QKZ X HBB Hades

HBB Hades. Just got them myself. It's a weird tuning and definitely not an all rounder but it shines with anything bassy. Also the Kbear Rosefinch but I haven't tried those yet. For the cable just buy a third party one like tripowin zonie, openheart or maybe the kbear cables.

I've listened the FatFreq Scarlet Minis and they are not even close to QKZ & HBB Hades. If you are a true basshead go for Hades. The punch-slam-rumble you get from them is incomperable. But you'll loose some detail, when you crank them up it's not bad they are capable. They take EQ and power like a champ too...

I wouldn't say I've found one like that yet, but it's true that there's very little correlation between price and performance, at least in terms of what you like or don't like. Technical performance does tend to increase a bit with price, but also caps out well before you get into TotL stuff. Ironically, if you're very skilled with EQ and have the patience to dial everything in perfectly, some of the best IEMs to use as EQ platforms are some of the cheapest (Kiwi Ears Cadenza / KBear KB01 for instance). In terms of my collection, I probably spend more time listening to the QKZ HBB than any other single IEM and it's only $15. It's not the most technical IEM out there, but it's tuned to its limitations and does what it does really well, which is to be very warm-yet-natural sounding and easy to listen to for a long time. My most expensive IEM so far, the Variations, is one that I almost never listen to. Even though it's technically excellent, the tuning isn't my favourite (tucked midbass) and it's not very comfortable. My favourite IEM overall is the Simgot EA1000 which falls in the middle price-wise, but I wouldn't call it endgame because it's not perfect. It does however do some things other IEMs cannot do (at least none that I've heard), and at least keeps up with others in all areas. Comfort is another big, and often overlooked factor. And the interesting thing there is no only is there no correlation with price, if anything there's an inverse correlation. With the exception of Sennheiser, almost all IEMs get less comfortable as they go up in price, and the cheapest ones are the most comfortable because they're small 1DDs. I expect that when I do find something I would call "endgame", it'll probably be in the ~$300 price range, technically good, comfortable and stable in the ear, with a tuning that I just happen to like. It's entirely possible it will be a $50 1DD though because there's no technical reason why a well-tuned 1DD can't outperform kilobuck IEMs. Sennheiser's flagship kilobuck IEMs *are* 1DDs, they just put more effort than usual into tuning via 3D printing. There are already 1DDs around $50 with among the best drivers you can get, so cost of parts isn't the issue. It's more a question of when/if the market will start releasing such well-tuned IEMs at that price point. Most IEM pricing doesn't reflect the BOM cost at all, and may or may not reflect R&D investment. I also expect the EA1000 will be kept around for a long time because if you remove the imperfections, you most likely also remove what makes it so good. I expect I'll find something that I'll eventually like as much as the HBB but is better in every way. But so far I haven't, so there's a good chance that will stick around for a long time as well. If I had to get rid of my entire IEM collection and keep just one, it would, perhaps counter-intuitively, not be the EA1000. It would be the Moondrop Kato, which is actually slightly cheaper (but now discontinued). The thing about the Kato is it's just a really good all-rounder, that works for all genres of music, both indoors and outside where it's noisy, and has no issues with being listened to all day. The EA1000 easily beats it technically, but the Kato is just a bit warmer and overall I prefer a slightly warm tilt like the Kato to a cool tilt like the EA1000. I can still listen to the EA1000 all day too, but if you have a badly mastered track, the EA1000 *will not hide that fact at all*, whereas the Kato will lie to you a bit and just make it sound good.

*In theory* you can fix anything with EQ, but in practice you can't. Very fine-grained FR features will be almost if not completely impossible to correct with EQ because you can't rely on graphs and have to do it by ear, which is increasingly difficult to do the smaller the features are. The IEM is highly modal then it will be more reactive to whatever ear (or coupler) it's inserted into so ideally you want less of that. You also ideally want the IEM to be as well vented as possible for comfort reasons, but that can affect things like sub-bass extension, especially when BAs are being used to produce those frequencies. The other factor is pure extension and the absence of nulls. If the drivers can't generate sound past 10kHz, no amount of EQ is going to add those frequencies back in, at best it's going to either do nothing or add distortion. Most IEMs don't actually extend all the way to 20kHz, even though they often make nonsensical claims like 40kHz (which nobody could hear even if it were true). It's always possible to EQ down, but again if the response is very jaggy then it might not be possible to get it where you want it. Nulls are where you get certain frequencies cancelling each other out because of resonances, reflections, or phase issues in multi-driver IEMs. That will result in a dip in the FR that doesn't respond if you try to increase it with EQ, although if you do try, you risk accidentally introducing a peak right next to where you think the dip is. Here's a good video about how trying to EQ away narrow features can often end up making things sound worse, which is one of the main reasons why AutoEQ often doesn't work as well as expected: /r/headphones/comments/1ivy4u7/how_measurement_error_hurts_eq/ The general rule of thumb aside from "sounds good to me" is you want the FR to be as smooth as possible, and change as little as possible between different couplers. That way you are really only making HRTF accommodations & preference adjustments rather than trying to "fix" things. One issue about smooth graphs is that the ones you usually see, e.g., on squig.link, are smoothed (usually 1/3 octave I believe), which means there might be features you can't see. Like a slight dip in the FR could actually be a much narrower null, but when averaged out, it looks smoother than it is.

