[goodvibes]

 
I sat down and listened to it yesterday at the show with my own (or familiar) music. I have loaner Laylas here (which I'm long overdue reviewing). The Shure is noticeably more detailed than them (or another IEMs I've tried from memory). What is confusing is that the Shures have a different tonal balance, one that works very well with Chesky binaural recordings (i.e.: they are so well recorded that if someone had a running nose, you could just about hear the snot dripping out) but I'm not a total fan of it. Imagine a pair of in-ear K701s -- that is, you get the tonal balance that is lovely with vocals, but don't get the soundstage or spaciousness that the K701s have as a result of being circumaural headphones. The upper mids are a bit too forward. My feeling when listening was that they have an insanely fast and effortless transient response that reminds me of my first experience of 'stats a few years ago, where I felt they made regular dynamic headphones feel like a pretentious effort at sound reproduction. They simply have a competence that is in another world compared to BA and dynamic IEMs. But they didn't engage me with all music as I would have hoped. Neither did the 009s when I owned them. I didn't try the in-built DAC, but, like regular 'stats, you're going to want to have the best source possible for them. The difference between my fresh-out-of-the-box Mojo and Jude's AK380 was pretty obvious.

You may have listened to the DAC as well, even if you were analog in. I suspect it's digitizing so perhaps you'd like it more dig in. 

 

[audionewbi]

I think it is safe to say we might be amp alone model for this product in the future. It is bound to happen if the product proves to be popular, the same way we saw amp made for the Stax which are far better than what Stax mades for their own headphones.
 
I personally liked their all in one solution however I always wonder on the other possibilities. There is no news on the release date for the Australia market. 

 

[jude]

  ...Absolutely, don't misunderstand me! It's just that I find some Head-Fi:ers to be über credible and you're not one of them as you depend on your sponsors. It may or may not effect your statements and assessments at all, but it really doesn't matter as we'll never be able to tell for sure...

 
I think it's more than fair to view my posts and opinions with some caution, given that I financially benefit from sponsorships and advertising revenue, combined with the fact that you don't know me, and have never met me.
 
Now, that said, I'll make a few points:
 

1. There are currently over 70 companies who directly sponsor Head-Fi.
   1. While, of course, we greatly appreciate the support of every single one of those sponsors, having that many sponsors means that the loss of any one (or even any five, any ten, etc.) is not going to swing the reaper's scythe on the site's solvency.
   2. When a website with such a tight focus (like Head-Fi) has such strong global reach (around 2M unique visitors per month, with a great deal of that outside of the U.S.) within a pretty finite topic space (premium personal audio gear), it's not surprising that companies whose products/services so directly target that space would want to advertise here for that reach.
2. Today, a few thousand posts will be made by people who aren't me. Contained within many of those posts will be criticisms--some mild, some scathing--of products made by both sponsors and non-sponsors.
3. I do not pay mind to whether or not a company is a sponsor when I try their product, nor does it have any influence on my opinion(s) of a product. I think it fair to say that I have written the vast majority of the Buying Guide that we currently update twice per year (currently read by around 350,000 unique visitors per year), and you'll find many reviews and impressions within it of both sponsor and non-sponsor gear.
4. Being added to the Guide for the Fall 2015 update in November is the Simaudio Moon Neo 430HA, wherein I will state that it is my current overall favorite desktop solid state headphone amplifier (unless something else comes around before then to oust it). Simaudio is not a sponsor; however, we do have a good number of sponsors who do make competing products.
5. Being added to the Guide for the Fall 2015 update in November is the Astell&Kern AK380, wherein I will state that it is the best sounding portable digital audio player I have yet used. (No, I haven't used them all, but I've certainly used a bunch.) Astell&Kern is not a sponsor (though they have sponsored in the past), and we have several sponsors who do make portable digital audio players.
6. I've stated for years that the best overall current-production headphone in the world (in my opinion) is the Stax SR009. Stax is an enigmatic Chinese-owned Japanese company who has never once shown any interest in sponsoring Head-Fi. In other words, I have, for years now, said that a headphone made by a non-sponsor (Stax) is better (in my opinion) than any other current-production headphone, which would, of course, include every headphone made by every sponsor of Head-Fi who makes headphones.

 
So of all the current-production products I've used so far, the ones I feel (and have stated openly) are the best overall in the key categories of solid state headphone amplifier, portable digital audio player, and over-ear headphones are made by non-sponsors.
 
Now, to make some effort to get this back on topic after all of this, let me add one more point to this discussion, and one more product category to that sentence immediately above this one:
 

1. If you are willing to confer current-production status to the Shure KSE1500, then I have now said that I think the best IEM (in-ear monitor) is made by a non-sponsor (though they were many years ago), and who stopped (around 2008 or 2009) directly marketing to the consumer market in the U.S. We have a lot of sponsors who do make IEMs. Shure isn't one of them, and, given their pro-audio-only marketing for the last several years, isn't likely to be one in the future.

 
I'm not trying to change your mind, @Aero Dynamik, but I did feel like addressing your post.
 
Now, if you want to continue the off-topic bits of this discussion, go ahead and start another thread for it, and/or PM me directly.

