Dave- yeah, I have some e2's, they're ok, better than most earbuds you'll find, but not really great for in-ear monitoring. For the money, I'd spend a bit more and get nicer ones.
I can understand the fit and noise reduction issue- sometimes I feel just too isolated, and it makes stage communications a challenge.

Steve, glad you're liking the SuperFi's. I still think they are among the best, and will do just fine for me. I don't think you can go wrong for the price, and it's amazing how they make an mp3 player sound so rich and full.

On a side note, this past week, we had our first rehearsal in the actual meeting room, with the full sound system, etc. Our leader wanted to get the Aviom's eq tweaked primarily for the drummer, but for all of us...it was set back when we started, but was never really tweaked or optimized.
Man, what a difference it made for us this past Sunday..we could all hear everything so clearly, the drums sounded awesome, my bass was sounding perfect tone wise, guitars and keys were dead on, and for once it all came together, one of those electric moments where the band is greater than the individual players.
I was almost moved to tears, it sounded so pure and powerful. (Of course, the songs and their message were great too, and obviously that's what it's all about.)

That practice session and getting to play my bass through the house, with no monitors, just standing out as far as I could get with my cords, has convinced me to run my Pod in the tube amp (clean) setting, with about 25% compression, a wee bit of mid and high gain, and that's it....no effects, no drive, etc.
It gave me chills down my spine, to be locked with the kick and to hear how tight we suddenly became.
I guess you can tell I'm loving this....
I hope I never have to go back to stage monitors, and now that we've got things set properly, I really don't need an amp....the Mackie subs are major thunderous.
We worked on the eq for the room also, now the audience can hear just how good this equipment can really sound....it's a bigtime hi-fi experience, instead of holding your ears due to distortion and poor eq. It's like a fire was lit under everybody, you can tell when they are getting into it, and it was happening. Can't really put it in words...

anyway....back to work.

Thanks guys

TonyY

Well, had a surprise last night. Our leader had ordered me a new set of in-ears, the SuperFi 5 Pros Extended Bass.

I haven't used them live yet, but just in doing an A-B type of test with my stereo system and a Y cable so I could have both sets of in-ears active, just change which one is in my ears, these guys sound phenomenal. The only issue so far is the ear-forms, they're a bit too small for my ear canals. According to the specs, these have a bit poorer sound isolation too, 16dB, down from 25dB on the other ones, but they also seem even more efficient, if that's possible.

Not that the regular ones aren't good enough, they certainly are, but these raise the bar, in my opinion- the bass is full and rich while still being tight and punchy. I'm sure there's some types of music that won't sound perfect in them, but for what I listen to an play, these are fantastic.

Oh yeah, one other minor downside to these- they are a bit clunky and larger than the other units, so if fashion is an issue, well- you may not like the looks of them. Doesn't bother me a bit, but it's not like that small of a change is going to make me suddenly uncool....I've been working on other ways to manage that!

Later
TY

BTW Ken N, did you ever get a set?

Tony, nice gift. Those Super Fi Pro EB's are bass monsters and are pretty much recommended for hip hop and rap. The huge bass tends to overwhelm everything else. Kind of like a double huge subwoofer in your trunk. Most prefer the Super Fi Pro's by a wide margin but it depends on the music. I wish you could try the Triple Fi Pros. They are out of this world. I use them almost daily.

SH-
Disagree with you on the "huge bass" overwhelming everything. Maybe if you've got the bass cranked anyway, and then use these, yeah- but I run most of my eq's flat, iPod, sound card, etc, and the extended bass earbuds sound more balanced bass wise. It's not that there's anything wrong at all with the superfi 5's, these just fill in the bottom end more. Which, on stage, I really need at times; the regular 5's can be a bit thin on the low end, sometimes.

I wish I could keep both sets, to be honest, that way I'd just use the extended bass for live and practice, and use the regulars for daily listening.
I'd love to try the triples, but it's not my nickel....and no way will I get away with spending that much on "frivilous" stuff like that when we have other needs to cover.

Anyway- back to work

TonyY

Steve, you may be more right here than I thought at first.....

They don't sound so good live, at least not the first time out- although it's not all their fault.
The low end (me and the kick, and even the lower strings of the guitars) is pumped up just enough to drown out the midrange and vocals. Admittedly some of it was the sound guy and the way the mix was in our Aviom monitor, but I had to almost turn off the kick to hear anything. Hopefully next time out, I'll have more time to tweak my personal settings on my monitor to balance it out. I'll for sure take the overall volume down, it was painful.
They were also distorting, I think once again the sound guy was mixing with the gains (which directly affects our feeds to the Avioms) instead of the faders, which only affect house.

But- with the regular 5's, even with a bad mix, I could usually hear everything well enough to continue to play, with a quick tweak here and there.
Sunday, I almost had to just stop, with these XBs. I turned down the whole unit between the first and second song, but that's about all I had time to adjust. That helped, but not much.

However- on my iPod, with some custom ear forms I made and the EQ flat, they sound wonderful.

They get one more chance, after some liberal doses of EQ time, to see if they are keepers. We've got a Saturday system tuning day coming up, (we're moving to a larger venue) so maybe I can figure it out then.

Not sure if this link will work comparing the ultimate ears IEM's but...All I'm saying is that Super Fi EB's are probably THE bassiest IEM's on the market, even with no EQ adjustment. If that's what a person likes, so be it but it is far from balanced. Many people even find Super Fi Pros too bass heavy and they are qite a bit less bassy than the EB's.

http://www.headphone.com/technical/produ...pare+Headphones

The straighter the line, the more balanced. Left side is bass right side is treble. The farther the right side goes before dropping off, the better extended the highs are but too low of the frequencies will mask the highs as well. But take the chart with a grain of salt. The real proof is how they sound to you.

Thanks Steve- that link works great, could even compare my old Sennheiser headphones to the UE's, etc. Very cool.
Does also show in a graphical way just how strong the bass in these things is. But, I think at lower volume levels, which I need to be listening to anyway, it's probably more like a loudness curve. Also probably why they sound good with my iPod, I usually have it really low, since these (with my earforms) have good attenuation. It actually has less than the 5 pros, which is a surprise, since the bass response actually heard is very dependent on the seal in the ear canal....you'd think they'd be better there.

Anyway- I'll pass that link along to our lead guitar player, I'm sure he'll devour that info since he's a tech head.

Have a good weekend!

TonyY

A couple months back I sold my UE Triple Fi Pros (mainly fit issues, some sound complaints) and picked up some Westone UM2's. The Westone UM2's are the most comfortable IEM I have ever put in my ear with Shure SE530 a close second. The UM2's have been around several years now but it is a very nice full-bodied sound, somewhat heavy on the bass but since they were designed as monitors they respond very well to EQ to tame it down and even boost the highs a tad. Highly recommended. I much prefer them to Super Fi Pros and find them to be about 90% of what the heralded SE530's are.

http://www.earphonesolutions.com/um2dudrineaw.html?gclid=CKrwifjav5UCFQMtswodMSMlQA