Panasonic RP-TCM125 Review (Budget IEM)

[Robbo99999]

Headphones have a different target curve from speakers(which should be linear in an anechoic chamber) in the first place because the sound takes a different path to your eardrum. So IEMs and headphones should have a different targets as well. There's no logic behind "target curves for IEM & over ear theoretically should be the same ", they should have been the same as the speaker curve then which is obviously wrong.

Sorry, but you're continuing to show your confusions even within this one post and even with regard to your logic of argument. Of course speaker target curves and headphone target curves are different, but for the reason that one is measured with a mic in free air in your room and the other is measured at your eardrum. So it doesn't logically follow that therefore IEM & Over ear targets must be different because of this observation of yours, because of course they're both measured at the eardrum. Look, it doesn't matter that you don't understand all of it. I can't explain it anymore than I have in my previous posts. This is my last post to you on this topic for the forseeable future, just research it and try to reflect on some of the posts I've sent you where I've tried to explain it.

 

[Lunafag]

but for the reason that one is measured with a mic in free air in your room and the other is measured at your eardrum

And why do you think measurements at the eardrum are different from the mic measurements?

 

[Robbo99999]

And why do you think measurements at the eardrum are different from the mic measurements?

Seriously, leave it, either attempt to learn how it fits together or stop trolling me. Either research it yourself & try to piece it together or read my many earlier posts where I've tried to explain to you how it fits together, or perhaps someone else can help you out. I really can't explain it to you any better than I have, I'm sorry if you've not understood me, assuming that's your intention.

 

[Lunafag]

Seriously, leave it, either attempt to learn how it fits together or stop trolling me. Either research it yourself & try to piece it together or read my many earlier posts where I've tried to explain to you how it fits together, or perhaps someone else can help you out. I really can't explain it to you any better than I have, I'm sorry if you've not understood me, assuming that's your intention.

I already know why the measurements at the eardrum are different from the free mic measurements but you seem to be avoiding the question.

 

[Robbo99999]

I already know why the measurements at the eardrum are different from the free mic measurements but you seem to be avoiding the question.

Good afternoon & goodbye.

 

[Nathan Raymond]

It doesn't matter that IEM's are in your ears rather than headphones are on your ear, the research was done in the same way - attempting to replicate the sound "speakers in a room" combined with some tested user preference added onto that. That's why the target curves are quite similar in some ways between IEM's and over ear headphones....don't forget the measurements are done at the eardrum so by definition means that HRTF and pinna effects have to be taken into account, and this is reflected in the target curve.

From what I've read, the role of the pinna is for sound localization, helping the brain to figure out where sounds are coming from. In real life when the things producing sound are moving or the listener's head moves relative to the things making sound, the brain can use the information from how the sound is reaching the left and right ears and the relative pinna gain differences (left and right) to localize/spatialize the sound even better than with a purely stationary emitter/perceiver system.

Pinna gain is due to the conical form of the pinna that causes reflections of sound to be redirected towards the ear canal. These reflections vary according to frequency and angle and when the reflections off the pinna are summed, an emphasis or de-emphasis on certain frequencies occurs at the ear canal opening. That mean's a person's pinna has a set of frequency responses that are different for different directions, horizontal and vertical.

My speculations: By bypassing the pinna with in-ear earphones, localization/spatialization information that can be perceived is just what is already in a recording (which I think is why IEMs tend to work particularly well with high quality binaural recordings). It's also why I think people are able to perceive a large over-ear headphone as having sound more outside-the-head than IEMs generally do. Some IEMs are able to sound more spacious and a bit more out-of-the head because, I'm guessing, they more closely emulating a listener's natural pinna gain. Even with over-the-ear headphones a lot of the sound from the driver does get directed straight into the ear canal and effectively bypasses the pinna... so the inclusion of the pinna when perceiving sound from over-ear headphones is not as significant as when listening to sound in a normal space, and binaural recordings do still have an effect when listening on over-ear headphones. I don't think that you can just ignore the different ways pinna gain is involved with the headphone vs IEM experience.

 

[Lunafag]

Even with over-the-ear headphones a lot of the sound from the driver does get directed straight into the ear canal and effectively bypasses the pinna...

That one seems more plausible. I actually did manage to find angle-dependent HRTF measurements and while not quite what I expected you do seem to need more "spikier" pinna gain region to make it sound like the sound is coming from in front of you.

 

[Nathan Raymond]

The reason that the curves are different between IEM & over ear I don't fully understand. I think I know why the bass levels for the IEM Target Curve is higher, and that's because bass is tweaked for user preference during the Harman study, so they found users preferred more bass when using IEM's.....and I think the reason for this is what I mentioned in one of my other posts....that over ear headphones can provide some actual tactile feel of bass on your earlobes and other "skin areas" of your ear, so it might be that the complete lack of tactile bass in IEM's means that bass needs to be further boosted beyond the boost required for over ear headphones in order to enjoy the bass in the same way.

