LOL, I guess you gave up on waiting for Z to create an official thread XD. The annoying part is he did actually acknowledge he hadnāt been keeping up.
Eh, dude is busy so why not make an unofficial thread? Lol
Ok, so my latest efforts to tweak the Ether CX to be my ideal closed back headphone was to replace the cable. As I had mentioned in previous posts, I was unhappy with the microphonics of the DUMMER cable that came with my Ether CX and I didnāt find the Periapt cable much better for microphonics.
Do not get me wrong, the Periapt cable has a premium, solid feel and the lower part has a nice drape to it, but it still has microphonics issues that I just have to point out. I enjoyed listening to my Ether CX with it, but I had to make nearly meditative effort to hold the split away from myself and not move. It was a strange feeling when I say wanted to stream or game in my Ether CX as I was trying to be still so I didnāt distract myself. And yeah, it may just be me being sensitive to microphonics, but this headphone has given me an appreciation of the issues you may run into and I have become more sympathetic to those wanting to find the right cable.
To that end, I first tried AliExpress, because cheap and maybe decent? Below is the review I left:
āFirst of all, this is a very nice cable in the looks department that I could easily recommend for those who want the contrasting appeal when using an Ether. I received this product very quickly by my standards and the sellerās contact was always prompt and helpful. I have nothing bad to say of the experience. I will say this about the cable: it has as much microphonics as a Periapt cable but less then the MrSpeakers DUMMER cable. I was looking to buy an IEM-like cable to get rid of microphonics but this cable wasnāt the optimal solution; however, for the price (especially when on sale) I donāt think it really can be beaten after fixing the divider bead from moving, rattling, and annoying me. Part of the reason that it does seem to transfer the amount of microphonics is that the teflon coating is harder than I had anticipated (the silicon FiiO IEM cables as an example).ā
Anyways, TL:DR; the AliExpress cable still had a lot of microphonics issues. So I decided to just do what I first thought of doing. I went to MrSpeakers and bought a VIVO cable: mrspeakers.com/shop/accessories/cables/vivo.html
The MrSpeakers VIVO cable is well worth the money for not having to think about microphonics. It is really quiet! Iāve never really been interested of what is inside because of physics until I realized that some cables are indeed free of most of the microphonics that plague the majority of cables. And I am aware that I just wrote that last sentence, but I need to follow it up with ābut now I think there might be something to what is in a cableā.
If you are going to buy the cable to rid yourself of microphonics anyways, then if I were to make words go to the effect that āthis cable made my Ether CX sound better than before even after not having to worry about microphonicsā, then I am guessing that Iāve lost most people reading along because Iād have stopped and thought ābullshitā even two days prior to now.
The bass sound quicker and has more presence and rumble than before. The highs sound tighter and that slight bit more accurate where Iām splitting hairs to find it, but it sounds cleaner. The mids dare I say feel fuller in a warm sense while still being coherent to what Iāve perceived in the music before. And it isnāt a volume change as Iāve noticed the same things at -40 dB on my Monolith 788 Desktop as I had at the regular -35 dB setting I use and at -30 dB.
Listening to Pendulumās Granite just sounds better. The build up to the wall-of-sound and bass is just more exciting, and the bass is just more sounding. Words are hard right now, so on to Gesaffelstein Oprā¦the highs and lows just sound right? Iām not sure myself what is going on least I admit the contents of cables really do matter, but the sound of coins or chips stacking in the song are just better defined than with the other cables.
I just tabbed away while listening to Mika Nakashimaās Kiss of Death (Produced by Hyde) to look at the MrSpeakers page and try to wrap my head around what is going on, and I have to agree with the ādescriptionā of smoothāthis cable added a bit of extra energy and smoothed it out from the bottom of the frequency range upwards.
As for the other claim of āspacious soundā in the description, um, is it? Skrillex Dirty Vibe, the percussion hits might be a hair further out from my ears, but they now have a gained a slight vertical dimension above my head as they exited from the space that used to be somehow in and behind my head. David Bowieās Iām Afraid of Americans (Nine Inch Nails V1 Mix) has the super distorted guitar that has moved from outwards, but at 2:12 the repeating, fading āAmericansā doesnāt just pass through my head but it actually takes more of an angular, circular path than I previously realized.
The hot mess of a song that is Girlsā Generation I GOT A BOY actually has that shimmering echo characteristics everywhere and when focused on vocally an illusion of depth can be felt and the clapping happens out further from my head. By the way, SNSD can now be found on Tidalā¦ Ok, so I actually thought I was going crazy until I listened to Miles Davis Stella By Starlight with the soft brushed snares on the right side plus all of the echos just extending out the room further than I ever heard before on the Ether CX.
This is nearly life deranging as now I will have to listen to just about everything again. How much changed? Well, if I had to quantify it, then the sound stage and separation is like an extra 5% at the widest but more importantly the VIVO cable gave me just like an extra inch out of my head things that otherwise felt like it was on the surface of my ears, a rounder sense of imaging around the back or through my head as a potential difference that I didnāt otherwise know existed, the added energy with smoother sound is more than my switch from the Dekoni Elite fenestrated pads to Elite Hybrid but less than 10% if-I-had-to-put-a-number-on-it, and an accentuated wet sound.
