Perfect Seal - PS2, PS3, PS4, PS6, PS8, Fusion 11

So I'm part of the tour for these over at headfi, and I've got some decidely non-headfi friendly things to say. There's maybe one or two in the lineup that are ok-ish, but at those prices? Ehhhhh....

It's not worth going in-depth, but here's my notes before I gave up.

They all have:
- not great bass extension
- midrange honkiness
- susceptiblity to noise to some degree
- harsh peak at 6 or 8 kHz (though I can't discount this being the tips I was using)
- at least overall construction and cabling seems decent
- crapola soundstage

PS2:
- very susceptible to noise
- withdrawn feeling esp w/female vocals
- limpy bass
- hollow mid suckout before ouch peaks 4 and 8kHz
- soundstage meh, resolution meh

PS3:
- not as noisy
- overall flat-ish with treble tilt
- still wimpy rolled off bass
- shallow mid dip, feels dull
- not as peaky at PS2 but still wobbly, extra hump at 6kHz
- resolution is mush

PS4:
- noisy
- overall balance better but not cohesive
- finally some body and oomph
- objectively seems flat, subjectively feels scooped in the mids
- peak 6kHz and mild hump at 8
- resolution? more like congestion

PS6:
- very little noise
- overall tone is balanced but off somehow
- bass finally coming together but lacks impact
- honk honk honk
- mild 8kHz hump but otherwise better than the rest
- resolution ok, could use more speed on the edges
- first one with decent soundstage so far

PS8:
- very litle noise
- balance seems good, but I hear harmonic distortion (poor control)
- bass seems cleaner but weaker
- less honky, more suckout
- there's that 6kHz peak again
- resolution: all the nopes

Fusion 11
- very little noise
- overall balance slightly north of neutral
- again no body to the bass unless you turn it up then it's ok
- mids more of a downslope and less scooped feeling, still bleh
- withdrawn feeling until broad hump at higher 8kHz
- not as offensive as the other model peaks
- false sense of resolution
- soundstage ok-ish
- driver crinkle
- adjustable bass tuning ports are interesting, but I wasn't able to test these properly due to a faulty thingamabobber on the right earpiece


If you put a sausage to my head and made me do a ranking on these: 6 > 4=11 > 8 > 3 > 2

 

...but the fit's great, right?!?

 

Ehhhh... there's only so much fitment you can hope for with generic ciem's right? I wasn't able to get a fit with any of the supplied tips and had to dig up one of my own. The "best" fit was with no tip at all, but this pushed the hard edge of the tipless nozzle against my ear canal.

 

WHAT!?!

THIS IS AN OUTRAGE!

 

So that's what the randos were for!

 

I owned the F11 before. I'd agree with your assessment. I don't think it's completely fucked up, but the one absolute, fatal flaw it had was its inexplicably thinny, sucked out mids.

 

Totally forgot about this thread. Hopefully the AR6 measures or sounds better than the rest of the lineup. It seems like the Deca and AR6 are the only ones even worth mentioning.