Back in 2011 Tyll Hertsens discussed this issue in his "Monster Beats by Dr. Dre Solo" review:

With regular speaker listening, you get a significant amount of visceral input from the low notes through your body. For example: chest and nasal cavity compression is audible; as is bone-conducted sonic impact. With headphones, you don’t get these. (You get a bit of bone conduction with full-size circumaurals --- tap on the skull bone behind the flap of your ear, it’s quite audible.) So I agree that headphones should have some artificially high bass boost beyond what’s technically correct to compensate for these visceral input losses. As an example, Jerry Harvey has a particular low-frequency profile he prefers, and I agree with his tastes. Mead Killion at Etymotic bumped up the lows in the ER4P over the more technically correct ER4S because people wanted more lows. So, yes, more bass can be a good thing.

So bone conduction, not feeling the bass on your skin. The bone conduction is why products like Backbeat and Woojer exist and work:

https://getbackbeat.com

https://www.woojer.com

My experience and personal theory is that the lack of bone conducted bass is why headphones/earphones always sound incomplete and lacking compared to live sound or a good set of speakers, and why different people have different perceived levels of what the "right" amount of bass is for headphones and earphones (because there is never a right amount when a whole class of sensation in a different part of your body is missing, and how much someone listens to music on headphones vs. speakers/live probably impacts their perception of what is "right" for them based on their intuitive sense memory).

 

[Robbo99999]

Back in 2011 Tyll Hertsens discussed this issue in his "Monster Beats by Dr. Dre Solo" review:



So bone conduction, not feeling the bass on your skin. The bone conduction is why products like Backbeat and Woojer exist and work:

https://getbackbeat.com

https://www.woojer.com

My experience and personal theory is that the lack of bone conducted bass is why headphones/earphones always sound incomplete and lacking compared to live sound or a good set of speakers, and why different people have different perceived levels of what the "right" amount of bass is for headphones and earphones (because there is never a right amount when a whole class of sensation in a different part of your body is missing, and how much someone listens to music on headphones vs. speakers/live probably impacts their perception of what is "right" for them based on their intuitive sense memory).

Fair enough, it's still enclosed under the definition of tactile bass though, which is what I was talking about as one of my points.

From what I've read, the role of the pinna is for sound localization, helping the brain to figure out where sounds are coming from. In real life when the things producing sound are moving or the listener's head moves relative to the things making sound, the brain can use the information from how the sound is reaching the left and right ears and the relative pinna gain differences (left and right) to localize/spatialize the sound even better than with a purely stationary emitter/perceiver system.

Pinna gain is due to the conical form of the pinna that causes reflections of sound to be redirected towards the ear canal. These reflections vary according to frequency and angle and when the reflections off the pinna are summed, an emphasis or de-emphasis on certain frequencies occurs at the ear canal opening. That mean's a person's pinna has a set of frequency responses that are different for different directions, horizontal and vertical.

My speculations: By bypassing the pinna with in-ear earphones, localization/spatialization information that can be perceived is just what is already in a recording (which I think is why IEMs tend to work particularly well with high quality binaural recordings). It's also why I think people are able to perceive a large over-ear headphone as having sound more outside-the-head than IEMs generally do. Some IEMs are able to sound more spacious and a bit more out-of-the head because, I'm guessing, they more closely emulating a listener's natural pinna gain. Even with over-the-ear headphones a lot of the sound from the driver does get directed straight into the ear canal and effectively bypasses the pinna... so the inclusion of the pinna when perceiving sound from over-ear headphones is not as significant as when listening to sound in a normal space, and binaural recordings do still have an effect when listening on over-ear headphones. I don't think that you can just ignore the different ways pinna gain is involved with the headphone vs IEM experience.

That's all well & good but we're talking about target curves, not how headphones interact with your anatomy. You don't need to consider how headphones interact with your anatomy to create a target curve, because frequency response is measured at the eardrum as part of the target curve creation so those effects are already "baked in/accounted for"....I explained how the targets were created. You only need to consider how headphones & IEM's interact with your anatomy if you're a headphone/IEM designer/producer because ideally you're trying to match the target curve, so you have to consider the effects of the design of the IEM/headphone on the frequency response that would be measured at the ear drum. Of course over ear headphones interact with your anatomy differently than IEM's in terms of which frequencies get amplified and attenuated, but that doesn't influence the shape of the target curve, instead that only affects the measurement. I also explained why the IEM & Over Ear Targets were very similar and why there were a few differences. These are some of the points I was making to Lunafag (what a name!), to try to help him/her understand. I think there's a number of people talking at cross-purposes on these topics due to it's complications.

 

[Lunafag]

because it's measured at the eardrum

Measurements at your eardrum are a function of your anatomy. There wouldn't even be a need for target curves if that weren't that case.

