That sounds fair and reasonable.
The “Theory” is not mine however it is from a Penon reviewer who was told as much and he asked not to be involvd because obvious reasons.
The up selling of an existing set was not spoken by me. That was extrapolated by foks who checked chinese sellers…I think?
By chance I watched a youtube video ‘Akros’ reviewing/ promoting the NOB & I was interested enough from what Tony Tex said to dig a little deeper, so I ended up here. I read from AS that this is a from the ground up new design, so I decided to take a chance & get one. I am happy enough with it even though it has some flaws; higher octave staccato piano playing can sound a little harsh & does not do binaural recordings well. What I am not happy with is the uncertainty, not with the product, but with the claims that the NOB is a rehashed FNA product. I have a NOB IEM set which came with a FNA case & cable. So as a customer I am bound to be confused & still am. It would be great to get some back to back comparisons of the two sets; NOB & FNA W10. My confidence in this so called hobby is at an all time low.
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Thanks for FINALLY getting ahead of this and clearing it up - so in summary:
-) Origin story was bullshit (as someone who works in corporate finance/VC evaluating companies for investment and has built products from scratch, dealt with IP claims (in my previous work life as a corporate lawyer) and sold my own & other companies on - what you describe is not deemed as building from the ground up from your own designs). In addition to the different drivers used and uniqueness of the venting feature being bullshit as it was featured on your own partners product without you seemingly knowing (you should have contractual cover preventing this)… the handling of the product roll out with the W10 already in existence, prototypes being sold, items withdrawn from certain markets and prices being changed after the fact, was a lesson in what not to do. Please try and scale back on such aggressive marketing and sales tactics next time as it is somewhat disengenious when your doing it as a community member and not a manufacturer. Further, some errors in partnerships, PR and CS have been made (which all unprepared new businesses can suffer from - so hoping that is a learning curve which will be remedied going forward) - all in all as @Ohmboy said and I previously commented on - hardly the worst chifi scandal since customers actually got their products (though you do need to fix @hawaiibadboy QC issue as you did publicly promise to regardless that you keep suggesting he said not to and overlooking when you agreed to and even stated that you had already contacted Jinny & Penon months ago - when he has openly asked about this quite a lot of times) and most people are SQ wise happy with the product & its relative market price point.
BUT
-) Accusation that it is a direct copy with a jacked up price is also looking more and more like bullshit to the extent that the accusor becomes a serial non tagger of his message targets and ‘tweet and delete’ merchant having a kiddy strop. He then wants to start walking his own accusations and comments back - blaming it now on other reviewers not chiming in when only a few posts back he was defiant as ‘he knows more than most and has industry contacts in china’. @hawaiibadboy - I do not seem to recall you remunerating the Kinda Lava, PR2 or DQ6S customers out of your own pocket - in fact IIRC didn’t Kinda Lava customers have to pay to send their sets back to China to have them retuned…
@hawaiibadboy as someone that has put their name on a few retunings of existing sets and sold them without issue - if that is your big gripe here with @AmericanSpirit_JP - surely that would be a contradiction in terms no… Pot calling the kettle black 
. Moreover, as someone that has continuously claimed to have the insider track in this situation and been unrelenting and unequivocal in stating your certainty that this is a copy the fact that you have not had hands on or even heard the W10 set before making the accusation is a little shocking and should have been disclosed.
And we are back to - reviewer collaborators doing reviewer collaborator things as really they are not remotely close to the process and just seen as marketers regardless of what they claim… 
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Please do that and report back since you have raised the alarm. I will retract my statement in that case.
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It might also happen that the W10 units marketed internationally on Penon are same as the unit AS got. We do not know anything concrete at this point.
AS was referring to the Silver Orioles W10 he bought in late April. If it was the same as Penon, that would go against what he was saying, since that listed the same or nearly the same specs as Butastur. But I know that late April purchase was different as Asakura explicitly mentioned the specs and gave the link.
