Etymotic Research ER2-XR Extended Response - In Ear Noise Isolating IEM Earphones with Detachable Cable

Etymotic. ER2SE Review Cost:£70, supplier was Amazon UK prime next day delivery. The little iem that can. Equipment used : FiiO M11 Plus used as both A DAP and a transport for the Hip DAC 2 Ifi Hip. DAC 2 (connected to both phone and M11 Plus Included dongle to run from phone DAC (Poco F3) TLDR: get a set they're amazing! Packaging : Nice big box for good store presence, designed to hang from a shelf peg. Very good quality carry case, faux leather and faux suade. Inside the carry case were the goodies. A bag containing a filter removal tool and two extra filters in case the originals get blocked. Don't think I'll need them personally but nice to have. Also inside was two different sizes of triple flange ear tips a medium (I'd say) and a large. A pair of foam ear tips are also included, along with a great selection of double flange tips from small to extra large. The cable is MMCX but don't expect to be able to use your fave MMCX cable with these. They've customised the MMCX so that there's a slot you have to line up to get the cable to snap in. It's a shame as the included cable while Perfectly serviceable is a little microphonic. Fit: Try as I might I could not get on with either size of triple flange tips. They were OK in my right ear but wouldn't go deep enough to seal and.trust me these things go in really deep. Extremely deep. I ended up settling on the XL double flange. Fit is still extremely deep but not uncomfortable. You get a tremendous seal and the IEM almost completely disappears into your ears. I recommend trying the triple flange first and if you can't.get them to fit right do what I did and go for the double flange. I should have tried the foam tips for this review but avoided them as they seemed cheap and nasty. I'll try them and post if they're any good. Sound : The. SE are studio tuned so lack any real bass thump from stock. Vocals are forward, male and female both soumd smooth. Mids are where you want them and the highs shine without a hint of sibilance, just a sparkling performance. For the following tracks I listened to them both through the M11 Plus as a DAP and. The Hip. DAC 2 using both my phone and the M11 as transports. All music is.sttramed from Tidal in "up to" Master quality. For Example Dire Straits was unfolded to 192KHz. All the following were listened to using either Wavelet EQ or ifi XBass. Listening to Dire Straits (Money For Nothing) the guitar and drums including symbals are equally represented without one masking the other. They also excel at dance music. Listening to the best of Scooter the artificial instruments were silky smooth and really represented what I've heard from some good sets of speakers. My G by Ed Sheeran and Aitch when EQd or Xbassed sounds full and. Has a wide sound stage. Aitch's rapping and the backing track are perfectly balanced. There are layers to the back g track that are only apparent when I use the Etymotic. Psycho by Aitch and Anne-Marie really thumps with a decent EQ bass.shelf and lyrics and the piano are almost 3D sounding. My Humps.by Black Eyed Peas really thumps.with the right EQ (for me). The song is sub bass and semi mid bass heavy on the beat and this really comes through clean and snappy especially using XBass. XBass really works magic on these IEMs. Jucy by Doja Cat sounds the best I've ever heard. The bass line when EQd to my tastes is.forward but not too dominant. The female lyrics are lush and you can hear every word even when the bass line is at its peak. Simply a fantastic rendition of one of my favorite Tracks. Ed Sheeran Shape of You has.everuthing in its place. The high pitched.beat that runs.throuhh the whole.trsck is always present but doesn't take over like on for example. QKZ x HBB. A perfect balance.of instruments all in the right places and very clear lyrics. Lack of Bass (EQ) EQ and final thoughts.on source pairing: As I got the SE and. Not the XR (Xtended Range) the bass is extremely light. To cure this and bring the bass shelf up to my personal tastes I used Wavelet combined with Tidal to increase all frequencies from 80Hz to 300Hz. A boost of +3 on each really brought out some smooth non boomy bass. On the Hip DAC 2 I used the XBass function which adds a nice dollop of bass to anything plugged into it. They sound great through this DAC with. XBass! The lack of bass really isn't an issue as these respond to EQ so well. If you want more bass simply increase the frequencies of your choice. I did not find that doing this over shadowed the mids or highs and there was no bass bleed or boominess. As for source pairing I was supremely impressed by ifi's XBass. It just adds the perfect amount of bass and in my opinion wins over anything I've tried in wavelet including custom EQ files. I'll. Definitely be reaching for the HIP DAC 2 when using the Etymotic! My phone could drive these but at a very reduced maximum volume. It was listenable but left you wanting to turn it up a bit more. The M11 Plus with wavelet was decent and had plenty of power to bring out the best in these earphones. I did have to use higher volume. Than usual but still had 30 clicks left after they became loud enough for me. Conclusion: For £70 these things are a steal. As long as you're prepared for an IEM that inserts very deep in the ear canal you will love the sound of these. EQ is the icing on the cake. They respond so well to EQ ing a decent bass shelf. XBass. Is the star of the show though for me. I highly recommend this set as long as you're prepared to EQ if you like a bit of bass. I'm not bothering with Moondrop Variations. I've got such a versatile set in these ER2SE I'm going to save the £400+ and get the car a full service. What ever is left over I may try the latest interesting IEMs Like I did with QKZ x HBB. In short…… get the ER2SE or ER2XR, they're worth the money and with some tinkering they're honestly the best sounding set I've got in my collection. They beat Timeless and. Dioko hands down for detail retrieval. Get on Amazon and grab a pair. You have 30 days to return them if you don't like them. It's a no loose situation if you have a localised version of Amazon. Anyway, enough rambling. Get them!

