I’m exploring budget IEM’s and got the Chu II and Castor Pro. I think the Chu’s are great for the money and the Castor Pro’s are almost great for the money but the bass is making my head swim. I feel like I’m experiencing a cabin pressure change on takeoff. I turned off the manual switches and EQ’d but good golly.
And it’s not even bad sounding bass. It’s just too much. Also, the instruments are hidden. Lots of bass and mid-bass, great vocals but the crack of a snare or complexity of a riff are just fine.
Anyway, I think I need to return them. Should I be looking for something that’s just considered balanced? I listen to bullshit that isn’t recorded particularly well and I have no idea what to buy. I was looking at the KZ PRX next.
And to be clear, I listen to bands like Thou, Mispyrming, Deathspell Omega, Marduk, Djevel, Alice In Chains, Immortal, Emma Ruth Rundle, Blut Aus Nord, mgła… if you’re familiar.
If you look for crinacle and his collaborations you can't go too wrong. He likes balanced/treble focused tunings that are close to harman values. Some people criticize that they're a bit boring and clinical, but honestly, in my experience they're not that bad. There's all sorts of options based on budgets.
https://crinacle.com/collabs/
I would agree except that the recent Crinacle Divine and Diablo are crazy, IMHO; I couldn't even bring myself to listen to a full song with them, and they're rather overpriced. This video gives a decent impression of them: https://youtu.be/mi6TGuNB5kA
But I generally agree, the Crinacle collaborations have been very good generally. And CrinEar has been a huge success, especially the CrinEar Daybreak.
I was originally going to try the 7hz x Crinacle 2 before reading that the Castor was better for bass. Little did I know, "better bass" just meant way too much bass. It sounds like Crinacle is what I'm after but now I'm wondering if the 7hz is a side-step and I should start with the Truthear x Crinacle Red.
Honestly, I wouldn't spend too much without knowing what you like first and I hear pretty good things about the salnotes 2 that might suit you perfectly.
Ahh I just logged back on to say that I’m just gonna wing it and spend like 50-80. Should I not just buy Truthear Zero Red?
I own it. It's excellent and pretty. But I've come to enjoy more balanced and detail focused iems over the years and it's a bit of departure from the typical v-shaped signatures that are everywhere.
Yeah, I’m doing quite a bit of research and they seem like they’re great but not what I’m after. As chaotic as my music is, there are layers and details that just don’t come through on my more fun headphones. For now, I want something that’s clear, good instruemnt separation and detail with modest amount of sub bass, clean mid bass and clean treble. I suppose the term is balance but I keep reading reviews about popular IEM’s and what people are willing to put up with and I’m just like… the excellent sub bass doesn’t matter to me if the instrument separation is muddy. At this point I’m just going to order the Kefine Delci or Truthear Hexa maybe.