At 96dB

Looking back, I could have been fully satisfied with Just a KSC75 and some modding. While I appreciate my more expensive gear and absolutely want to keep trying more, it's not so much of a drive to upgrade as it used to be. Just enjoy what you have

I mainly just use my galaxy buds pro and Blessing 2 Dusk. All my other IEMs are rarely used other than situational cases (ER4XR for isolation), so yeah I get ya.

There are some competitors, but in general most budget stuff, even things that sound good, just don't present themselves the same way the Blessing 2 does, but again it is down to preference. You may find something you like more

A lot is based on the recording itself. In the end, we only hear in left and right channels, but the shape of our ear and the timing of the sounds as it reaches our ears all works together to change the Frequency in a way that our brain understands as position.

If the audio has that frequency information and timing in the recording, our brains will decipher positioning as well in headphones

If you're happy, then there's no problem.

Different amp combos can slightly alter the sound and frequency response, but it's not necessarily a case of "this is better than that". Its more just what you prefer.

The main case crin was trying to make was, don't buy an amp expecting them to transform your headphones. Some claim that if Headphones sound bad to you, you just need to spend more on an amp and they'll sound good. This is a trap that is easy to fall into and if you're on a budget, it's totally fine to spend your money elsewhere and save where you can

The HD600 has quite high sensitivity, so they run well on a wide variety of sources.

Good marketing story for the general public, but yeah some things don't add up to me. Their page tries to explain IEMs with each frequency being it's own individual particle, and traditional IEMs ( speakers/headphones/normal hearing) scattering half of them while their design preserves it all.

I don't think that's quite how it works.

Then again, on their page they said they are treating sound waves the same as light waves, which is telling enough.

Your ear with an IEM is a pressure chamber type of environment, and sound waves with differing frequencies from a driver are generated more as a whole waveform. Their explanation seems flawed more you look at it

Gotta love their animation of how a traditional IEM has most of the soundwaves bouncing back and forth inside the chamber and only a few reach the eardrum https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/1721/0649/files/Traditional-Earphones.gif?v=1662979573

The change to the Sennheiser build and boxes was a couple years before they sold to sonova though. Back in 2019

He retired 4 years ago and his website was pretty much wiped. Now he travels in a tiny home he built himself. But yeah, before most of the known reviewers that are around now, Tyll was making youtube reviews and posting measurments on his website

Tyll found what really matters and is living the dream

First of all the part that goes around the actual nozle itself is thin, which gives more room for the tips to flex. Then the tips themselves are quite thin silicone and shaped more like a cone rather than the thicker rounded tips that the mpondrop and Zero have. It makes them form a lot better to small ears. Spinfit tips also have a swivel design that allows the tips to bend and fit your ear shape better

Yeah I found both those IEMs don't fit my ears no patter which stock tips I use. I use spinfit CP155 tips with them and the fit is perfect now

For me it's just wanting to experience more and understand as much as possible.

It started as just a love for music, started from my dad and grandpa who always had large floor speakers playing rock throughout my childhood.

Once I got into headphones, the bug to try as many different sound signatures took over and I just wanted to experiment with headphones. Over time looking more into EQ, reading papers, experimenting with measurments.

It's a fun hobby that kept me occupied throughout covid, and the drive to learn and experience more is still there

Other than the Hifiman Sundara and probably some ZMF stuff, it's still pretty much the same, and Sennheiser 6X0 is still a default recommendation

Headphones can never be perfect, which means it will always be subjective. So yeah I guess we have reached a peak in a general sense, but there's always something unique that speaks to different people

don't take this serious, just having fun in conversation

Airpods Max are good compared to their direct competition, Sony XM5, Bose, but they're not amazing by any stretch. I think something like a $100 AKG K361 sounds better tuned, and the airpods max are all about the features and name.

The drivers themselves are just sort of crammed into the cup with minimal room, and DSP does all the work to tune the drivers to sound decent. But still they are missing a lot of upper mids.

I wouldn't pay full price for them

I wouldn't really pay attention to Rtings Soundstage scores as they come up with their own methodology, but yes the HD600 is known for not having the largest Soundstage as an open back

This gets really deep and there's been a lot of research on it. In short, Yes if two pairs of headphones had an identical Frequency response at your eardrum they would sound the same (ignoring factors like comfort, ambient noise, how the pads feel on your ears which all affect how we perceive sound).

The thing is, it's virtually impossible to make two pairs of headphones have the exact same Frequency response at your ear. Even from two models of the same headphones there will be differences you can't EQ in.

The frequency response graph you see from measurments is best used for comparisons, but it doesn't represent the frequency response it will have in your own head, and even headphones that measure very close on a rig, can have large differences in the frequency response when it's on your head due to difference acoustic impedance.

The best way to look at it is, yes everything does come back to frequency response in headphones, but it's just the end result and not something you can EQ one pair of headphones to match another. So in a way, "Technicalities" does exist as a part of frequency response, and you need to listen to them to get the full picture.

Yeah the cp145 is a little thicker around the nozzle. The 155 is thinner there and shaped a little more tapered. I find them more comfortable myself, but everyone is different

Yeah the EDA silver is really a good cheap IEM

The tips have thinner silicone walls and also much thinner around the part that goes on the nozzle. That, combined with the more tapered design, allows it to mold and fit deeper and more secure, compared to the stock tips which are more rounded and bulky with stiffer silicone. The nozel on its own isn't too big for most ears, it's just with the thick silicone layered on top it gets too big

If anyone has fit issues, Spinfit CP155 tips solve that issue and fit completely in my smaller ears

Exaggerating the positives and negatives between headphones and their differences to prove a point or push a preference really isn't good for the audio hobby. Sadly many fall into this (I have as well)

Hoping the community continues to improve

For me the biggest difference between headphones and earphones is the interaction with your pinna and HRTF. Headphones directly have the sound interact with your pinna and changes the Frequency response to how you're used to hearing, where as IEMs Bypass your pinna and use an approximation of an average pinna gain.

That said, yes earphones are very good, and there is a very noticeable difference between a $50 pair and a $300 pair.

My wired IEM earphones are $320 and there's quite a difference in sound presentation with that and a pair of over ear headphones that cost the same. Both excell in their own ways.

Our perception of sound is also heavily influenced by other factors. Fit, space, how much sound is let through. There's so many factors that change not only the frequency response, but also our perception of sound, which makes no pair of headphones, even of the same model sound exactly the same

MP3 has a stigma in some places because old mp3 was bad. But modern MP3 320kbps is good enough, most people won't be able to tell it from lossless in a blind test.

Get whatever headphones you'd like to