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Second hand IEMs — how to check if they are not damaged?

the0bs3rv3r

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I've purchased IER-M9. Blind purchase, and the sound they output is "weird" on any source. Before that I've owned Moondrop Blessing 2, and they sounded much closer to my dynamic headphones.

Now I'm wondering if something's wrong with the headphones I got (some form of internal damage), but i have no idea how to properly test it. I got several microphones, but none of them is calibrated and made for measurement.

The only thing comes into mind is to try finding an outlet which has a pair of demo M9 and compare them to mine. But at the moment it looks like no audio stores carry them in my area.
Any help is appreciated!
 

Dunring

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Check with a magnifying glass if any of the covers over the drivers are clogged. I had a pair a while ago and had to remove them with tweezers to get the tiny disk out for cleaning. If you have a multimeter, you can check to see if they're returning the ohm rating they're supposed to. Also if you're using an adapter that came with it, I've had 6.35mm adapters fail. I'm paranoid now and test everything on a multimeter (cables, adapters, you name it). The other thing is they may be fakes. On Wish.com that's all they sell, not a single authentic item to be found. Also some people buy there and then unload it on ebay or Mercari not knowing they're selling a fake item. I've had both the Sennheiser Momentum real buds and some fakes I had to return. They sounded 70 percent as good as the fakes, but some who never heard real ones maybe wouldn't have picked up on it.
 
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the0bs3rv3r

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Check with a magnifying glass if any of the covers over the drivers are clogged. I had a pair a while ago and had to remove them with tweezers to get the tiny disk out for cleaning. If you have a multimeter, you can check to see if they're returning the ohm rating they're supposed to. Also if you're using an adapter that came with it, I've had 6.35mm adapters fail. I'm paranoid now and test everything on a multimeter (cables, adapters, you name it). The other thing is they may be fakes. On Wish.com that's all they sell, not a single authentic item to be found. Also some people buy there and then unload it on ebay or Mercari not knowing they're selling a fake item. I've had both the Sennheiser Momentum real buds and some fakes I had to return. They sounded 70 percent as good as the fakes, but some who never heard real ones maybe wouldn't have picked up on it.
The thing is -- the foam inserts are glued in, i didnt risk removing them.
 

DVDdoug

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It would be unlikely for both to be identically damaged.

the sound they output is "weird" on any source.
A broken ground can create a "weird vocal remover effect" where the "center" is lost and there is no stereo. Since bass is normally centered, it will be greatly reduced too. If that's the problem a mono file will be almost silent, and you can unplug the left or right channel somewhere in the chain you'll still get sound in both ears.
 
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