JBL Endurance Run 2

[IAtaman]

Sean Olive was talking about JBL Endurance Run 2 recently on Twitter.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1721692088436478016

I thought I give it a try.

Here are the measurement shared by Dr. Olive himself.

I generally find in-ears uncomfortable. This one is OK. More than OK actually, I'd say they are quite comfortable for me.
Packaging is what you'd expect from a $20 earphone. Cables do have built-in mic (not tested) and are not inter-changeable as expected.
Good passive isolation as well.

Sound wise, a bit too V shaped for me. I have dialed in a negative low shelf and a high shelf which made it better.
Not a critical listening device maybe, but definitely a better buy than all these similarly priced IEMs in my opinion. And they have magnets.

 

[Deleted member 21219]

I have never been comfortable with IEMs, but I'm going to try these. I'm "frugal", but for that price, I can't really lose.

Thanks for the heads-up!

Jim

p.s. - Just placed my order with B&H.

 

[Deleted member 21219]

Just got'em, and gave a listen. Sound is great! Bass is powerful. Unfortunately, the promise of "never hurt, never fall out" might be a little optimistic. I'll wear them a few times and see what I think of the comfort.

Jim

 

[IAtaman]

Just got'em, and gave a listen. Sound is great! Bass is powerful. Unfortunately, the promise of "never hurt, never fall out" might be a little optimistic. I'll wear them a few times and see what I think of the comfort.

Sorry to hear that they are not as comfy for you. They got this "baffle" like thing that fits perfectly into my concha (I think it is designed to hold on to your ear while you are running) which takes the load from the ear tips and makes it super comfy for me. I also switched the ear tips to large on one side which also made a difference, FYR.

 

[Deleted member 21219]

Sorry to hear that they are not as comfy for you. They got this "baffle" like thing that fits perfectly into my concha (I think it is designed to hold on to your ear while you are running) which takes the load from the ear tips and makes it super comfy for me. I also switched the ear tips to large on one side which also made a difference, FYR.

Hmmmmm. I examined the box again. No "baffle" thingee. I would value something like that highly.

Got a picture?

Jim

 

[staticV3]

Hmmmmm. I examined the box again. No "baffle" thingee. I would value something like that highly.

Got a picture?

Jim

I think IAtaman is referring to those things:


The silicone rings surrounding the IEM housings.

 

[IAtaman]

Yea

I think IAtaman is referring to those things:
View attachment 328033

The silicone rings surrounding the IEM housings.

Yes indeed. Thanks for translating me in to English

 

[Deleted member 21219]

The silicone rings surrounding the IEM housings.

I see. After the weekend, I'm going to try them again today. (I wear them in the gym.) I also lubed them with petroleum jelly (sparingly!) and that increases the comfort level somewhat. It seems my ear canal is exceedingly small. My wife says that's unusual for someone with such a big ego.

One thing I can't contest, though ... I love the sound! No irritating spikes in the FR, and no obvious distortion. For $20, it's amazing!

Jim

 

[jhaider]

I’m not surprised. I bought the original ones for our older daughter to take to school after she complained the original set I picked up for her (Truthear Zeros) were uncomfortable (as they are for me). I took a brief listen and liked them.

Do the new ones have the same magnets in the stems, so they stick to each other? It makes packing them easier.

 

[IAtaman]

Do the new ones have the same magnets in the stems, so they stick to each other? It makes packing them easier.

Yes, they do.

 

[Neddy]

I recently have been comparing 6-7 inexpensive BT earbuds (and one BT headphone pair), curious to compare to each other, and to assess 'value' vs the screechingly expensive Apple variants.

I'm only about halfway thru the comparisons, but so far, I'm kind of blow away by the quality of sound you get for like $20.
(It is EXHAUSTING to do even these crude subjectve comparisons - hats off to Amir!)

One pair seems a bit 'screechy', and had a horrific app (one of the few that had an app that claimed EQ abilities tho); but the others are mostly impressive OOB. The headphones, though a bit pricier, and a cleverly designed folding set, are just not quite as clear, for some reason -will take a second look at those, though.

Sure, I only really wear them for lawn mowing and yard work (and soon, snow blowing), but they ARE great fun to have.
I haven't yet tested voice calls, or ANC (as I really want to HEAR that snowplow bearing down on me as I shovel snow!)

Granted, all of these are probalby 10+ year old 'apple' manufacturing technologies, but heck, for that little money they are close to being disposables.

But - some of these appear to 'do' really well in the 20-30hz range, which is frankly astounding to me.
Lady Gaga whilst mowing the lawn? Why not!!??

Conclusion for now, is that, for 'everyday' use, most of these are great -and why risk multi-hundred $ buds to loss or theft?

 

[Rednaxela]

Cool tip, just ordered a pair.

Thanks for sharing!

 

[USER]

I figured this belongs on this thread: Sean Olive's Harman EQ from his twitter account (which you should all follow). This is a great and possibly the cheapest way to "hear what he hears" (theoretically, of course, given our unique ear/canal shapes).

Click to increase size.

