[stozzer123]

i use with the hje900 and pfe both very different bass wise, i still feel the zo adds a lot to both founds, like beefs it up and makes it fuller overall.  i did try with hippo vb and using the middle plates id still rather use the zo than not, although it was on the edge of acceptable.

 

[RPGWiZaRD]

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In my experience, I've paired the Zo with MANY bass heavy in-ears, including the TF10, and I found it a tad too overkill (even on the lowest contour settings), in the sense that the lows become distorted, muddy, and much too boomy for my listening pleasure. I've found the Zo works best with bass moderate to bass light in-ears, the ER4S and RE252 being prime examples. The Zo works wonders with the two aforementioned, without any appreciable loss in SQ. 

I don't know man, I think it's more that you have to ask yourself how much of a basshead you are, I used XB500 at contour lvl 2 (2 taps) and thought it sounded very nice, it also brings the rest of the range a bit more forward when switching from the lowest lvl to the first one, so I think ALL headphones benefit at least from the first level, then you get the ZO colorisation to it, then it's a matter if you like that or not though. At the lowest level it even decreases bass and everything sounds a lot less dynamic, not just bass, mids and highs too. I have a feeling ZO v2 will be different in this regard between the lowest and the first lvl compared to ZO v1 but that remains to be heard. As it is with v1 it sounds like you maybe loose around 1.5~2dB bass at lvl 0 while at lvl 1 you maybe gain 1.5~2dB or so compared to not using ZO and then between lvl2 and lvl1 it's a smaller increase than from lvl 0 to lvl 1, well every step from there onwards is smaller, like a 0.5dB increase or so only per step. Now I'm pretty sure MizMoxie even mentioned that in v2  you'll have the same increase between every lvl so that's a good hint that the first lvl on ZO v2 may have a smaller boost than on v1 which would be a good thing.
 

 

[i2ehan]

Of course, it varies based on the listener, as always. For me personally, I don't mind a bass boost as long as it doesn't compromise the overall detail and clarity, which for the already bass-heavy in-ears, it certainly did to my ears, and began to sound muddy/distorted.

 

[SoulSyde]

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Of course, it varies based on the listener, as always. For me personally, I don't mind a bass boost as long as it doesn't compromise the overall detail and clarity, which for the already bass-heavy in-ears, it certainly did to my ears, and began to sound muddy/distorted.

Out of curiosity, was the distortion present only with that combination?  Because I've heard from many reputable sources that the ZO does an excellent job of adding the extra desired "oomph" in the low-end without getting muddy/distorted.
 
I suspect it may be a synergy thing in trying to get the ZO to play well with BAs.

 

[RPGWiZaRD]

Volume settings also play a major role, your windows volume settings should be set lower when using ZO as digiZoid recommends to start with around 25% volume. Now with v1 as it lacks volume control this is pretty much a requirement anyway unless you want some ear-piercing volumes but will be interesting how v2 will behave volume-wise, like what volume level will ZO v1 correspond to on v2, that in particular is very interesting to me and then I'm wondering how adjusting the volume on ZO v2 will affect distortion and how much of lvls you are able to boost etc, perhaps with a lower or higher volume lvl on v2 and adjusting windows volume thereafter compared to what v1 is "fixed" at might allow you to further boost the bass without getting distortion etc.
 
I can say from my testing, as I've got a very interesting kind of volume adjustment possibility as I'm using kX Audio 3rd party drivers, the windows kxmixer affects output quality quite heavily depending how it's set. With the drivers I use, I've got multiple independent volume bars that aren't linked to each other which all "normal" drivers for a soundcard would. What this provides me is the freedom to for example keep either volume bars to maximum and adjust the other accordingly or then just lower both with a similar amount for example. Depending how I configure this the difference is very significant when I start EQing/boosting frequencies. Now if I keep the windows volume bar high, say at 100% it'll start clipping/distorting as soon as I even boost the frequencies a little on the EQ that comes with the drivers. Now if I lower the windows volume bar and keep the volume bar in the kX Audio drivers for my Audigy 2 ZS a bit higher instead, there's no clipping/distortion whatsoever and the lower I put the windows one the higher I can boost the frequencies on the EQ or ZO without getting any distortion. I can boost the ZO to the max lvl 31 even on this XB500 and it just results in uberstrong bass output but won't affect the quality really and it stays "clean". With the windows volume bar (kxmixer) set too high and it'll sound like a mess, not clean.
 
So I would guess with v2 since there will be volume level adjustment I'd guess that you might still benefit having the windows volume bar as low as possible and adjusting the volume lvl on the ZO itself higher for cleaner output/higher bass boost capability without getting distorted sound. Now many of you are using ASIO or WASAPI anyways (I haven't been able to as the volume would just get too much with ZO v1)... but if you're not bypassing kxmixer take this into consideration. 
 