 

[Currawong]

 

 
I sat down and listened to it yesterday at the show with my own (or familiar) music. I have loaner Laylas here (which I'm long overdue reviewing). The Shure is noticeably more detailed than them (or another IEMs I've tried from memory). What is confusing is that the Shures have a different tonal balance, one that works very well with Chesky binaural recordings (i.e.: they are so well recorded that if someone had a running nose, you could just about hear the snot dripping out) but I'm not a total fan of it. Imagine a pair of in-ear K701s -- that is, you get the tonal balance that is lovely with vocals, but don't get the soundstage or spaciousness that the K701s have as a result of being circumaural headphones. The upper mids are a bit too forward. My feeling when listening was that they have an insanely fast and effortless transient response that reminds me of my first experience of 'stats a few years ago, where I felt they made regular dynamic headphones feel like a pretentious effort at sound reproduction. They simply have a competence that is in another world compared to BA and dynamic IEMs. But they didn't engage me with all music as I would have hoped. Neither did the 009s when I owned them. I didn't try the in-built DAC, but, like regular 'stats, you're going to want to have the best source possible for them. The difference between my fresh-out-of-the-box Mojo and Jude's AK380 was pretty obvious.

You may have listened to the DAC as well, even if you were analog in. I suspect it's digitizing so perhaps you'd like it more dig in. 

I checked when I started listening that the EQ was on bypass, which means the ADC/DAC wasn't being used, so I'm sure I wasn't listening to the DAC. 

 

[harmonix]

 
I checked when I started listening that the EQ was on bypass, which means the ADC/DAC wasn't being used, so I'm sure I wasn't listening to the DAC. 

Electrostats biggest weakness and I say this from my experience with Quad ESL is the bottom end reach as well as percussive instruments.
Stats are best with strings and voice. Haven't heard these obviously but suspect they will have the same traits since it is intrinsic to the design of stats.

 

[Joe Bloggs]

I checked when I started listening that the EQ was on bypass, which means the ADC/DAC wasn't being used, so I'm sure I wasn't listening to the DAC. 

Is that stated to be the case by official documentation?

If I had designed a hypothetical pair of earphones practically chained to its own DAC/amp complete with ADC for analog input, I would take advantage of the digital signal path at all times, digitally reshaping the earphones' response characteristics to the desired outcome at all times; "bypass" on the equalizer in my case would simply mean the output adheres fully to my designed response. You would never hear the "raw" sound of my earphones unless you plugged them into a 3rd party amplifier somehow.

Who knows? :rolleyes:

 

[Joe Bloggs]

Electrostats biggest weakness and I say this from my experience with Quad ESL is the bottom end reach as well as percussive instruments.
Stats are best with strings and voice. Haven't heard these obviously but suspect they will have the same traits since it is intrinsic to the design of stats.

Electrostat headphones don't really have the problem with bass that electrostat loudspeakers have...

 

[harmonix]

Electrostat headphones don't really have the problem with bass that electrostat loudspeakers have...

I will get my hands on a pair to listen eventually but curious why that is the case - is it because the smaller size doesn't have to push the massive volumes of air? How about percussion instruments?

 

[Joe Bloggs]

I checked when I started listening that the EQ was on bypass, which means the ADC/DAC wasn't being used, so I'm sure I wasn't listening to the DAC. 

Is that stated to be the case by official documentation?

If I had designed a hypothetical pair of earphones practically chained to its own DAC/amp complete with ADC for analog input, I would take advantage of the digital signal path at all times, digitally reshaping the earphones' response characteristics to the desired outcome at all times; "bypass" on the equalizer in my case would simply mean the output adheres fully to my designed response. You would never hear the "raw" sound of my earphones unless you plugged them into a 3rd party amplifier somehow.

Who knows? :rolleyes:

Have just read the sales literature and apparently "bypass" as opposed to "Flat" bypasses digital signal processing (DSP).

I'd say you should at least have tried out "Flat" in comparison to "bypass", there's probably a reason for there being a distinction between the two (I'd wager that reason being that "Flat" with DSP engaged is how the engineers envisioned the system to sound...)

 

[goodvibes]

  Electrostats biggest weakness and I say this from my experience with Quad ESL is the bottom end reach as well as percussive instruments.
Stats are best with strings and voice. Haven't heard these obviously but suspect they will have the same traits since it is intrinsic to the design of stats.

I disagree about percussion as it's an attribute. Which quads and what was driving them? Yes about bass extension and overall volume. 63s were a bit soft but 988s were not with the same topology, especially if you roll down the cloth. 57s are downright crispy when used optimally. 57s are reasonably flat to 45hz and the later models to about 38hz and then roll quickly. 

 

[harmonix]

I disagree about percussion as it's an attribute. Which quads and what was driving them? Yes about bass extension and overall volume. 63s were a bit soft but 988s were not with the same topology, especially if you roll down the cloth. 57s are downright crispy when used optimally. 57s are reasonably flat to 45hz and the later models to about 38hz and then roll quickly. 

63 pros.

 

[Kunlun]

@Jude and @Currawong
 
 
I know you are both very busy, but any word on the sub-bass extension of these earphones would be much appreciated. Just how deep do they reach when the music calls for it?
 
 
 
I'm so looking forward to hearing these myself sometime! But, until then, please let us know about the sub-bass, thanks!

 

[audionewbi]

One Japanese audio guy is telling me Shure failed to impressed him as to him it is still not an over-all performer. Bass must be eq, it is just not present and despite its low extension it is failing to provide any impact.
 
But this is just one report based on a 5 minutes listen. I guess the price tag is making people very critical on them. 

 

[drgajet]

Jim Graff to the rescue! OUCH!

Wow, really!

 

[Currawong]

  @Jude and @Currawong
 
 
I know you are both very busy, but any word on the sub-bass extension of these earphones would be much appreciated. Just how deep do they reach when the music calls for it?
 
 
 
I'm so looking forward to hearing these myself sometime! But, until then, please let us know about the sub-bass, thanks!

 
I didn't find the sub-bass extension that good on the tracks I had where it was noticeable. 
 
Very roughly speaking we're looking at an in-ear version of the later Stax Lambdas (e.g.: 404LE or similar) [Edit:] but with more mid-bass.