Well, you can already get $150 4TB SSDs made with domestic NAND in China. IEMs aren't even in the same ballpark in terms of manufacturing precision, why would it not be dirt cheap to make?
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7Hz x Crinacle Zero:2 IEM Review
- Thread starter amirm
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Well, you can already get $150 4TB SSDs made with domestic NAND in China. IEMs aren't even in the same ballpark in terms of manufacturing precision, why would it not be dirt cheap to make?
That's awesome insight. I guess the question becomes: why are so many IEMs so expensive? They should go away just like herpes. (bad joke, I've been drinking) There should be an actual performance advantage to spending more money. Is there? Is there some IEM that significantly out performs these? I could live with my Hola, but when you see things of this cost that should get a little closer to perfect.... why not?
Like almost everything under the sun: Marketing tax
NoteMakoti
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I want to find out, honestly. I remember many people debating this when the u12t and Truthear Zero were reviewed, and when I tried them both in real life, the u12t blew the Truth Zeroes out of the water. Maybe that's not special at 40 times the price, but ever since then, that's the dragon I've been chasing.
Nango
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Not that bad Joke .
Nango
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There IS no way you pay 20x for a hyped IEM vs Zero:2 and admit the Zero:2 we're even close. It is not consistent with the Human Nature.
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IAtaman
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In consumer world, things escalate quickly.
Say you manufacture a product, and it costs you $10 in bill of materials and direct manufacturing costs. Depending on your volume and fixed overheads, your average cost of goods sold can easily be double that. This will be things like the rent of your manufacturing space, amortization of the equipment you bought etc. So now you have a product that costs you on average $20 dollar a piece, and you want to sell it at 50% margin for all the trouble you went into to produce the product to make sense, meaning that the buying price of the retailer would be $40. He needs to pay shipping, customs and other transportation expenses, which is betweeen 10-35% in most cases depending on the country, but lets say 20% average, so the retailers landed cost is $50. Retailers work with 40% - 50% margins normally, so the normal price you see on the website will be around $99. That is 10 times the actual cost of manufacturing the product.
IAtaman
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Depending on your source, you can either use some free software, or you might need to buy a product that actually has EQ capabilities, like Qudelix 5K.
For software, check these :
EQ Software for Windows, Linux, macOS, iOS/iPadOS and Android.
Any suggestions are welcome. Post suggestions here. I will gather the details and add them. Thanks. :D This will be organized as results come in. @sweetchaos made a guide for PEQ filter data input and operation. For crossover software go here. Windows: AutoEQ four easy steps to make your...
audiosciencereview.com
For EQ settings, Amir shared his recommendations. There are quite a lot of measurements of these, so you can also find other recommendations. Be careful though because measurement rig used might have an impact on the actual tonality and therefore the EQ settings that might be applied.
A great place to search for reliable EQ settings is AutoEQ.
Nango
Major Contributor
Yes, the more evidences arise the cheap are good/better the more your brain will work against these evidences by elaborar ING an alternative truth. At the end you can say only like "but to me, it Sounds better/cleaner/whatever" it might make sense logically.
I ordered both the zeros and the zero:2s, the zero:2s arrived today;
I'm not someone who likes to listen with headphones, having my ears covered bothers me a lot and I would never have thought of buying earphones that go inside the ear, I hope to get used to them a bit because the sound of these zero:2 it's fantastic, transparent, dynamic, natural and balanced, I don't feel the need to equalize anything. I listen to classical music.
I'm not someone who likes to listen with headphones, having my ears covered bothers me a lot and I would never have thought of buying earphones that go inside the ear, I hope to get used to them a bit because the sound of these zero:2 it's fantastic, transparent, dynamic, natural and balanced, I don't feel the need to equalize anything. I listen to classical music.
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The Aria is the one I've been looking at as an upgrade to these. Better build and comfort, I think. After EQ I think they'd all sound very similar.
I have the Aria and the Build quality is great as far as I'm concerned. You feel its weight in the ear, but much lighter than the JVC FDX-1. The FDX-1 is so adjustable that you can get the fit absolutely perfect and comfortable with any tip, but you still feel that weight. I'd personally take my Hola over all of them. It has a nice, but plastic build quality, and is light and comfortable in my ear. The Hola is also better balanced tonally out of the box. I might look into the Chu 2 as far as build quality and sound are concerned. The build quality is similar to the Aria but the tonal balance should be better out of the box.
Jean-Paul Petrosyan
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I've noticed a kind of obsession with mental aberrations and similar phycological phenomena here. While it's important to bear those in mind, it's even more important to know and remember that you are (all of us) not immune to them as well.