Damn, I love these IEMs. They isolate amazingly well; airplane noise, screaming children, and other distractions disappear, even if you aren't playing anything through them. As for sound quality, they are fantastic; flat, but punchy. They are dynamic drivers, not balanced armatures like the ER3 and ER4, but they still have great technicality. I imagine comfort might be hit-or-miss for people though, since they have a deep fit which some people's ears might not appreciate. Also the included eartips are horrible, I've heard some people prefer them, I am not one of those people. Get the Comply P-series eartips; they might color the sound, but they are so much more comfortable; I often forget I'm wearing them. Cable noise can be an issue if you wear them down, since they conduct vibrations from your clothes, beard, etc straight into your ears, so I normally wear them up, hooking the wires over my ears, which kills any vibrations.

Ah the Etymotics, infamously known for their sound and value. However, be warned that you must be happy to plant these deep in your earholes. Renowned for their uncomfortable and intrusive fit, some will survive, but personally I could not manage and had to return. I thought I would have loved these, at the time I was using triple flange silicon tips on other IEMs so thought I was already used to an Etymotic style fit, but boy howdy was I wrong. Maybe it's my small ear canals, but I don't think I ever managed to plant these deep enough. However I certainly got close as they sounded amazing, quite bassy for a neutral IEM, but in a good way. Amazing clarity and tuning, slightly bassier than my Moondrop Starfields, and just really smooth and clean. Probably the best IEM I've used so far, just amazing presentation. However I couldn't live with them in the end and have since settled on Moondrop Arias. Worth trying for sure, but be prepared to return if you can't suffer the fit.

I read a lot of reviews and comparisons before choosing these earphones, and they still blew me away. The detail listening with them is fantastic, regardless of whether I'm listening to Pentatonix, the London Symphony Orchestra, or for really tiny phonetic details in speech. Using the "Fluent Forever" minimal pair contrast anki decks with these headphones is an amazing experience: some phonetic distinctions that I can make out with other earphones or headphones stand out way more clearly, particularly aspiration and glottal detail. These headphones are surprisingly comfortable. I was expecting to need to spend days getting used to them, but they're actually the most comfortable pair of earphones I've ever had. I have a fairly narrow ear canal, and nothing other than these or foam earbuds have ever been particularly comfortable (even single flange silicone xs tips on other earbuds have been unpleasant). I'm using the default 3-flange tips. I wouldn't want to pop them in and out of my ears often, but I've been wearing them for the 6 hours since they arrived and will gladly wear them longer. The noise cancelling is good. I love how low-fuss these earphones are: passive noise cancelling and a wire mean they don't need batteries or charging. The sound quality is a lot better than on other, more expensive headphones and earphones I own. Etymotic really did a great job.

Very good sound quality, I can compare with Audesy LCD2. But, with foam year plugs (grey).

Som perfeito. Fit dolorido

Triple flange let's gooo

I got this to cut down on the AC noise near one of my rooms. I expected decent sound and decent noise isolation. My expectations have been greatly exceeded. First the isolation: when no music is playing I can still hear the AC if I get close enough. Once something starts playing, nothing. The downside is that you won't hear it if someone's trying to talk to you, so one should be careful using it outdoors or anywhere situational awareness is required. The sound: absolutely outstanding. I really can't find any weaknesses. Everything is natural and balanced. The timbre of instruments and voices is natural and there's enough bass, as much as can be expected from IEMs which can't produce the visceral bass of speakers, anyway. The spatial qualities of the sound are as good as can be expected from IEMs but again don't compare to speakers of course. Other things such as detail, balance between treble and mids etc are outstanding. Comfort: for the first couple of days my ear canals got itchy after about an hour or so but now they've accommodated and I can wear them without any discomfort. They are pretty light and the included case is pretty small. Value: Amazon had them for 125 before the holidays and they are outstanding value for money. They seem to be well built and should last quite a while unless mistreated.

The headphones are just amazing. They work very good with many of my genres, in particular electronic music (psytrance) and pop. Extremely well defined sound, and although a bit intimate stage the definition and separation is just another level, especially for a single dynamic driver. The big breaking point is the fit, but i got used to it fairly quickly and the obvious advantage is superior noice cancellation that you wouldnt get without this type of fit. It does make the stage a bit intimate, but for electronic music this isnt something i care that much about anyways. It turns it as an advantage in that genre, atleast to my preference. Getting a good seal and deep fit is absolutely crucial for these iems to come alive and show what they are capable of and it may require some perseverance to get used to them. But if you manage, they are very hard to stop listen to. They are almost addicting. What isnt that good is basically all the rest. Some of the ear tips was literally broken(had holes and leaked sound/didnt isolate external sound) right out of the box. Even if the earphones are fairly priced, things like this shouldnt happen at this price point. Now i have to spend extra to be able to explore other potentially more optimal tip fits. The cable is also pretty lacking in many areas, and the clip is absolutely essential to avoid the pretty apparent microphonics the cable brings. It also feels cheap and it seems like the plug core is of some steel/iron alloy, and not copper(or atleast brass) since its magnetic. Not really ideal, but thanks to the stellar earphone itself it doesnt have that much of an impact on the general performance, although no fair comparison with an adequate cable has been done so far. If you dare to take a gamble on the fit, these are the absolutely best iems you will find in the ~100$ category. I have the hexas and olina se which are also heavy hitters in this category, and the er2xr beats those two fairly easy to me in most categories (excluding staging, but not to say er2xr staging is "bad". Its just intimate and special). I can however see how rock genres/electric guitar songs sound better on the hexas but for me that is not something of weight since i rarely listen to that type of music.