Iāve got a set of original Teas and have pulled the plug on the Teas2 from Linsoul. Iāll try to remember to post my experiences when they arrive!
The Teas I have are one of the earlier model that came in a different case and didnāt come with the lip at the end of the nozzles to hold the tip in place. The Teas have quite deep nozzles and result is that almost every time I take the IEMs out of my ears the tip comes off and either stays in my ear canal so I have to try picking them out or worse they fall out on to the floor and Iāve always been scared this will happen while out and about and I will lose the tips entirely.
Mangird recognised this was an issue and changed the shape in later iterations, so one improvement iāll notice straight away hopefully is my tips should actually stay on the IEM. The overall shape has changed too and the nozzles arenāt as deep, so that should also help.
What Iām getting from this and HBB reviews is āIf you already have the first generation, you can continue to use it with peace of mind. You donāt have to rush to change the second generation.ā
haha itās better than what you expected?? i thought it read like he wasnāt strongly reccing this at the price pointā¦
Also, on his ranking spreadsheet, the score for MK2 is 3.55 - i think he hasnāt inputted a number in the āBiasā cell yet, which is probably why itās not showing 5? Itās better than OG Tea (4.3), but not by much. Olina is ranking higherā¦
no iāve been following him for a while too; even considering his even-keeled approach, the last two paragraphs arenāt laudatory by any means. But, this is why one should read a range of reviews before deciding on where to spend $$$$
As you might infer, I think that the tuning of the Tea 2 is pretty solid and that the people at XENNS arenāt your usual, mud-slinging warriors. But technicalities are where the Tea 2 stumblesā¦To this end, I find the Tea 2ās note texturing and ability to capture trailing ends of instruments is mediocre. It is fair to note that too much texture yields undesirable grain. But if youāre asking me, the Tea 2 has leaned too far in the opposite direction, and this lack of perceived detail probably isnāt aided by the recession in the lower-treble. Outside of this, the imaging and dynamics of the Tea 2 can best be summarized as āadequateā for $300, but nothing that really grabs my attention.
I suppose the question at this point is whether the Tea 2 is the Moondrop B2 alternative that its predecessor was purported to be. Mostly, I guess? The Tea 2 is certainly not a bad IEM. It does offer a more laidback presentation relative to the B2 thanks to a more desirable bass tonality, relaxed upper-midrange, and a foil to the B2ās 6kHz peak. But even if the IEMs mostly trade blows for raw tuning, I do feel that the B2 comes out on-top by a decent margin for technical performance, especially in terms of raw detail retrieval. So while I think the Tea 2 is worth a listen, the bias score will reflect my general feelings: I want to like this IEM, and I commend XENNS for trying a different style of tuning, but itās missing something for me.
P.S. Did you add in the 5 to that bias score cell? That would raise the overall score to 5.55. Should be more like 3-4 to land at 5/10.
Ah really? interesting. should make that clearer in his write-up, tbh. So, for his tastes, he views Tea MK2 and Olina as equally enjoyable. I guess this is in line with your initial impressions, right? They trade blows?
Curious also though graph looks promising. Some of what I have read was not flattering . I am realizing that I may well have to go some EJO7 type to get what I want. We will see. Did just get Timeless so I have something to play with as I bide my time. I really want these to be great btw.
