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The discovery thread!
Jul 12, 2019 at 5:34 PM Post #42,782 of 100,329
what was your path to your current iem/headphone collection?

Mine goes back to the early 80's, when I got my first Sony Walkman with the Sony headphones with the orange pads and metal headband. After that, I got a imported gold Samsung mymy portable cassette player in 1985. This player sounded amazing, and the earbuds that came with it were far better than the Sony headphones. Eventually I settled with some Kenwood earbuds in the late 80's that were simply the best sounding earbuds I ever owned up to that point. Those lasted until the early 90's, when I yanked them on a bus ride into town, and sadly, no longer were for sale at the Navy Exchange. So for the next decade plus, I used Sony cans. I was pretty much exclusive to Sony cans until 2008, when I went into Sam Goody and saw a display for the Skullcandy Ink'd earphones that just came out. They had a listening station and a $8.00 sale. My Sony cans died on yet another bus trip to work, so I tried them on and were blown away by what I heard! I know..it was Skullcandy, but I'd never heard such bass + treble in my life. I bought a pair for myself and a pink pair for my girlfriend at the time, and she was also impressed. I liked the ear tip concept, which provided a nice snug fit, seal, and bass response. I would continue with the Skullcandy until 2010, when I lost my Skullcandy ink'd tips, and decided to try the Sennheiser CX150 at FYE. They sounded, imho, was better and clearer than the ink'd. They also seemed to bring the details when I listened to fast tracks much cleaner and clearer than the ink'd. I bought two pairs of those at about $20.00 each. Then I started reading about a higher priced and "better" pair of earphones from Sennheiser, but couldn't find them anywhere. That was until I went to Best Buy. I saw the Sennheiser CX300 II $70.00 at Best Buy. At the time, I had a really well paying job, so I decided to sink my $70 + tax on these black beauties. To my eyes, they looked so small and luxury. My family wasn't happy with my plunking down that much money for these tiny earphones, but side by side with the CX150, they clearly sounded better. Bigger everything. I used them faithfully for 2 1/2 years, and they were by my side for my moves, job changes, and life events. Then they accidentally broke, and I was crushed. I bought some Klipsch S4's, Ludacris Soul, and a parade of other similarly priced earphones, and just wasn't getting what I got out of my extremely broken in CX300 II. That's when i went on head-fi and decided to see what there might be out there. This is when my $$$$$$ started flowing from my wallet like water. I bought the UE500 DD, and those were getting close to the Sennheiser CX300 II. Then the Sennheiser IE80. Those really had my attention in a strong way, but to me, i was leaning away from booming bass, and losing my basshead label, and so I saved up even more money and got the UE TF10. These things seemed to tick every box, except fit. What was the most refined and fun revealing sound in my life was impeded by that horrendous fit. So in the ensuing years, I would go through about 50 different iem's and cans, from Sony 3 and 4 BA's to 3 BA + hybrids, to dual dynamics to chi-fi bargains to Zero Audio's early offerings and finally to the JVC woodies, which I still have, but I've come back to the Sennheiser IE800 and IE40 Pro (my recent Sennquisition). They've taken their place ATM as the top rung in my collection. I guess i've never been able to shake the Sennheiser sound since my intro to the CX150 and CX300 II? Though the Moondrop Crescents have gotten much play, especially at the gym and my daily walks and work. The UE700 currently satisfying my BA urges, along with my ZA doppios. My cans are also Sennheisers. So my journey has taken me from Sony Walkman stock headphones to the very very VERY good IE40 Pro. Again, let's not discount the Crescent, which are truly a value discovery for the Discovery page. Just so rich and full sounding for a $30.00 pair of earphones. Plus details. They can deliver details at a budget. CHEERS!
 
Jul 13, 2019 at 9:02 AM Post #42,783 of 100,329
Game on :wink:

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Jul 13, 2019 at 10:29 PM Post #42,784 of 100,329
chickenmoon said:
I got my parcel and everything did not go so well, I received TFZ No3 Transparent instead of TFZ No3 Ti (from TFZ official store on Aliexpress). I've opened a dispute asking for keeping it and being refunded the price difference (we'll see how this goes, first time I am filling a dispute on Ali) and I've ordered a Ti from Penon this time. Fecking annoying but on the plus side, I'll be able to compare both versions.
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I just received my No.3 transparent on Friday, but have not yet had the time to even unbox them, much less listen to them. Hopefully, after tomorrow, when I'm off work for 3 days, I can get them going. I hope you can do a comparison between the No.3 and the Ti version. I'd be curious to see if the much more expensive Ti is worth the substantial extra amount of money, over the transparent No.3. I will also compare the No.3 with my KPE and ZS10 Pro and post my impressions of all three.
 