 

[Robbo99999]

Measurements at your eardrum are a function of your anatomy. There wouldn't even be a need for target curves if that weren't that case.

Sorry, you have no idea, all you're doing is picking up on a snippet of my post and bending it to your own needs, in fact I think you're trolling rather than trying to understand.....you're on my ignore list as they say.

 

[Lunafag]

Sorry, you have no idea, all you're doing is picking up on a snippet of my post and bending it to your own needs, in fact I think you're trolling rather than trying to understand.....you're on my ignore list as they say.

You keep saying that anatomy doesn't matter because measurements are done at the eardrum but the measurements are done at the eardrum precisely because of the anatomy, otherwise a mic would suffice.

 

[Lunafag]

Robbo99999 probably thinks that the measurements of speakers performed by HATS are themselves a target curve. Target curves take into account the effects of the device(IEM/OE) such that when the device is calibrated to that curve it will produce what HATS would record from speakers. But HATS measurements themselves are not a target curve, not until we can directly vibrate the eardrum. What I was asking is why IEM and OE targets are so similar despite OE not bypassing the pinna.

 

[amirm]

What I was asking is why IEM and OE targets are so similar despite OE not bypassing the pinna.

Which two targets are you looking at and on what fixture? You do know that the ear canal resonance exists in both, yes?

 

[Lunafag]

Which two targets are you looking at and on what fixture? You do know that the ear canal resonance exists in both, yes?

harman_over-ear_2018 and harman_in-ear_2019v2. Don't know what fixture they use. The 8k resonance is shifting depending on the insertion depth and isn't present on either target anyway.

 

[amirm]

harman_over-ear_2018 and harman_in-ear_2019v2. Don't know what fixture they use. The 8k resonance is shifting depending on the insertion depth and isn't present on either target anyway.

I can't see a graph there but a sea of numbers. If it is what Listen Inc has provided, we have their word that it is "v2" of Harman target curve. It is not based on anything official from Harman, nor are there any papers on it. I asked about the measurement gear because the new anthropomorphic pinna from GRAS has a firm stop that keeps IEMs from being inserted much into the "ear canal." This was a pleasant surprise as I noted in the review. So the ear canal resonances remain more or less consistent in both situations.

To be very clear, you cannot use Harman target curve on any other measurement gear than the one they developed it for. So knowing this information is a must in any suc discussion.

 

[Lunafag]

I can't see a graph there but a sea of numbers.

I opened them in REW for you all.

To be very clear, you cannot use Harman target curve on any other measurement gear than the one they developed it for.

Of course. I'm not measuring myself though, I just use the measurements other people made on GRAS fixtures. Or perhaps you meant that measurements themselves are fixture-dependent? That their values aren't absolute, even though target curves made for them would give the desired result?

 

[Ata]

I love my Ety ER3SEs but ONLY with EQ because there is simply no freaking way that "bass light" response sounds like real music to me, live or on a properly set up speaker rig.

There is something "pristine" about the sound of good IEMs, especially BA's like Etys, though they don't have those "perceived spatial qualities" on most pop/rock material. That is, until you listen to a properly executed binaural recording or a small ensemble using a single stereo mic rather than a multitrack mix from close-mic'ed tracks, and then those qualities seem just right.

Have you tried the ER2 (single DD) series? I have ER2XR and there is a soundstage to speak of, even if it is in my head only, not outside of it. THD seems to be very comparable between DD and BA Etymotics, and with EQ most timbre differences should be taken care of.

I have not had a chance to hear the BA series (ER3, ER4) yet.

 

[sejarzo]

Have you tried the ER2 (single DD) series? I have ER2XR and there is a soundstage to speak of, even if it is in my head only, not outside of it. THD seems to be very comparable between DD and BA Etymotics, and with EQ most timbre differences should be taken care of.

I have not had a chance to hear the BA series (ER3, ER4) yet.

No, and TBH, while I still feel that there is something unique about good IEMs, I have a bad habit of listening too loud and IEMs seem to exacerbate that. I also have a daughter who just graduated with honors in speech, language, and hearing science who makes a compelling case for not using IEMs at all (and only uses IEMs for phone calls if needed, and over-the-ears for music.)

If there is no "soundstage" in a pop/rock cut that I know was mixed from close-miked instruments and voices (perhaps with artificial reverb) it doesn't really matter to me, because it truly is an artifact generated by the headphone/earphone. As long as what I hear on a binaural or properly mic'ed acoustic ensemble has appropriate width/space, I'm fine.

 

[Ata]

Are the drivers on the RP-TCM125 same as those of RP-HJE125? The latter has no microphone and costs half the former (USD 10 vs 20)?

https://shop.panasonic.com/audio-and-video/headphones/earbud-in-ear-headphones