Man I gotta stop lurking on Head-Fi if I'm ever to be satiated with my Pinnacle P1... That PM4 looks awesome....
Ahh, thats an interesting comparison here. I own the P1 and the PM4 and they are definitely two different beasts. The P1's game is sort of like, here im gonna give you a fairly neutral version of this sound with just a tad of brightness and warmth. Its very smooth and laid back, but still detailed. The PM4 is much more in your face. It sacrifices some of that smoothness to give you some real punch, but at the cost of the possibility of some harshness, particularly in vocals and some treble. Its a much more fun sound sound, but at times the lack of smoothness and what might possibly be a peak in some of the higher frequencies can make it a bit fatiguing at times, especially with rock/alternative tracks with a lot of cymbals or as another poster described it "wall of sound" type of guitars, or tracks with very forward vocals. The P1 definitely lacks the punch of the PM4 and if you like a little more bass, you can absolutely get it with the PM4, the bass is easily my favorite part, its punchy, detailed and doesn't seem to bleed much or get in the way, and with the filters, you can get pretty much exactly how much you want.
On another note, I am one with some filter fitment issues and one or two other issues, but Bob and Jake have been very responsive and helpful and are getting me sorted out. In the meantime, I have still been able to give these a listen, and I think for me the gunmetal filter tames enough of that harshness and still gives me a good amount of punch. Its funny, I figured I would end up with the gold undamped filters since thats what I settled on with the vyrus, but these just really blow the vyrus out of the water in terms of detail and clarity in the mids and highs that I had to tone it back a bit, and the bass just feels so well shaped that I wanted a bit more than gold offered.
And as others have said, amping definitely seems to round out the sound for me. As is my understanding with all things amping, it doesnt drastically alter the sound, just allows me to more comfortably push some extra volume and get that sound rounded out.
Overall, even with some of the harshness (which I suspect might in part subside with some brain burn in, been listening to the smooth P1's for a while) and with some of the threading issues I had (that are already being resolved) I am very happy with these. They offer a nice detailed sound with the punch that I like and if I ever get tired of that, I can always tune them a bit. Pretty happy overall with these.
