[timeslip]

I was curious if people could post their custom Fei wan or point me to links with pics.

 

[osocan]

Acoustune HS2000MX Sho (mk any), Madoo 821, custom arts (all of them), VE Eve20

+1 to Acoustune Sho, especially with the ACT07. Japan has it in a bundled deal which cost less than ¥200k. Not sure about other markets.

 

[osocan]

Landed… 1TB of music loading - then the decision is what IEM to try first!

Camelot

 

[nihalsharma]

Dear beautiful people of Watercoolers, I received the Kinera Verdandi this afternoon. Sharing my initial impressions after a couple of hours of listening.

These iems are outstanding from the get-go. I think Kinera as a brand is on a good path to progress. They take customer experience very seriously, which is quite evident from the look and feel of their products. The unboxing is top-notch, as it usually is with Kinera. Those shells are so beautiful, I nearly spent 5 minutes checking out the art on them. It's such a great work of art. One of the most beautiful iems I have seen, for sure. It has a big shell, but it's lightweight.

Eartips and source:

The nozzle is on the bigger side. Azla SednaFit Light comes to my rescue every single time. Though there is a pack of Azla Crystal tips with the iems, I find the Azla Light better fitting.

The cable is very nicely built, complementing the colour of these iems. It sounds nice, too. I think with this quality, there is no need for cable rolling with these iems.
It takes a lot of power, my god. I am at 45-48 sound level through balanced 4.4mm on LPGT. I don't remember using any iems at this volume level.

Early sound impressions:

It's just a couple of hours of listening to the iems, and all I can say is that it's highly musical and addictive. The vocals are rich, lush, and very sweet. There is a feeling of open sound with a huge stage, to the point that sometimes it feels gimmicky (in a positive way, though). There is excellent layering, and the separation of instruments is quite commendable.

The bass is full, fast, and impactful. The BCD is surely adding a lot to the bass. The subbass presence is quite pronounced. The treble has an ample amount of energy and is not sharp or harsh at all. It's safe throughout. The sound is no less than what TOTLs offer. I think Verdandi, at it's price point, will surely receive a lot of praise.

I have spent just a little time, so I cannot share quite a lot of things. I will return in a few days to share more thoughts.

 

[Scubadevils]

Given what I have learned of your tastes over the course over the years, you will no doubt fall in love. Don't forget to play around with the filters too (and get the Joe Bloggs filters available on the dedicated RS8 thread), along with the MSEB settings and the plug-ins. Really a lot of fun to tailor the sound to your needs. Congrats!

Thank you - only a brief listen so far but looking forward to delving deeper after work!

 

[jwilliamhurst]

So I bought Perseus for my Bonnevilles at first with MMCX. But I didn't love that combo. The cable opened the soundstage perhaps too much. The Bonnevilles excel in that "wall of sound" phenomenon where blankets of music come at you in cohesive waves and I guess the Perseus broke this up a little and also took a bit away from the mid-bass power.

Then I thought about my Ronins. I have loved the stock cable since getting the set but always thought the IEMs felt a little closed-in, a little intimate, a little dark, a little midrange-centric with satisfying mid-bass but so-so subbass. So it seemed like Perseus might mitigate the very things I was missing in the Ronins.

Well, the earth titled slightly on its axis and I knew the match was a keeper so I had Christian reterminate the 2-pin using his excellent-sounding rhodium 2-pin connectors. The cable allowes the Ronin''s deeper and textured sub-bass to come out, which I guess the stock cable was holding back. Then it pretty radically allowed an expanded soundstage to emerge, opening up the entire flow of music, allowing more space between instruments and especially allowing the gorgeous upper mids to shine forth and, with that, the Ronin's incredible detail to peek out more from the midrange warmth. The Ronins are now more like all-rounders than mid-specialists.

I am big fan of copper/silver hybrid cables. I feel they offer the best of both materials. The Liquid Links Evua II is another example. But the Perseus cable has that Eletech magic whereby their multi-sized conductor configuration seems to allow them to home in on each element of the FR and their litz structure creates the black background equivalent of shielding. Plus the cable is super light-weight and dead silent microphonically.

So if that's what you're looking for, the Perseus is the best copper/silver hybrid cable I have heard.

Hope that helps.

Thank you for this! This was awesome!!

Really appreciate your time to write this.

 

[Ike1985]

It’s because they’re still relatively new. Dealers have only had demos for a couple weeks, and they’ve only gotten stock this week. Rn6 and Anni have been available for almost a year, so almost everyone here’s probably heard it.

By most accounts of those who’ve heard it, the VE X is one of the best (if not the best) warm-tilted IEMs on the market right now. I’m itching for the custom version, myself.

Yea, I'm gonna need your VEX vs Fei Wan take ok? Aroma + VE + Fir, the holy trinity.

