Found the best planar iem out there, no contest.
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that U tho.
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Thats graphed by Super Reviews (MRS). He is at Canjam atm and graphed it there.
Thatās one heck of a graph. Sub bass off the chart and bright to balance me likes a lot.!
Wow!
Whoever tuned the TANGZU Shimin Li needs to be slapped. I mean, it is a perfectly functional IEM that isnāt amazing but steps pretty correctly.
And then at 4k, they decided to just quit tuning it and stuffed it with dampener. I simply do not know how you could put this into production and think you were done. This is easily the worst treble Iāve listened to.
Did I mention, wow!?!?
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STUDIO REFERENCE TUNED?
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Banger write up, my friend. Iām very content with my Mon. MKII but Iāve started to get the itch to look for another set. Probably not in the same price categories as these but itās always interesting to read the views of others.
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Well. I was very close to listing the Maestro, just the Serial matching my preferences overall as usualā¦
But the last couple of hours Iāve been listening to them. Low gain, 2.5mm via Qudelix 5k. Iām not only loving the full range of the tuning, but Iām really really
impressed with the technicalitiesā¦
This brings me in to an observation I donāt have the expertise to say more about: āhigh gainā.
Whenever Iāve had a set of IEMs that Iāve either read ālove powerā or otherwise can infer need it (giant DD, planars), Iāve set them to high gain. Not just on Qudelix 5K, but various DAPs too. Well in almost all cases, Iāve found they all sound better on low gain raised to a higher volume.
āHigh gainā setting just sound like they take the sound and V-shape it, like EQing the last stretch instead of genuinely relying on power. Perhaps
Itās simply what more power genuinely does, but matching volume on low gain seems to have a different result?
In the Maestroās case disabling it just really unified the sound, the treble stood out a bit on HG.
Some tracks that have sounded phenomenal in the last session (vocals, staging, bass, coherency, atmosphere, detail). Bolded = extra stand-out
Radiohead - Exit Music (for a film)
Ewigheim - Wir, der teufel und ich
Dire Straits - Lady writer
Rammstein - Los
Eqigheim - Shlaflied
Plaid - Ratās step
Weyes Blood - Mirror Forever
Beach House - The Bells
Chairlift - Met before
Jordi Savall - Bach, JS: Sonata for Viola da Gamba in G Major, MWV 1027: IV. Allegro moderato
Incantatem - Einsame rache
Kim Gordon - Donāt play it
Purity Ring - Pink lightning
Judas Priest - Grinder
Hans Zimmer - Blade Runner
At this point, unless this session is a one-off fever dream before starting a week with the grading done but 0 classes planned for, Iāll have to retract words to the effect of the Maestro being a one trick pony. I hope the ePro Hornsā length are enough to stop me worrying about the gaping nozzles.
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Unless you are really maxing out the voltage output on the low gain I donāt really see a point of switching it to high gain mode. In q5k you have good example where you can check the RMS voltage out from the amplifier and compare in what ranges you land with both low and high gain for comfortable listening level (max android level first or at least keep it constant).
Most likely it would be 100mV or less for IEMs, so the high gain adding this extra 1V of headroom does not really mean a lot, and added noise distortion in high gain is the real deal. Even in the app they recommend leaving 1V mode on unless you are not happy with the loudness level 
I am not sure about the high gain sounding more V-shaped though - I just propose the good volume matching
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It very much seems to vary on the implementation that the amp creator has made, sometimes their amps will sound best with the lowest volume/gain combination you can get and other times (Schiit being the main one I think of) the amp will sound better with the highest gain setting and matching the volume to account for that.
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Source Police
Woop Woop
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Yes, there may be cases that in some ranges of operation of an amp (likely near max and min of the range - I would say by rule of thumb out of my ass first 10% and last 10%) it does not control the output properly. And this is when you think of changing the gain. I am not sure about different implementation of different amp gains honestly within one amp, but that is just me.
Then there are transients (high outstanding peaks of volume ā power need) in highly dynamic music recordings, but I am not sure that those are often the problems (I dissected couple of my āwell-recordedā songs in audacity and I cannot find many examples of them)
Yep, this is my personal mission to fulfil until I really hear something āscalingā with power output of the source 
Donāt hate me for that, I had very tough weekend with my daugher
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Xinhs x Akros Erasmus graph below - looks very similar to MIM Dark Magician V2 up until the treble!
I would have a listen by the end of this week.
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and it has switches (00 and 11). It sounds like the graph looks like. Delicate, neutral with tasteful bass boost. Almost too good for a first collab. Akros hit a homerun here.
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Any similar sets that you would compare it to sound wise?
Nice, I wanted to buy that one (due to the looks and configuration mainly, but still)
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Quick comparisons:
Xenns Up: Not vivid enough memory to compare. My Xenns Up sounded surprisingly balanced, but it turned out later one side was missing a few dB in the low end.
FW01: FW01 has less definition, more bleed, and the highs are comparatively speaking ātokenā highs
Fan: Incoming hopefully soon, I think it will be an interesting comparison
Serial: Especially with ePro tips, Serial often delivers very very well on bass. On a plane ride I didnāt hear any of the usual background noise, just my own personal speakers it what it seemed like. Has a certain quality to the bass (texture, punch, quantity) that I feel is often unmatched by much more expensive sets. Comparatively, after a while of the Maestro, the bass response seemed modest. Still well textured, just not as prominent. So if you havenāt mentally burned-in to be predisposed to monstrous bass, the Serial has plenty of bass. But it has much less than the Maestro.
The Maestro has a plus of never sounding dry. Lovely warm low end. Itās a miracle that it doesnāt bleed, like the FW01 and others tend to.
The more time Iāve given the Maestro, the more its treble extension is impressive, compared to all the above really. The mids can be a little breathy with female vocals, accentuating too much treble in breathing noises over sung notes, but itās a nit pick, Iām increasingly happy and surprised by the mids delivery.
If Iām missing out anything Iāve heard (and can accurately/recently remember) that has a lot of bass, let me know. I guess thereās my cotton modded DQ6?
I donāt think anything I have quite mimics this level of bass, and anything close has not kept the bass so successfully separate so as not to bleed, yet not separate enough to spilt up an overall sensible and cohesive tuning.
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