shotgunshane’s IEM (custom and universal) recommendations, favorites and classics

Make sure that the strips end up almost flush with the nozzle and don't protude:

Yep, that's called masking.

 

Hello guys, and particularly Shane, for those who like an iem with a great balance frequency, the Advanced Acoustic Werkes W900 (BA + 1DD) sound very nice to my ears. Spacious and airy, coherent, non peaky highs, punch but non boosted mid bass. Needs a good source, but me likey.

 

Just to keep things in perspective regarding the FW01's "bass hump"... here's @crinacle's measurement:



While I perceive mid bass subjectively indeed as a little more elevated than this graph would suggest, I personally wouldn't call it a "hump".

 

Hello Shotgunshane,

How would you compare among Aurisonics asg-1.5, forte and Andromeda?

 

There's actually some research to support what you prefer, apparently. John Moulton cited a study that found people hear a little extra subbass in an earphone as sounding more natural, iirc.

 

Right, gents. I think I need some advice.
I have a workplace situation that prevents me to listen to my open cans, so regretfully I need to concentrate my efforts in the ways of closed cans or iems that don't leak.
My wish is to get into playing fields that HD800 and HD650 provide with decent front end (tubes).

Spoiler: More detail

I am too afraid of blind-trying BAs. I hate things that constrain dynamic scale and mess with timbre. My fear might be deceptive, though.
My sound preferences: So in general I see no point in planar sound, I hate S-D sound, love tubes, love open dynamic cans. BAs that I have heard have been sub 400$, these have lacked slam, have squished dynamic range, too light note weight to give realistic timber quality to acoustic instruments. BAs that I used never scaled much with better equipment.
Dynamic iem-s despite being also more on budget side have had flaws as well, but more agreeable to me. For example I like many qualities of TFZ-5 and RE-00, but they won't cut it for whole day of listening at work. I don't like boosted bass of the TFZ, RE-00 levels are ok to me, but RE-00 lack in slam/dynamics down low.
I don't want to hassle with custom iems.
I have no experience with any top dog iem to be frank.

 

You're probably going to get recommendations for either a CFA Andromeda or a...

Yeah, I think you're going to get recommended an Andromeda. Or maybe FW01.

 

+1

 

Why not Vega or EX1000 or FW01?
Out of these 4, which is most resolving? And with most slam?

 

In terms of slam (stock tuning), it's: Vega > FW01 > 7550 = EX1000.

But why are you asking about slam, if you don't like the TFZ-5's boosted bass and consider RE-00 levels ok for you? All of these 4 have more slam than the RE-00. And the Sonys would be just about right for you, if you want authoritative but not boosted bass.

 

Thanks for input.

Yes, I asked slam, because for most people it says uncompressed, lively, effortless bass. What I really want the most is effortless dynamics across the fr range(why I stick up with HD800) and coherence. I read the whole thread earlier today, it looks like timber is not a significant problem for these dynamics.

TFZ has reasonably effortless delivery, but they seriously lack coherence and the effortlessness is not consistent from bass to highs (they are muddy in some areas), it's timber for strings also suck.

RE-00 is not effortless enough, they sound small (no, I don't mean exclusively soundstage size), if that makes any sense. I don't mind them rolling off in extremes that much. They do timber great to my ears.

I might be able to swallow some peakyness in highs if other attributes weigh it over.
It looks like the EX1000 has most effortless dynamics, no? Then how far behind are FW01 in this?
What I'm looking for is something that makes one shit themselves when orchestra goes full swing in an instance, figuratively speaking. That requires unconstrained, effortless dynamics across the audio band.
I have hard time making sense of myself some times, I'm sucker for dynamic range.

 

Both Sonys are able to make you shit yourself, depending on voltage swing delivered to their 16mm drivers.

The difference is just some more treble damping in the 7550, which is actually a good thing if you like to listen to orchestra at high volume, because the EX1000's treble will possibly make your ears bleed when the horn section kicks in.

The JVCs are not far behind when it comes to halfway realistic orchestra dynamics, but the Sonys convey things more effortlessly.

The RE-00 are overdamped imo. Nice for string quartet, but no-go for orchestra.

 

You can definitely eq the ex1000 to have slam... And lots of it without bleed and still sounding very coherent... Of course with that annoying peak, which you can tame via eq as well. You can also tape the vent on the 7550 and it will have more slave than the Vegas, by far. I haven't heard the new jvc yet though.

 

I tried the Fostex TE-02n. Definitely have an insanely good driver at that price. Really fast and flat. The housing doesn't seem stiff or solid enough to give it justice - kind of has a thin plastic sound. Hence the mods I guess. Still great at that price.

Any suggestions on a DD that isolates well for air/train travel? <200. Neutralish with maybe an uptick in bass to compensate for the background noise. Rugged to not have to worry to much about out and about?

Too bad the TE-02ns don't isolate well.

 

Have you tried the RHA T20? Those are pretty rugged and have a long warranty. It does offer some tuning possibility and the isolation is pretty good with the comply tips.

 

What about the sound?

 

OK so a week in and the GO 450 - JVC FW01 synergy is really something special to my ears. None of somewhat annoying, artificial-sounding brightness I sometimes heard with the GO 450 with other HPs or the slow thick murkiness I heard with FW01s and the ZX2.

So much texture and natural detail coming from the whole frequency, especially the mids but also spaciousness in the sound. Live recordings like these sound particularly good.





But it's not just slow paced live music that shines. There's a propulsion of rhythm and explosiveness of drumming (dynamic range?) too that makes percussion believable. And there's plenty of separation between the fairly complex elements of this track.



As expected it shines conveying the timbre of string quartets.



The main weakness as I see it is that bass is a little slow or loose. So the upright here isn't as well articulated as it should be.