Wish they would have taken the HALC driver they spent all that R&D on and used it for the midrange. The Elysium has the best vocals of any IEM I’ve ever heard, nothing comes close and I would say things remain that way. There was a lifelike quality to it I have never heard since and probably never will. I sense a new flagship in a year or 2 with all the best qualities of VE10 with the HALC midrange driver, no way they abandon that driver.

Also hats off to VW, they could have easily charged everyone $5k for VE10 but they didn't.

Also the Jewel Centurion pairing is fantastic, exactly what Jewel needed; a dash of dynamism. Love the way Centurion tightens up the sub bass making it more impactful, one of Jewels strongpoints-even better now. The slight high end lift is also very nice and for once an cable that elevates the highs and lows without sucking out the midrange.

 

[Scubadevils]

Never thought I’d do this but Shanling M6 Ultra up for grabs if anyone in Europe is interested… HERE

 

[blotmouse]

Thank you - only a brief listen so far but looking forward to delving deeper after work!

I hope you like it.
It took an astonishing 275+ hrs to settle and smooth out highs and extend the bass. It's tight and blurry for quite a long time. I wanted to sell mine initially.
Turii Ti + v2 Darwin Ultra filter / Class A is (chef's kiss)

 

[dleblanc343]

Hi guys, I am playing around with the new iBasso DC Elite dongle and this piece of gear offers tremendous value/ $ and what I'd consider sound quality beyond mid-fi DAP's at a price below mid-fi DAP pricing. This is straight up Hi-Fi $1000.00 + quality in a more accessible form factor.

As you may know, it's got most of the important sound quality related trickle-down tech from the DX320MAX, minus several components which naturally drive-down costing - pretty sweet! (Smaller chassis, less complex circuit board w/o analog gain selection, no display screen, no battery, no card reader, no wifi card, no bluetooth chip, less moving parts, etc etc). Yet, you maintain the same DAC chip (x1 instead of x4 chips on the 320MAX), fully analog potentiometer (which is less finicky than 320MAX's) & a lot of volume gain for a dongle.

Most things you should care about when it comes to sound quality, especially as an IEM user, is offered in a small and portable package which can be used with your mobile devices or computer. It's a huge quality of life upgrade over being tethered to my DAP in many instances. This won't have the same beefy amp stage as DX320MAX, which will be more beneficial to headphones or challenging to drive IEM's.

Sound quality - It's very much reminiscent of DX320MAX & DX320, which I'm happy to say is as advertised. Performance on the whole is slightly under both DAP's, but tonally more in-line with DX320MAX. What do you get in terms of sound profile?

- Neutrality
- Sharp but immaculately clean transients therefore incredible dynamics and contrast
- Great Slam
- Precise imaging
- Good proportional staging (though, this is where it differs from DX320MAX, stage is more intimate on the dongle, but the centre image focus/ crossfeed is better, and bass is a bit more upfront and slammy, though less fleshed out in its sustain (it's tight and fast).

Now I want to recall a communication from @Paul - iBasso from the iBasso thread which provides very valuable information. I am an iPhone user therefore I don't natively have access to the companion app where there are additional fine-tuning adjustments to tinker with. Thankfully, DC Elite has onboard flash memory it seems, so if you sync up to an Android device at any point, you may fine-tune your optimal settings and then carry on with those settings on your Apple devices. It's not ideal, but thankfully this workaround exists!

These are the setting in the app.

Filter (Sharp roll off "D1" / Slow roll off "D2") - On Sharp Roll Off by default.
Input Pad (0dB / -1dB / -2dB) - Allows adjusting for noise floor or more controlled volume calibration based on your gear.
DSD Filter (Low / High)
PCM DSD Volume Matching ( On / Off) - I tend to turn off volume leveling features as generally there is a sense of dynamic compression if you level it.
SPIDF Out (ON / OFF) - If you want to use this as a transport.

For me, I've changed from the default D1 filter in favor of the more organic and ever-slightly more euphonic D2 filter. D1 is super technical and transparent, but for some of my already very technical iem's, the D2 helps flesh out the harmonics and lingering overtones just enough to make things more musical & contour notes a bit more.

Interestingly, D1 is very reminiscent of DX320MAX voicing (neutral/ reference with incredible speed) whereas the D2 filter is more reminiscent of DX320(X) which has a bit more midbass/ lower mids presence & less pronounced upper treble/ air.

Anyway, I've gone through my share of dongles over the pandemic, because it's inexpensive and convenient (RU6, Paw S1/ S2, Questyle M15 & L&P W2) & I found the W2 to be the most technically proficient of the bunch by a significant margin, albeit a bit lean sounding at times. iBasso DC Elite just comes in and smokes the W2 in itself by quite a margin - it's not really a fair comparison. I guess the DC Elite is a nice headphone amp in the form of a dongle

Pretty impressive stuff, hard to believe how much of a quality source you can have in such a form factor and at a reasonable price. Just 3 years ago, I would have claimed this absolutely impossible to achieve.

