I initially used my ie600 with my gryphon and it was nearly as detailed and resolving as my Mest MkII - no kidding. I was surprised.
Then recently i have tried it with my es100 as well as my q5k and… There were serious cutbacks in the resolution and details.
If you have a more powerful source, I would suggest trying that out before coming to a final opinion on the ie600!
I personally find the IE600 a little too much on the technical, analytical and cold for my personal tastes. I prefer the DM OG but thats just my subjective preferences of musicality > technicality.
Planar won’t slam as hard as decent sized DD, so that’ll mean a hybrid/tribrid if you want resolution, imaging, and slam (but maybe IE600 or DM can pull those off!).
Edit: As an example, I directly compared Canon (1+4) vs Olina (and by extension, the O2 as I have owned both previously and have notes). Imaging would be Canon > Olina =~ O2. (This is not based on memory but on notes, where I wrote that I can’t consistently differentiate between Olina & O2 when it comes to imaging.) Stage is taller on the Canon, so what I end up when listening to this track is female voices just circling above my eye level in a lovely holographic way. I don’t have a >250 USD price DD on me, but maybe @nymz can elaborate based on DM and Tea OG / Tea 2
Like I always trust your own ears. We do not internet sound the same. This is proof. The 600 is not on my interest list but why who knows. I do know for me the last set of tips on the Timeless really changed things. I liked it but it now images better ( it great but good) and sounds so much fuller. I liked planars a lot when I had speakers but not just planars or all planars. The moonlight has captured my attention as the Ej has and to an extent the Variation The Tea well it always an interest but ne er seems to get past that. I am more interested in the Canon. Why who knows?
Z1R comes to mind, although I never heard, just pulling top names out of my a**.
Timeless/S12 are very resolving, especially for price, and also have treble help and a midbass clean cut, to give that analytical feeling.
Of course. It will murder timbre due to decay. Example that comes to mind: FDX1. Too fast of a decay feels unatural.
Hard to get great slam with planars, that’s where DDs shine. Imaging is very import to a lot of libraries, but I still think planars shine with eletronic/EDM.
Stock tips, Cayin RU6, stock nozzle, literally grab out of the box and plug in, literally no A/B, fully blind. Point is to see if this feelings go away once I A/B or test more stuff tonight and measures. This is raw and wrote as I listen.
Mid-bass is punchy/slammy
Mids well done, have some detail and a bit of analog feel to it (maybe RU6 is helping with that);
Good female vocals, not too soft, not too much bite;
Very nice separation, some air;
Treble is energetic. Extension seems good, but lower treble has a smidge more power than I usually like, but not offensive at all;
Fleetwood Mac - Dreams intro Cymbal strike felt very detailed and long lasting, a proper splash. Loving the decay, not the energy, but that might be easy to fix for my library with nother nozzles;
Woodkid - Run Boy Run sounds amazing! Wow. Was not expecting this from a single DD and most transducers fail when it gets busy;
Yosi - Crossing: Stage depth is very nice (I’ve been dealing with budget stuff lately so I almost dropped down a tear); Left to right pans show Very GOOD imaging.
Wide but not too holographic (Hello Mr. Titan S in steroids!). Yosi - Bubbles confirmed it;
Lykke Li - Silent my song show that vocals are pending to neutral more than the “In your face ripping your head off” style. Stage depth also helps. Separation!!
Michael Bublés’ Feeling good has some weight to his voice, but not thicc. His upper harmonics are more enphasised than his lower ones. Female vocals feel better than male’s; Still very very good!
Bass has texture and speed - enough to have clear attack and decays, but not TOO fast to feel unatural; Sub-bass goes low;
Has dynamics. You feels various notes at various levels, not 1 note flabby for sure; Zomg Hyper - FCKD;
Ozzy Osbourne - Dee details is not as hyperealism as Planars, but you still notice it. Same goes for Hania Rani’s tracks (these sound better than Dee for sure, love it);
Separation and imaging are raving oh Jazz tracks!
First take: Over Hana 2021 or Kato for sure, Olina not sure due to 3D, but it will probably sweat (Olina costs less than half tho lol). Etymotic feels a diferent beast, will need to A/B.
On a personal note: I love it and keep in mind this is stock nozzle. I have a feeling the more relaxed one will fit my library even more.
Too bad it’s a limited edition, damn. Insane driver tech. Packaging is insanely good, let alone for price.
I have to imagine that, since they already had the tuning and tech, if the reception is as positive as I think it will be they’ll do a release without the special green colorway.
The -3 hour “drive” at the end of the day is hard to beat.
For a while my goto was a Tripowin Mele and Fiio BTR5, which was was $50 IEM and a $110 source.
That said I am probably atypical, given that bought the BTR5 first. I got it for the two Bluetooth inputs feature, so I didn’t buy it as a source. I sort of stumbled into having a decent portable DAC/amp. Which was sort of gateway into this hobby.
Despite owning the BTR5, I still have an Apple dongle, and it is something that most people should own at least as a reference point.
I can tell you guys that I had some amazing time last week with MEST OG. They clearly outperform anything I own and owned up until this point in every regards apart from comfort. They bring me joy in listening to my whole library on shuffle just to get this “I have never heard that before!” kind of feeling and that is the highest praise I can give to anything.
The best part of them is that they are resolving like crazy (I really cannot imagine how would something like Enole VS sound), while still being musical and not tiring. I had this problem with Olina, that when I cranked up the volume the highs were piercing me like hell (I did not mod it though).
All in all they are still not worth the price asked (especially the original 1300$ - I paid 615$ and still this is way too much for 10% better experience). After long thinking I am team S12 for all rounder for conscious masses - I don’t necessarily feel like you need extra power for it as on NW-A55/on simple dongle they sound exactly good as on balanced Q5K.
Do I regret the purchase - hell nah, I know I would end with one of those anyway at some point.
Do I believe it would remain my end game and I won’t have itch for something better? I honestly do - even while buying Tea I knew there are some better stuff I would like to try. This was like a final nail in the coffin of the idea that you could expect the music to sound completely different with different earphones. It only works up to certain degree and you could end your journey at 50$ stuff and be happy about that as well.
Some further thoughts about source power/matching and belief that “ESTs are power hungry”
did comparison testing Q5k balanced (240mW available) vs NW-A55 (37mW available) on my 3d printed jig to do very primitive volume matching and no real positive difference was found by my amateur ears toward qudelix.
BTW the Q5k app shows the RMS voltage output and the values are far far lower than what you can imagine on levels where it starts to be painful
NW-A55 looks to me like a perfect DAP in terms of form-factor, battery, and usability apart from this ridicolous WM proprietary connector… Sound signature? I don’t know, my ears are kind of useless at this point as it sounds the same (same great with good dense file) against anything else I tried, maybe a bit more warmish/analogue if I convince myself that it is true what they say on the internet.
I would need to do more A/B of sources and different IEMs at some point - probably when I would get rid of my girls 15years from now as it is so tempting in my free time to just sit down, take MEST and relax for this 40 min than to swap gear back and forth.
I feel really sorry for that stuff that reviewers need to go through over and over again - therefore big thanks for guys like nymz, Goku, hbb or anyone who contributes so heavily towards this hobby with their free time.
Another fun note:
I checked internet archive and this abomination what the stock cable of UMM is used to cost 420$ on musicteck at some point. It is so rigid, that it is physically unable to lay flat on the table, it oxidized and it has chin slider and splitter made of shrink tube (sic!)…I mean wtf it is worse quality and usability than my 15$ kbear cables.
