garyahouse
newbs need the forum
Some of you may recall that I stopped in at the DBplugz booth at Daytona 3 weeks ago and ordered a set of custom molded ear plugs. Michael, the owner of the company, was there in person and got me fitted up in no time. If you want to start at the beginning of my journey to audio nirvana, the story began here on post #32 of my "Losing my hearing" thread: CLICKY.
Today I got home from work and there was a box waiting for me from DBplugz. I opened it with anxious fingers to find a beautiful black velvet box packed in bubble wrap. Did I order ear monitors or ear rings? Snazzy little box indeed. I opened it to behold my new riding buddies.
The appearance
They are truly a work of art. I ordered them in clear. They even put my name on each one in very tiny blue letters. Looking at them with a magnifying glass, I can see the tiny wires and electronics inside each one, with a port running from each driver to the ends of the ear canal extensions. They are crystal clear with removable twisted kevlar wires. Nice.
The fit
Trying them on for the first time was challenging. I had to figure out which was which. I've never used anything like this before. The instructions said to rotate my wrist as I put them in. I messed up the process several times before getting one in. This will take some getting used to I guess. It seemed like I got the first one in place, finally, by accident. They seem to fit well, but then I don't know how they're supposed to feel. The left one has just a little more pressure than the right. I'll have to wear them for awhile to know for sure if everything's all right. At the moment they seem OK. I can certainly feel the pressure that there's something in my ear, the left a little more than the right, but that's about it just sitting here on the couch for a 1/2 hour. The right one feels about perfect, but they're so new to me, it's hard to tell for sure. I'm told that your ears get used to them after awhile. They extend WAAAYYY down into the ear canal, coming up perhaps 3/16 of an inch short of my ear drums. That stands to reason as the small foam plug placed in my ear just before filling them with foam during my fitting... was about that thick. That makes sense. Anyway, time will tell.
The performance
I plugged them in to my computer and kicked on an old familiar song. Very first impression: way too loud. I turned it down. Still too loud. I ended up with the volume set just a click above "0." These things are seriously loud. Make no mistake, these are not your run of the mill ear buds. I didn't buy them to "crank em up," but I cranked them up to about half volume just to test them. Absolutely no distortion, of course. But way too loud for me. Fine... I can certainly turn them down easy enough.
Second impression: what was that I just heard in "All Right Now" by Free? I've heard that song a thousand times, I'm sure. But what was that unusual growl in the bass guitar? What was that twisting sound coming out of the drums at times? So very hard to describe here, but something was rather different with the first song I listened to. I didn't recall ever hearing that before. Was something wrong here?
Another song, the Beatles, "Paperback writer." I know every note of that song after hearing it for nearly 50 years. (Hard to believe isn't it? And don't even start in on me about being old. Look in the mirror, gram-paw). But there were several little unusual nuances in the song that I don't recall having heard before.
On to "Alone" by Heart. Wow. The bass is so crisp, not heavy and sticky like my Klipisch S4i's. I never realized that there was an issue with the S4i's sound. These indeed sounded different.
Time for Jan and Dean's "Pallisades Park." Again, several little things going on in the song that I never heard before. I'm starting to see a pattern here.
Flipped on the Temptations, "Papa was a Rolling Stone." This will be the ultimate test.
OH MY SOUL... that did it. What's going on here? Listening to the gentle tapping of the cymbals in the beginning of the song, there's the strangest echoing, cycling kind of resonance rolling off the initial tap of the cymbal... with each beat. I honestly never heard this before. Once the song gets rolling and all the other instruments start cranking up, it's not so easy to hear, but it's just amazing. It's as if I never heard the song before. It sounds so much more ALIVE.
THE VERDICT:
Guilty. I am indeed guilty. I have no excuse your honor. I just didn't see it coming. I've been blindsided.
My ears have died and gone to heaven.
But I have a great deal of work to do. I've got 1700 songs on my iPod that I need to listen to again for the very first time.
Can't wait to get started. Listening to "Papa was a Rolling Stone" still as I type. Wow. I never realized there was all this stuff going on in the back ground. And I've got the volume at less than 1/4.
