So, one of the Patrons of my Youtube channel is @palinetes, who owns Audio Dream in Brazil. He makes high-end IEMs, and asked if I'd like to try his new model, the Diaboli. Consisting of a planar magnetic driver with 4 Sonion electret drivers*, they cost around US$2500.
I'm somewhat wary of trying out IEMs, as I'm not really an IEM person, and so I hoped that there was enough unique about the design to impress me. After leaving them with music playing for a few days, during which they went through periods of sounding wonky in various ways, they settled down to a warm, yet compellingly wide sound signature, which I felt was a bit thick in the mid-bass and a bit lacking in the treble. After EQ'ing up the 8kHz band a bit, I was happy. What really struck me was how spacious they sound. After listening with them for a while, favourite IEMs such as the Final A8000 sound flat and odd tonally. I'm still trying to nail down how they sound for my review of them, but so far I'm liking listening with them more so than I have IEMs in general, which is very unusual for me. Maybe imagine the Final Piano Forte series, but without the whacky tonality.
They do thrive on power though, sounding more even (with less bass) out of a FiiO K3, and very full out of an N6ii or better, including desktop amps, as they need gain to get loud -- we're talking desktop amp levels of gain. Some of it has probably to do with the unusual single-chamber "bell bore" design. The IEMs themselves a vented with two small holes as part of the tuning.
I'm posting with the web-site images at the moment. The pair I was sent is down below.
Here's the pair I was sent:
*I call them electrets, because technically they aren't electrostats.
I'm somewhat wary of trying out IEMs, as I'm not really an IEM person, and so I hoped that there was enough unique about the design to impress me. After leaving them with music playing for a few days, during which they went through periods of sounding wonky in various ways, they settled down to a warm, yet compellingly wide sound signature, which I felt was a bit thick in the mid-bass and a bit lacking in the treble. After EQ'ing up the 8kHz band a bit, I was happy. What really struck me was how spacious they sound. After listening with them for a while, favourite IEMs such as the Final A8000 sound flat and odd tonally. I'm still trying to nail down how they sound for my review of them, but so far I'm liking listening with them more so than I have IEMs in general, which is very unusual for me. Maybe imagine the Final Piano Forte series, but without the whacky tonality.
They do thrive on power though, sounding more even (with less bass) out of a FiiO K3, and very full out of an N6ii or better, including desktop amps, as they need gain to get loud -- we're talking desktop amp levels of gain. Some of it has probably to do with the unusual single-chamber "bell bore" design. The IEMs themselves a vented with two small holes as part of the tuning.
I'm posting with the web-site images at the moment. The pair I was sent is down below.
Here's the pair I was sent:
*I call them electrets, because technically they aren't electrostats.
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