Can’t guarantee since I would need to A/B test it with a lot of budget stuff haha. But one thing I can say right now, is for the price that it’s going for, GET S12.
It’s not bad at all tbh, but I was also told that my ears are S tier ears that are not too picky in form or treble peak But I’m sure that there are cheaper IEMs that can perform as well as Soloist, given that Soloist came out a few years back now.
I’ll state the obvious. Shuoer Soloist, while good, is massively overpriced due to its unique DD. I got it at a discount around $135, but the MSRP on LETSHUOER’s site is a whopping $209… While it’s DD is impressive in its own right, S12’s planar tech today basically excels in every aspect, and S12’s MSRP at the moment is $149.
But not blindly! And can you imagine how hard they’ll be to get off my hands if I’m not fond of them, with no reviews anywhere? I could see if they’ll take offer but I’d love to find out more first.
I can get an Aune Jasper for about the same, but the upper mids look steep. HBB graphed those but didn’t feel the need to make a video of them, which isn’t a good sign for them being outstanding in any way.
Wow I appreciate it. Assuming Everest at the end there is a resonance peak just from the coupler, that’s a pretty nice tuning, at least I think so. Could use some more sub bass though… might be moddable…
I’m going to spend the rest of my life cloning a good fitting Dark Magician. If he did custom shells I assume it would change the sound — plus I could never afford one brand new or customized.
Mangird Tea (more balanced, deeper stage, warmer without muddiness)
Blon BL-05s (warmer, but lest frequency separation less)
KZ ZEX vent mod (warmer but congested, stage wider but muddy)
Final VR3000 (muddier, although imaging is good and balanced due to less bass body)
QKZ VK4 (overall just dark and muddy)
Soloist is getting better and better by day, but it could be brain burn in. But the one place that will make people avoid this set will be the metallicky, more sibilant (than average) high-mids. However, if one can look beyond critical A/Bing with other sets and just enjoy music, Soloist itself is a pretty fun set with great body, tonality, and frequency separation. The brain just needs longer burn-in with its unorthodox tuning, which employs the other frequencies to balance out that metallicky nature. Overall, I’m enjoying this set pretty much. I’d say Soloist is Metallicky/Sibilant done to perfection, but of course that’s a signature that not a lot enjoy, yet I don’t know how to explain it better that the overall balance overcomes that fatigue that’s normally very tiring for other sets. Soloist just does.
Oh, it needs power too. I need to run balanced 4.4 on my Zen Dac V2 with volume at 9 o’clock to get the full potential out of this set.
I can confirm that the CCA CRA is excellent for its price point and at least matches the experience I get from the HBB Mele. This is incredible value, wowzers
I did order a Lotoo LE M1. I really really hope the gamble pays off. Running off almost nothing here…
Their ridiculously scaled official graph, their reputation for DAPs at least being good, a poorly recorded graph from a German reviewer, and the score that review gave (they never gave a score bellow 93% that I could see, so not worth much)…
Desperation to find something to spiritually replace the DM is real. Might have to blaze some trails.
The shape of the curves still looks markedly different from the (IE11?) coupler I mainly see people using for IEM measurements. So there’s hope. The reviewer could also have had Insertion depth/tip choices that led to such a peak? I can only hope, at this point!
The graph Lotoo provides is so odd. Besides a squished y axis, to e x axis goes out far, they suggest one peak is close to the 20k mark which is usually beyond meaningful measurement?
That guys measurement is the strangest thing I’ve seen in a long time. I’d guess he measured his wife’s frequency response while telling her he bought a new IEM and mixed up the graphs
(more balanced, deeper stage, warmer without muddiness)
(warmer, but lest frequency separation less)
(warmer but congested, stage wider but muddy)