Quotes from Asakura
The one you buy should be called “W10”
It use Sonion 38 *1 (@100 rmb) as low, Sonion E50dt *2 (@100 rmb) as mid, Knowles 32406 *2 (@120 rmb) as high
1800rmb is reasonable priceI don’t think it use recycled BA either since 32406 still rarely used (quite new BA series, for example only mangird top state to use it) and you can order more Winking face
And ve8 / silver oriole (aka oriolus mellianus 10BA from Oriolus) just for SEO search lol
i do found his taobao, and there is W10 listed (bought by AmericanSpirit, so you can wait his impression)
Taobao Link: https://item.taobao.com/item.htm?id=678765405879
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15£! 
should get a set n see what the difference is, if any 
Chris are you going to do a side by side strip down full autopsy stylee with both the W10 and NOB?..ie shells, vents, crossovers and driver etc…if so, looking forward to you publishing your audio coroners report it should make for some very interesting reading…
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I think just the sound comparison and graph comparison will be sufficient. No need for destructive testing 
Just make sure you read that report quickly before he gets second thoughts and deletes it…
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I’d like to know if the drivers and crossovers are by the same manufacture of not…
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I’ll do it myself with one half and send the other two left sides to Hifri so he can do a video.
Still no update on replacement set and I DM’d on Twitter.
I unfollowed him in September, at some point he unfollowed me. I am able to message him though and will be n here daily
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Sounds like a plan my man 
after that once you finally receive your warranty replacement hopefully we can put this whole sorry saga to bed 
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He deleted what he had previously posted AFAIK…guess he was getting tired of repeating himself and getting no joy
That’s a crazy specific gif, nice job!
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27 Days ago
Jinny was happy to replace it. I said no rush no biggie in August. I gave it away and wanted to give the proper set.
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@AmericanSpirit_JP I appreciate you coming back and trying to explain things a little. I listened to the NOB, and I felt it was a good IEM - whilst it wasn’t for me, reflected by my letter grade I gave it, there’s no denying it’s a good IEM for the money and considering the claimed hardware inside, maybe even good value for money which is rare in this hobby.
I am not going to sit here and claim I know the entire story front to back - if you mentioned the W10 In your previous post, then I apologize. I must have missed that portion of the story. I stepped away from the hobby and this forum for a few months and during that time, the NOB thread was updated and the NOB was also released. I was under the impression it was a passion project being built from the ground up. All the recent drama was something I may have gotten sucked into a little too hard.
I’ve been losing companions on this forum left and right the last few weeks and the last thing I want to do is continue to make internet enemies and have to ignore certain folks to keep the peace.
If the NOB was in fact a genuine passion project that you tried your best with, then I commend you and I wish you the best on your next project if there is one in the future. I always vouched for you in the past with your recs because as far as I’m concerned, before the NOB, you batted 1.000 - SR5, 41T, H570 tips various cables…. All of these worked for me and they are all legit finds with genuine good quality. I apologize if I came off aggressive in my previous posts, that wasn’t the intention, I just wanted something of an explanation I suppose.
I don’t believe I have the full story yet, but you just coming back to address the concerns has proved me wrong as I predicted you’d never come back, but you did so I’m man enough to say I was wrong.
Anyways - I hope QC issues can get sorted out soon enough and this forum can go back to normal soon enough. I miss talking about music and gear rather than the drama. I avoid reality TV for a reason… best of luck. I hope things can get rectified soon 
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How so buddy…I’ve not seen ‘enemies’ as such on this thread just folk with differing opinions and QC issues?
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Lots of misunderstandings through the internet where tone is definitely not translated well unfortunately. It is what it is - I don’t dwell on it too much but it definitely does suck sometimes. I should add it’s not specifically just from this thread either.
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Don’t sweat it, Dom. The Internet is what it is, which is why I don’t engage in social media. There are no enemies here, bud. Ya big jerk! 
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