switch to Stax O2 or HE Audio Jade or ES3X).
Now, with this next part I am relying on faulty auditory memory, but I believe if I had to pick one I would choose the IE8 over the stock SE530 or Image X10 or Triple.fi 10 Pro which I placed below the Phonak in my ranking (but have sold a while back). But only IF I don't need as much isolation - which I mentioned before that I do indeed have a use for an IEM that lets me hear when people are calling for me. I don't think the IE8 would make me sell the Phonak because there is some music that I can't listen to with the IE8 without fine tuning with the EQ (which is not always available), and also because my Phonak have a mic for my iPhone.
Certainly neither has replaced my Westone 3, which are like taking some of my favorite traits of both the IE8 and the Phonak and putting them into one universal IEM. The W3 have more bass presence and impact than the Phonak while having slightly less than the IE8, so W3 do not force me to EQ out the bass in order to listen to certain music. I'll admit that there are a few times when the W3 bass is a little too much as well, but it is never so much that I would have to skip music on my playlist if I can't EQ them properly. I can listen to all my tracks with no bass EQ on the W3, even with Robert Plant and Alison Krauss "Raising Sand", which many people here commented is produced with too much bass. However, with the IE8 and no EQ their bass can be a problem with music like that, unless I break the seal intentionally to pull the bass back.
And the scary part is that NONE of these are as good as my Westone ES3X that I reviewed in the Westone ES3X Appreciation Thread - if I weren't afraid to take my ES3X out of the house to be lost or damaged then I would have little need for any of the others. Most of my buying universal IEM these days is out of curiosity and from dozens of PM's asking me to compare them, since I was actually pretty happy once I got my W3 around Thanksgiving.
