Congrats and very nice pic!
Thanks
Nice pic! Looks like yours came with the new tips! Are they comfortable ?
Having tried the other sleeves when I first got my Westone 3s way back, those sleeves were the only ones I needed to try out. I can say that they're my favourite sleeves - low maintenance, high isolation, high comfort. Before I used to switch between Shure Olives and Shure grey silicone sleeves.
In terms I what they're like, well, they are between the grey silicone sleeves and the white bullets in terms of thickness and flex. They're not glossy like the grey silicone sleeves so they feel very smooth and easy to put into the ears as a result.
My issue with the mushroom sleeves (is that what you call them? The grey silicone sleeves with a very small opening) was that they're very thin and glossy, so I could never get a proper seal in one go; I'd have to move it around for a few seconds before I can listen properly.
I also don't like the Comply Tips - strangely enough and unlike almost everyone else anywhere it looks like - because they discolour very quickly and feel wet and mushy to the hands when you remove them after use. That, and the fact that they discolour to an unspeaking yellow-green if not replaced often enough; did I mention that they're annoying to insert and they're also rather expensive?
Then there are the bullets and the triple flanges - I actually like the former, if it didn't hurt to wear them for extended periods, and if they didn't change to a rather off-putting transparent yellow-brown/black after a while. They do provide good seal as they're stiff enough to press against your ear canal, forcing a seal. They hurt for this same reason after a while, however. Triple flanges didn't offer much seal to me and seems to remove a lot of "depth" to my music, probably due to the reduction of bass. Also, I could never figure out I should stop cutting my triple flanges to size, or whether I should remove a flange, etc.
Anyway, these are great because their isolation is superb, without the hassle of squishing the sleeves that Comply or Olives bring about, and even more isolating as I chose to use the longer length sleeves; IIRC, like the Comply tips, these have a shorter version. Shorter sleeves weren't as isolating or fitting as I found with my W3s, its nozzles being too short and all and causing me to hear more background noise and lose bass simultaneously. So these solve that problem (4Rs seem to have a longer nozzle than do the 3s, but still) and slide into my ear so smoothly. That matte feel really makes a difference to me in ways I couldn't have imagined and the orange colour designation on top of it all (to identify sleeve size) matches the orange of the 4Rs themselves perfectly.
Most importantly, they sound great. Complys really muffled the sound for me, as did olives to a smaller extent. Westone grey silicones were too distracting to put on to even get to listening, though once I did manage to get a fit, I found them a tad bit lacking in bass, while Shure silicones were just fine. Bullets sound great (more bass, almost no sacrifice to the highs and mids) until they start feeling like actual bullets in my ears. Triple flanges lose way too much bass and sound like a super detailed version of my bass-anaemic laptop speakers. If the Shure Olives had a child with the Shure silicone sleeves that (literally) looked like the overgrown child of the bullet and grey silicone sleeves, this would be it.
tl;dr: easy to wear because of matte finish, comfortable because softer and thinner, yet has stiff enough to impose good seal/isolation, looks bad*ss because of complementary colour scheme, and sounds somewhere between Shure olives and grey silicones. What's there not to like? Best sleeves ever, IMO.
