Chu 2

From $200 to $1000 there’s practically no gain its like 800 extra for like 3% gain but from $20 chu2 to $200 iems omg the sound is so amazing all those extra drivers help so much it’s like your rediscover musice once you step into $100+ iems it’s impossible to listen to budget sets

use mine while playing bass. it highlights too many mistakes lol

Alright so everybody here has an opinion, most of them based on "trust me bro". There is a bunch of ~20usd iems, all of them having very similar tuning (tuning is ALL that matters in the sound of earphones/headphones). A lot of them, because they are cheap, come with bad cables that break over time (cables are usually the nost fragile thing on this stuff). Thus I would recommend the Truthear Gate, it comes with a cable that is far better than even cables that vome with iems costing 5x the price. Under 100usd, I would recommend the the Truthear Pure. It is tuned to be what we call neutral now (jm1 and -1db/Oct. Tilt), leaning a bit warm. KZ is... questionable. Some praise it for its price to performance, others hate it. What we are certain about is that they do not sound *objecitevly* correct, not even close to it sometimes. On top of that, they got questionable QC... and marketing practices (paying reviewers, silent revisions for the worse...) 7hz Salnotes Zero:2 - is a good option with a solid tuning, but many find it uncomfortable. Edit: The moondrop chu2 is also a solid option, but I would still go for the Gate.

Hi OP, Fair warning; wired audio can be a huge rabbit hole, ESPECIALLY if you start with a hard to drive open back. It’s really rewarding when I finally got my HD650 to sound the way I wanted, but I sank 300+ dollars into an amp to make it do so (and had a $$$$ DAC). There are some really high value options nowadays for nice, cheap open back headphones and IEMs. My recommendation is actually a nice IEM that you can drive with your phone to see if you even like (or care about) having good transducers for your music. I really, really liked my 7Hz/Linsoul Zero 2 and they cost like 10 bucks, and would probably feel the same way about other cheapos like the Moondrop Chu2. I *can* imagine buying a pair of R70x or Verum2 and finding a DAC/Amp combo to make them work for not much more, but I think having a frame of reference that lets you know what you like just from a phone would do a lot long term (and save a ton of money). Just my 2cents. I hope you enjoy this corner of our hobby!

if you can afford 2 sets...get the Salnotes zero 2 and either the Chu2 or the Wan'er. They should have different enough sound signatures that you can start making a decision which you might like. Watch the reviews for the two sets you buy. Learn the lingo...and what it is you're hearing. That knowledge will help you when you're looking for an upgrade later on

OP... don't get rid of your Astral. Someone else mentioned it already...but it's a lack.of reference that has you second guessing. EQ (parametric EQ) is a good tool. It can help you fine tune the sound of the IEM to your liking. But...the IEM should sound good to you out of the box. HD550...hmmm... just go for the legend. Save for the HD600. I wrote down my experiences and things I learned as a beginner [Posted here](https://www.reddit.com/r/iems/s/u2D7CWFQw9) Go and find all the reviews you can on the Astral. Listen to the terminologies and try to associate what you hear from the Astral. Then pick up a budget set or two (if you want to learn) watch those reviews from the same reviewer. See if you can hear what they are hearing...and establish a frame of reference. Hope that makes sense. Outside of that...you picked a really good IEM. Stick with it. HD

check the community recs for under 50...that's where I started (kiwi ears cadenza, Moondrop Chu 2, and the 7Hz Salnotes x Crinacle Zero 2) There should be enough of a difference between 2 of those sets to start getting a frame of reference. You'll likely hear the differences between those and your Astral