I have a mele, bl-max, dq6 comparison coming. But haven’t had much head time yet.
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I’ve written my first review, feel free to review my review for me - I’d love to improve and better organize before writing a review for the YanYin Aladdins which I am now free to do.
Shame it’s such a downer to start on:
I can go on in detail for almost any song why the Aladdin is the best thing ever, so looking for advice on how to condense repeated comments while still justifying them with examples. I might pick a piece from each genre or something similar, if it’s condensed I can get into timestamps and be very specific.
I’ve been wanting to make a thread here about the Aladdins and rec them constantly, but I didn’t think I could do that without in-depth and detailed support for each claim and compliment. It’s of no use to anyone to have to listen to my vague praise and general euphoria without actual examples.
You may notice a lack of a comparisons section. While I’ve actually listened to a good many IEMs, my budget requires that I usually own one at a time, or have a brief period of overlap or A/Bing. I can’t in good faith publish comparisons if I don’t have sets in hand, audio memory is too fickle.
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Nice job 
And congrats for finding some free time to spend on your hobby 
adulting is hard - I still haven’t written my impressions of the Aladdin 
Things I liked:
- Pros and cons at the start
- Review system at the start
- Being transparent about the review process, payment, etc
- Basing performance on specific tracks
- The commonalities section
My two cents:
- Maybe a summary of the performance for the bass, mids, treble? I feel like I only knew a couple of the songs you mentioned, and I don’t know if I’ll put in the time to listen to all the specific tracks
- I do agree that grouping the notes on specific songs by genres would help bring more structure to the review
- Pros and cons are a bit redundant if you have the TL;DR
- Maybe a FR graph (obviously doesn’t have to be produced by you if you don’t have the equipment)
- Specific section on fit & recommended eartips
Hope this helps!
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This does help - thank you!
Shout out to the DQ6 being absolutely ridiculous for its class. Listening to them with starline tips, and there’s no fair comparison to other budget sets like the QOA Vesper etc. I don’t like any IEM more than the Aladdin at time of writing, and I enjoy these a good 70-80% as much, for about $20.
I like the tuning of the Vesper for example, but its exaggerations and compromises are patently obvious and part of it being a “fun price”.
Certain sets are removing the “wonky but fun” category altogether from the budget sector, if this can sound this good for $20, there are no excuses when it comes to $60/$80 sets that are given a lot of forgiveness due to their low price tag.
I say this as someone typically not a KZ fan. I did like the ZEX too but couldn’t take the treble, and I’m less into a V shaped tuning.
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Okay, I’ve tried several times to get the pin out of the Kato and I’ve accomplished nothing more but getting superglue all over my hand. I think this is past my ability here, and I think the earphones are shot. After a couple perfunctory responses from Fiio about my broken FD5s I haven’t heard anything more back from them on Head Fi and I don’t think they’re going to do anything about it.
In better news, I got the Shure TW2 bluetooth adapters and so far they’re excellent and better than the UTWS3 or 5. For one, they actually hug my ears so they don’t flop around while I’m walking. The earphones come on and off the MMCX plug much more easily and surely and while I’m still a bit skittish with them, I’m much less scared they’re going to tank my earphones on me. And the connectivity is much more consistent and reliable.
I got them with the Shure Aonic 215, which are pretty good, but I just put the FDX1s on them and they sound great, and I’m getting less microphonics from them because of the tight fit. We’ll see how they fare outside, I might end up putting the 215s back on for walking around, but right now these are working pretty well.
RIP my Katos and FD5s.
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I am very sorry to hear that. One last thing you can try (but it won’t be nowhere near close to aesthetic solution) is to solder the wire directly to the pin (and the second one in that earpiece as well). You would loose a cable, but it would at least work. Using some shrink tube around would make it passable
Do you have any good pics of how the IEMs fit in the TW2 case? Preferably with your largest ones to get an idea.
drftr
After what happened to me I kind of don’t want to be liberally popping earphones on and off them, but here’s a pic of them with the FDX1 in and I stuck a Blessing2 in there for scale. The case is pretty big–it’s actually shockingly big, bigger than even the massive UTWS5 case. I would be surprised if you had IEMs that wouldn’t fit in this case.
EDIT: I actually stuck both Blessing2 earpieces in the case ALONG WITH the attached FDX1 and they fit and closed perfectly. So yeah, I don’t think you’ll have trouble fitting IEMs in this thing.
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Yeah, I don’t think I’m going to be doing any soldering. At this point I’d be willing to sell them for the cost of shipping to anyone else who thinks they might be able to fix them, and good luck to them.
Do you need to bend the cable to get them in this way and then bend them back in the original position again when you get them out? Or do you create your perfect fit only once and don’t have to alter it?
Also, do you think this is a valid reason to use MMCX instead of 2 pins if I have the choice? (not sure which connections the TW2 allows to be honest)
drftr
If you would end up blank and you are in EU I might be interested in that, but I really hope you would manage somehow (maybe with help of Moondrop themself).
One another idea is to use precision 0.7 - 0.75 drill bit to remove the pin material out of the socket. The earpiece needs to be held in vise for that and it is best to use some benchtop drilling machine to reduce the play as the drills this size are extremely fragile
The tool in spindle has runout so it would end up bigger than original diameter probably closely to the 0.78mm.
Those drill bits are generally easily available for Dremel/Proxxon tools
I don’t even own a hand drill, muchless a vice, or a benchtop. (Or a soldering iron for that matter.) I’m just not a remotely handy person, sadly.
I live in New York City, so not the EU, I’m afraid.
I am quite confident you could find some repair shop or jeweler or maybe the best option - watchmaker that would make it work in New York (or would at least try) for couple of bucks. I guess the Katos are well worth the try
I didn’t have to bend anything, that’s just the shape they are. They’re tight, which is why they fit behind my ears so snugly. (But they feel fine.)
The TW2 seems to only come MMCX. You could of course use a MMCX-to-2-pin adapter, but that was how I messed up my Katos so I can’t say I recommend it.
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I’ve been sitting on buying OH10s because I’m not too sure how the fit will work out. Anyone know some tips that’d go well with them? I’ve heard the bore is a bit wider than other IEMs.
Also slightly related: would anyone know a good way of determining whether or not an IEM will fit well beforehand? Seems like you have to cross your fingers and hope if you don’t have a reference point.
on the ikko oh2 product page, on hifigo, the tips looked really wonky and i thought it was just a strange editing mistake, IKKO OH2 IEM Unboxing! - YouTube
they really do just look like that lol
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Update: Fiio just replied with an address I can send the broken units to for repair (I don’t know if they mean the UTWS or the FD5, but I’m sending both).
I’m going to reach out to Moondrop and see what they can do for me as well about the Katos.
Thanks for your advice everyone!
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See? Good service can keep you hooked for life so be careful.
drftr
So I wanted to get some Final Type E Tips since I have never had any yet and need a few new good tips anyway.
Now, they are a pain to get in the EU (good tips are generally hard to get here imo) and where you can get them, Amazon for example, they‘d cost me about +38€ and would take one to two weeks to get to me.
So, the alternative: I bought a pair of Final E1000 for 19€, because they come with a set (SS/S/M/L/LL) of Final Type E Tips and get to me in two days.
So not only do I get the Tips I wanted but I can try out a Final IEM for the first time as well. Excited to get them 
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