[Superbaldguy]

I have been a faithful user of the 4P's for years. They have superb isolation and detail that is hard to describe, and are truly audiophile-quality reference monitors.

I have yet to have a positive experience with them for listening to rock music. I find them to be grainy; I am using the tri-flanges, if that makes any difference. I am wondering if thee is anything I can do to enhance my enjoyment of these phones when I listen to this type of music, or simply accept their stunning performance on jazz, classical and softer types of genres.

I am guessing there are other IEM's that are better for this sort of need.

 

[catscratch]

I found the ER-4P's to have a serious spike in the lower treble. This brings out a lot of detail in recordings that have restrained treble - a lot of classical and acoustic recordings, for instance, as well as some electronica. Rock recordings, however, are usually produced to sound thin and bright to make them clearer and more punchy on average, muddy sounding consumer gear. The ER-4P is just about the complete opposite, and what you're hearing is the poor recording and skewed tonal balance of rock recordings, exascerbated by the ER-4P's overhyped treble response.

I couldn't stand the things for rock either.

You can try the UM2 for a very full, punchy sound, or the E500 for a sound that's still quite detailed but has a more restrained treble response. However, you will not get the ER-4P's clean, crisp, hyperdetailed and very focused sound with any other universal-fit IEM. You will have to make some sacrifices.

If you want to spend lots of money, you can go custom and have it all. I went with the Westone ES2 and have no regrets, though now's probably not the best time to get a custom IEM, given that new Westone and UE customs are on the horizon. Wait till they're out and reliable impressions have come it before you put down irreplaceable sums of money.

Note that I never tried the UE triple.fi's, or any UE products for that matter. The triple.fi's sound like they might be just what you need, but I hesitate to recommend them without personal experience.

 

[Superbaldguy]

I'll just continue to use my cheapie CX300's for rock, they work well for that.

 

[germanium]

I've listened to mettalica & it does sound grainy but that is because they overamped the sound & rode the limiters. that will make it sound grainy & the ER4's do not hide that fact. On sections with one or two instrments it sounds excellent with no grain but as whole band cuts in they start riding the limiters & it turns grainy. If you set the media player to scope you will see a lot of clipped waveforms when the whole band is playing but not in the softer sections with only a couple of instruments. Clipped waves have a flat top & bottom & sound very edgy & grainy. limiters allow a small amout of clipping but not over a certain percentage but even 5% clipping of the waveform is audible They put limiters on various instruments & on the overall mix. Waves that appear clipped but not reaching overall peak sound are individual instruments being limited there the the highest clipped peaks are from the overall limiter.

 

[Superbaldguy]

That is a valid point, many rock recordings are just medicore in production. You cannot hide anything from the Etys, can you?

 

[bellsprout]

hard rock didn't sound very good until i got supermicro iv

 

[bangraman]

I've been taking a tour around memory lane as of late, with the ER-6i, E3C and ER-4P/S... but this time, overcoming my distaste for portable EQ and really tweakarama-ing it with the Sony NW-A808, Samsung YP-T9 and the Cowon D2. Only yesterday for example, I was being surprisingly successful in removing the midrange hump and maxing out the bass response of the E3c for my electronica fix.


And it is possible for all of them to actually do a passable imitation of a half-decent headphone even for rock given enough tweaking. However it's a testament to the misleading 'it's so revealing' tuning of the Etys that it sounds surprisingly 'meh' once the tonal response is somewhere near in line with a regular dynamic driver's performance.

 

[germanium]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Superbaldguy /img/forum/go_quote.gif That is a valid point, many rock recordings are just medicore in production. You cannot hide anything from the Etys, can you?

Not at all They are very very revealing of flaws in the recordings. More profesionals should use them to monitor the finished product before sending to production so they can fix the mix before it reaches the customer.

 

[sidewinder]

IEMs and heavy rock music (or metal/anything in that region) don't get well together. Soundstage is too thin imo, while regular pop sounds best. Dual driver IEMs may be a good bet, but bass is too overpowered (or boomy) for my taste, and midrange (voices) suffers quite a bit, which I don't like. Customs may also be great, but you still have to like the basic sound of universal IEMs of the specific company you want customs from.

 

[ILikeMusic]

Quote:

Originally Posted by catscratch /img/forum/go_quote.gif I found the ER-4P's to have a serious spike in the lower treble. This brings out a lot of detail in recordings that have restrained treble - a lot of classical and acoustic recordings, for instance, as well as some electronica. Rock recordings, however, are usually produced to sound thin and bright to make them clearer and more punchy on average, muddy sounding consumer gear. The ER-4P is just about the complete opposite, and what you're hearing is the poor recording and skewed tonal balance of rock recordings, exascerbated by the ER-4P's overhyped treble response.

I think you pretty much nailed it. That, and the recessed bass (graphs notwithstanding.)

 

[germanium]

Quote:

Originally Posted by catscratch /img/forum/go_quote.gif I found the ER-4P's to have a serious spike in the lower treble. This brings out a lot of detail in recordings that have restrained treble - a lot of classical and acoustic recordings, for instance, as well as some electronica. Rock recordings, however, are usually produced to sound thin and bright to make them clearer and more punchy on average, muddy sounding consumer gear. The ER-4P is just about the complete opposite, and what you're hearing is the poor recording and skewed tonal balance of rock recordings, exascerbated by the ER-4P's overhyped treble response. I couldn't stand the things for rock either. You can try the UM2 for a very full, punchy sound, or the E500 for a sound that's still quite detailed but has a more restrained treble response. However, you will not get the ER-4P's clean, crisp, hyperdetailed and very focused sound with any other universal-fit IEM. You will have to make some sacrifices. If you want to spend lots of money, you can go custom and have it all. I went with the Westone ES2 and have no regrets, though now's probably not the best time to get a custom IEM, given that new Westone and UE customs are on the horizon. Wait till they're out and reliable impressions have come it before you put down irreplaceable sums of money. Note that I never tried the UE triple.fi's, or any UE products for that matter. The triple.fi's sound like they might be just what you need, but I hesitate to recommend them without personal experience.

That spike you refer to is designed to compensate for the loss of resonance that an open ear haswhen nothing is in the ear. I found in live verses live mike feed to the ER4's that they are in fact totally neutral & not overhyped at all. one needs to consider the quality of the recording as many rock recording have sounds that are recorded loud enough to saturate the limiters on a relatively steady basis & this makes it sound really bad on any system that is at all revealing. Even my sound system I use for my computer will reveal these same qualities. My computers sound system is tonally almost identical to the ER4's & almost as revealling. This is not your ordinary system as I started with professional componants & modified the amps for improved resolution. By the way the bass is not rescessed either just not emphasized like many others. The bass is in fact neutral as well. Tracks with a lot of bass sound that way. The Mettalica I refered to earlier has very strong bass even on the ER4's

 

[MD1032]

The UM2's sound fantastic for rock. I've been really impressed every time I hear them and I consider them to be the "Grado" of all the IEM's out there.

 

[OptionTrader]

Etys sound great for rock. They just need to fit properly. If they don't fit, they will underwhelm you with any type of music, not just rock.

 

[Superbaldguy]

The fit is fine, I have been an Ety user for a few years. These are simply at their best for classical and airy types of music.

 

[robm321]

I enjoy them for rock. I use bass boost out of the Supermini III. Maybe that's why, but I don't need artificial amounts of b

ss to slap me in the head to enjoy rock.