The discovery thread!

[FreeWheelinAudioLuv2]

Did you order the version including all of those options and not receive it? Then open dispute.
I got the version with the USB-C option and it was all there.

Nah. I went back and realized I picked the option without the other two options. The other two are for an added $20. That cable sucks, so not worth it. Glad I didn't pull the trigger on those. Now the IEM itself sat on the burner for about 8 hours, and though the sound has improved, and the bass is actually quite interesting, I'm just not a fan, so the Sea-Elf is going in the wooden box along with that cable. I've got some excellent IEM's recently acquired so I'm not too bothered by this fail. I pulled out my Sennheiser IE100 last night and added the NF Audio NM2+ bass tips, and the sound is better than I've ever heard before from them. I finally achieved a very good sustainable seal and the tips and IEM have excellent synergy. This was all by accident, thanks to the Sea-Elf, due to some deeper tip rolling, and I thought "hmm..i've never paired the NM tips with the Senns before" and it was revelatory. I'm looking forward to the release of the IE200. I'll be purchasing them upon release.

 

[FreeWheelinAudioLuv2]

Hakugei Sea-elf arrived!

OTTB impression;
-Shell faceplate is extremely cheap texture paste…it reminds me of counterfeit streetside cigarette lighters with nude blondie models on it. Hakugei has a lot to do with that faceplate quality for sure,

—Stock ear tips are very basic, I probably will do a ear tip roll sooner or later. At least it comes with another ear tip storage box. Stock ear tip boost Bass too much, and cuts out treble too much, not a good match. Currently pairing with Latex H570.

-Cable is pretty nice feeling, soft compared to the more premium ones that comes with See Audio Bravery. But I can see a cost down took place for this cable.

The L/R indicator has to face inward to have proper polarity, if you plugged L/R indicators facing outward (as you can see both face plate & L/R indicator on the cable, that’s wrong connection. My first guess was that and the moment I hear the sound, I noticed the polarity was reversed. L/R had to face inward for Sea-elf)


—Pretty bass heavy! Driver transient speed is fast enough that I can tell it is LCP.

— 2pin socket and IEM seemed detached, which actually worries me…

—qdc tuning Sea-elf it is. Very exactly what I was looking for. Less engaging upper-mid qdc tuning with dual-LCP. I can tell qdc tuning is not for everyone , as this is the very anti-thesis of popular harman (upper-mid focused). People looking for vivid vocals may feel this tuning may lacking focus on vocals and instruments.

—however I don’t see the upper registers performance at this moment yet. Will try to play with Sea elf and see how it turns out.

—OOTB impression is quite positive for me, as a initial voice from sloppy LCP, it does enough first impression. I’m going to expect more defined bass imaging, tighter control as more hours are waged on Sea-elf.

The only concern is the lack of air and resolution, I will see if this a permanent thing or IEM-native. Not sure why but there are no 10khz+ Lack of air is what I’m going to expect from TRN X7, I’d expect more air from the FR of Sea Elf. Will report back for this later.

This didn’t happened to 6mm LCP + 10mm LCP Truthear Zero, so I’m not sure why, Sea elf isn’t singing on upper registers

Thanks for that tip! I had the L side lined up with the faceplate, and the R side opposite. That definitely warped the sound, so when I lined them up the way you said, they sound more normal. Even after 8+ hours of burn in, the bass is too much. This is definitely a basshead IEM, with that LCP driver hitting deep, punchy, and, present. The mids are too recessed though and there is a tonality issue. Not a fan. Will keep playing around with them with the Sony's so I can feel I got my $80 worth, but these are ultimately going to the wooden box graveyard with the other 25-30 IEM's that reside there.

 

[AmericanSpirit]

Thanks for that tip! I had the L side lined up with the faceplate, and the R side opposite. That definitely warped the sound, so when I lined them up the way you said, they sound more normal. Even after 8+ hours of burn in, the bass is too much. This is definitely a basshead IEM, with that LCP driver hitting deep, punchy, and, present. The mids are too recessed though and there is a tonality issue. Not a fan. Will keep playing around with them with the Sony's so I can feel I got my $80 worth, but these are ultimately going to the wooden box graveyard with the other 25-30 IEM's that reside there.

Great!