So I would say the general thumb rule for ZO v1 is that the lower you set the windows volume bar the cleaner output you'll get as you raise the contour levels on the ZO. So the more efficient your IEMs / headphones are the cleaner output as the lower you can set your windows vol slider to get sufficient volume, this is also one thing where v2 will help with as I'm pretty sure 100% vol on ZO v2 will be higher than that fixed volume setting v1 has (MizMoxie said something about 5dB higher I think).

 

[JamesMcProgger]

is it out yet?

 

[treal512]

Nopes. Back to the cave!

 

[JamesMcProgger]

*crawl back into his dark cave

 

[estreeter]

I've used this quote before, but talking about music is like dancing about architecture - you reach a point where its meaningless when we dont share the same mental map.
 
You can get all kinds of bass 'tests' online - most are very low frequency sine waves designed (apparently) to destroy subwoofers (!). For those who can deal with the prospect of downloading 128k mp3 files, I found a much better source : the bassotronics demo files sound bloody good to me.
 
Since most of you are probably at a computer and should be working/studying, check out 'Bass I love you' - apparently it has something of a following:
 
http://www.youtube.com/user/Bassotronics?blend=7&ob=5
 
No, its not the 'bassiest track eva', but its eminently listenable compared to the aforementioned test tracks. I dont listen to much electronica (ok, I dont listen to any electronica except some Chemical Brothers), but I like the 'hi-fi' (!) version of 'Bass Fidelity' on this page:
 
http://www.soundclick.com/bands/page_songInfo.cfm?bandID=129857&songID=8952083
 
My point, and there IS one, is that with any combination of my sources/amps/headphones, both of these tracks have more 'bass punch' than anything in my collection. Yep, WAV vs crappy 128K mp3s, even from the $30 speakers hooked up to this work computer - the bass just leaps out at you and, to me anyway, its a lot more enjoyable than listening to low frequency sweeps designed to attract sperm whales. I dont really care if its 'loose' or 'uncontrolled' - I'm not after fidelity from some 128k files I found on the net - but I do use these to tell me how each of my phones renders bass from a given source. Even the AD900 has a lot of fun with these tunes, and I hope the 'serious audiophiles' here will accept that fun is a valid reason for listening to music.  

 

[i2ehan]

Quote:

Out of curiosity, was the distortion present only with that combination?  Because I've heard from many reputable sources that the ZO does an excellent job of adding the extra desired "oomph" in the low-end without getting muddy/distorted.
 
I suspect it may be a synergy thing in trying to get the ZO to play well with BAs.

 
Absolutely. The ZO remains the best purchase I've ever made through Head-Fi, and happens to be one of the few products I've come to own that does EXACTLY what it's meant to. It's a personal subwoofer, plain and simple. However, synergy is the key factor IMO. Based on my own experience, some in-ears have good synergy, while some have great synergy, and of course, others, not so good. I posted a list a while back where I mentioned the in-ears I personally found to have good/great/bad synergy (with bad being lows that begin to sound uncontrolled and muddy even at low gain settings, and great being lows that offer that"oomph" without sounding muddy even at high gain settings, and good being somewhere in between, where the Zo functions best at low gain settings), and a few others contributed their own experiences as well. To be honest, the only reason I considered thinner sounding, analytical in-ears (e.g. RE252 and ER4S) to begin with was because I knew all too well what the Zo is capable of, and the synergy between the Zo and the two aforementioned, for instance, puts them in a league of their own, as far as I'm concerned. Hell, even on the max contour level, the ER4S sounds absolutely killer! The best synergy I've come across to date, however, has been between the Zo and the EX600/EX1000, and I urge all EX owners to test for their own ears exactly what I mean when I say they were practically made for one another. 

 

[SoulSyde]

Thanks for expanding on your previous statement.

 

[i2ehan]

Your very welcome my friend, and feel free to PM me anytime if need be. 

 

[estreeter]

Man, I am feeling the love in this thread.  ZO lovin'  

 

[182751]

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is it out yet?

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Nopes. Back to the cave!

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*crawl back into his dark cave

 
 

Pre-orders just started...
Just ordered mine.
 
Got an Email from digiZoid about the release, I asked them a month or 2 ago about it and they put me on the list for notification. Placed my order immediately... $99.95USD
 
Quote: DigiZoid

Hello,

The time has come to share all the juicy details regarding ZO version 2, our newest product launch.

Please visit our web page that announces price & product features. We are also offering a pre-order option for those who are interested in being one of the very first to get their hands on ZO 2. http://www.digizoid.com/zo/

The digiZoid team can't begin to thank you for your patience with the ZO 2 launch.

 
 

 

[i2ehan]