[jonathan c]

As for SJY, vote with your wallet … elsewhere!

 

[Leonarfd]

Have Sjy responded to any of this?

For me its difficult with comfort on headphones, very few models work without ears touching the drivers/enclosure. Moonlight work here.

Models that has failed for me is most ZMF models, except Verite Open do to more recessed driver.
Audeze LCD models with exception of ore fazor models with new pads.
Hifiman models both round and oval, unless I had swap to deeper aftermarket pads.
DCA Aeon series.

Not left with many more planars then

For DDs it's quite many that work with deep cups or angled driver design.

So my biggest con now with Moonlight is the association with ZMF, pre purchased this without thinking about the copying. Just thought it was cool with another brand using wood and similar design as ZMF models.
But it does leave a sour aftertaste when using it.

 

[zach915m]

without ears touching the drivers

The Atrium has the recessed driver as well. For our planars we have the thick caldera pads which are super deep.

One trick I've given to a number of owners is to put paracord under the foam of the pad but inside the foam covering. This lifts the driver away from the ear by pressing the foam out. I always suggest using the thinnest paracord needed. I'll tey to make a short video on this at some point on our youtube.

 

[Leonarfd]

The Atrium has the recessed driver as well. For our planars we have the thick caldera pads which are super deep.

One trick I've given to a number of owners is to put paracord under the foam of the pad but inside the foam covering. This lifts the driver away from the ear by pressing the foam out. I always suggest using the thinnest paracord needed. I'll tey to make a short video on this at some point on our youtube.

Thanks @zach915m Didn't know that, maybe the Atrium I have used had shallow pads. Similar to have Verite works with Universal pads and not with BE2 due to less height.

The new Bokeh will it also have recessed?



I bought originally Moonlight to try planar again after seeing Zeos and DMS videos.
I sold my LCD 3 when I found out Verite did everything better for me. But started to miss the planar tech.

And was thinking I could expand my reviews more into headphones, and try first with Moonlight. But Sjy don't deserve that.

 

[arielext]

Thanks @zach915m Didn't know that, maybe the Atrium I have used had shallow pads. Similar to have Verite works with Universal pads and not with BE2 due to less height.

The new Bokeh will it also have recessed?



I bought originally Moonlight to try planar again after seeing Zeos and DMS videos.
I sold my LCD 3 when I found out Verite did everything better for me. But started to miss the planar tech.

And was thinking I could expand my reviews more into headphones, and try first with Moonlight. But Sjy don't deserve that.

If you want to help and promote someone, want to review a planar and get a frikkin good one to start with might I suggest to take a look at the Ukrainian company SASH and his new Très SE.

 

[Leonarfd]

If you want to help and promote someone, want to review a planar and get a frikkin good one to start with might I suggest to take a look at the Ukrainian company SASH and his new Très SE.

Had one some years ago from Sasha, the Tres 16ohm I think.

Been tempted to try one of his new ones, but really disliked his choice in headband. And again shallow cups and need to pad roll.

 

[ThEvil0nE]

The Atrium has the recessed driver as well. For our planars we have the thick caldera pads which are super deep.

One trick I've given to a number of owners is to put paracord under the foam of the pad but inside the foam covering. This lifts the driver away from the ear by pressing the foam out. I always suggest using the thinnest paracord needed. I'll tey to make a short video on this at some point on our youtube.

I’ve been using 5mm, 6mm and 7mm solid core natural latex rubber. I slip them under the pads as tuning rings, works like a charm

 

[LXMc]

The Atrium has the recessed driver as well. For our planars we have the thick caldera pads which are super deep.

Does this extend to the Atrium Closed as well? I had thought all the ZMFs were, at most, flush with the mounting plate so any extra space difference was purely at the pad level.

 

[zach915m]

Does this extend to the Atrium Closed as well? I had thought all the ZMFs were, at most, flush with the mounting plate so any extra space difference was purely at the pad level.

Yeah the closed is recessed too, the only ones that sit on top of the baffle are Atticus and eikon and VC, auteur classic is slightly recessed as well. The new Bokeh has the recessed grille as well.

But yeah anyways that poly trick will work for the older models and anything that's come out recently (post VC) is either flush or very close to it.

 

[zach915m]

I’ve been using 5mm, 6mm and 7mm solid core natural latex rubber. I slip them under the pads as tuning rings, works like a charm

Wow nice that's nifty, send me an email/link and I recommend them to people when this comes up.