Bonus - I spiced it up by changing its knob, to render homage to the 320MAX's aesthetic a bit

 

[osocan]

Hi guys, I am playing around with the new iBasso DC Elite dongle and this piece of gear offers tremendous value/ $ and what I'd consider sound quality beyond mid-fi DAP's at a price below mid-fi DAP pricing. This is straight up Hi-Fi $1000.00 + quality in a more accessible form factor.

As you may know, it's got most of the important sound quality related trickle-down tech from the DX320MAX, minus several components which naturally drive-down costing - pretty sweet! (Smaller chassis, less complex circuit board w/o analog gain selection, no display screen, no battery, no card reader, no wifi card, no bluetooth chip, less moving parts, etc etc). Yet, you maintain the same DAC chip (x1 instead of x4 chips on the 320MAX), fully analog potentiometer (which is less finicky than 320MAX's) & a lot of volume gain for a dongle.

Most things you should care about when it comes to sound quality, especially as an IEM user, is offered in a small and portable package which can be used with your mobile devices or computer. It's a huge quality of life upgrade over being tethered to my DAP in many instances. This won't have the same beefy amp stage as DX320MAX, which will be more beneficial to headphones or challenging to drive IEM's.

Sound quality - It's very much reminiscent of DX320MAX & DX320, which I'm happy to say is as advertised. Performance on the whole is slightly under both DAP's, but tonally more in-line with DX320MAX. What do you get in terms of sound profile?

- Neutrality
- Sharp but immaculately clean transients therefore incredible dynamics and contrast
- Great Slam
- Precise imaging
- Good proportional staging (though, this is where it differs from DX320MAX, stage is more intimate on the dongle, but the centre image focus/ crossfeed is better, and bass is a bit more upfront and slammy, though less fleshed out in its sustain (it's tight and fast).

Now I want to recall a communication from @Paul - iBasso from the iBasso thread which provides very valuable information. I am an iPhone user therefore I don't natively have access to the companion app where there are additional fine-tuning adjustments to tinker with. Thankfully, DC Elite has onboard flash memory it seems, so if you sync up to an Android device at any point, you may fine-tune your optimal settings and then carry on with those settings on your Apple devices. It's not ideal, but thankfully this workaround exists!



These are the setting in the app.

Filter (Sharp roll off "D1" / Slow roll off "D2") - On Sharp Roll Off by default.
Input Pad (0dB / -1dB / -2dB) - Allows adjusting for noise floor or more controlled volume calibration based on your gear.
DSD Filter (Low / High)
PCM DSD Volume Matching ( On / Off) - I tend to turn off volume leveling features as generally there is a sense of dynamic compression if you level it.
SPIDF Out (ON / OFF) - If you want to use this as a transport.

For me, I've changed from the default D1 filter in favor of the more organic and ever-slightly more euphonic D2 filter. D1 is super technical and transparent, but for some of my already very technical iem's, the D2 helps flesh out the harmonics and lingering overtones just enough to make things more musical & contour notes a bit more.

Interestingly, D1 is very reminiscent of DX320MAX voicing (neutral/ reference with incredible speed) whereas the D2 filter is more reminiscent of DX320(X) which has a bit more midbass/ lower mids presence & less pronounced upper treble/ air.

Anyway, I've gone through my share of dongles over the pandemic, because it's inexpensive and convenient (RU6, Paw S1/ S2, Questyle M15 & L&P W2) & I found the W2 to be the most technically proficient of the bunch by a significant margin, albeit a bit lean sounding at times. iBasso DC Elite just comes in and smokes the W2 in itself by quite a margin - it's not really a fair comparison. I guess the DC Elite is a nice headphone amp in the form of a dongle

Pretty impressive stuff, hard to believe how much of a quality source you can have in such a form factor and at a reasonable price. Just 3 years ago, I would have claimed this absolutely impossible to achieve.

Bonus - I spiced it up by changing its knob, to render homage to the 320MAX's aesthetic a bit

Which iPhone are you using? Mine doesn’t work on 12 Pro Max. I use it mainly with my laptop.

The sound coming out from this little one is phenomenal. Like the DX320Max and DX320. Not cheap but it’s worth it.

Edit: how do you upgrade the volume knob?

 

[DunkFealer]

Hi guys, I am playing around with the new iBasso DC Elite dongle and this piece of gear offers tremendous value/ $ and what I'd consider sound quality beyond mid-fi DAP's at a price below mid-fi DAP pricing. This is straight up Hi-Fi $1000.00 + quality in a more accessible form factor.

