Last night I spent a few more hours playing around with mesh and pad combos.
I like swapping pads, particularly between caldera ultra perf and universe, although other options sometimes appeal too.
I had been using the solid mesh for a while, enjoying the smoothness of the sound. But I started to find it was a little too smoothed off with the universe pads.
An almost perfect combination is the stock atrium mesh with the caldera pads. It just made me smile, how good it was. But when I now use the stock mesh with the Universe pads (as I love, LOVE the universe pads' staging) I find the lower treble very slightly still too smoothed.
So another almost perfect combination I have found is the universe pads with the radial mesh. I'm getting the universe staging with a bit of the added clarity that the caldera pads bring. It doesn't quite fully deliver the dynamics and better resolution of the Caldera pads but it gets close on the clarity.
I think that the radial mesh with the Caldera pads is a little too hot but still very listenable. I may give that more of chance too from time to time. My tastes have been evolving lately, but as someone who also enjoys grados and the Arya V2, this pad/mesh combo is still well within the acceptable limits of brightness.
I've said this before but no mesh doesn't work for me. Too much treble not enough separation and definition.
So it seems I'm going to be jumping between stock perforated mesh and radial mesh and universe and caldera pads for the foreseeable future.... Until Zach one day decides to throw an ultra perf unverse pad into the mix or some other disruptor.
Lots of fun still to be had with the Atriums