[necropimp]

these are what i'm looking at for use with my iRiver iFP-895 and eventually H340 or X5L

i mostly listen to rock and metal...

i'm leaning towards the er6i because of price

 

[Mr Iriver]

I listen to a lot of rock and from the canalphones I have tried I enjoy the E3c the most. I have also tried the ER6i and the ER4 and still find the E3s to be the most musically involving. The ER4 while I find amazing detail-wize, like the ER6i sounds hollowed, with the extremely little decay. The E3s also have more midbass which is also something else that makes them better for rock. By the way I use an iRiver H320, and equalized the bass, and highs in the E3 come out nicely.

 

[warpdriver]

Unlike the poster above, the ER6i is a lot more enjoyable for me, I find it has a more linear character unlike the Shure which needs a lot of equalization to fix its midrange forwardness and lack of high end.

Bottom line for me: the ER6i is a better sounding headphone than the E3 for less money. Even if the E3C was cheaper, I'd take the Ety's

 

[gcogan]

I'm gonna have to give the nod to the etys as well.
I think the shures are nice canalphones, but I don't really think you can compare the sound.

For the record, I listen to a lot of different kinds of music:
The Strokes, Amon Tobin, Paul Simon, Miles Davis, etc. and I think they all pretty much sound better with the etys.
The only time I'd recommend maybe not choosing them, is if you have a lot of music encoded at 128. In that case, the etys might not be the best idea.