I did tip roll and believe many would find Latex H570 would fit with their needs to have a better (less emphasized bass) and opened up upper mid and up


https://a.aliexpress.com/_mrTt6tg

Their L size is pretty much ML, so L size is recommend for many IEMs

 

[Jmop]

Is the Senn IE200 one to look out for? I only saw one graph but bass seems a bit cleaner.

 

[PhonoPhi]

You never know before stuff like this arrives, 7N is also often marketing talk. Isn't it almost impossible to measure above 5N since hardware to measure is not good enough?

Exactly the point!
5N and 7N can be distinguished only by precise chemical analysis, and then the nature of impurities will matter more than their percentage, e.g. benign gold and silver vs. detrimental oxygen, sulphur, etc.

True, 7N is better than 4N in all aspects, OFC is very good; Litz is great for high frequencies (well above the audible range though). Do these better conductors make an audible difference beyond a simple threshold in resistance for IEM cables? No tangible proofs so far!

Then there are alloys with much worse conductivities than of pure metals - 10% silver on copper would be one of the most ridiculous (I do hope that it may be just a poor translation for silver-cladded copper - a good combination).

Furthermore, having 7N copper enclosed into common PVC jackets giving all the impurities starting with chloride - really defies the point of ultrapure copper junked in degrading impurities.

Electrical measurements can be very precise and are much more sensitive than transducer measurements with the couplers. Yet, no one so far showed any difference for different cables of the same resistance, such as copper and silver claimed typically by the most rampant "reviewers" out there...

From simple stock cables like old KZ, good cables can make a difference.
In all my limited experience, the difference correlated only with the cable resistance, the resistance of 0.3 to 0 4 Ohm of a single conductor was a limit for me not to hear the difference using sensitive multi-BAs with the cited impedance below 16 Ohm.

So to your question in another thread: to me, the best cables are those that are comfortable and do not interfere with the fit and insertion and are not microphonic. Then the aesthetics - your preferred colours and tactile feeling.

I approached several manufacturers asking the same question about ~$100 cable - what difference would it make? The polite fair answer invariably was - "some people can hear the difference". Sorry, not sufficient for me to spend extra $ beyond my favourite colours of the comfortable cables!

At the same time, if to let the power of imagination rule - anything can make a difference, just define your budget

 

[FreeWheelinAudioLuv2]

Is the Senn IE200 one to look out for? I only saw one graph but bass seems a bit cleaner.

If it provides the overall tone and imaging of the IE300 with less bass bloom and a more refined treble than the Ie100, then yes! It'll be a winner in the $100-$200 bracket.

 

[FreeWheelinAudioLuv2]

Is the Senn IE200 one to look out for? I only saw one graph but bass seems a bit cleaner.

I reviewed the IE300 for Senns, and It had a remarkably refined and lush sound with uncanny imaging, but the bass undid it. You can now find it for under $200 now for a reason. The mid bass was too much, and the sub bass didn't reach, so it ended up being bloomy and it was present in songs where you didn't need bass presence, and so they dropped the ball. They know they did, because they came back with the IE100 and IE600, and neither had intrusive bass. They turned out to be more balanced, but in the case of the 100, the treble wasn't nearly as refined as the IE300, and the resolution was a step or two behind. So please Sennheiser, give me that type of resolution and treble with toned down bass and it might be a be all end all for DD?

 

[Jmop]

I reviewed the IE300 for Senns, and It had a remarkably refined and lush sound with uncanny imaging, but the bass undid it. You can now find it for under $200 now for a reason. The mid bass was too much, and the sub bass didn't reach, so it ended up being bloomy and it was present in songs where you didn't need bass presence, and so they dropped the ball. They know they did, because they came back with the IE100 and IE600, and neither had intrusive bass. They turned out to be more balanced, but in the case of the 100, the treble wasn't nearly as refined as the IE300, and the resolution was a step or two behind. So please Sennheiser, give me that type of resolution and treble with toned down bass and it might be a be all end all for DD?

I haven’t heard any but was always put off by the rising bass. Treble seemed even so the relatively higher level is acceptable, and upper mids can be brought out enough depending on your gear.

 

[Orfik]

>


thanks to @Orfik

so, on aliexpress they're on offer as well right now

soundnews.net review called it "Genre Masters" - so apparently those rare pokemons exist in the "endgame" mid-fi range that are capable to play everything well and transparently

https://soundnews.net/headphones/iems/fiio-fh7-genre-masters/

Are there any other IEMs in the below mid-fi or mid-fi range that are capable of playing all genres equally well ?