I don't want to explicate further and go on about this issue in detail to avoid spaming the thread with more off-topic rants and embarrassing myself with bad English, so I'll limit myself to anecdotal evidence (which seems to be accepted here just fine, at least if it doesn't contravene with the general consensus) for this little argument. I've never defended an expensive purchase before others or myself if I was/eventually became dissatisfied with it. On the contrary, I try to make it known that the product/service in question is a ripoff or, in certain cases, an outright scam. All it takes is to be able to accept the fact that you can make mistakes since your knowledge, experience and abilities are always limited AND that lying to others and oneself always ultimately turns out for the worst.
In this thread we've already seen a person state that they see no point in keeping their Moondrop Variations after getting a pair of Zero 2's. I don't believe that mindset to be such an exceptional rarity characteristic of only those few who have achieved the highest degree of enlightenment. I would share the sentiment as well, if I wasn't concerned with the slightly better treble extension on Variations, looks and build didn't matter to me at all AND I haven't bought Vari already (or could sell them for at least 60% of the price I paid). I feel like Zero 2's are tuned better overall, or rather have a better tonal balance OOTB. I find Vari's treble to be executed better, though, and since I EQ anyway...
Would I pay 20x times more for Variations now? I honestly don't know.
It's also important to keep in mind that Harman IE is not universally congruent with both subjective and objective factors determining the perceived audio quality and enjoyment for every single person, e.g. individual tastes and HRTFs.
Premium headphone and earphone brands typically go for some kind of "tastefully colored" sound in their products instead of aiming for neutrality. Those who are actually competent at what they do sometimes manage to achieve just that - a pleasing and in a sense unique presentation of sound with it's own distinct character that still manages to avoid obvious faults like huge peaks/dips in FR or easily apparent overall unnaturalness. And even the latter may not be an issue for some, especially if they just end up enjoying it more.
You could argue that it's possible to achieve that yourself with EQ, but it's already a slight inconvenience in any form, and many times more so if you embark on a journey towards discovering your own preferred/optimal sound, which is ultimately endless. That can become incredibly frustrating pretty quickly.
I'd eagerly bypass that for any price if I could.
I'm not actually defending boutique audio companies here, but I both enjoy and find it highly important to play devil's advocate.
Premium headphone and earphone brands typically go for some kind of "tastefully colored" sound in their products instead of aiming for neutrality. Those who are actually competent at what they do sometimes manage to achieve just that - a pleasing and in a sense unique presentation of sound with it's own distinct character that still manages to avoid obvious faults like huge peaks/dips in FR or easily apparent overall unnaturalness. And even the latter may not be an issue for some, especially if they just end up enjoying it more.
You could argue that it's possible to achieve that yourself with EQ, but it's already a slight inconvenience in any form, and many times more so if you embark on a journey towards discovering your own preferred/optimal sound, which is ultimately endless. That can become incredibly frustrating pretty quickly.
I'd eagerly bypass that for any price if I could.
I'm not actually defending boutique audio companies here, but I both enjoy and find it highly important to play devil's advocate.
Expensive audio products have their own place and raison d'etre, at least for now, as well as the right to exist. Can't say the same about their arrogant and overbearing fanatics, but this extends to all kinds of fanatics.
I'm just glad that you don't have to pay a lot of money for a good sound these days because it brings more fun and joy to people, myself included. I don't believe it to be necessary to look down upon, mock and deride fellow hobbyists for their choices and preferences.
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Just a quick interjection to touch on your last meaty paragraph - EQ is a great way to understand and determine what your ultimate preferences are. This is so because it's free and quick to apply a different EQ and then to quickly compare it to your previous. So with different EQ experiments with different headphones based around measurements (mostly done on GRAS for best validity), then you can really narrow down on the general target curve that you prefer. They'll always be unit to unit variation to get in the way, along with some peculiarities of how some different headphone models interact with your own anatomy vs the measurement fixture (eg GRAS), but you'll likely work out the kind of target curve that works for you. Ultimately though, all of that experience is not strictly necessary - instead you can purchase a good measuring headphone, use an Oratory EQ and then tweak the bass and maybe one of two other areas and then you've got close to your best heaphone - so you don't have to go on a major oddissey of adventure unless you want to take it to the nth degree (which some of us do.)
Yeah for a 20x difference price I should be immediately blown away in every way possible by the much more expensive pair, not splitting hairs over minor variations of treble or bass etc. That what's I got when I demo'ed a Blessing 3 Dusk versus a Zero 1.
Splitting hairs?
Ditto. I have Roon, so I am getting these to try with Amir's EQ settings.
These with active noise canceling would be a dream for listening on flights.
Art of sound
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