It's midnight and I have just arrived home-- it was a long and satisfying day. Grateful to
@SBranson for the portable audio opportunity of a lifetime. I don't have the time or energy to write a lengthy post but I'll jot down a few salient points before I crash.
--> Yes the Oriolus Traillii is the single most satisfying listening experience I have ever had with an IEM.
I won't go so far as to say "it's not even close" or anything like that because there are plenty of great IEMs out there and I don't love my own IEMs any less now that I've heard the Traillii. That said the Traillii is a decided step up from pretty much everything else I've heard in a few key ways.
IMHO Traillii's magic is largely derived from two factors:
1) Tuning magic. Quite honestly nobody in my experience can tune an IEM like "The Old Man"-- not Campfire, not Empire, not 64, not UM, not Sony, not even Vision Ears (though imho they have come the closest). When the age of Traillii began in earnest earlier this year I had my doubts and lacked a frame of reference to help understand what was going on. It wasn't until I heard the tunefully sweet and perfect tuning of the Isabellae that I gained some sense of what the appeal might be-- and I think the tuning is a large part of it.
2) Tuning magic of (1) flawlessly applied to state of the art drivers. When I heard the Tansio Spark I recognized in its sound salient things I'd heard described in Traillii, but the Spark most certainly have the magic or potency of the Bird, nor its vivid staging or seperation. The Old Man's effortless, natural, peerlessly balanced tuning combined with the summit fi technicalities possible opens up a literal world of auditory perception. Apart from the separation the real technical marvel of the Traillii for me is the scale, vividness and depth of staging. As I alluded to in another post it literally felt I switched on a Holodeck-- the realism and "3dness" was off the charts cood and combined with the tuning utterly captures your heart. Oriolus markets the Traillii as an evolutionary synergy of a musical and balanced approach and I think they nailed it.
--> No I will not be selling off all my gear to fund a Trailliii-- unfortunately it is quite out of reach for me financially and likely will be for some time.
--> No it does not make me love my current IEMs any less. After the meet today I didn't listen to any music for a couple hours, partly to keep my mind clear to sort out my thoughts, and partly to cleanse my palette. That said once I popped my CFA Honeydew back in early in the evening it wasn't long before I was back in the zone and loving it's simple and engaging little groove.
--> The only "up in the air" thing for me would be the lack of DD timbre...I didn't notice it at all today but time would have to be the judge there.
Current Top 10
1) Oriolus Traillii
2) Oriolus Isabellae
3) Visionn Ears Elysium
4) Campfire Dorado 2020
5) Sony IER Z1R
6) Campfire Andromeda 2020
7) Campfire Solaris
8) Vision Ears VE8
9) UM MEST
10) Empire Legend X