I must have read now close to all reviews that exist out there on the FH7 and they differ quite a lot - interesting how impressions and assessment / estimation diverge

When going with the Harman Target tuning and how close to it the tuning is, it appears, that the Harman target curve isn't equally well suited for all genres

https://github.com/jaakkopasanen/AutoEq/blob/master/results/RANKING.md

e.g. FH7 is rated at 58% and STD / deviation 3.57 - so one interpretation would be that Harman isn't suited for all genres, each genre might need a different tuning

and a different kind of tuning might be capable of play well with all (jack of all trades - master of none), but not equally well (I recall having read that before in reviews)

FH7 is absolutely a Jack of all trades, it has no weakness across the frequency spectrum other than slight brightness to some people which is easily controlled by tip selection.

 

[WAON303]

Wonder how many compromises Senny made in order to sell the IE200 for only $149?

 

[r31ya]

I reviewed the IE300 for Senns, and It had a remarkably refined and lush sound with uncanny imaging, but the bass undid it. You can now find it for under $200 now for a reason. The mid bass was too much, and the sub bass didn't reach, so it ended up being bloomy and it was present in songs where you didn't need bass presence, and so they dropped the ball. They know they did, because they came back with the IE100 and IE600, and neither had intrusive bass. They turned out to be more balanced, but in the case of the 100, the treble wasn't nearly as refined as the IE300, and the resolution was a step or two behind. So please Sennheiser, give me that type of resolution and treble with toned down bass and it might be a be all end all for DD?

Whats with big audio corp and their need of bass in their mass market products?
i remember trying out Sony XtraBass, i forgot which exact series, but it was suprising to me that the imaging is pretty good with little details that is hard to find with pther sub$100 headphones is easily listenable in that Sony... underneath that everpresent cloud of bass.

i understand bass sells and many of my friend equate bassquantity=audioquality but yeah...

 

[baskingshark]

I reviewed the IE300 for Senns, and It had a remarkably refined and lush sound with uncanny imaging, but the bass undid it. You can now find it for under $200 now for a reason. The mid bass was too much, and the sub bass didn't reach, so it ended up being bloomy and it was present in songs where you didn't need bass presence, and so they dropped the ball. They know they did, because they came back with the IE100 and IE600, and neither had intrusive bass. They turned out to be more balanced, but in the case of the 100, the treble wasn't nearly as refined as the IE300, and the resolution was a step or two behind. So please Sennheiser, give me that type of resolution and treble with toned down bass and it might be a be all end all for DD?

Wonder how many compromises Senny made in order to sell the IE200 for only $149?

Well, given that Sennheiser sold away their audio consumer wing to Sonova (https://www.theverge.com/2021/5/7/2...heiser-consumer-business-headphones-soundbars), I wonder whether this will impact their strategy and plans, when it comes to releasing audio gear for consumers.

I haven't tried any of their recent IEMs, but I was disappointed with Sennheiser's previous IEMs, found they were quite veiled and boomy in the mid-bass as @FreeWheelinAudioLuv2 says, and CHIFI IEMs of equivalent or lower priced killed them in technicalities and resolution. Their headphones on the other hand, some are timeless eg HD650, but even so, some of these are decades old since release. I do feel Sennheiser headphones are generally better than their IEMs, YMMV.

 

[AmericanSpirit]

Hakugei Sea-elf arrived!

OTTB impression;
-Shell faceplate is extremely cheap texture paste…it reminds me of counterfeit streetside cigarette lighters with nude blondie models on it. Hakugei has a lot to do with that faceplate quality for sure,

—Stock ear tips are very basic, I probably will do a ear tip roll sooner or later. At least it comes with another ear tip storage box. Stock ear tip boost Bass too much, and cuts out treble too much, not a good match. Currently pairing with Latex H570.

-Cable is pretty nice feeling, soft compared to the more premium ones that comes with See Audio Bravery. But I can see a cost down took place for this cable.

The L/R indicator has to face inward to have proper polarity, if you plugged L/R indicators facing outward (as you can see both face plate & L/R indicator on the cable, that’s wrong connection. My first guess was that and the moment I hear the sound, I noticed the polarity was reversed. L/R had to face inward for Sea-elf)


—Pretty bass heavy! Driver transient speed is fast enough that I can tell it is LCP.

