Ingo
Headphoneus Supremus
- Joined
- Aug 16, 2004
- Posts
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Well, I've received my new Zen Vision: M and E4 headphones. I only have about an hour of good listening in, so my mental burn-in is nill.
The first impression I had was,"Where's the bass?". Coming from the iRiver H320 w/ Super.fi 5Pro, I figured that would be the case at first. Then I messed with the EQ. The EQ is not quite what I expected, very light impact on the sound compared to the Rio Karma, H320, and some flash players I've used. I turned on the smart volume feature and that seemed to make things all-around a little better. Still not much bass impact. The bass is there, just tight and light.
Next I put on some classical and bluegrass tracks to test out the top end. The first track I played was Nickel Creek - Sabra Girl [This Side]. I was very impressed with the richness and resolution in the upper mids/lower highs. It was really the first thing that I was impressed with. With the next track, Bela Fleck - Keyboard Sonata in C Major [Perpetual Motion], I noticed the lack of instrument separation. In that song there's only a Mandolin and a Banjo playing together, but they seemed to be the same instrument (although they do sound similar in certain ranges). The E4s definately seem to outperform the SF5Ps in the high end, but I remember the separation being better with the SF5Ps.
The mids on rock, country, pop, bluegrass, sound very smooth and pleasant. The difference between the E4 and SF5Ps in this area isn't very remarkable. But I was using a different source with the SF5Ps and it has been a few months.
My conclusion is that I'm satisfied for the time being with this setup. I think I'll stick with the E4s until the SFXXX and the E500 come out.
The first impression I had was,"Where's the bass?". Coming from the iRiver H320 w/ Super.fi 5Pro, I figured that would be the case at first. Then I messed with the EQ. The EQ is not quite what I expected, very light impact on the sound compared to the Rio Karma, H320, and some flash players I've used. I turned on the smart volume feature and that seemed to make things all-around a little better. Still not much bass impact. The bass is there, just tight and light.
Next I put on some classical and bluegrass tracks to test out the top end. The first track I played was Nickel Creek - Sabra Girl [This Side]. I was very impressed with the richness and resolution in the upper mids/lower highs. It was really the first thing that I was impressed with. With the next track, Bela Fleck - Keyboard Sonata in C Major [Perpetual Motion], I noticed the lack of instrument separation. In that song there's only a Mandolin and a Banjo playing together, but they seemed to be the same instrument (although they do sound similar in certain ranges). The E4s definately seem to outperform the SF5Ps in the high end, but I remember the separation being better with the SF5Ps.
The mids on rock, country, pop, bluegrass, sound very smooth and pleasant. The difference between the E4 and SF5Ps in this area isn't very remarkable. But I was using a different source with the SF5Ps and it has been a few months.
My conclusion is that I'm satisfied for the time being with this setup. I think I'll stick with the E4s until the SFXXX and the E500 come out.
