The Watercooler -- Impressions, philosophical discussion and general banter. Index on first page. All welcome.

[Scubadevils]

Travelling with work this week and grabbing a moment this morning to listen to music and catch up with Head-Fi! A meeting shortly and then a two hour drive…

Interesting reading the discussion on BCDs - something I’ve noted with every set is I experience a degree of pressure build which is frustrating - currently having the problem with MEST JB. The most voodoo trickery BCDs I’ve tried are probably the TSMR SHOCK, that set tends to position elements in what sounds like almost impossible levels of imaging inside and around my skull - not sure whether this is solely due to the BCDs or otherwise. Overall though, on the fence about BCDs and lean forwards sets that don’t use them.

Listening at the moment to Sony ZX707 and Final A6000, a really beautifully tuned single DD and quite a step up from the A5000 - much more melodic with excellent resolution, stage size and imaging - along with the comfort and durability, a perfect travel set… plus I’m a huge fan of the minimalist styling of Final - can’t wait for their new flagship. Great to see the humble dynamic driver still has a place in a world where IEMs with several drivers get most attention! Long live the DD

Listening to:

 

[TheMiddleSky]

I might be in the minority here with this very subjective opinion, but I personally think the average $1k-$2k IEM is leaps and bounds better than the average headphone in the same price range.
And this is using the same desktop chain to drive the IEM and the headphone.

When you're in Immanis territory though, yeah, I would concede that it's hard for IEMs to compete.

In my case, if it's only about sound, I would easily prefer Abyss Joal than any IEM under $2K.

The "problem" with headphone is they scale up better than IEM in this price range, so to optimize them we definitely need more budget and time to match the whole chain.

IEM has big benefit to sound generally already good, even from not so expensive DAP like Hiby R6 III or even from Dongle. Yes IEM still scale up, but not as far as typical headphone in general.

 

[RonaldS86]

That's the point I was trying to make, BCDs in IEMs make no contact with bone. I currently have no hearing in my right ear; I just popped the UM Mentor in my ear and cranked up the volume - nothing. I need to schedule an appointment with my audiologist and have them perform this test...

I hope it's nothing serious. Keep us updated and gws

Define portability; been a while since anyone has posted this pic.

If this is not an old image, I might think it's AI generated

I guess you are trying to be funny, what you describe is not how or where I live. I live rural go for walks on the country roads and hills, with spotty to no internet, that is my most used portable case. There is no real danger of theft here it is just not that kind of area.

Please try to understand. He's practically living in his own world. Act like he knows everything even though he's not

Guys, Esoteric classical music SACD’s are fricking amazing! Listening to one right now, oh my goodness, the sheer quality is stunning. I’m not sure what the Esoteric team is doing but I am loving it.

All I know that Esoteric team is doing a great things

Travelling with work this week and grabbing a moment this morning to listen to music and catch up with Head-Fi! A meeting shortly and then a two hour drive…

Interesting reading the discussion on BCDs - something I’ve noted with every set is I experience a degree of pressure build which is frustrating - currently having the problem with MEST JB. The most voodoo trickery BCDs I’ve tried are probably the TSMR SHOCK, that set tends to position elements in what sounds like almost impossible levels of imaging inside and around my skull - not sure whether this is solely due to the BCDs or otherwise. Overall though, on the fence about BCDs and lean forwards sets that don’t use them.

Listening at the moment to Sony ZX707 and Final A6000, a really beautifully tuned single DD and quite a step up from the A5000 - much more melodic with excellent resolution, stage size and imaging - along with the comfort and durability, a perfect travel set… plus I’m a huge fan of the minimalist styling of Final - can’t wait for their new flagship. Great to see the humble dynamic driver still has a place in a world where IEMs with several drivers get most attention! Long live the DD



Listening to:

Great music like always. I want to purchase that album immediately, but too bad I just got scammed 2 days ago and my CC is being blocked while waiting for the replacement. Silly me

 

[Leonarfd]

And some IEMs may actually play better with the higher OI of the 6.3 or even XLR on an amp like Aegis anyway.

Same as Cayin HA-2A and other models from them, but same as you say a few sets can work better with the other outputs.

I love to use iems with desktop gear, some sets scale so well. And with some gear like the Cayin you can add some warmth and fun to your sets

 

[tresvigint]

Even if Fugaku portable, I dont think people would bring 17k + 3-5k DAP on public place...

No such thing exists, nor has there been any indication that it will. If it eventually does, I’d hope it comes out at the $6-7K price range that they’ve promised for the past 2 years. Now that would create some interesting competition and really undercut the HEX.

Tried to swap
Anni beyond and dio apex cable
To anni apex and dio beyond
Both not synergi...