The crossover just determines which frequencies go to which driver(s), which in turn affects the final frequency response along with other things like acoustic tuning. Badly designed crossovers can cause things like nulls or other phase errors, which I mentioned earlier, can't be EQ'd away. This is why cheap hybrid IEMs are often bad, although the cost of a reasonably well-implemented hybrid has come down a lot in the last few years. That's one of the reasons a 1DD is typically better for EQ than most multi-driver IEMs, because there is no crossover to go wrong (and no possibility of phase errors between the drivers). Doesn't necessarily mean 1DDs are automatically better either. In the end, it's the end result that matters, which is almost entirely about the frequency response. That, alongside HpTF, distortion and time-dependent characteristics, although the last 2 are pretty much always below the audible threshold in IEMs, so there's no point in worrying about them most of the time. Having said that last thing, distortion is one of those characteristics that can't be controlled with EQ, so if it is audible, then it will make a difference. Crinacle actually put some thought into this in the design of the Daybreak, on the basis of "*if*you can hear it, it will sound better like this". He had said he intended to talk about it in the release video, but in the end it's only mentioned in passing, blink-and-you'll miss it sort of thing (I had to re-watch the video to see if it was mentioned at all). The thing about harmonic distortion is that even-order distortion tends to sound good, and odd-order distortion sounds bad. This contributes to why a lot of people like tube amps even though they're objectively bad. They add "good" distortion. Low levels of distortion that don't lead to clipping are typically referred to as "saturation" instead of distortion and are used a lot in mixing & mastering to make things sound fuller. That's another effect that can be added with DSP (not EQ but using the same sort of processing). But you can't *remove* distortion if it's being added by the IEM itself. As a generalism, distortion is always so low that it's not contributing anything to the sound anyway, but that may not have been the case 20 years ago, which may be where some of the myths about technicalities, and *physically* not being able to EQ them (as opposed to it just requiring a lot of skill), came from.

It varies. I'm currently having a headphone clear-out because I tend to mostly listen to the HD650 or AKG K712 (for comfort & airflow, especially after a shower). But I find that I rotate between different IEMs for the variety of different tunings. Current favourites that I am listening to the most are: * Ikko OH300 - warm v-shape, quite vocal-forward. * Moondrop Stellaris with Dunu Candy tips - bright-neutral with exceptionally clean, very linear bass. I specify the Candy tips with the Stellaris because they really change the sound signature quite dramatically, which is crazy bright normally. IDK if those tips would have the same effect for others though. Some other favourites include: * QKZ HBB - warm and laid back; similar to the OH300 except that while the OH300 is vocal-forward, these push the vocals back a bit in the mix, which makes them great for background listening while reading. * Simgot EA1000 - balanced, mild v-shape that is slightly cool/bright leaning but also has exceptional bass quality. Other than the slight cool tilt to the midrange, these are overall the most realistic-sounding IEMs I've heard so far, especially how they reproduce drums. And they keep up with my planars for resolution (I have several, not just the Stellaris, though the Stellaris is probably the most resolving). My endgame, if I eventually find it, is probably this but a bit warmer. * Dunu Titan S - when I feel like something a bit more neutral, but not as boring as the Hexa. Probably the closest thing to my ideal tuning, although it can be a bit grainy in the treble at times. * Moondrop LAN - if I'm feeling bass fatigue and want something a bit lighter while maintaining a fairly smooth (not overly bright) upper mids & treble. * Ikko OH10 - mainly for walking around outside, I prefer more of a v-shape. While I prefer the tonal balance of the OH300 for listening indoors, these are a bit cleaner and more resolving. I like the combination of deep, thumpy bass with crisp incisive treble, although they can be a touch strident at times. The main thing is the comfort though, these are incredibly comfortable and stable. Those are the main ones I rotate between the most, along with the Moondrop Kato for another mild v that sits somewhere between the EA1000 and the OH10. Nothing really stands out, but it's just a really solid all-rounder for listening to anything, anywhere, any time.