 

[JeffS7444]

Wow, thanks for the tip! My Apple IEMs are more than a decade old, and are starting to fall apart, so the timing couldn't be better. And as we speak, the JBLs are $14.95 USD at B&H Photo.

 

[Rednaxela]

So the other day I took delivery of my pair. I also shared some initial impressions here, including thoughts on bringing out some clarity using EQ.

However that was all from listening to them at work through my laptop’s headphone out. To my surprise, when I switched to my iPhone with a lightning to 3.5mm jack adapter, most of the issues that made me reach for EQ seemed to have gone. Same for the iPad with USB-C dongle.

I am highly suspicious about my own observations and will have to investigate them further. But they were disturbing enough for me to delete the initial write-up. Sorry for that.

What I can say now is that they sound really really nice on my two iDevices. Bass is bigger than what I am used to but it’s also cleaner, and the sort of immersion this provides is quite sensational. Harman curve first-timer talking but yeah.

Regarding comfort - they fit my ears very well. The nozzles are not round but elliptical, which works for me. The pre-installed medium tips were too small. They seal well enough, but only after inserting them slightly too far, resulting in some longer-term discomfort outside the ear canal, around the entry if this makes sense. Switching to the included larger tips solved this. The magnets that make the buds cling together when not in use is a brilliant touch. Overal build quality is excellent and it all feels like it could take a beating.

All in all I'm very happy with my <€20 purchase.

Hopefully an update on the laptop sound issue later.

 

[Rednaxela]

Found it!

Turns out I was fighting the Windows 11 'Enhance audio' setting under System -> Sound -> Headphones -> Properties. After switching it off the sound is now clean as a whistle and thoroughly enjoyable.

Sorry for bothering you all with this oversight.

To conclude - I'm totally in seventh heaven now.

 

[Human Bass]

They are 13.5usd on Ali Express, free shipping even lol. Had to give them a try. Now I shall wait.

 

[Human Bass]

Wait, they are even cheaper, there is an 1usd coupon to make 12.5

https://a.aliexpress.com/_mOIGOAi

 

[JeffS7444]

I've now spent a number of hours listening, and I'm impressed! Initial impression w/o any sort of correction applied was: Smooth, bass-heavy, very listenable. But I've since applied correction per Post #13, which transforms very good sonics into great sonics. Screen shots from the MiniDSP HA-DSP configuration utility, left and right channels configured identically.

And think I've figured out the proper way to implement crossfeed in MiniDSP's HA-DSP headphone amp, with a bit of help from a 1971 article by a certain S. Linkwitz.

Clicking "Crossfeed Processing" button brings us to a new set of options. I changed Low Pass Filtering as per the S. Linkwitz article, did not touch CF FIR and CF PEQ settings. I don't recall where the Delay settings came from, but 0.03-0.05 ms seems pleasing to me. Greater delay times produce a more profound out-of-head sensation, but I thought it became distracting.

Clicking the "Back" button brings us back to the main screen again, and here I implemented SL's high shelf filter as FIR. It's my first effort using FIR, and I generated the necessary data file using rePhase. I don't know that using FIR gave me any particular advantage versus the parametric equalizer, but I was out of parametric filters, and by keeping the crossfeed processing separate, I can use the same crossfeed settings with any future headphone configurations I might want to use.

I'm not surprised that MiniDSP's HA-DSP has been discontinued: It's a complex product for tinkerers, and it's taken me a few years to feel like I've really tapped into most of what it can do!

Qudelix-5K as mentioned in Post #13 is new to me, but appears to be a good deal simpler (no crossfeed), smaller, and less expensive.

 

[KosherButcher]

I've now spent a number of hours listening, and I'm impressed! Initial impression w/o any sort of correction applied was: Smooth, bass-heavy, very listenable. But I've since applied correction per Post #13, which transforms very good sonics into great sonics. Screen shots from the MiniDSP HA-DSP configuration utility, left and right channels configured identically.
View attachment 364283
And think I've figured out the proper way to implement crossfeed in MiniDSP's HA-DSP headphone amp, with a bit of help from a 1971 article by a certain S. Linkwitz.

Clicking "Crossfeed Processing" button brings us to a new set of options. I changed Low Pass Filtering as per the S. Linkwitz article, did not touch CF FIR and CF PEQ settings. I don't recall where the Delay settings came from, but 0.03-0.05 ms seems pleasing to me. Greater delay times produce a more profound out-of-head sensation, but I thought it became distracting.
View attachment 364284
View attachment 364285
Clicking the "Back" button brings us back to the main screen again, and here I implemented SL's high shelf filter as FIR. It's my first effort using FIR, and I generated the necessary data file using rePhase. I don't know that using FIR gave me any particular advantage versus the parametric equalizer, but I was out of parametric filters, and by keeping the crossfeed processing separate, I can use the same crossfeed settings with any future headphone configurations I might want to use.
View attachment 364286
I'm not surprised that MiniDSP's HA-DSP has been discontinued: It's a complex product for tinkerers, and it's taken me a few years to feel like I've really tapped into most of what it can do!

Qudelix-5K as mentioned in Post #13 is new to me, but appears to be a good deal simpler (no crossfeed), smaller, and less expensive.

I believe the Qudelix-5K does have crossfeed.