Urgh I already have a 64Audio U12T for referential listening and the IE 900 looks tempting. Iam a sucker for minimalist yet elegant looking design like this one. Read through reviews, but can somebody help comment on the "fun" factor of this IEM? I know it's bassy, but will it throw off somebody who's familiar with the resolving capability of the U12T?
If you don’t mind me not comparing to the U12T (partly because it would be bad form for one sponsor to rate another sponsor’s product, but also because I haven’t heard a U12T myself), I feel there is enough of a u-shape in the IE 900 to kick up the fun factor when a song calls for it. Just yesterday, I was listening to the IE 900 with this track (and eventually, the whole album), and I was experiencing a weird effect where my mind was being tricked into feeling the bass on other parts of my body.
Your Mileage May Vary, of course, but I feel pretty confident that people will agree the IE 900’s bass is quite visceral. If you know Yosi Horikawa’s music, you know that a large portion of his songs are made up of field recordings, and I suspect he uses binaural microphones or even head-shaped microphones to do so, and that his recording quality is immaculately clear. In my mind, Horikawa-san spends a lot of time in a sound-proofed and treated basement, throwing ping pong balls and tearing paper all day. I think it’s this resolution in the recordings (conveyed by the IE 900) that contributes to this sense of hyper-realism, all the grit and texture that tricks me into feeling like I am in Horikawa-san’s studio and it is only natural for me to be feeling the bass.
Actually, I want to replace my excellent Xelento due to be unable to buy a protection grille, as I broke it in trying to clean it.
Let's hope Sennheiser services are better than Beyerdynamic for parts selling when necessary (Tips, Grille, Cable).
One thing that I’m noticing about the IE 900 and IE 300, it appears that both the nozzle AND the included tips include a protective grille (and foam?). So, I don’t think my cerumen is going to get down into the IE 900’s nozzle, and in fact changing a dirty filter will be as easy as changing Sennheiser tips.
If you need to change the filter inside the IE 900’s nozzle, though, I have so far had pretty good success with Sennheiser’s service department, either for myself (I just remembered! I need a fresh headband pad for my HD 800!) or when I hear back from other customers after I refer them to the CS department.
I bookmarked this link, you are welcome to as well:
http://www.sennheiser.com/customer-service
@ericpalonen
I forgot to ask how much sound isolation does this new ie900 offers? For me isolation is very important I am in a very noisy environment.
I need minimum 20db.
If you don’t mind me not being Eric
I’m still waiting to hear what the average spec figures are, but I recently experienced a practical example. With the IE 300 (similar ergonomics as the IE 900, and I’m literally using my small IE 300 tips so I keep my ear gunk off of Eric’s IE 900), I decided I wanted to listen to music while mowing the lawn. “Whole Love” by Wilco, if you’re curious
Now, I have a Ryobi battery powered lawn mower, which I would guess is 6-10 dB quieter than a gas powered mower, and I set my music volume BEFORE I started the mower so I wouldn’t be tempted to set the music too high... but I was totally able to mow while jammin out! There were a few points where my mower automatically throttled up for thick grass and the song was a little more mellow, and I could hear the buzz of the motor, but there was also one point where I got to the end of a mowing line, turned around, and saw that I would have to redo my last line. The battery had died, and I had kept walking
To hazard a guess, I would say there is somewhere between 20 and 26 dB of isolation (obviously a little less against the penetrating powers of longer wavelengths), and maybe I’m estimating conservatively. So it’s pretty good, and the IE 900 isolation will have been informed by Sennheiser’s PRO IEMs which are intended for stage musicians.
You may still be able to hear the roar of a tiger through your IE 900. Which, I’m sure you would agree, is probably a good thing for safety
But you should be able to enjoy music and ignore more mundane things.