xerxes
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Post by xerxes on Sept 8, 2006 3:03:32 GMT
I was reading a review of some Shure ear canal type headphones: www.trustedreviews.com/article.aspx?page=8029&head=0£419.00! That seems a touch over priced to me, even if they sound excellent, they would need to be constructed from some very exotic and expensive substance for them to be worth anything like that in material value. Has anyone ever tried these? Are they twice as good as a pair of Sennheiser HD 650s, or as good as an equivalently priced pair of Grados, AKGs or Beyers? I recently bought a pair of Sennheiser ear canal headphones, ~£25.00, and they are OK for descrete, portable 'phones, but can't match up to a full size set of headphones, or even Sennheisers similarly priced PX 100s for that matter.
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rickcr42
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Rest in peace my good friend.
Posts: 4,514
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Post by rickcr42 on Sept 8, 2006 3:41:19 GMT
I don't know how folks do it.I come from the "if it is smaller than your fist do not put it in your ear" school of thought and maybe because of,maybe for other reasons (mental ? real ? fetish ?) can NOT STAND anything in my ears.If the fit is a snug one I feel like someone plugged my head with cement and that goes for ear plugs for hearing protection or ear phones.
Obviously that is not the case for most folks and why you see more and more "in the ear seal" type devices for monitoring,especially in the pro field.I wish this was not the case 'cause according to the reports the in ear seal type devices are top notch in sonic quality so I feel I am missing out on the.
In the case of the Shure's,they are pro monitors so suit the requirements for both durability and easy in the field repair (essential quality for anything where your salary depends on NOW performance ) so why they cost so much is my thought
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xerxes
Been here a while!
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Post by xerxes on Sept 8, 2006 14:29:31 GMT
I thought that before I tried the little Sennheiser ear canal 'phones. They feel a little odd when you first put them in, but after a couple of minutes, you almost forget they are there. However, these Shure 'phones cost 21 times as much as the litte Sennheisers, that's some jump.
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xerxes
Been here a while!
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Post by xerxes on Sept 9, 2006 16:31:31 GMT
So, noise blocking aside, how do they compare to the full size HD600s? Better, worse or as good but different?
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Post by PinkFloyd on Sept 9, 2006 18:33:47 GMT
Fellow member Duncan has a pair of these and he reckons they're the dog's bollocks, it may be worth PM'ing him for his opinion or, better still, he may come across this thread and reply in public
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Sol
100+
loves motorcycles !
Chief Technical Numpty
Posts: 135
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Post by Sol on Sept 11, 2006 8:47:37 GMT
So, noise blocking aside, how do they compare to the full size HD600s? Better, worse or as good but different? So if you want good sound reproduction at a reaonable price then you can do far worse than Shure E4C or Etymonic ER4. I have the shures and a friend has since gone out and bought the Etymnonics. So ... on the comparison with HD600s I cannot say - but I was looking for a replacement set of travel headphones for a while. I commute into london and came across the Shure E4c quite by accident when someone at work had them - they look very good, and the thick cable attracted me as my current earbuds were almost threadbare with the thin "standard" wire looking set to pull out of the bud. I borrowed them for a lunch time trip round the streets of London. The buds are easily replaced, and washable ... personally I'm not squeemish about such things - the washing was for his benefit - I was amazed how good the sound was. Certainly on a par with the quality I get from my Grados 325i which i recent bought for my home system. At the time they blew me away compared to the crappy sony earbuds I had been using. On that first listen there were a couple of occasions when how good they were was illustrated. Some laughter on Christine Augiulera- Stripped had me reeling round to see who nearby was laughing - it really did ooze realism - and as I sat listening to Damien Rice - "O" I was very impressed with the clarity, detail in the guitar and the imaging. So I started looking around for some, and bought them from ebay. If you intend to use IEMs on the move then you have to take into account how rugid they are. I bought Shure E4C for that reason - although I considered the Etymonic ER4 - both around 150 and readily available on ebay at that price new - the E4C sold it on looks! Bass is the area mostly suffering in IEM - it's so dependant on the fit, and a good seal. I find the huge number of earbuds you get with the Shures ensure you find one that fits. Although the over the ear fitment technic is a little odd, you soon get used to it, and it helps to maintain that all important seal. Etymonic ER4 may be easier to seal, and they do seem to have a reputation for blocking ambient sound better. Though I can't say the E4C are bad at this - I regulalry listen to quieter classical tracks on the train, and the background noise no longer requires me winding up the volume only to be worrying about volume levels as the music invariably gets louder again. One very important element of sound quality of course is the player ... I use the iAudio X5L because it supports flac ... I have about 80 albumns on it stored in flac format. I'm constantly amazed how good the thing is. 18 hours of battery ... 1/3 of my music collection with me at all times. I can't say how good or bad IEM are with MP3 - the iAudio however is very very gpood with flac and the advantage of course is i have a single store of all archived CDs on my computer to stream to my Squeezebox, and this same stire is sued for the iaudio Once other thing to consider - Impedence. The Shures are low impedence ... meaning no need for an amp - The Etymonic ER4 has a higher impedence (100 I seem to remember) and you really need a portable amp to get the best from them.
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Post by merton on Sept 16, 2006 23:41:58 GMT
where did you get the er4 for $150?
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Post by jonnywolfet on Nov 29, 2006 22:40:01 GMT
iems are not cost effective for sound quality, but awesome at blocking out noise. i think the general consensus is that at each price range, there are full size cans that trump them. that said, for portable use, and for in noisy enviroments, iems cannot be beaten. the fact that they isolate so well means that (for me at least) there is no better portable solution. i love my e4c, and e5c.
oh and merton, your sig is hypnotic...
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