So to end with, I will allow myself to repeat gushing about one experience with the Ether CX that I am having again and now I have to face that I just didnāt know music could sound this good: Anne-Sophie Mutter with the Wiener Philharmoniker performing Sarasate: Zigeunerweisen, Op.20 on Tidalā¦I found myself just pulled in by her phrasing and the endless flowing and joining of notes that make the musicājust so legato and smooth. Add in the extra wetness, those decaying echos outwards and the deliciously warm lows that are still coherentā¦it is just do damn captivating. As a check to ensure Iām not just a totally crazy person, I watch a YouTube performance of of the piece by SoHyun Ko with their rather honest and unflattering microphone setup to listen to the young soloistās performance. The lightning reflex corrections are still there, her youthful phrasing remained, and tone remained about the same as I recalled as I would expect of that recording.
Drop + MrSpeakers Ether CX has showed me a lot. I heavily discounted burn-in as a thing to this until my own anecdotal extensive sound change. I didnāt think that cables did anything different aside from microphonics until I listen to the MrSpeakers VIVO cable because physics. I canāt explain it away unless I was to overly generalize and theorize about diminishing returns with finding the right price to performance balance. Part of me really wants to punch myself and say there is no difference, but I canāt or I would just say so, so I donāt disrupt my a priori beliefs.
Iām skeptical about that cable really sounding betterāespecially considering how most high end cables are surrounded by BS marketing. Itās hard for me to believe that a tiny improvement in impedance or the like could have a noticeable impactā¦ But I have seen multiple professional reviewers claim cables make difference. so maybe you all just have better hearing than I doā¦ ĀÆ\ _(ć) _/ĀÆ
Well impedance can make a difference, more then the actual metal of the cable itself if itās constructed properly. I have experienced this, but it was a small change and it wasnāt my cable or headphones so idk
I am skeptical too and will say this: I felt the cable was worth it for ridding myself of microphonics alone and anything else that sounds crazy with an assertion without evidence (such as my long winded anecdote) should be discarded without the need for counter evidence. But if you do buy a VIVO cable and have an anecdote to share, please do.
From my experience and training in electronics, witnessing testing, and assembly standards, there really shouldnāt be a change unless something is out of specification. I have no clue to elucidate what the mechanism for change would be between the two beyond maybe a percent to three of conductivity (copper vs more-expensive-for-1-to-2-percent-more-conductivity OFC vs silver) and maybe an ohm or two of resistance difference between the materials (copper would be something like 2 ohms higher resistance over 1kmā¦or just about nothing at headphone wire distances).
Small change is correct. I am sure the numbers I threw out there would not objectively hold up, but I felt I had to throw some attempt to gage my subjective thoughts at the time.
I do not think the difference is due to a non conformance in the cables but some difference between materials and construction. Again, a small difference in what I perceive I hear.
Well the fact that you heard a difference at all is definitely something. A cable isnāt going to make leaps and bounds for a headphoneās sound unless the cable is made from the bottom of the barrel utter shite or constructed purposely to change the sound.
My ether c flow 1.1 came with the VIVO cable and never bothered to change it because I thought it was fine.
I used a pink noise FLAC file and a sine wave sweep on playlist repeat via Fubar2k at -20 dB software, -50 dB on the Monolith THX AAA 788 Desktop.
For reference, my regular listening volume on the hardware side is -30 dB to -40 dB and Fubar2k is usually set between -15 dB and 0 dB.
As a general guideline, take the usual listening volume and turn the volume to nearly half of that. If you are going to do continuous burn-in, then do program in a break for the drivers (can be additional time of dead air at the end of the burn in tracks) at a slightly reduced volume.
Thanks, I am going to try that out with my pair of CXs. Currently, there is not enough bass for me so hopefully burn in will change that.
Im planning on buying the Ether CX because its on sale for 700.
Iāve only ever had a B&O H6 before never had a proper audio set it.
This will be my first time buying a dac or an amp.
What dacs/amps should I buy to pair it with the CX? I definitely wonāt spend over 300. Looking maybe around that 250 to 200 range.
Are you looking for a portable or desktop amp? I think for desktop, you could get a jds labs atom and a topping d10 and be pretty happy. If you wanted a little more fun sound, you could swap out the atom for a liquid spark amp. If you wanted a portable amp, you might want something like the fiio q5s or xduoo xd05 plus, but it would cost more than a desktop solution
Just purchased while drop has the sale. Anyone try these on the es100? Hoping to at least do the burn in on them while I decide on something more powerful.
Iāve tried some ether c flow 1.1s on an es100 balanced and while it does work itās not something I would want to use imo
Fair enough. Iām eyeing the q5s with the thx amp module or the monolith desktop as well.
Those are pretty nice for sure, I think you wouldnāt have any issues with that, especially the thx desktop. Personally my favorite portable for the ether is the ifi idsd micro bl
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So these are on sale. Would these be a good alternative to the LCD2C? I owned the LCD2C for a while, but sold them off recently. I was thinking of upgrading to the LCD X, but now that these are on sale, how do these compare?
These have a more dynamically compressed sound that reveals detail fairly easily but TBH can sound a bit strange compared to the LCD x. I think I prefer the X more. The x is also more intimate than other audeze, but itās very detailed, I think moreso than the cx
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Mine just showed up, initial impression is that they have very good imaging, the soundstage isnāt particularly wide, but theyāre closed backs, the other noticeable thing was they are very fast.
They are also very comfortable for me, but I find the cable connectors rub on my shoulders if I move much, which is a little irritating.
I know they are supposed to have a somewhat long break-in period, currently tonally, they are on the thin side, but given Iāve listened to all of two tracks, Iām interested to see how much they change.
I also havenāt touched the optional foam inserts to see what difference they make.
Overall initial impression, they sound OK, though certainly not the Wow of the Elex, but I need a set of closed backs and they might be what Iām looking for there.