Some particularly good budget IEMs: - **QKZ HBB** - not technically amazing, but really wall tuned warm, relaxing, surprisingly natural-sounding despite being quite bassy - **Tin C2** - mild U/V shape (possibly some unit variance at work there, but I have two and both sound good, just different) leaning a bit bright, but can be made closer to neutral-ish (with a bass boost) with some tip rolling. Very resolving, incisive and with great imaging for such a cheap IEM. Even more so when they were selling off the older model for $20, but those offers seem to be gone now. It's built like a tank too. The build quality of these can easily shame some $300+ IEMs. - **Ikko OH300** - similar to the QKZ HBB, but more energetic and vocal-forward, with exceptional imaging, but especially the sense of depth/layering. These knocked the Letshuoer S08 off my #2 favourite IEM spot because there's enough similarity in how they present sound, but these have better bass, so I tend to grab these over the S08 if that's the sort of mood I'm in. They're also much less tip-sensitive than the S08. The S08 does have a few unique aspects of its own though. - **Artti T10** - just ridiculously good value for what it costs, very resolving with a fun tuning that isn't fatiguing (unlike some more expensive planars). - **TRN Shell** - another one that's insane value for money when it goes on sale around $40, especially given the accessories package. A really well done hybrid that sounds much more expensive than it is, with a really good sense of texturing in particular, without being bright. The OH300, HBB and Shell in particular are IEMs I listen to a lot, despite having many other more expensive IEMs. There isn't really a direct correlation between price and sound quality, but if you ignore the ones that are not worth the price, you do tend to get more of the good aspects together and fewer trade-offs as you go up in price, due to better drivers etc. The HBB is cheap, but tuned perfectly to its driver limitations: it doesn't need to be highly resolving, because it's not an analytical tuning. It has a big weakness, but while I wouldn't say it turns that weakness into a strength or anything that clichéd, I would say that it makes it so that the weakness isn't that important. It just works and achieves what it is trying to achieve. That's something not all IEMs do, regardless of price. I wouldn't say any of these made me "reconsider" any of my more expensive IEMs, because those are generally good too. But I probably spend more time listening to my under-$50 IEMs than my over-$200 ones. A lot of IEMs that I've bought as "a better version of X", or "Y without such-and-such issue" have usually not worked out as well as hoped. Whereas the ones I've ended up liking the most have often just been a pure fluke. Like I bought the OH300 on a whim because it was on sale and I thought the glass faceplate was cool. Also I've kind of lost count, but I have something like 8 or 9 planar IEMs now, and the one I like the most is one that I initially returned because it was too bright, and re-bought it again because (a) it looks cool and (b) was massively reduced to clear. Turns out it can sound *incredible* with some tip-rolling, although to this day I don't know if that's only in my ears or if the same tips would have the same effect for anyone else.

My favorites for PUBG so far: \- Kefine Delci Angel Ears (Delci AE) 70€ \- Tripowin Vivace 30€ \- Truthear Crinacle Zero blue 60€ \- Simgot EM6L 100€ \- QKZ x HBB 20€ (but short-lasting) What I wouldn't recommend: \- 7Hz Salnotes Zero (partrially usable) 25€ \- Moondrop Chu 20€ \- KZ Zex Pro (CRN) 30-50€ I do have the HD 560S, and I use them balanced using the 4.4mm cable and the Akliam PD4. They, like most headphones, cause "gamer hair", and that's a look I can't rock at work. That's why I mostly use IEMs. I also use the IEM-s with 4.4mm cables.

he wants a quality bass kbear rosefefinch and QKZ X HBB bass have more volume but not a good quality bass castor pro have better quality bass than those 2

i didnt say he needs to get to 100$ im just saying if for him if castor pro bass sucks the other 2 suck even more they have bass volume but not a quality bass he already complain about the bass quality of castor which is better than those 2 i would prob recommend him kz saga

I would suggest the QKZ x HBB or a sleeper pair that I use all the time… the CCZ DC02 which I got for $10 and use the most and I have over 40 pair of iems.

Mas maigi dun ka magtanong sa r/iems dun din ako nakakuha ng suggestion eh, qkz x hbb nabili ko around 600 pesos lang, lakas ng bass, perfect sa mga nilalaro ko na pang cinematic.

Gamit ko ngayon qkz x hbb around 600 pesos ko nabili. Sobrang lakas ng bass.