Audiosense do huge discounts if you message them before buying. You got a good deal, but for reference they would sell it for $130 over a year ago if asked. Just a heads up. Your price is nothing to worry about in this case, just if they release anything newer/pricier later on it’s worth a shot.
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And now you tell me LOL 
Thanks very much.
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Saw the Ikko OH2 on sale for 50% off so figured it might be worth a flyer. Then I started looking at graphs and found these:
Bass that profiles in the vein of Dark Magician with mids and treble that are related to the Xenns Up? At the least, this probably won’t suck…right?
Alternatively, it graphs like a more mid-centric relative of Serial
I can remember no particular details other than I tried one and it was awful.
I’m not going to call it awful, but it is fatally flawed. Way too much roll off, on both ends. But I’m glad I’ve heard this though.
It makes me miss the P1 Max. I didn’t feel like I had to get that one back, but now I’m starting to think I do. Because that is a great mid-centric IEM, under $100, and that’s hard to find.
Not So First Impressions of the Kinera Celeste Gumiho
So this is a kinda long overdue set of impressions posts that I’m going to get caught up on: @nymz (before his hiatus) sent @domq422 @Lcg842 and myself our Holidays care package that included the following sets:
For Lisa
- TGXear Alpha
For Dom and I to split
- Kinera Celeste Gumiho
- TANGZU Wu Zetian (the OG)
- Dunu Kima
For Dom
- Tripowin Olina (double filter modded)
I’d been spending some time with these sets, and had Gumiho in my ears today when it finally clicked for me, so I wanted to get the thoughts out while they’re fresh.
PROS
- This is a pretty well tuned set: acceptable bass, clean mids, clear treble. Where I was struggling was placing it in the sets I know, and thus where to rate it. I was looking through some graphs and then it slapped me like a porpoise:
(credit to hbb.squig.link normalized to 300hz)
- It sounds like a dead ringer for the TRI Starsea, in terms of tone and tonality
- The biggest difference is the cut Gumiho has at 6k: if that’s a sensitive point for you, the smoothness there is notable
- Compared to Starsea it has immensely better fit and no driver pressure build-up. Comfort for days
- If you remember my early posts/reviews, I am a BIG fan of the Starsea sound
CONS
- Gumiho does not have the special sauce Starsea has
- It is quite inferior in soundstage and technicalities
- The competition sub-$100 is too fierce to really recommend this
Overall, Celeste is a fine-enough IEM, but it was a year or 18 months too late. It’s a very nice first IEM, but it’s not going to stand up to the killers out there
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Yup. Competition is too hot nowadays - and didn’t know you had the OG Wu. Let me send you the HeyDay for you guys to A/B along with the other stuff 
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FIIIIIINE, if you must! 
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Looks like a Fiio Hybrid
Named like a KBear DD
Is a Planar
From TRN
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12mm planar huh and not spd maybe. Im guessing its one of the same types as the ones used in the older Tin planars.
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WTF another Rosefinch I hated the first one LOL
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GET OUT OF MY THREAD YOU HEATHEN!!!
Nah, I’m just messing. I can appreciate Rosefinch being too much for people in a bad way. It is too much
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BLASPHEMOUS!
I’m just kidding. I love the OG Rosefinch.
I like the ring of that … OG Rosefinch 
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LMAOOO your one liners are probably my new favorite thing about this website 
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Okay if you guys make me listen to this thing The Original Rose Finch OG and I start liking it. again I’m really going to actually hate you guys really like I just bought a second EA 500 and I blame Goobs for that one 100%
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Just for reference, I thought my first pair of Rosefinch went out on the right side and I bought a second pair off of Goobs because I love the Rosefinch that much.
I always want to have a pair in my collection as a staple, benchmark basshead set. I just respect KBear for truly embracing the term basshead. They didn’t try to neuter the low end in the slightest, they went all out and gave them a nice bump in the mid treble region so you get all the god damn bass you could ask for, without it sounding muffled. Yeah, they’re “muddy” and overly warm or whatever, but shit, man - for under 20 bones, you’d be hard pressed to find a better package if you’re after that hard hitting wub wub.
The QKZxHBB is probably a better overall IEM, but if I had the choice for just pure bass, gimme the Rosefinch.
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Yeah, this ^^^^^
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I take no responsibility for the reckless life choices made (I have to be responsible for my own reckless choices, after all), but there are 3 IEMs that I’ve fully been willing to go out on a ledge for
- OG Rosefinch for an actual budget basshead set
- Panda for something mid-centric on a (relative) budget
- EA500 for the best price-to-performance (EDIT: I should specify for IEMs, cause earbuds do exist) I’ve heard in the hobby
Penon Fan 2 is still my personal favorite IEM (and the main reason I don’t currently own Panda), but I can’t go out and tell anyone that it’s worth buying outright.
If I was starting over in the hobby, those three sets would probably have me in and out
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