[x RELIC x]

Labsters, I sh!t you NOT!  Just charged it up (you can see the power led is 'on' in the picture), and driving EL-8C with it now!!!  Warm smooth sound with a decent bass punch!!!   This is INSANE!!!

Haha! Just got mine in. For 14 bucks it isn't terrible with efficient full size cans but with IEMs it is just horrendous.

I tried the JH Angie with it and there was some serious jack issues. I got a very fast clickclickclickclickclick and a HUGE POP!! when I inserted and removed the IEM. Damn. The player simply doesn't work with BA IEMs I think.

The included ear buds are funny, but I expected that. I think the cable is 1 1/2 feet long. They sound as cheap as they look.




It's better with full sized cans that are easy to drive. The audio isn't anything to write home about but good enough for a throw away device. There's hiss between tracks, there a compressed dynamic range, there's clipping at high volumes. It reminds me of............. An old cassette player!





I think your units build quality is better than mine looking at your pics. My USB port is barely in the casing and the headphone jack does not line up with the hole. What ever manufacturer made yours certainly didn't make mine by comparing pics. I like the terrible EQ settings as it brings me back to my past.

Anyway, fun little device that I'll never worry about trashing!

 

[thatBeatsguy]

1. What are you using for a source?

2. What type of music files are you using?

3. You should do an A-B comparison between the S3 and S0. I think you'll see its much bassier (both sub and midbass) and has a perception of more treble roll off because of it.

4. Also, try some Sony silicone tips and see if you get some better results.

If anything, I would say that the S3 will give some the impression of being underwhelming because it isn't a V signature. While the S3 midrange is warm, I hear better mid bass resolution with less forwardness and bloat on the S3 as compared to S0.

I'm not saying you're wrong in what you're hearing in any sense. Just trying to rule out variables.

Cheers

1. My source is still the same old iPod Touch for portable and a Fulla at home. Nothing as fancy as whatever you guys have.

2. My music files have always been 320kbps or higher (for the most part).

3. I did an A/B/X test between the S3, S0, and S1, and I found the S3 to still be excessively warm and bloated compared to both of the IEMs. I mean, personally the S0 isn't my cup of tea sound-wise, but the S3 has made me like it a lot.

4. I fiddled with the silicone eartips long before I posted here, and I eventually settled on some small Sony hybrid eartips since they were the ones that didn't make me go insane over the S3's driver flex issue. Sound-wise I detected no difference from the stock eartips.

I guess that, now that I think about it, the reason why I hate the S3 so much is the obvious lack of treble energy. Brainwavz seems to have taken this quality from the S0, but the S0 had much less bass impact IMO, and that was what made the S0 more...tolerable than the S3. To these ears, I found the S3 doesn't have enough treble to outweigh the bass, so to speak, and this leaves the low-end to fill in the rest of the soundstage, resulting in a very irritating sound signature IMO. Simply put, I'm hearing the S3's sound sig as a hill sloping downward, with the peak somewhere around the upper bass.

 

[RedJohn456]

Picked up a rebrand of the Takstar Pro 80 (Hyper cloud X or something like that) as it was on sale at a local store today. I previously had a gemini HSR-1000 but ended up returning it due to treble issues. I don't seem to be having the same trouble anymore since I am a treble head these days
 
Really happy with the performance for what I paid, much cheaper than what I even paid for the Gemini HSR 1000. Its a shame the Takstar Pro 80 is being discontinued! Hopefully they reiterate on this, with bigger headband and ear cups, with a tiny bit less treble it would be damn perfect.

 

[Brooko]

Vince - I didn't go for the S3 because I'm too busy with other things.  Can you measure the S3 with your Veritas and post the graph?  I can measure any of the other Brainwavz IEMs.  Can then tell by measurements comparatively where the S3 sits.

 

[Mr Trev]

  Picked up a rebrand of the Takstar Pro 80 (Hyper cloud X or something like that) as it was on sale at a local store today. I previously had a gemini HSR-1000 but ended up returning it due to treble issues. I don't seem to be having the same trouble anymore since I am a treble head these days
 
Really happy with the performance for what I paid, much cheaper than what I even paid for the Gemini HSR 1000. Its a shame the Takstar Pro 80 is being discontinued! Hopefully they reiterate on this, with bigger headband and ear cups, with a tiny bit less treble it would be damn perfect.

I think I looked at those (hyper cloud) online, but ended up passing cause they seemed to be marketed towards gaming, and I wasn't too sure if the tuning had been tweaked for that.
It is too bad the Pro-80 are being axed. Maybe it means that something better is on the horizon? A Pro 90 perhaps. Are the 2050 still available?

 

[Hisoundfi]

Vince - I didn't go for the S3 because I'm too busy with other things.  Can you measure the S3 with your Veritas and post the graph?  I can measure any of the other Brainwavz IEMs.  Can then tell by measurements comparatively where the S3 sits.

I'll compare it in a bit. I was actually A-Bing them right now

 

[nmatheis]

A/B'ing with what Vince?

 

[Hisoundfi]

Okay, this is a first for me. I was A-Bing the Brainwavz S0, and got a good reading, channels matching, and a graph that matches what I'm hearing:
 
I 
 
But then the strangest thing happened when I was measuring the S3. I measured the left channel, and did get a much leaner sound than the S3 (as I was expecting) but when I measured the right channel I got a line very similar to the S0. I thought it was a mistake so I remeasured the S3 six times on both channels and got the same results. The graph would indicate that there is a major channel imbalance. But God as my witness, I swear I don't hear any imbalance when I pop them in my ears. I swapped channels to see if they sounded any different. Nope! I even ran test loops and they match up, and they did. I haven't had a phenomena like this since I got the Veritas. Here's the graph:
 

 
I seriously don't get it. I mean, it explains why I might be hearing something different than TBG, but I swear I don't hear any kind of channel imbalance like that when I listen to them. Is it maybe because of the jack of the S3 is made for Iphone  and not working with my Startech interface maybe? I tried using a male to female cable in between and got the same results.
 
Guys, any ideas why this would happen?

 

[nmatheis]

Ok. S3 M narrow bore single flange tip used on all IEM. Dayton IMM-6 calibrated mic + Audiotools app with calibration file loaded. Used FFT tool with mono pink noise and set Audiotools to normalize all FR curves, so they'd intersect at 1kHz. This is all raw, uncompensated data.

S3 is the purple FR curve


Unless BW has some QA/QC issues, I just don't see how anyone could call S3 overly warm and bassy. It's nowhere near the other S-series IEM.

 

[nmatheis]

Damn, Vince. You beat me to it. Let me measure both S3 channels and see what I get.

 

[Hisoundfi]

Damn, Vince. You beat me to it. Let me measure both S3 channels and see what I get.

Haha, Ya, we hang out a lot. Our posts are starting to match up a lot, lmao 
 
 
We were both on track to the same thing at the same time. Cheers buddy
 
Curious to see your S3 L/R measurements

 

[nmatheis]

Measured S3 L+ R channels a couple times each, reseating them in my rig between measurements and got consistent results. Added S0 in for comparison.



S3's left channel consistently measured bassier than the right channel. Both S3 channels are significantly less bassy vs. S0.

From the FR graphs I posted above, it's pretty clear that S0 and S3 have less treble presence than S1 and S5.

 

[nmatheis]

Kinda wondering if adding in the new mic might be f'ing things up...

 

[nmatheis]

Pinged Salsera with my measurements to let her know something might be amiss.

 

[Hisoundfi]

Throw my measurements in there too if you don't mind. Mine are pretty extreme.