— 2pin socket and IEM seemed detached, which actually worries me…

—qdc tuning Sea-elf it is. Very exactly what I was looking for. Less engaging upper-mid qdc tuning with dual-LCP. I can tell qdc tuning is not for everyone , as this is the very anti-thesis of popular harman (upper-mid focused). People looking for vivid vocals may feel this tuning may lacking focus on vocals and instruments.

—however I don’t see the upper registers performance at this moment yet. Will try to play with Sea elf and see how it turns out.

—OOTB impression is quite positive for me, as a initial voice from sloppy LCP, it does enough first impression. I’m going to expect more defined bass imaging, tighter control as more hours are waged on Sea-elf.

The only concern is the lack of air and resolution, I will see if this a permanent thing or IEM-native. Not sure why but there are no 10khz+ Lack of air is what I’m going to expect from TRN X7, I’d expect more air from the FR of Sea Elf. Will report back for this later.

This didn’t happened to 6mm LCP + 10mm LCP Truthear Zero, so I’m not sure why, Sea elf isn’t singing on upper registers


[30min of initial run]
—treble extension starts to kick in H570 ear tip tones down somewhat excessive mid-bass yet retain the bass rumble. Still Sea-elf is not the level of Truthear ZERO yet, but bass and mid is performing better. I probably would let Sea-elf get to get her legs stretched for a while for the new home then
Hakugei surely need to deal with build quality with sea-elf


Lenovo LP5 $11 TWS;
https://a.aliexpress.com/_mPVdb82

Wow, better than I expected from my experience with their $12 bluetooth headphone. Mid-bass thru mid-centric softer sounding but it has OK level for back up kid for TV-use. I may not for music, but it works fine for conference call. I got is as a back up kit for TV‘s wireless solution. Ok resolution for $10 IEM, but the somewhat muddy mid-bass makes it not a good kid for music. Amazingly it stops playing when you pull off from your ear, wow very functional! (I have no idea why battery status indicator LED is always on for the case)

Lenovo $10 TWS XT88
https://a.aliexpress.com/_mOxhrAq

Better tonal balance than LP5, still a bit nasal, random mid-bass boosted mainstream V-shape. Better set than LP5, and works fine as a back up set for TV’s wireless solution. No fatal flaws except rather bloated bass but that is hard to complain for almost sub$10 TWS. I will be sad if I have been issued this as a gear to enjoy music, but fine with watching TV and conference calls.

Follow up on Sea-Elf.

Faceplate
▶︎Does it look like you copy and pasted random 3DCG texture? Yes it is. Not a good quality faceplate.

▶︎shell built is somewhat low grade, it looks like whoever made Sea-Elf isn’t experienced in making IEMs, good news and bad news for this.

Good news; Sea-Elf isn’t your ordinary IEM coming out of same ODM with different faceplates and same drivers, it is out of nowhere type brand new IEM.

Bad news: This brand new IEM still has lots of challenges to overcom, especially the build quality, this reminds me of GeekWold GK10. We probably can expect some quality issues

▶︎After 4 hours of runing, the driver starts to shine. Bass is very impactful and enjoyable with H570 ear tips. Mid is a little recessed just like Bravery’s tuning. Enjoyable U-shape with qdc in mind for upper mid presentation

▶︎10khz finally starts to show some presence yet not reaching the level of Truthear ZERO’s performance. Will report back.

Driver’s distortion starts to settle. Sound Image’s focus starts to get better.

It seems this dual driver isn’t too good at handling sub 30hz though.

Tonality isn’t like what Bravery does “Fragile / Transparent and resolving” Sea-elf is more of “Warm and fun-tuned” with main weight on bass.

The main part of Sea-Elf is the fun sounding bass, it has two vent holes that let two of its dual LCP driver to breathe. Sound guide tube is very wide.

They need to do something with faceplate, but the shell’s main part looks very nicely 3D printed. It’s just the socket of 2pin connectors are somewhat loose that worries me a bit in a long run.


What I started to find from Sea-elf is that it has layering capabilities, when played a full orchestra, it rendered a good layers of symphony, of course not a BA/EST like detailed textures, but LCP driver’s inoffensive soft touched layers are some unique features on Sea-elf.


Sea-Elf vs Truthear ZERO.