 

[mrjayviper]

does ZMF have exclusive use of stablized wood in headphones? (I searched the net and stabilized wood seems pretty easy to buy and can be used in as replacement for wood in --any-- application

 

[Exekuhtor]

I updated my thoughts after having this thing for almost a year.
If you're too lazy to click and scroll:

--- Update after having the Starry Night for almost a year: ---
I significantly reduced my headphone collection and this thing stayed! I had the Utopia as my aggressive neutral / midforward headphone and now the Starry Night took that job. Its sound pairs really well with certain genres or music. You might think it is more tiring and fatiguing with a pushed up midrange and voices right up close. Yes, i agree. BUT, sometimes you exactly want that. I have some albums where the singer is originally too much in the background, the Starry Night totally fixes that. In some songs a very close up singer is fantastic, for example Anette Askvik - Thema. Her voice is very soothing and relaxing, and with the Starry Night she is right up next to your ear, the incoming saxophone takes over the voice later in the song and acts like one, it also gets pushed forward, whether you like that or not, that's the nature of it.
Another big example is hip hop, i'm basically only listening to Eminem. He has a bit higher pitched voice and when he raps it just sounds like he's standing half a meter away. He's aggresively spitting his rhymes towards your face, exactly what i want in this case. Most of the time in his songs there are also no guitars involved which can't be also pushed forward, and in the few songs where there are (e.g. "Superman"), they are in the background anyway and they don't disturb the rap god.
Because the soundstage is not small (for a closed back) and the Starry Night is well extended in both directions, you don't get the HD650 experience in losing (treble and bass) information and have that experience that everything is very close to you.
Another thing is amp pairing. This thing has a very low impedance and is hard to drive, but oh boy, it does sound exceptionally good out of a tube amp. In the best case you have an OTC (output transformer coupled) amp where you can reduce the gain to have no background hiss. The Feliks Audio Envy does that. I have a slight background noise on medium and high gain, but on low gain the Starry Night is dead quiet, and the Envy has even more than enough power on low gain. This amp truly brings out the best in the Starry Night, zero sharp consonant sounds while still retaining the mid-forward nature. If you have an OTC tube amp - i highly recommend pairing it with the SN. With an OTL (output transformer less) you most likely get (too much) background noise, but you might want to experiment with it. Sadly OTC amps get very expensive.
Also, another thing: I had no issues anymore with any lose connectors or anything, after fixing the screws myself once right before writing this review, this thing does what it is supposed to without any problems.
In summary: I will keep this thing because i enjoy its presentation and it pairs very well with my system.

 

[grailnewt]

To add a little to Exekuhtor's comments it sounds absolutely phenomenal on my xduo ta-22 hybrid tube amp it's a great pairing imo if you want something cheaper than otc just my 2 cents

 

[SemperMalum]

Slight derail - I know it's not the Starry Night but I've posted a review of the SJY Umi.


Review of the Umi here

 

[HiFiWar]

I'm bored, so I'm going to weigh in here. I've looked back through this thread and it seems like the only thing that SJY did was copy paste some terms of service. OH NO! Who cares? That's an easy fix and hardly counts as copyright infringement. It's definitely not worth the weird hatred they've suddenly earned from ZMF fanboys. It's a simple fix, and hell, might have been done by an AI that copied the TOS from another website automatically. SJY is a college student - I did dumber things than that as a college student designing websites. I own a set of Moonlights, which I bought after reading all this crap just to support him. It's a good headset and it's nothing like the Caldera.

I also own a ZMF Verite Open, which, again, is nothing like the SJY Moonlight, but which took me OVER 2 months to get, despite the 0-8 week promise. SJY did not charge me the price of the headphones and keep the money while shipping ZERO product for over 2 months, ZMF did that. SJY shipped the Moonlight out the next day, and while it's not perfect, he is making nice, solid headphones with good comfort and good sound for a good price. The wood isn't as nice as ZMF, and I don't expect it to be. I don't expect anything to be as nice for thousands of dollars less, but I do like supporting small companies trying to do their best, which ZMF used to be, and still claims they are (frankly, they need more people, their 12 week wait time right now is stupid.)

The Moonlight are nothing like the Caldera, and the fact that anyone even brought them up in the same sentence is laughable. They share a driver type and some styling concepts - that's like comparing the Verite to the Meze 109 because they're both dynamic drivers and have round wooden earcups. No one seems to be getting upset that the Caldera is planar with stylized grills and wood cups like the Audeze LCD series - despite them coming years before. No one is getting upset that almost every IEM is a similar shape and material using similar drivers. Now, SJY has the UMI, which looks nothing like the Caldera, but you lose the nice wood option and have a far uglier product in my opinion. Again, whatever, the ZMF bullies strike again, forcing a cool concept into obscurity because it might be competing with them. Who's next? Gonna go after SASH? JM Audio again? Anyone else who dares to choose wood and metal as a medium?

Odds are the mods will take this post down because they seem to delete anything that even remotely dares to say something negative about ZMF (pays Head-Fi well to advertise), who, again, makes really solid headphones, but who used to mod T50RPs before creating his own style. They looked a whole lot like a T50RP (they were), but no one is whining about that despite it actually being someone else's product they modified and sold. I have never seen Fostex in here whining about that. Going to someone else's thread and complaining is pathetic. Spend less time worrying about others and focus on building some of your extremely expensive, super backlogged headphones that people still pay tons for. Cool, rant complete. Feel free to rage against me now, I'll just ignore button it.