TDM play dumb games win dumb prizes
Bro is cooked
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I received the Ziigaat Estrella courtesy of the Audio Geeks Tour Group and have been listening for the past week or so.
I received the IEM without the packaging so I can’t comment on this, the IEM came in the included case with the stock cable and tips.
The shells themselves are nice, there’s some glitter making them quite interesting, rather than a dull black. The IEM’s fit really well for me and I find them very comfortable. They do stick out a fair bit, but its a non-issue.
There’s been a fair bit of criticism towards the supplied cable and I can understand why - it looks and feels quite cheap. However, having said that, its fine, it does the job and I’ve seen much worse.
I didn’t even bother trying the stock tips, so I couldn’t comment on them.
Overall what you get is pretty basic, however for me it’s not important, its how it sounds - and I have to say, I think the Estrella is excellent value for what you get in terms of sound.
It’s noticeable immediately that its a V-shaped sound signature, with elevated sub-bass that digs deep and solid mid-bass punch without the lower mid bloat which I dislike. It also has quite pronounced treble. Its very well extended on both ends. I wouldn’t say its too spicy in my opinion, but it can come across a little sharp. What this does though is create a real fun dynamic sound with extremely good detail, imaging and separation. I have primarily used the Eletech Baroque tips, but I did find the mid treble can be tamed a touch if switching to a more narrow bore tip like the Dunu Candy tips.
The Estrella instantly reminded me of my Monarch Mk3 that I previously owned, and from looking at the graphs I can really see why, its extremely close and it sounds it too. Now I’m not saying its quite reaches the MMK3’s level, in terms of overall resolution or refinement (from memory) but its not far off - and for the price its an absolute steal, for me it really does sound like a low-cost MMK3.
I currently only have three IEM’s, with the lowest priced (and therefore closest) being the Pilgrim Noir, so I only briefly compared it to the Noir. Having done so, i was surprised that the Estrella has better detail, separation and imaging, now this is probably primarily due to the tuning, however it was still mighty impressive and I was surprised it was noticeable thin this department.
The Estrella might just be the best IEM I’ve heard in its price range, it punches well above its price. It’s truly amazing what you can get these days for a relatively modest price. This is an excellent collab by Jay, hats off to him. I look forward to hearing his future collabs.
Thanks again to Audio Geeks tour group for the opportunity to demo the IEM.
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Thanks for the impressions man 
Glad you’re digging them!!
The point with the Estrella was to provide as much value sound wise as possible while being fun, so I’m glad they worked out for you 
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Hmm… going purely by graphs which rarely is valid of itself, I’d take Explorer over Odyssey and Arcadia over KE4.
I’ve been having far too much fun with the Explorers that last several days.
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Nice one! Seems like you and I had a very similar experience with it 
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So far Odyssey is much better to me, like a straight up upgrade from the Explorer
Arcadia is similar to KE4, feels even warmer. Ps, the plating on the Odyssey is really nice, pics soon 
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I was about to agree with John and the I saw this comment… ayo, looking forward to that review, my boy! The Explorers have a special place in my heart, it’s a sick set that’s perfect for laid back listening… I’ll be patient for your vid but I am curious as to why you say it’s a direct upgrade 
I won’t lie, the Arcadia’s graph looks dope af
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Just looking at the graphs… Even tho I can’t read them that well… It looks like the Odyssey may be a good iem under 250 for metal music. But again I can’t read graphs like you guys who have been in the game for a while.
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You want more mid-bass with metal/rock and that treble might be a bit too much on it.
Arcadia treble looks more fitting for that while the Estrella bass shelf looks better.
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Good point. I heard from others in the metal section that you just want a be careful with bass especially with that style because it can sound congested. But yea the Arcadia graph looks good as well!
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That is definitely the risk when it comes to having boosted mid-bass on iems.
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I wouldn’t know the first thing about metal music but in my experience, you’d really benefit from a driver type that’s faster in the bass region for those sick double kicks like a planar or a well tuned BA. The trade off is of course less impact and air being pushed (most of the time) unless you go really big on the wallet with a pure bery driver IEM, like the XENNS up for example.
Bery drivers are usually very snappy in terms of their response but, I’m getting too into the weeds here
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That is because Beryllium is a VERY stiff material. (ironically a lot of beryllium DDs are only coated in the dome and that is only doing treble but still see people attribute the bass to it.)
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True true, I’m mostly talking about the pure Bery driver IEMs out there, I understand there hasn’t been a lot of them produced, but I know the UP was one of them. From my understanding, it’s because beryllium is difficult to work with, and even toxic(?) but I haven’t looked into that too much admittedly.
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Yes, Beryllium is highly toxic and is dangerous for the ones making the driver. (proper airflow and other protection like masks and gloves should prevent any issues though.)
Another issue is that sometimes you see “beryllium” drivers that only have like a dot of beryllium on the entire diaphragm, in those cases not only is it a scam, it can even be worse than if it wasnt there at all.
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If you want rock/metal the Arcadia would be better, but imo I like Odyssey the best, it’s cleaner and more mids/vocal focused with good treble extension, also scales really good. So far tuning wise for me around $200 it’d be:
- Odyssey
- KE4/CKLVX
- Arcadia
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Ya it’s called Bery because people had to be buried to make it
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