Dio without apex need synergi cable

 

[Tanalasta]

Even if Fugaku portable, I dont think people would bring 17k + 3-5k DAP on public place...

Dio without apex need synergi cable

With the Dio tuning and the mids on Elysian mids being on the slightly thin side, my recommended cable pairing would be NightJar Sovereign custom made with a P-Conn termination. Whilst you can also ask for VERSA interchangeable for the 2W Sovereign, there may be a subtle loss of technicalities or tuning with an interchangeable adapter system. The 4W Sovereign Symphony whilst heavy/thick adds substantial note weight and the "cost no option" pairing suggestion.

Sovereign tends to work well with most IEM's I have tried it on. Great technicality, note weight and musicality.

Even if Fugaku portable, I dont think people would bring 17k + 3-5k DAP on public place...

I know people who commute with Storm. But then there are people who wear a 20k watch on the wrist in a public place ...

 

[Deezel177]

Even if Fugaku portable, I dont think people would bring 17k + 3-5k DAP on public place...

Tried to swap
Anni beyond and dio apex cable
To anni apex and dio beyond
Both not synergi...

Dio without apex need synergi cable

I actually recently got the chance to audition the Dio with the APEX cable after my musings about its messy launch. My thoughts on the pairing is honestly mixed. On one hand, it offered staging and air I couldn’t replicate when I swapped the cable out for Effect Audio’s Code 51. The 51 created a noticeably smaller, more compressed image, even though I found the bass insanely fun on it. It’s obviously a lopsided, 4 vs. 8-wire comparison, but it’s clear the APEX is technically superb. On the other hand, though, the APEX also introduced a grain to the Dio’s treble. It added this dry, sandy coarseness around 7-8kHz that’s the opposite of what you get an Elysian monitor for. You get one of Lee’s IEMs for refined, smooth, yet uber-detailed highs, and neither refined nor smooth were words I could attribute to the Dio in this setup. That grain completely went away when I put the Code 51 on it. When I shared my impressions to a couple Coolers who tried the Dio + APEX pairing at CanJam NY, it turns out they felt the exact same way.

So, despite going into the audition ready and willing to eat my words, I ended up walking away feeling more or less the same. I think a base version of the Dio without the APEX cable is necessary for the IEM to be looked upon with at least some favor by the community, not only because the price of the bundle (in my opinion) doesn’t make sense, but also because the pairing isn’t 100% optimal anyway. I think the tonality of something like the Janus cables from Effect’s lineup several years ago would work better with the Dio, or a more technically-capable version of the Cleopatra, perhaps. All in all, I genuinely do hope the Dio ends up coming out in a good state. The market always benefits from competition, even if it’s Lee versus himself.

 

[Emvo]

Define portability; been a while since anyone has posted this pic.

What in the world is that contraption haha. Wicked!

 

[warrenpchi]

I actually recently got the chance to audition the Dio with the APEX cable after my musings about its messy launch. My thoughts on the pairing is honestly mixed. On one hand, it offered staging and air I couldn’t replicate when I swapped the cable out for Effect Audio’s Code 51. The 51 created a noticeably smaller, more compressed image, even though I found the bass insanely fun on it. It’s obviously a lopsided, 4 vs. 8-wire comparison, but it’s clear the APEX is technically superb. On the other hand, though, the APEX also introduced a grain to the Dio’s treble. It added this dry, sandy coarseness around 7-8kHz that’s the opposite of what you get an Elysian monitor for. You get one of Lee’s IEMs for refined, smooth, yet uber-detailed highs, and neither refined nor smooth were words I could attribute to the Dio in this setup. That grain completely went away when I put the Code 51 on it. When I shared my impressions to a couple Coolers who tried the Dio + APEX pairing at CanJam NY, it turns out they felt the exact same way.

So, despite going into the audition ready and willing to eat my words, I ended up walking away feeling more or less the same. I think a base version of the Dio without the APEX cable is necessary for the IEM to be looked upon with at least some favor by the community, not only because the price of the bundle (in my opinion) doesn’t make sense, but also because the pairing isn’t 100% optimal anyway. I think the tonality of something like the Janus cables from Effect’s lineup several years ago would work better with the Dio, or a more technically-capable version of the Cleopatra, perhaps. All in all, I genuinely do hope the Dio ends up coming out in a good state. The market always benefits from competition, even if it’s Lee versus himself.

Maybe Centurion II would be a viable replacement for APEX? Actually, now that I think about it, I wouldn't mind a Leo III, as I liked Leo II.