As you may know, it's got most of the important sound quality related trickle-down tech from the DX320MAX, minus several components which naturally drive-down costing - pretty sweet! (Smaller chassis, less complex circuit board w/o analog gain selection, no display screen, no battery, no card reader, no wifi card, no bluetooth chip, less moving parts, etc etc). Yet, you maintain the same DAC chip (x1 instead of x4 chips on the 320MAX), fully analog potentiometer (which is less finicky than 320MAX's) & a lot of volume gain for a dongle.

Most things you should care about when it comes to sound quality, especially as an IEM user, is offered in a small and portable package which can be used with your mobile devices or computer. It's a huge quality of life upgrade over being tethered to my DAP in many instances. This won't have the same beefy amp stage as DX320MAX, which will be more beneficial to headphones or challenging to drive IEM's.

Sound quality - It's very much reminiscent of DX320MAX & DX320, which I'm happy to say is as advertised. Performance on the whole is slightly under both DAP's, but tonally more in-line with DX320MAX. What do you get in terms of sound profile?

- Neutrality
- Sharp but immaculately clean transients therefore incredible dynamics and contrast
- Great Slam
- Precise imaging
- Good proportional staging (though, this is where it differs from DX320MAX, stage is more intimate on the dongle, but the centre image focus/ crossfeed is better, and bass is a bit more upfront and slammy, though less fleshed out in its sustain (it's tight and fast).

Now I want to recall a communication from @Paul - iBasso from the iBasso thread which provides very valuable information. I am an iPhone user therefore I don't natively have access to the companion app where there are additional fine-tuning adjustments to tinker with. Thankfully, DC Elite has onboard flash memory it seems, so if you sync up to an Android device at any point, you may fine-tune your optimal settings and then carry on with those settings on your Apple devices. It's not ideal, but thankfully this workaround exists!



These are the setting in the app.

Filter (Sharp roll off "D1" / Slow roll off "D2") - On Sharp Roll Off by default.
Input Pad (0dB / -1dB / -2dB) - Allows adjusting for noise floor or more controlled volume calibration based on your gear.
DSD Filter (Low / High)
PCM DSD Volume Matching ( On / Off) - I tend to turn off volume leveling features as generally there is a sense of dynamic compression if you level it.
SPIDF Out (ON / OFF) - If you want to use this as a transport.

For me, I've changed from the default D1 filter in favor of the more organic and ever-slightly more euphonic D2 filter. D1 is super technical and transparent, but for some of my already very technical iem's, the D2 helps flesh out the harmonics and lingering overtones just enough to make things more musical & contour notes a bit more.

Interestingly, D1 is very reminiscent of DX320MAX voicing (neutral/ reference with incredible speed) whereas the D2 filter is more reminiscent of DX320(X) which has a bit more midbass/ lower mids presence & less pronounced upper treble/ air.

Anyway, I've gone through my share of dongles over the pandemic, because it's inexpensive and convenient (RU6, Paw S1/ S2, Questyle M15 & L&P W2) & I found the W2 to be the most technically proficient of the bunch by a significant margin, albeit a bit lean sounding at times. iBasso DC Elite just comes in and smokes the W2 in itself by quite a margin - it's not really a fair comparison. I guess the DC Elite is a nice headphone amp in the form of a dongle

Pretty impressive stuff, hard to believe how much of a quality source you can have in such a form factor and at a reasonable price. Just 3 years ago, I would have claimed this absolutely impossible to achieve.

Bonus - I spiced it up by changing its knob, to render homage to the 320MAX's aesthetic a bit

I've got my own unit coming in later today! Very exciting.

 

[wolfstar76]

One of the concerns regarding any dongle is the source. For example, RU6 is phenomenal from a PC, but pairing with a phone, not so much besides the issue of quickly exhausting the battery of my cellphone. I guess it might be just a matter of time dongles will make DAP obsolete, but right now I will still focus on DAPs.

 

[nikbr]

getting organized with the gear I want to demo this year. What under 2k MUST be in this list that I am missing?

All three AüRs. You could almost get all 3 offerings for 2k and have all the spices. From classical to acid trance to death metal. Surely you don't season your food only with salt?

That said, I really need to go to Highend Munich in May to hopefully hear some of these sets on your list. And I better be joined by any of the European Coolers!

Edit: Forgot about the fourth AüR set, AüR Alita, but adding that brings you closer to $3k combined.

 

[Scubadevils]

I hope you like it.
It took an astonishing 275+ hrs to settle and smooth out highs and extend the bass. It's tight and blurry for quite a long time. I wanted to sell mine initially.
Turii Ti + v2 Darwin Ultra filter / Class A is (chef's kiss)

I already do like it but will certainly leave it to burn - currently about 5 hours on the clock I’ll definitely leave it round the clock though.

It certainly takes the prize for the heaviest DAP I’ve owned, quite the beast but I love a bit of heft in my electronics! Beautiful device.