I do need to get the helmet on and try these out on the road.
Stay tuned.
Pictures to follow tomorrow if I can get to it.
Gary
Today I got home from work and there was a box waiting for me from DBplugz. I opened it with anxious fingers to find a beautiful black velvet box packed in bubble wrap. Did I order ear monitors or ear rings? Snazzy little box indeed. I opened it to behold my new riding buddies.
The appearance
They are truly a work of art. I ordered them in clear. They even put my name on each one in very tiny blue letters. Looking at them with a magnifying glass, I can see the tiny wires and electronics inside each one, with a port running from each driver to the ends of the ear canal extensions. They are crystal clear with removable twisted kevlar wires. Nice.
The fit
Trying them on for the first time was challenging. I had to figure out which was which. I've never used anything like this before. The instructions said to rotate my wrist as I put them in. I messed up the process several times before getting one in. This will take some getting used to I guess. It seemed like I got the first one in place, finally, by accident. They seem to fit well, but then I don't know how they're supposed to feel. The left one has just a little more pressure than the right. I'll have to wear them for awhile to know for sure if everything's all right. At the moment they seem OK. I can certainly feel the pressure that there's something in my ear, the left a little more than the right, but that's about it just sitting here on the couch for a 1/2 hour. The right one feels about perfect, but they're so new to me, it's hard to tell for sure. I'm told that your ears get used to them after awhile. They extend WAAAYYY down into the ear canal, coming up perhaps 3/16 of an inch short of my ear drums. That stands to reason as the small foam plug placed in my ear just before filling them with foam during my fitting... was about that thick. That makes sense. Anyway, time will tell.
The performance
I plugged them in to my computer and kicked on an old familiar song. Very first impression: way too loud. I turned it down. Still too loud. I ended up with the volume set just a click above "0." These things are seriously loud. Make no mistake, these are not your run of the mill ear buds. I didn't buy them to "crank em up," but I cranked them up to about half volume just to test them. Absolutely no distortion, of course. But way too loud for me. Fine... I can certainly turn them down easy enough.
Second impression: what was that I just heard in "All Right Now" by Free? I've heard that song a thousand times, I'm sure. But what was that unusual growl in the bass guitar? What was that twisting sound coming out of the drums at times? So very hard to describe here, but something was rather different with the first song I listened to. I didn't recall ever hearing that before. Was something wrong here?
Another song, the Beatles, "Paperback writer." I know every note of that song after hearing it for nearly 50 years. (Hard to believe isn't it? And don't even start in on me about being old. Look in the mirror, gram-paw). But there were several little unusual nuances in the song that I don't recall having heard before.
On to "Alone" by Heart. Wow. The bass is so crisp, not heavy and sticky like my Klipisch S4i's. I never realized that there was an issue with the S4i's sound. These indeed sounded different.
Time for Jan and Dean's "Pallisades Park." Again, several little things going on in the song that I never heard before. I'm starting to see a pattern here.
Flipped on the Temptations, "Papa was a Rolling Stone." This will be the ultimate test.
OH MY SOUL... that did it. What's going on here? Listening to the gentle tapping of the cymbals in the beginning of the song, there's the strangest echoing, cycling kind of resonance rolling off the initial tap of the cymbal... with each beat. I honestly never heard this before. Once the song gets rolling and all the other instruments start cranking up, it's not so easy to hear, but it's just amazing. It's as if I never heard the song before. It sounds so much more ALIVE.
THE VERDICT:
Guilty. I am indeed guilty. I have no excuse your honor. I just didn't see it coming. I've been blindsided.
My ears have died and gone to heaven.
But I have a great deal of work to do. I've got 1700 songs on my iPod that I need to listen to again for the very first time.
Can't wait to get started. Listening to "Papa was a Rolling Stone" still as I type. Wow. I never realized there was all this stuff going on in the back ground. And I've got the volume at less than 1/4.
I do need to get the helmet on and try these out on the road.
Stay tuned.
Pictures to follow tomorrow if I can get to it.
Gary
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