NOVA

Both the hexa and pure. Neutral sounds so calm for me. I owned the Truthear Nova also. Neutral harman but still a bit bombastic for my ears. The two are perfect, and I think I won't be upgrading to this. I'm just currently looking for a good TWS and seems like the Golden Ages 2 is a good fit as it almost has the same tuning as the hexa.

I ONLY USE IEMS, and have been since 2019 KZs, Arias, Truthear Zero Blue/Red/Hexa/Nova, Simgots, Chu/Chu2, 7Hzv:Zero, Singolo and Crinacle: Dusk Currently daily driving Dusks, but the Nova comes very close. Basically nova gets slightly more congested in some very specific places(Anubis/Ancient Caves and Nuke B) with the footsteps. But other than that it is pretty similar to my ears in mid/top end. Would not recommend Hexa/Pure or any reference tuned IEM

So its not miles ahead of the supermix 4 then. I'm currently stuck in the budget-barely midfi price bracket with S12 pros, TE Nova, Ziigaat Arcadia and I can't convince myself if its evem worth going higher in price especially since I got all of these at big discounts.

Ive had TE Nova, s12 Pros, Ziigaat Arcadia. All pale in comparison to my hd560s in terms of soundstage but I think are still good enough for an iem. Still able to tell directions, space and width but imo I dont find audio gear that necessary for gaming even for competitive ones. Any decent soundstage iem or headphone is enough. I never heard the Arete before and I know freshreviews is like the gold standard for audio gear reviews catered to competetive gaming side of things so it might be a great leap but from the OG TE Zero which he said was good for gaming, didn't notice much of a difference upgrading to the Nova. Idk man, unless you REALLY want to get into high ranking comp games, I personally don't see the benefit. Actually I also ordered the Performer 7 for about the same price and can't wait to get it though I wanted it purely for music enjoyment and maybe casual gaming or media consumption. Better iems or headphones never got me better at gaming so yeah lol. Good luck on deciding tho. Sorry for the lenghty reply

Truthear x crin Zero Red, Artti t10, or GK Kunten.. I like all of them better than my Truthear Nova

I think the truthear nova is my go to iem for j-pop and female vocals

The kinera Celeste wyvern is great I personally really love the tuning and it’s consistently within my rotation among 200-300$ iems the tuning of them is similar to other iems I love like the truthear nova