Jul 13, 2019 at 10:43 PM Post #42,785 of 100,329
:beerchug::ksc75smile:
chickenmoon said:
Audio123 says there is quite significant difference and HBB hardly any. I'll see but as I am a sucker for metal shells, especially Titanium ones it's going to be good either way.
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Yup, I also like metal shells, but I'm not willing to spend so much more extra just to achieve a 5 or 10% improvement in SQ. Aesthetics isn't as important to me, as SQ. Sure, the iems need to fit me well, but beyond that; I'd gladly trade a fancy dress for a t-shirt and jeans anyday. After all, it's the total package underneath that counts the most.
 
Jul 14, 2019 at 6:22 AM Post #42,786 of 100,329
courierdriver said:
I just received my No.3 transparent on Friday, but have not yet had the time to even unbox them, much less listen to them. Hopefully, after tomorrow, when I'm off work for 3 days, I can get them going. I hope you can do a comparison between the No.3 and the Ti version. I'd be curious to see if the much more expensive Ti is worth the substantial extra amount of money, over the transparent No.3. I will also compare the No.3 with my KPE and ZS10 Pro and post my impressions of all three.
Click to expand...

courierdriver said:
:beerchug::ksc75smile:
Yup, I also like metal shells, but I'm not willing to spend so much more extra just to achieve a 5 or 10% improvement in SQ. Aesthetics isn't as important to me, as SQ. Sure, the iems need to fit me well, but beyond that; I'd gladly trade a fancy dress for a t-shirt and jeans anyday. After all, it's the total package underneath that counts the most.
Click to expand...

I got my partial refund from TFZ store alright but No3 Ti from Penon hasn't arrived yet. I gave No3 Transparent a spin the other day and found them initially horribly crude and unrefined sounding with an hard to take to take in your face forwardness.

Since they are closest on graph to EN700 Pro, I gave those a listen to see what's what and found them almost similarly crude and forward and normally the EN700 Pro is one of my favorite in terms of sound signature.

What happened is that I spent lots of time with the much warmer/thicker Flares first and then the CKR100 and they made these harmanish iems feel very crude and almost unbearably forward indeed and I needed some time re-adapt to that kind of signature.

As expected from graphs, I find the No3 to be very close to the EN700 Pro but with some extra brightness/forwardness due to this 8khz peak the Simgot doesn't have. The No3 are also more technical with tighter/better defined bass and overall better resolution I guess but it's not a massive difference to my ears.

I haven't compared the No3 with the KP or O2 but I am pretty sure, having compared those with the EN700 Pro in the past, that it doesn't beat either of those in technicality.
 
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Jul 14, 2019 at 4:20 PM Post #42,789 of 100,329
Zerohour88 said:
ah, the Big Dipper, right? the one that got away:L3000:

mostly because I found an Andro at a very great price:ksc75smile:
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Yeah, Big Dipper, A6 and HQ12 :)
 
Jul 14, 2019 at 6:14 PM Post #42,790 of 100,329
Jul 15, 2019 at 11:18 AM Post #42,791 of 100,329
So I got a little reveal I will do tonight. Jim contacted me to try out a prototype in their next line up. Was in May of this year. It has been an interesting journey from where it was to what this item sounds like now. But I have to say this earphone is going to surprise a lot of people.

Driver count is 7 per side. Dual layered carbon nanotube for bass duties and 4 BAs doing mids to treble + piezoelectric for the upper highs.

I have been listening to these for a good 2 months. You guys are in for a treat.
 
Jul 15, 2019 at 11:50 AM Post #42,792 of 100,329
Dsnuts said:
So I got a little reveal I will do tonight. Jim contacted me to try out a prototype in their next line up. Was in May of this year. It has been an interesting journey from where it was to what this item sounds like now. But I have to say this earphone is going to surprise a lot of people.

Driver count is 7 per side. Dual layered carbon nanotube for bass duties and 4 BAs doing mids to treble + piezoelectric for the upper highs.

I have been listening to these for a good 2 months. You guys are in for a treat.
Click to expand...
This post is meaningless without a model name, photo and purchasing info:stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:
 
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