 

[RonaldS86]

I actually recently got the chance to audition the Dio with the APEX cable after my musings about its messy launch. My thoughts on the pairing is honestly mixed. On one hand, it offered staging and air I couldn’t replicate when I swapped the cable out for Effect Audio’s Code 51. The 51 created a noticeably smaller, more compressed image, even though I found the bass insanely fun on it. It’s obviously a lopsided, 4 vs. 8-wire comparison, but it’s clear the APEX is technically superb. On the other hand, though, the APEX also introduced a grain to the Dio’s treble. It added this dry, sandy coarseness around 7-8kHz that’s the opposite of what you get an Elysian monitor for. You get one of Lee’s IEMs for refined, smooth, yet uber-detailed highs, and neither refined nor smooth were words I could attribute to the Dio in this setup. That grain completely went away when I put the Code 51 on it. When I shared my impressions to a couple Coolers who tried the Dio + APEX pairing at CanJam NY, it turns out they felt the exact same way.

So, despite going into the audition ready and willing to eat my words, I ended up walking away feeling more or less the same. I think a base version of the Dio without the APEX cable is necessary for the IEM to be looked upon with at least some favor by the community, not only because the price of the bundle (in my opinion) doesn’t make sense, but also because the pairing isn’t 100% optimal anyway. I think the tonality of something like the Janus cables from Effect’s lineup several years ago would work better with the Dio, or a more technically-capable version of the Cleopatra, perhaps. All in all, I genuinely do hope the Dio ends up coming out in a good state. The market always benefits from competition, even if it’s Lee versus himself.

What if their answer is that APEX is once again not the final version

 

[Ike1985]

With the Dio tuning and the mids on Elysian mids being on the slightly thin side, my recommended cable pairing would be NightJar Sovereign custom made with a P-Conn termination. Whilst you can also ask for VERSA interchangeable for the 2W Sovereign, there may be a subtle loss of technicalities or tuning with an interchangeable adapter system. The 4W Sovereign Symphony whilst heavy/thick adds substantial note weight and the "cost no option" pairing suggestion.

Sovereign tends to work well with most IEM's I have tried it on. Great technicality, note weight and musicality.



I know people who commute with Storm. But then there are people who wear a 20k watch on the wrist in a public place ...

You can cover a watch with your sleeve.

 

[Rockwell75]

Define portability; been a while since anyone has posted this pic.

The man, the myth, the legend. I always thought that if he got caught in a rain storm with that rig it could short out and take out a whole city block.

 

[fejnomit]

2-channel, and to a lesser extent headphones, have the luxury of something in actuality-- air and space-- that IEMs have to simulate through various forms of acoustic trickery. In this sense 2-channel is inexorably and objectively the superior medium of reproducing sound.

But in terms of use case-- the most important factor-- it's fundamentally an apples-oranges situation. I can't take a 2-channel system out and about with me-- nor the best full size cans really. Saying that IEMs are inferior to headphones is a lot like criticizing the proverbial fish for its inability to climb a tree.

All of that said there are I think some things that IEMs can do intrinsically well. For example,I also love the imminent in-your-face-sound-injected-right-into-your-brain immersive experience IEMs provide.



Nice to see more of you in here lately

Yes... and... it's very very hard to get a room to sound right. Believe me. I worked at it for years and years before folding the whole 2-channel operation. So that air and space and physical pressurization of 2-channel can be quite fleeting... Not to mention the need for a dedicated room in the first place, along with the chair in the right place, etc. The "inexorably and objectively" better thing about headphones and IEMs, in my opinion, is that they take the room out of the equation. They take a ton of variability out of the equation, in fact. You can have the same sound anywhere...

Also, I don't view IEM tuning as trickery. It's all just sound reproduction through technology. Any amp, any interconnect, any room treatment - you could conceivably argue it's all "trickery" to get the music to sound as close to the source material as possible... Or as close to your platonic ideal as possible..

Personally I could never get my very expensive 2-channel systems to sound as consistently good as my current IEMs. As for my long foray into TOTL headphones, I could never get over the discomfort of the increasingly massive headgear, as well as being tied to a desk. This detracted significantly from the listening experience (I do find that bodily comfort, mood, etc. matter a lot to our perception of sound).

Anyway, YMMV at all that, of course, but for me the sense of air, space, immersion and comfort of IEMs is unrivaled... And pleasure is the goal, no?

 

[nikbr]

'Coolers, I proudly present this project that's been in the works for the longest, since not one, but two singers gave up halfway, forcing me to restructure the whole thing - collaborating ain't always easy.
I'm glad it turned out how it did, with Mr. Peter joining me behind the mic

Check out one of Slovenia's finest rock ballads and feel free to leave any feedback

 

[Onurb8690]

It’s in SGD, so it’s actually 2/3 the price of Dio, which is a wild thing to say about a US$9000 IEM. What a world… what a world…

I completely agree! I think it's a huge exaggeration, I don't believe it has a sound that can be said to be (much better) than a flagship car worth 3000/4000 dollars, and that is already quite expensive!