Both IEM are dual LCP drivers, but ZERO is 10mm woofer + 6mm tweeter set up, as opposed to dual 10mm?

Surely ZERO has more natural tonal balance, as basically the tuning is a copy from Moondrop’s Variations.
ZERO’s has forward imaging projection vs Sea-Elf’s side projection. ZERO has higher imaging focus, Sea Elf has more layers than ZERO.

I guess I will fully burn-in Sea Elf to see how it would compete with Truthear ZERO, at this moment Sea-Elf is still 1.5 class below Truthear ZERO.


midtange overtone test; hmm not very technical at this moment(6th hour). Harmonic distortion could be easily detected.


If Sea-Elf ever catches up with Truthear ZERO’s technicalities in the future, I guess this will be a one of alternative option to audiences not liking “vocal-forward” styled tuning mainly harman variants. Like @Leonarfd pointed, I also would love to drop mid-bass @200hz ish of Sea elf few decibels down. Bravery has the same level of floor structure but that’s a BA’s woofer, the sound pressure impact of BA woofer vs dual 10mm LCP is night and day.

 

[Carpet]

JOYODIO Shine - full review from Akros​

 

[Leonarfd]

Impressive analysis so fast, tbh I felt almost bad when reviewing it so much wrong. Specially the faceplate. And also agree very much on the fun bass being its main thing. One of the sets that had tightened the most up with burn in.

You have good ears sir I need a very long time to define what I hear.

Follow up on Sea-Elf.

Faceplate
▶︎Does it look like you copy and pasted random 3DCG texture? Yes it is. Not a good quality faceplate.


▶︎shell built is somewhat low grade, it looks like whoever made Sea-Elf isn’t experienced in making IEMs, good news and bad news for this.

Good news; Sea-Elf isn’t your ordinary IEM coming out of same ODM with different faceplates and same drivers, it is out of nowhere type brand new IEM.

Bad news: This brand new IEM still has lots of challenges to overcom, especially the build quality, this reminds me of GeekWold GK10. We probably can expect some quality issues

▶︎After 4 hours of runing, the driver starts to shine. Bass is very impactful and enjoyable with H570 ear tips. Mid is a little recessed just like Bravery’s tuning. Enjoyable U-shape with qdc in mind for upper mid presentation

▶︎10khz finally starts to show some presence yet not reaching the level of Truthear ZERO’s performance. Will report back.

Driver’s distortion starts to settle. Sound Image’s focus starts to get better.

It seems this dual driver isn’t too good at handling sub 30hz though.

Tonality isn’t like what Bravery does “Fragile / Transparent and resolving” Sea-elf is more of “Warm and fun-tuned” with main weight on bass.

The main part of Sea-Elf is the fun sounding bass, it has two vent holes that let two of its dual LCP driver to breathe. Sound guide tube is very wide.


They need to do something with faceplate, but the shell’s main part looks very nicely 3D printed. It’s just the socket of 2pin connectors are somewhat loose that worries me a bit in a long run.


What I started to find from Sea-elf is that it has layering capabilities, when played a full orchestra, it rendered a good layers of symphony, of course not a BA/EST like detailed textures, but LCP driver’s inoffensive soft touched layers are some unique features on Sea-elf.


Sea-Elf vs Truthear ZERO.

Both IEM are dual LCP drivers, but ZERO is 10mm woofer + 6mm tweeter set up, as opposed to dual 10mm?

Surely ZERO has more natural tonal balance, as basically the tuning is a copy from Moondrop’s Variations.
ZERO’s has forward imaging projection vs Sea-Elf’s side projection. ZERO has higher imaging focus, Sea Elf has more layers than ZERO.

I guess I will fully burn-in Sea Elf to see how it would compete with Truthear ZERO, at this moment Sea-Elf is still 1.5 class below Truthear ZERO.


midtange overtone test; hmm not very technical at this moment(6th hour). Harmonic distortion could be easily detected.


If Sea-Elf ever catches up with Truthear ZERO’s technicalities in the future, I guess this will be a one of alternative option to audiences not liking “vocal-forward” styled tuning mainly harman variants. Like @Leonarfd pointed, I also would love to drop mid-bass @200hz ish of Sea elf few decibels down. Bravery has the same level of floor structure but that’s a BA’s woofer, the sound pressure impact of BA woofer vs dual 10mm LCP is night and day.