riccardo
New Head-Fier
- Joined
- Jan 22, 2013
- Posts
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Hello everybody, I'm new here even though I've been lurking there forums for a while, now I've decided to write as I badly need a piece of advice from someone more expert than me. I hope I won't bore you out of your minds with this and that you'll be able to understand me despite my English.
I've received a pair of Shure se535 yesterday and I've been listening to them on my rockboxed ipod classic as that's what I'll be using them with, especially when I'm not at home. The sound, while not terrible, wasn't very good. Sure, I could hear a more detailed and spacious sound than with my previous iem (phonak's pfe 121) but the highs were terribly sibilant on vocals and sounds like cymbals sounded almost distorted, definitely not the experience I had expected.
I tried plugging the ipod on my sony hifi and listening through that to the same track, one where I had heard some of the most sibilance out of the ipod (dave matthews band's grace is gone, 320kbps mp3). I don't know if in this case the hifi was just working as an amplifier or as a new source but the result was so uncomparably better. The sound was warmer, there was no sibilance or distortion and I could definitely hear even more details (like some additional percussion sounds).
I tried again the same track on the laptop and phone, and while it wasn't as good as with the sony hifi, it definitely was a much better and more satisfying listening experience than out of the ipod.
Now my question is: can the ipod really be this bad in reproducing music and why haven't I had the same bad experience with other iems (it was never the best, but not this level of bad)? for instance the phonaks with black filters (=more bassy, slightly less highs and mids) sound better on the ipod than the shure. With the other sources it's the other way around, shure sounds so much better. Maybe shure iems are less forgiving of a bad source. Problem is, I've bought them to listen to them on a dap and the only one I own is the Ipod.
So now my options are:
-returning the shure (there's a 10 days free return policy) and just keep listening with the phonaks
-switch to a warmer iem that might give me less problems with the highs of the ipod (ie8 maybe?)
-buy a new dap (in this case I'd need one with lots of storage space, as I travel a lot and can't upload different music from home every day)
-maybe buy a portable amplifier? with my cheap fiio e5 there wasn't any major change in sound tho
-something else I haven't thought of?
Let me know, based on your experience, what you think I should do...
I've received a pair of Shure se535 yesterday and I've been listening to them on my rockboxed ipod classic as that's what I'll be using them with, especially when I'm not at home. The sound, while not terrible, wasn't very good. Sure, I could hear a more detailed and spacious sound than with my previous iem (phonak's pfe 121) but the highs were terribly sibilant on vocals and sounds like cymbals sounded almost distorted, definitely not the experience I had expected.
I tried plugging the ipod on my sony hifi and listening through that to the same track, one where I had heard some of the most sibilance out of the ipod (dave matthews band's grace is gone, 320kbps mp3). I don't know if in this case the hifi was just working as an amplifier or as a new source but the result was so uncomparably better. The sound was warmer, there was no sibilance or distortion and I could definitely hear even more details (like some additional percussion sounds).
I tried again the same track on the laptop and phone, and while it wasn't as good as with the sony hifi, it definitely was a much better and more satisfying listening experience than out of the ipod.
Now my question is: can the ipod really be this bad in reproducing music and why haven't I had the same bad experience with other iems (it was never the best, but not this level of bad)? for instance the phonaks with black filters (=more bassy, slightly less highs and mids) sound better on the ipod than the shure. With the other sources it's the other way around, shure sounds so much better. Maybe shure iems are less forgiving of a bad source. Problem is, I've bought them to listen to them on a dap and the only one I own is the Ipod.
So now my options are:
-returning the shure (there's a 10 days free return policy) and just keep listening with the phonaks
-switch to a warmer iem that might give me less problems with the highs of the ipod (ie8 maybe?)
-buy a new dap (in this case I'd need one with lots of storage space, as I travel a lot and can't upload different music from home every day)
-maybe buy a portable amplifier? with my cheap fiio e5 there wasn't any major change in sound tho
-something else I haven't thought of?
Let me know, based on your experience, what you think I should do...